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A new writing competition to find the “next big thing” in children’s literature has being launched by the National Literacy Trust in partnership with Bloomsbury. The New Children’s Author Prize is set to unearth brilliant new talent in writing for children. Unpublished authors who enter the competition will be in with the chance of winning a publishing contract with Bloomsbury, publisher behind the Harry Potter series. The first prize will also...

Brendan phoned me last night. I’ve known him longer than Laughing Boy had hair. ‘It’s me,’ he said. ‘Brendan.’ Neither of us use our mobile phones much. I don’t know where mine is (it’s just beeped somewhere behind me, because it’s out of charge, and that gives me a clue). So we’ve got to explain who we are when we phone. We did the usual how’s it gaun? flung back and forth between us, until he got down to why he was phoning. ‘I’ve got £20 for...

The third and final of our authors has now gone up on Unbound as we strive to gain funding for their books. Laurie Avadis has been a great supporter of ABCtales and his novel, 'Ex', was written on the site. It's a splendid tale of a 32 stone policeman who is determined to murder his son! See the video, read and extract and support him if you wish here: http://unbound.co.uk/books/ex Do take a look at our other two authors and support them too if...

I was out at the pub watching a Champions League match. (I won’t be saying that for a while.) Punters were crowding round the bar and the barmaid was looking through me as if I was made of glass. I bumped into Tam-who-will-remain nameless. ‘You’ll never believe it,’ he said. ‘Somebody’s put a video of somebody that looks like you up selling something?’ ‘What is it?’ I said. ‘Dunno,’ he said. ‘But it’s really funny.’ Neither of us laughed. ‘You...

What you see is what you don’t get is a wysiwyg clause I rarely use in normal conversation. I was out last night to meet my adoring public. It was Saturday night and it was the Drop Inn so you can guarantee a crowd of at least four people and Wullie Dalziel. There’s a rule that nobody can kiss at the bar, unless it’s Brian Thompson, and he’s had a bit much and he hears some song on the Jukebox and wants to do his wee Indian dance and wants to...

http://unbound.co.uk/books/lily-poole I used to think that writers were two exotic beasts joined by a furrowed brow -- the person that writes and the person that edits. The taxonomy has changed. Upon closer examination I recognised a third diablo poking out between the bones of the writer, clinging to the person and their reality and claiming to be an independent personality, the writer’s real self and willing to sell their souls for the quick...

The second of our books on Unbound is now available to support. Ewan's Gibbous House is described as 'Victorian Psycho'. It owes a lot to Edgar Allen Poe, Dickens and a host of other great writers - but Ewan's knowledge and skill takes the genre on to new places. It is vital to the development of ABCtales that these books get your support. If we are successful with these two, and one more yet to come, then we will be in a position to get many of...

Great to see Harry back - and on fine form with this one: http://www.abctales.com/story/harry-buschman/man-i-was-0 and from elsie katz, one of her finest ever: http://www.abctales.com/story/elsie-katz/journal-wanton-wanting I forgot the Inspiration Point last week so here's a format from way back when. Just use these two phrases in your story or poem. They can be integral to the piece or purely incidental: the black boots looked fine smiling...

James Leslie Mtichell took the pseudonym of Lewis Grassic Gibbon and was author of the classic A Scots Quair, the best known (and best liked) being Sunset Song . I can't say I know a lot about the man. He died young, in his early thirties in the 1930s. He was a Socialist that lived in Aberdeen and like his heroine Chris Guthrie had a strong link with the Cloud of the Howe land and a calling to be educated with a love of books and learning...

Well, I've plastered it all over Facebook and Twitter and pestered friends by e-mail. What's left? A heads-up to any ABCTalers who still remember me? Or a message in a bottle? These may be the same thing. ABC's next joint venture with Unbound is a historical novel with a difference. A strombolian mash-up of gothic tropes and a sardonic, if not always entirely self aware narrator. By the way, he murders people - and we're not really sure who he...