Congratulations to debut writer Jenny Valentine who won the Guardian Children's Fiction Award this week. The story Finding Violet Park was triggered by an urn of ashes left in a minicab office. Julia Eccleshare writes, 'It was the clarity of style and the freshness of Valentine's hero, Lucas - a 17-year-old who discovers the eponymous Violet's ashes abandoned in a funeral urn in a cab office - that impressed the Guardian judges.'

Synopsis: Sixteen-year-old Lucas Swain becomes intrigued by the urn of ashes left in a cab office. Convinced that its occupant -- Violet Park -- is communicating with him, he contrives to gain possession of the urn, little realising that his quest will take him on a voyage of self-discovery and identity, forcing him to finally confront what happened to his absent (and possibly dead) father!

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Read an interview in The Guardian