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Writing contest # 14 - Entries
Dear moderator, please may we have a poll?Many thanks, your humble servant, Ignite.
(See, I can be creepier than Jud!)
EwwwwwwwThat was really creepy!
Give me a few minutes. I'll sort the poll now.
Patti (Fluffy) wrote: "EwwwwwwwThat was really creepy!"
Glad to be of service!
Here's the poll.Could you please check I've got it all correct?
https://www.goodreads.com/poll/show/8...
I've set the end date for May 29th. Is that right?
I suggested just a week (22nd) and then a week for the winner to choose the next theme. It goes on forever else, and we lose the momentum. What do you think?Edit - they're all there. :)
Oh right. I'll change it now. I hope.
Whew. I found the edit button.
I've voted on behalf of the scouse jury. I doubt TonyQ will manage to get a vote in. Which reminds me: I shall ring him and see how he's getting on.
Should I shift this thread to the top of the group?
Patti (Fluffy) wrote: "Should I shift this thread to the top of the group?"Like only you can, P!
Whoa, great standard of entry. I don't stand a chance!
I think they're all worthy, Holly. Different tastes should result in a spread of votes.
David wrote: "I think they're all worthy, Holly. Different tastes should result in a spread of votes."You're too kind!
The main motivation for me anyway is experience (I've only just started putting pen to paper), and a wider readership.
Good for you, just enjoy the process :~)
They're great fun, Holly (as the sadist once said to Santa Claus) I really enjoy being taken out of my reader-zone for a while each month: getting votes is just a bonus :-)
Mago (Mark) wrote: "Patti (Fluffy) wrote: "Should I shift this thread to the top of the group?"Like only you can, P!"
Yeah, but then you know someone will complain that they can't find it.
Well done everyone, a cracking selection. Have voted.
I wholeheartedly agree Mark. Like Ignite so aptly put it, much better brain stretch than sudoku!
I thought it was fascinating how differently people had interpreted the brief. But also I felt that the juxtaposition of some of the stories was in itself amusing
Again, I've read them, I dunno, four times?Can't decide.
I'm intrigued as to whether it's writers who write stories about writers and writing, or non-writers who do so. Happened with the last comp too.
Marc wrote: "I'm intrigued as to whether it's writers who write stories about writers and writing, or non-writers who do so. Happened with the last comp too."You mean you want to find out if they're up their own arse or someone elses ... mmm ... interesting ;-0
I've voted.And I can say we've got a tie for first place at the moment.
I juxtaposed them accidentally while I was trying to ensure they didn't go there in the order I got them - so no-one could guess which was which.I thought of doing something about bicycle wheels!
Patti (Ogre for Hire) wrote: "I've voted.And I can say we've got a tie for first place at the moment."
Oh the tension! How can I wait a whole week!?!
Ignite wrote: "I juxtaposed them accidentally while I was trying to ensure they didn't go there in the order I got them - so no-one could guess which was which.I thought of doing something about bicycle wheels!"
rebellion not revolution! :-)
Does anyone remember the Leprechaun Rebellion of 1765
Gingerlily (or Cyberlily..) wrote: "Does anyone remember the Leprechaun Rebellion of 1765"What that? About 5 past 6?
"rebellion not revolution! :-) "See, good job I didn't enter! ;)
David wrote: "24 hour clock, GL ;~)"but its still wrong. And that wasn't what I meant anyway.. I'm confussed.
More votes in but still a tie.
Patti are you seeing more votes in do you think with the thread in general forum rather than writing competitions?
Dunno Marc.I think it helps when it's mentioned in other threads.
Reminds more people to look at it.
We have several more voters than entries now. Yay!
Voted! Very nearly forgot about it since I changed my notification preferences.
So Emma cast the deciding vote. The tension :~/
Does that mean I know which one is winning...
Voted! I was really torn between 2 of the entries.
Oh.Different one in the lead now!
Almost three years I’d waited. I just happened upon a clip on YouTube: The Rebels playing their song “Rebellion” from an actual garage nonetheless!
“Such potential” I thought “Such originality”. Well apart from the spotted hanky bandanas but you can’t account for all tastes.
