On Wednesday evening, Hannah was announced overall winner by judge Victor Rodger at the awards ceremony held in the Katherine Mansfield Reading Room at the National Library.

There were 11 finalists overall, and Hannah's winning story 'Henry and Eliza' was said to display maturity in both content and voice. Rodger also said that he enjoyed the way Hannah's story confounded expectations. You can read her story here along with the other finalists.

The Katherine Mansfield Short Story Competition invites entries from Year 12 and 13 students in the Wellington Region. The award is a $500 cash prize made possible by a generous bequest from Gay Saker, a long-time Wellington English teacher. Each year, we encourage our senior students to submit their work, and last year, Hannah was also selected as a finalist and was a runner up.

Hannah has been a prolific writer throughout her teenage years, often submitting her poetry and prose for competitions and has had much success with this over the years. Hannah's Class 12 Project this year reflected her love of literature and writing, as for her practical component, she completed a course in creative writing at Massey University alongside her research component, which required many hours of reading and writing to complete an evaluation of feminist literature, resulting in an impressive bound research document.

Next year, Hannah is heading off to Otago University to do her first year in Health Sciences, and while she is keen to pursue a career in medicine, she has promised to keep up her creative writing as it is one of her favourite ways to unwind.

Congratulations again, Hannah, we look forward to seeing more of your published work in the future.