First Chapters Competition Overall Winner Announced and Category Winners Recognised
At the HNS UK 2024 conference at Dartington on 7 September, competition judge Kate Quinn awarded gold medal category winner certificates to the nine category winners and announced the overall winner, Lenore Hart. You can read an extract from Lenore’s winning entry and an interview with her here.
Read more on the category winners and their entries.
Photos by Isabella Jones.
Entries for the HNS UK 2024 First Chapters Competition closed on 15 February 2024 and the overall winner was announced on 7 September 2024.
The competition was for the first three chapters of a full-length historical novel that had not been previously published in any form. We were looking to recognise and promote excellence in storytelling and the craft of historical fiction. The overall winner was announced at the the HNS UK 2024 conference.
The competition categories were:
Historical Fiction Ancient to 16th century
Historical Fiction 17th century to 19th century
Historical Fiction 20th century
Historical Romance
Historical Crime
Biographical Historical Fiction
Historical Adventure
Historical Fantasy, Timeslip, Alternate History
Children’s & Young Adult Historical Fiction
There were over 400 entries in the competition, many great stories, and many hard decisions to make.
Competition Prizes
The Overall Winner received £1,000 and the competition trophy.
The nine Category Winners each received £500 and an HNS UK 2024 conference ticket. They were recognised with Category Winner Certificates at the Gala Dinner at the HNS UK 2024 conference on 7 September 2024.
The competition was judged in a series of three rounds.
First Round Assessment
The First Round judging produced the Category Shortlists. The assessors were book reviewers for Historical Novels Review magazine.
Read more about the First Round assessors.
HNS 2024 First Chapters Competition Category Runners-Up
Second Round Assessment
The Second Round judging produced the Category winners. The assessors were book review editors for Historical Novels Review magazine.
Read more about the Second Round assessors.
Judges for the Overall Winner
The judges for the overall winner were agent and publisher, Lisa Highton; author and publisher, Jane Johnson; and author, Kate Quinn.
Read more about the judges for the overall winner.
Competition Timeline
15 Feb 2024 2024 Competition closed 23.59 GMT
6 May 2024 The Category Short Lists were announced.
10 June 2024 The Category Winners and the Overall Short List were announced.
7 Sept 2024 The overall judges presented prizes to the Category Winners and announced the Overall Winner at the HNS UK 2024 Conference Gala Dinner.
The Historical Novel Society UK 2024 conference 