Year 1, Week 11: Results!

Can you tell NaNoWriMo is coming up in a couple o' months? I think Si is practicing her word count--though, certainly, this is quantity and quality (not to say that all novels written for NaNo are only quantity. I like NaNo.). Either that, or she's trying to show me up by writing reviews twice the size of mine (Oh, alright, she wrote hers first.).

What's that? You want to see the reviews? Oh, tch. Very well, here they are.

Honorable Mention

Firdaus' Paranoid

Si: GREAT twist at the end! I like that you first show us the MC running in terror, then the memory of the hammer. Good immersion into the character, from the line "She had seen it in his eyes again," you establish the close third POV very smoothly, and give us something to add to the tension. This definitely feels like something awful is going to happen, and the MC MUST flee! I like that she grabs the broken branch to defend herself, then is talked out of it with calm words by the guy--THEN THE END! You give no hints in their conversation and effectively turn the reader about with the talk about meds. The last line is the best in the story; excellent job! I would suggest perhaps reducing the exclamation points ("She bolted!"; "looking frantically around for something--anything!") as with the first one we are still unsure what the tone is going to  be, so it can be read as 'Yay, she bolted!' or 'Ahhh, she bolted!' This is established by the end of the paragraph, so by then the reader is fully immersed. I would aim for a tone more like that of the line, "She had seen it in his eyes again, just like before," and that of the last line of the story. Excellent plot twist, and good story!

Mars: Ah, the old question of, "Is it paranoia if someone really is after you?" returns in full force with this piece. For a few minutes now, I've debating if the ending was actually a bad one--the reader has no reason to suspect the husband actually is going to kill her . . . but then I realized that him suggesting she has paranoia gave me a reasonable explanation to discredit the ending, which is a fine twist indeed. Fooling a character within the story is one thing, but the reader as well? That gets props. Something I notice is the piece feels less tension-y than it does rushed; the long sentences strung together with commas probably contributes to this--I would try to match the sentence and paragraph structure with the words. Action scenes are better written with short sentences and paragraphs, to pace the story appropriately (Periods are nice. Very punctuating.). Again, I think the most masterful lines in the piece are these:

"I saw how you looked at me, you were..." She hesitated, not sure anymore.
"Have you stopped taking your medicines, honey?" He looked concerned.

Nicely done!

First Runner-Up

Iores Trooly's Close Call

Si: What really struck me about this story was the clean writing. There's no confusion and it's descriptive without slowing down the tension. I loved the images the story gives us: "the faceless crowd parting for her and merging again," "functional infinity," the description of the metallic voice, the arrow flashing above her head--some really excellent turns of phrase there. It takes a very mundane setting--that of an airport--and turns it into something both poetic and mysterious. The tension is maintained the whole story, and I really applaud you on your imagery--the damp paper, the knowledge that, as long as the voice speaks, she still has a chance. One thing I would add would possibly be an additional hurdle or object in the middle--give us a chance to catch our breath and something else looms up--is she going to make it?--then bring it down again as she dodges past. Something to vary the tension a little. I liked the picture of the boy happily celebrating, oblivious to the MC's panicked run. Well done!

Mars: (Don't worry, we trust your word count. Or, at least, it looks close enough to 300 that we don't really care. XD) This piece is a little clever. The tension is dramatically built up, and reading through it the first time, the reader can't tell quite what's going on. The scene could be anywhere, yet it can only be one place--the airport. I applaud the vivid imagery maintained throughout the piece (I'm usually horrible at that sort of thing, so I appreciate it when I see it!). It's a quaint story--very well written, with the feel of a melody coming to a resolution at the end. Truly, it's not the plot that I find particularly compelling--'a mother rushes through airport to make her flight on time' is an, honest-to-goodness, boring idea. It's the way this is written, however, that makes this piece a little gem.

And, without further ado, though I do wonder what ado we give it, the moment you've all been waiting for--

Y1W11 Winner!

Steph Ellis

with Hunter Reborn

Si: What a great story! The opening is really excellent--we get a mixture of emotions from Rowena: fear, hope, pain, exhilaration. The way that hints are dropped through the story gives us the details we need to get her situation and also makes us want to know more. "How many years ... since she had actually seen him?" is a great example of this. Just enough is left unknown so we NEED to keep reading, we're curious. This story plays with tension well, mixing suspense with occasional pauses that heightens the contrast. I liked that here had been some change in Theo--that he wasn't the terror she remembered. That felt very real to me. Only a few quibbles: I wasn't sure exactly what to picture with the description "long-shackled limbs" (long limbs that are shackled, I assume), and in, "Making mistakes like the one that had allowed her to escape.", I would stop it at "Making mistakes," as the reader could infer the rest from the story. "The scent grew stronger, coppery notes playing a metallic symphony that roused her hunger." This is a BEAUTIFUL line, well done. I love how, with only a few words, the story changes from one of the hunted to that of the hunter--a palpable transformation in the MC without it being explicitly stated. Excellent story!

Mars: This piece is enough to send a shiver up one's spine. I think it's a fine example of 'showing'--the character's emotions are present between the lines: "Adrenaline fueling her long-shackled limbs onward . . ."--hope--". . . a perfume that had infiltrated her uneasy sleep on so many nights . . ." --fear--"Who else could boast such a trophy? . . . Vengeance."--disgust, anger! The emotions might have been amplified by different word choices, to knock the tension up another level--for example, I found the line, "Rowena paused and sank back into the shadows . . ." somewhat lacking; I felt the fear should have been stronger--perhaps 'froze' instead of 'paused', or 'shrank' back into the shadows--minor changes, but large effects. Nevertheless, the quality of the plot--the shift from prey to predator--is well-crafted, subtle tension already woven in. 