I was heading towards “The Cavern” in Mathew Street, actually not the one of Beatles fame (that used to be across the road, apparently) not that it mattered to me The Rebels were going to be bigger than the Stones and Beatles put together and to think I was virtually there at their conception. Slightly overpriced ticket in hand I hastened into the not so cavernous club.
I’d not been there before but I did expect the place to be a little less crowded on a Wednesday evening: a student drinks promotion night, maybe. I squeezed my way to the bar. Whatever promotion was my pint of Bitter wasn’t part of it!
From where I was standing I could just about see the stage. A sudden hush descended; I stood tiptoe on the bar rail to get a better view. The first chords of “Rebellion” hammered out; an ear-splitting roar from the crowd; on cue, hundreds of spotted bandanas were donned and the first verse shouted from every mouth.
“Bugger this!” I said and went home.
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The Turn of the Worm
“The open packets go in the red tin, not the blue one! And you shouldn't be eating them anyway, you know what the doctor said. Think of your arteries, dear.”
Arnold stood in the kitchen, listening his good lady wife, as usual. “And for goodness sake use the nice cups, not that dreadful old mug. What would people think if they saw it - I just don't know!”
The tirade was, as usual, accompanied by the occasional sad shaking of the head and punctuated by the odd well-formed tut.
“Don't sit in the lounge, my bridge ladies will be here any minute. You can watch the little TV in the den if you must, but keep the volume down. We really need to concentrate you know!”
Arnold knew from previous experience that the Bridge Ladies' concentration was apt to be rather strident and considerably louder than the television, but wisely he refrained from pointing this out.
“Don't worry dear, you won't know I'm here,” he said, and shuffled away to the den.
Arnold sat down, carefully holding his mug in front of him, and sighed contentedly. Stirring precisely and delicately, he smiled to himself. “Heheheh, three sugars...”
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Brawn
For all his brains, Charles had no brawn. This he knew all too well. His wit and charm such an ill fitting tool against such spectacular brute force.
He stared through the gates at the hellish mass that had gathered, and prayed his end be swift. He would not plead for mercy, for he knew he would receive none.
‘How long do you really think you can hold us off?’ a man through the gate spat at him. ‘How long before we storm your ill gotten castle?’
Charles tried to remain resolute in the face of such brutality, but knew the slight quiver in his voice betrayed him. ‘I don’t claim to be able to hold you off much longer, so I just ask this, why on earth are you here? What do you want?’.
The man beyond the gate began to laugh. He turned to his henchmen, beating them quiet with his hand. He turned back to face Charles and said sombrely, ‘You do not know?’ Charles shook his head earnestly in reply.
The man looked him over once again and said, ‘That’s for me to know, and this rebellion of men to show you’. And with that his men stormed forward.
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A Joke too far:
“Stop flicking that glint in my eye,” she said, with a stare.
“It’s the magnifier,” he claimed, “catching the glare
from the sun, at the window, at the back of me here.
I need the light to see, so I have to sit near.”
“Well hold it still, my dear, so the light doesn’t dance.”
And she chanced a look, and caught his quick glance
as he smirked, lifted his lens to capture the light,
and sent it toward her, so blindingly bright.
“That joke’s gone too far,” she said with disdain,
as she thought on her marriage, fifty years full of pain.
And she thought of his tricks, and all he had done,
which she took to be torture, but he thought was fun.
So she stood in a fume, snatched the lens from his hand,
went into the kitchen and ground it to sand.
Then for tea she made mash and put in the powder,
An act of rebellion, she laughed last, and laughed louder.
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
A Matter of Pride
The king was getting annoyed, but she had to try again.
“Please, Sire – you have to set an example.”
“I am King. I do not have to do anything I don’t want to. It’s the only good thing about being King.”
“Sire, you know that isn’t true. Sometimes you have to fight. You don’t want to, but you do.” She eased closer, checked that no-one could hear, and purred softly into his ear, “And I’m sure Your Majesty can think of other good things about being King.”
He tossed his head and growled, “Fighting is a matter of pride.”
