An author from Harpenden has been longlisted for a prestigious award.

Kitty Edwards from Harpenden is one of just 20 authors selected for this year’s longlist in the Bridport Prize Peggy Chapman-Andrews Award for a First Novel.

Her novel, The Alchemy of Botany, was selected from almost 1,100 entries, and an extract has been published in the anthology collection.

Kitty Edwards grew up in Manchester, the daughter of a botanist and a South African Indian immigrant. She studied law at Oxford and practised in London for several years. She now lives in Hertfordshire with her husband, two young daughters and a cat. Outside writing, her hobbies include cycling, gardening and supporting SEN children. The Alchemy of Botany is her first novel.

The Bridport Prize is one of the most prestigious open writing competitions in the English language with categories in poetry, short stories, flash fiction and first novels.

The Novel Longlist anthology is available from www.bridportprize.org.uk