Book prize going up for grabs

THE Dundee International Book Prize competition has opened for unpublished authors to stake a claim for £5,000 and a publishing deal with Freight Books.

The submissions process for the 2017 award opened today.

Writers with a spellbinding, unpublished novel will have until midnight on Monday March 13 to enter t he competition, which attracts hundreds of entries every year and also offers a week of protected writing time in Dundee.

A shortlist will then be drawn up and a judging panel will debate the merits of the finalists before the winner is announced at the Dundee Literary Festival in October.

The competition i s a joint venture between the “Dundee — One City, Many Discoveries’”campaign and Literary Dundee, with the aim to bring the very best writers in the world to the city. Peggy Hughes of Literary Dundee said: “Reading new, unpublished fiction by authors from all over the world is a privilege and I can’t wait to see what people send us.”

The Scottish Fire and Rescue Service attended the incident in the car park of the Nine Maidens pub on Laird Street, St Mary’s, just before 8am.

They found a white Audi A9 to be “well alight”.

The blaze is thought to have started in the engine compartment.

Police were also in attendance, although it is not known whether or not the blaze was started deliberately.

A spokeswoman for the Scottish Fire and Rescue Service said: “We attended a vehicle fire at 7.51am.

“One pump from Macalpine Road was sent to a car on fire in Laird Street.

“The vehicle was in the car park of the Nine Maidens pub.

“It was well alight when the crew arrived and two hose reel jets were required to tackle the flames which have now been extinguished.

“Cutting equipment was used to reach the engine.

“We don’t know if the fire was started deliberately but police were in attendance to investigate.”

Philip Ingram, 61, who lives a couple of streets away from the car park, said he heard a huge explosion at about 7.30am.

He said: “It was a loud explosion and I thought there had been a car crash or something.

“When I went outside there was a fire engine in attendance as well as police.

“It must have been about 7.30am when I heard the explosion. “Maybe it was a fault in the car. “The car park is always full on a Sunday as people leave their cars overnight after drinking in the pub the night before.”

EMERGENCY services were called to a car fire near a Dundee pub today.