“Look, Sire. Your people are watching you. They dare not start before you, but some are desperate.”
He looked around. She was right. Although none would meet his eye, they shuffled closer.
“I don’t care. I’ve told you what I want – cold crisp salads, nuts and fresh, juicy fruit.”
With a sweep of his tail he indicated the fly-covered, still twitching, disembowelled wildebeest sprawled in the hot sand. “I’m not eating that anymore.”
“But what shall I tell the pride?” she asked, doubtfully.
“That they can eat and that things have changed. I am now a vegetarian and their rebel lion.”
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200 words
I do not want to write only two hundred words! It pens me in, ties me with ink stained knots, treads on my adjectival toes and brings the sky down on my chicken headed aspirations.
The masters and their word police rip out our thoughts and make examples of them in vast piazzas, crushing the tiny rebellions with mass chants: “Too long, too long, too long.”
You know the power of my words, you know they can raise the blood or sooth the soul, escape the penary exercises of our toil, and it scares you. No, not for you the full, unbridled lament of the love sickened wife, the song of pain and joy from the chain gang, the chorus of hope and suffrage echoing from the mouths of a united people. These are the banners of discontent, the barricades of freedom and they insult and batter your uniformity, your organisation, your dictate.
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Carly
Carly held her brother close in her arms. Never a sturdy child, the fall down the stairs looked like it might have been the last straw. She screamed for her father even though she knew it was no good. The hospital would not be able to do anything for him now.
Slowly, Carly allowed the warmth to grow within her. It spilled over into Richard, her sweet baby brother. Who’s legs were so mangled they splayed back up his body. Who’s back straightened as she sang him a favourite lullaby.
The blood remained, but the back of his head felt smooth rather than mushy. Carly stopped the gathering warmth far too soon. Leaving her cut off and cold.
“What have you done?” Carly had rarely heard her father so angry. He wrenched her brother away as the sound of sirens reached their door. “You condemn us all!”
It was three long days before the man came to the door. Richard had recovered well in the hospital. But Carly’s father whispered about the house like a ghost, never speaking.
Looking into the cold, piercing blue eyes in front of her; Carly realised what her small act of rebellion had cost them.
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Revolution in 200 words
Yeah, well; what the judge said really. Like I scatter apostrophe’s like confetti and, apply punctuation, retrospectively, with a shotgun. Smug git, but at least the nurses are cute. So I got indictable dyslexia: we all have here. Leastways if youve not got it when you come it, they give you it: toot sweet
But Raoul. hes’ smart, showed us the number’s. Like I could understand, I struggle; playing five hundred and one. Still it’s like a code. Or a virus. So me, I’m sat at the screen typing, away while he chat’s up a cute nurse so she dont notice.
Says Raoul, if; we get this thing on the net, if it goes live. Then it’ll freak out them what’s into this punctuation stuff. Its the sequence. The spacing of the error’s. Its going to fry the brains so that theyll not be able to punctuate whatever they do. Once; that happens Raoul reckon’s they have to let us out. Me, do I look like someone who thinks? I type faster than he does or so he say’s but; I think he just wanted a crack at the nurse leaving, me to email revolution, in exactly, two, hundred words.
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SYSTEM
“It’s the year three thousand, everything we live for and believe in is controlled by the SYSTEM. They or It controls who we are, how we dress and even who we choose to wed. Do we citizens of Jahannazberg really want to live in such a world of corruption?
They claim that our nation was corrupt a long while before they ‘calmed’ things down. They said that many different organizations ran different aspects of our lives before; aspects like health and entertainment. Then those organizations erupted in a war, a destructive war so great that it left our world as a mass of desolate grey ruins, grey dust populated air which is slowly killing us from inside out.
But what the SYSTEM fails to admit is their involvement in this war. A war which many fought in hopes for our freedom, many whose lives were taken just for speaking out against what they believed was wrong.
My own mother Alexria Kalis Romanov was one of the many who rebelled against the SYSTEM. Her dream was to fight for a better life for her family, a better life for me. The SYSTEM’s response was a price, the price of her life.”
(Edited to add last minute entry!)