Reward for top student scribes | Hawkes Bay News | Local News in Hawkes Bay

Two young writers from Karamu High School have been named in the top seven in one of New Zealand's most prestigious competitions for young writers.

Beth Rust, 17, and Madeleine Ross, 14, were both pleasantly surprised to be shortlisted for the secondary school's division of this year's BNZ Literary Awards.

Their short stories earned high praise from judge and New Zealand author Penelope Todd, and earmarked them as talent on the rise.

Both girls had tasted earlier success in other short story and poetry competitions, but as Beth said: "This is probably the biggest success so far."

The teenagers were part of Karamu High School's extension writing programme - a creative writing group run by the school's writer in residence, and Madeleine's mother, Anna Mackenzie.

Beth began writing seriously as a 13-year-old. She said she wrote mostly for herself but hoped to become a professional.

"It would be nice if I can make a living out of it, but if I can't, I'll do it anyway," she said.

Her short story Catch Smoke depicted the characters a girl meets during an afternoon walk around a semi-deserted town.

Ms Todd said the story was "an experiment that paid off" with its sparing use of punctuation and the absence of capital letters. She commented: "The character sketches are deft and the conversations quirkily authentic".

Ms Todd described Madeleine's story Now and Then as "beautifully crafted". She praised the smooth handling of the first person narration of an elderly man with Alzheimer's Disease, and noted the deliberate treatment of dialogue created a reading experience that echoed the character's movement.

A second short story of Madeleine's "very nearly" also made the shortlist.

Madeleine, who had no ambition to be a professional writer, had the benefit of drawing on her mother for "a few hints and pointers".

Ms Mackenzie said the two writers' success was "absolutely amazing", especially in such a highly-regarded competition.

Ms Mackenzie praised the school's English department and former schoolmate Brittany Rorrison who was the overall secondary school winner in last year's competition. "Brittany's just made this a really achievable goal," she said.