The shortlist for what’s now going to be the final First Novel Competition (see this entry for the ridiculous reasons why) has been announced over at Susan Hill’s blog.

I’m not amongst the shortlistees, but I’m sure that’s because their stuff was better than mine. Still, no harm in entering – ‘if you don’t ask the answer’s always going to be no’ and all that.

I like to think I’m being reasoned and stable about this – then again, I take comfort in the words Sir Arthur Conan Doyle wrote in ‘The Valley of Fear’: “Mediocrity knows nothing higher than itself, but talent instantly recognizes genius”

And let’s face it, he was a man who knew what he was talking about when it came to talent.