Author Alison Fisher has worked in an Easter egg factory, in air traffic control centre and as an EastEnders scriptwriter. Now she has turned her attention to creative writing - and successfully.

Ms Fisher, who is in her 50s, has won the Bridport Prize, an international short-story competition. Brighton-based Ms Fisher picked up the honour for The Woodcutter's Wife, a fairytale about a girl, who comes from the sea and has to go and live in a forest.

Aimed at adults, the story received excellent feedback from novelist Zoë Heller, one of the judges. Ms Fisher spent more than 20 years as a television script writer. She tells People: "My work on EastEnders seemed to come to an end and I had been working on this story, so I sent it off. I never expected to win."

Her story has since been published in the Bridport Prize Anthology.