Young Australian Author

Melbourne schoolboy Alex Lewis, 15, took his father's advice about the story he was working on ("a piece of crap"), ditched it and started on "Zero Summer", a reflection of the internal emotions and motives of adolescents during a trip to the beach. That work has now won Lewis first prize in the Somerset College National Novella writing competition for secondary students. Given that the competition is open to all students under the age of 19 he has done particularly well. The $3,000 first prize isn't too foul either.