Would be authors and writers are being offered the opportunity to work with the celebrated and much-admired historical novelist Rosemary Aitken at a creative writing workshop this Friday.

Rosemary will be running a creative writing workshop for budding writers, to celebrate the 'Sense of Place' competition and help inspire entrants in the Millennium Hall, Portreath from 10am to 4pm, with an hour for lunch.

Rosemary's writing workshop will have a practical slant, and take the form of short input sessions, followed in each case by an opportunity for personal writing. The sessions will concentrate on creating setting - probably local - and work on creating character and theme from there as appropriate.

Rosemary, author of eight historical novels based in Cornwall at the turn of the 20th century, also writes as Rosemary Rowe, under which name she has published nine historical detective stories set in Roman Britain, and has had numerous short stories anthologised. Rosemary has also written short stories for woman's magazines as Brenda Lacey, Betsy Reynolds, and in other genres as I.M. Roberts and Francis Campion. Rosemary's grandfather was killed in the Levant mine disaster and she is particularly interested in social history, and Cornish economic history.

Rosemary has had many years experience in tutoring adults. She ran the Quiller postal writing course for 15 years, has been a regular tutor on fiction workshops for various bodies, including the Wye Valley Arts Centre, has run short story and non-fiction workshops, and is the author of 'Writing a Novel: A practical Guide', a hand-book published by the Crowood Press.

On Saturday also at the Millennium Hall in Portreath, local artists are invited to bring their work along to show and inspire others at three free workshops led by Portreath Artist Peter Skinner.

The workshops are directed at different age ranges and levels of ability, from young children and families in the morning to a workshop challenging enough for the most seasoned artist in the afternoon. Budding artists may take their own photographs or other materials to work from or be inspired by resources provided by Peter.

Advance booking is essential for all workshops on 01872 323468 (week days 9am-5pm). Under 16s should be accompanied by a parent/guardian.

Full details of and entry forms for the Sense of Place art, writing and photography competition are downloadable from link below.