ASPIRING young writers in West Devon are being encouraged to enter an exciting story competition, which will be judged by acclaimed writers.

The Arvon Totleigh Barton Short Story Competition is a 500 word writing competition set up to celebrate the creativity of young writers in the Devon region.

If you are aged seven to 18 and attend a state school in Devon, then you are eligible to enter.

Stories will be judged by acclaimed writers Michael Morpurgo, Emma Carroll and Yemisi Turner-Blake and the winners and runners-up will win prizes for themselves and their schools.

Winners will be invited to read their work aloud at the Hatherleigh Festival in July 2017. The competition was launched at Hatherleigh Primary School back in March with author Adam Marek.

The competition is free to enter and there is no set theme, only a word count of a maximum of 500 words.

The contest closes on May 26 and the winners will be announced at the Hatherleigh Festival on Saturday, July 22.

The competition is split into three age groups: seven to ten years; 11 to 14 years and 15 to 18 years.

The short stories should not exceed 500 words in length and must be entirely fictional. There will be a winner and a runner-up in each age group to be awarded book tokens, and a visit from an Arvon writing tutor to the winners’ schools.

All winning entries will also be published on the Arvon website.

To enter, visit www.arvon.org/schools andgroups/competition