The winner of our New Novelist of the Year competition is already an established playwright. Now he's hoping - with the help of agent Caroline Sheldon - to see his debut novel in print one day. Lindsay Jennings reports.

THE Northern Echo's New Novelist of the Year competition attracted more than 120 entries, from children's fiction to gothic literature.

But it was the historical spy novel, White Magick, which our judges felt had huge potential to gain publication.

All of the judges - agent Caroline Sheldon, author Wendy Robertson, Northern Echo columnist Sharon Griffiths and Features Editor Lindsay Jennings - praised the novel for its atmospheric writing.

"I was really excited to read White Magick,"

said Caroline. "The author writes beautifully and has the rare ability to evoke place and time.

Also the subject matter is fabulous, being a historical spy story set in 16th Century England."

"We also liked the way it was an historical novel with modern relevance," added Sharon Griffiths.

Bishop Auckland-based author Wendy Robertson said the winner had great potential. "There is great assurance in the writing and a clear ability to create atmosphere and write in a modern way about times past.

"It also hits the market in being a quest novel with all kinds of esoteric bits of information being addressed.

With Caroline's guidance - particularly with character establishment and development - it could be an important novel. Fingers crossed for next year."

Wendy said she was impressed with the writing of all of the 16 finalists in the competition, which was sponsored by the University of Teesside. But she expressed surprise at the number of historical novels as entries and said she would have liked to have seen a wider selection of comic and contemporary novels.

"I do think it important that aspiring writers should read novels that are out there now, what works as good writing in terms of syntax and style," she said.

"Present day life is complex and fascinating. There are a thousand stories out there."

Lindsay Jennings felt the high standard of entries reflected the amount of talent which was in the North-East and North Yorkshire.

"It is talent which doesn't always get the attention it deserves," she said. "I hope The New Novelist of the Year competition has given would-be authors the opportunity to show what they can do."

Winning writer Tony Glover will now spend the coming months working with Caroline with the aim of securing a publishing contract in the future.

I T has been 24 hours since we rang with the news. Tony Glover was somewhat speechless when he heard he had been named the winner of The Northern Echo's New Novelist of the Year Competition.

Today, he admits, it has finally sunk in.

"I've stopped shaking now," he laughs.

"It was wonderful news, I really didn't expect to win at all. It's absolutely fantastic."

Tony, 54, impressed all of the judges with the quality of his writing and the intriguing plot of White Magick, his historical spy novel set in 1583.

The story centres on Richard Brock, a young musician, who is sprung from the Clink in Southwark, by Sir Thomas Phelippes, codebreaker to Sir Francis Walsingham.

Amid all the spying and intrigue, involving secret negotiations with James of Scotland over the English succession, Brock becomes embroiled in attempt to steal the codebreaking book of Dr John Dee, an occultist and cypher expert who introduced cryptography into the spy network.

Tony, of Forest Hall, Newcastle, studied the era as part of his English, history and politics degree at Newcastle University.

"It's always been a period which fascinates me but also I think there are a lot of parallels with what's going on today.

This morning there was someone on the radio from the MOD (Ministry of Defence) saying how they were using psychics to try and find Osama bin Laden and Dr Dee was doing exactly the same thing. We live in very paranoid times, as they did, with plots, bombings and betrayal.

They couldn't trust anyone.

"But it's also about the way a nice person, Brock, is forced into doing something that he doesn't want to and how he's torn between personal loyalty to people and what he feels he must do."

Born in Ponteland, Northumberland, Tony runs his own video production company. Prior to that he taught English and history in Castington Young Offenders' Institution in Morpeth and was a lecturer at Sunderland University, teaching video production, for seven years. He lives with his wife, Stevie, and the couple have two children Rose, 21, and Ruby 15.

Tony has always enjoyed writing in his spare time but until now, his main experience has been in radio and short films.

He was named BBC North Playwright of the Year in 1997; won a Royal Television Society Award in 1992 for film Posh Monkeys and in 1998 was given a Sony Radio Award for his play, Just A Trim.

Recent work includes Year Of The Tiger, filmed by Wildcat Films for Yorkshire Tyne Tees; What We Did In the War, a book about the wartime memories of the people of Darlington; and I Want My Baby, devised and produced with young people from Greenfield Arts Centre in Newton Aycliffe.

"The Sony award was great but winning this competition is a fantastic achievement because it was just so unexpected and I've never written in the genre before," he says.

Tony's favourite authors include Ian Rankin, James Lee Burke and historical espionage novelist Alan Furst.

But he recognises it may be a while before he sees his work in print. His prize will involve working with successful agent Caroline Sheldon over the coming months with the aim of securing a book deal. But he's prepared to wait - and to put in the effort.

"There is still a long way to go," he says. "It really needs a lot more work and I would like to cook it for a bit longer. I want to make it as authentic as possible and there is still research to do.

"But all credit to The Northern Echo for running this competition. It's fantastic that it's given someone from the North-East the opportunity to be published."