The BBC recently commissioned the Roscrea-based writer Mary Arrigan to write the opening paragraph for its web event for children, "What's your story?"
The project is aimed at children aged between eight and 12 who take the author's beginning and complete the story online. At the end of each month a winner is chosen and published on the website.
Ms Arrigan from Monaincha, Roscrea, recently had her latest teenage novel, Baldur's Bones, described as a "scary adventure", published by HarperCollins.
The response to Ms Arrigan's opening paragraph was "fantastic, with a terrific number of entries submitted", said a spokesman for the BBC website yesterday.
The results of the online competition are due to be announced this month.
The former art teacher, whose training was as a sculptor at the National College of Art and Design, began writing seriously after winning the Sunday Times/CWA Short Story Award in 1991. In 1994, she gave up her teacher's job to pursue her writing career. Since then, she has written 22 books, eight of which she illustrated herself.
She was awarded the Hennessy Literary Award in 1993 and was shortlisted for the Bisto Award in 1994. She won the International Youth Library (Munich) White Ravens title in Germany in 1996.
She writes two or three books every year. The secret of her writing success, she says, is not to be condescending or "talk down" to children.
"What's your story?" can be viewed at: www.bbc.co.uk/cbbc/write/