Meet our 2024 E.J.Corbett Mentorship winner!
Congratulations to David Shield for winning the 2024 Elizabeth Jane Corbett Mentorship contest!
HNSA is delighted to announce the winner of the 2024 Elizabeth Jane Corbett Mentorship contest is David Shield with his manuscript, Blind Dragon. Congratulations, David!
David wins a mentorship with Dr Wendy J Dunn, author and Swinburne University tutor, to receive 5 mentoring sessions.
Wendy will read and assess the novel in its entirety, discuss David’s inspiration and goals, and identify any ‘roadblocks’. She will also provide in-depth feedback on plot, characterisation, pacing, dialogue, world building and effective use of research, and ultimately will proofread the manuscript and provide comments on the way forward.
About Blind Dragon
In 1630’s Japan, Tsukiyo a young up and coming painter in Kyoto is blinded in a freak accident, ending his career before it can even get started. With his art lost to him and with no other option he joins the blind guild of musicians. But music is not always a safe profession as Tsukiyo soon finds himself embroiled in the intrigue of the imperial court. A place where one sightless musician might be all that stands between order and another century of civil war.
About David Shields
David is a Japanese-English conference interpreter, award winning translator, professional koto musician, kimono maker and all around Japan nut. He lived and worked in Japan for over a decade and still spends several months every year there continuing his studies into Japanese culture. David also writes middle grade fantasy and sci-fi novels and has previously shortlisted for those in the Publishable contest and several of his short stores appear have been published in magazines and anthologies. Blind Dragon is his first ever historical fiction.
David currently sits on the management committee of the Queensland Writers Centre and is President of the Australia Japan Society Queensland. In between having too many hobbies he enjoys quiet cups of tea and Japanese hot springs.
Our judge, Rachel Nightingale says:
It has been a joy and a privilege to read the entries for the EJ Corbett Mentorship. I was transported through time, from Ancient Rome to Tudor England, from 12th Century Germany to the Pleistocene era. Tales based in Australia explored key issues like the impact of colonisation, the mistreatment of women, and even true crime. I was absorbed in incredibly realistic depictions of life, whirled into the past with time shift novels, and taken to fantastical worlds that nevertheless held history at their heart. Each author brought an intriguing idea to their pages and I often found myself wishing that the entries could be longer so I could enjoy more of the story.
Ultimately the job of a judge is to decide on a story that stands out from the rest. I was seeking a project that vividly brought to life the era in which it was set due to outstanding research. The winner, Blind Dragon, by David Ijyushin Shield, offers a fascinating, original story of intrigue and transformation. In 1630s Edo era Japan, Tsukiyo’s dreams of being a painter are crushed when he is blinded in an accident. Instead, he is taken in by a blind musician and steps onto a new life path, one that will ultimately take him to the court of the Empress. The attention to historical detail in Blind Dragon is outstanding, whilst the writing reveals the inner life of Tsukiyo, painting the world vividly through his remaining senses, and sings with a poetry that illustrates the theme of creativity as the heart of life and human expression.
A few questions for David on writing Blind Dragon.
What attracts you to Young Adult fiction?
I love the endless possibilities that exists within Y.A. It’s an area with few preconceptions and fixed tropes so as an writer it’s a very freeing place to work in where you can blend a lot of techniques form different genres. I was very fond of R.A Salvatore’s The Sword of Bedwyr when I was a teenage and still adore that ‘finding your place in the world and let your greatness shine’ narrative that is often found in Y.A which is another reason I like writing around this area. Y.A I think is a gateway for a lot people to find a new direction at a time in their lives when it’s easy to get lost, a theme I think that we are seeing become very popular in the market generally as more adults are being attracted to Y.A novels because being lost in life isn’t limited to being a teenager.
What do you hope to achieve through completing the mentorship?
This is my first ever historical fiction novel so I’m really hoping to get some specific advice on where and how to polish and tighten my manuscript up. Courses and books on writing are great but that sort of advice is always non-specific to any given work, so having Wendy, who works in the genre all the time, to work with me I think will be a game changer in getting Blind Dragon over the line and giving it that final polish to really make it shine.
Why do you love the period in which your book is set
Early Edo period Japan is much neglected even by Japanese scholars in favour of the more battle heavy Sengoku period (1467-1603) or the rapid change and industrialisation of the Meiji period(1868-1912). Early Edo is more about the social structures and traditions that were put in place that kept the Edo peaceful 300 years. But that doesn’t mean it’s without its conflicts, it’s just that the conflicts of the Edo period are more secretive and clandestine rather than open warfare. The Edo period generally was much like the renaissance was for Europe. A time of brilliant progression and the advancement of the arts but also filled with political intrigue, skullduggery and the odd assassination. It’s the period where what we think of as the classical Japanese arts were really born an honed into the beauty we know today.
The EJ Corbett Mentorship Contest for Young Adult Historical Fiction is run biennially. The next contest will be in November 2026. For more details visit our contest page.