The Dundee International Book Prize has established itself as the UK's premier prize for emerging novelists. Its £10,000 cash award together with publication by Birlinn Ltd, publishers of the Polygon imprint, make The Dundee International Book Prize highly valued by tomorrow's great new writers seeking to break into the publishing world. The award, now running for the fifth time, is for an unpublished novel on any theme and in any genre.

Dundee is a city which embraces writers - A.L.Kennedy, born and bred in the city, Douglas Dunn, Kate Atkinson, John Burnside, Bill Duncan and Rosamunde Pilcher are amongst the "glitterati" who have drawn on the City of Discovery for their inspiration over the last two decades.

The first four Dundee Book Prize winning novels have all gone on to have success. The authors have also gone on to produce further works of fiction and non-fiction. Andrew Murray Scott's book Tumulus detailed bohemian Dundee through the 60s and 70s to the present day. The winning novel in 2002, Claire-Marie Watson's The Curewife drew on the tale of Dundee's last execution of a witch - Grissel Jaffray in 1669 and the winner in 2005 was Malcolm Archibald's adventure on a whaling ship Whales for a Wizard. 2007 saw French resident Fiona Dunscombe scoop the accolade with her gritty, dark and full of life novel The Triple Point of Water .

It is said that everyone has a book inside them - now is your chance to write it!

The Dundee International Book Prize is a joint venture between the City of Discovery Campaign, the University of Dundee and Birlinn Ltd, publishers of the Polygon imprint.