Hunter Reborn 

She bolted down the hallway. Adrenaline fueling her long-shackled limbs onward, away from the room that had been her prison for an eternity. Occasionally Rowena stumbled as daylight shot its daggers through shrouded windows, skewering her eyes with a pain that she found strangely welcome. The windows, though, were mercifully few. 

She continued forward but found her progress slowing as she fought the weakness caused by her imprisonment.

A door slammed somewhere ahead.

Rowena paused and sank back into the shadows, old instincts allowing her to merge with the stillness and become part of the silence.

Footsteps. Slow and heavy on the stairs. Theo. He was getting old. Making mistakes like the one that had allowed her to escape.

He was closer now, she could make out his shape as her sight adjusted to the gloom. He had been a giant of a man but this … this version was a shrunken copy. How many years had it been since she had actually seen him? Unwashed and unkempt, he was not the man she remembered. The smell though. The smell was the same; a perfume that had infiltrated her uneasy sleep on so many nights, pulled her mind back to the surface of life.

The scent grew stronger, coppery notes playing a metallic symphony that roused her hunger. 

Closer. Was she strong enough after so long in the dark? 

Closer. 

The call of his beating heart, the siren song of skin-clad blood, hammered loudly in her ears. 

Closer. 

Vanity had stayed his hand, kept her alive. She had been his prize exhibit, a creature of the darkness. Who else could boast such a trophy? 

Closer. 

Vengeance. 

Hunter. Hunted. Hunter reborn.

Year 1, Week 8: Results!

Guys! We had seven entries! We haven't done that well in almost 7 weeks! Way to go, all you beautiful contestants! (Can you tell this is exciting!) From this lovely batch, we have selected three stories (I mean, like usual, but seven entries, guys).

Also! Announcement: For fun, we're going to start having Trippin' Thursdays (it'll come out at 12:01 am). Stress-free prompt-writing (no judging). You also get like 1k to write with (and I guess we really couldn't care how long it is, as long as it's still flash fiction, but 1k seemed reasonable, so). Hope to see you there!

Note: Si wrote her reviews while being menaced by a totally fearless squirrel.

Honorable Mention

firdaus' Crashed

Si: OMG this story. Such pain. Much tragedy. Wow.

Great dialogue, great story progression. THE ENDING. There’s very little description but the reader is totally clear on what happened, and what is happening. The ending, while powerful (excellent job cutting it off where you did btw), is a little confusing because it seems like the nurse was aware of the husband in the room the night before--so it took me a second to “get” that she didn’t. The dialogue throughout is great: short lines that keep you in the story, but there isn’t any wasted space. It conveys emotion with the briefest of description, and I like that it’s not hard to keep track of who is speaking even though we don’t have “tags” (he said, she said)--the clarity of the dialogue makes them unnecessary. Well done!

Mars: This story is great in the way that it makes even the reader question reality. Whenever a ghost shows up in a story and delivers factual information that the main character couldn't have known, it makes me wonder if they were really there or not--when the husband details the extent of her injuries, for example. The ellipses used complemented the dialogue instead of detracting from it (I have a thing about ellipses. When used in excess, I don't like how they make dialogue sound, usually, but here it fit the whole "I've just been severely traumatized" thing). Watch out for repetitive sentence structure--"She woke up [. . .] . Her throat was dry. She watched [. . .]"--since that can make a piece lose some of its luster. I have to give you props on the ending, though--that moment of hope, just to be crushed by an unassuming bystander. What a punch in the gut! 

First-Runner Up: 

Steph Ellis' Leonard

Si: I really like the twists in this story, and the unreliable narrator. We don’t know that he’s unreliable--first he’s crazy, then he’s a sane bystander, then he’s clearly seeing things. It’s hard to handle this kind of narrator well, so great job! There was some confusion over the Leonard in the fight and Leonard the bystander--clarified somewhat by him thinking it annoying that the guy shared his name--but at the very end of the story, he seems totally cognizant that the guy IS actually him. So it’s hard to tell whether he is unaware of what he did, or whether he knows. My favorite part was the description of Leonard in the mental hospital--you can really see it. The initial dialogue is also very well done--each line is short but easy to follow. Great job!

Mars: A sense of pity is evoked readily by the great character development in this piece. There was also clever hinting towards Leonard's true location and mindset before the final reveal--lines like "their conversation echoing round and round in his head," and the description of the other residents of the asylum. In his "I shouldn't be here" thoughts, one could assume that it was simply a nursing home. The only real confusion I feel while reading the story, even now, is the line, "He heard a cry, the sound of a body crumpling." I'm not sure what's going on there. Otherwise, however, I found it was very easy to keep track of the story, and the ending was fabulous. 

And, without further ado, the moment you've all been waiting for--

Y1W8 Winner!

Phil Coltrane

with Come to Grief

Si: This story had excellent emotion and tension throughout! I loved the way that the details of the situation--the father’s age, the futuristic setting, the relationship between father and daughter--were dropped throughout the story and avoided a big info-dump. Great integration of backstory, world/setting, and the story! The scene is not action-y but still has a lot of tension--is she going to press the button? Is he going to convince her? I’m curious as to why he tried the Immortality Treatment so late--or why if he had it earlier, it didn’t manifest until year 437. I like the way he switches tracks from “Push the button if you love me” to “Push the button because you hate me.” “In his bloodshot eyes, she saw something virtually unknown to modern civilization: real pain. ” --great line. Excellent story!

Mars: I love the idea that mankind has found immortality . . . almost, and now pain is practically nonexistent. Though it is never mentioned directly in the story, I get the sense that all Zara can feel for her father at this point is pity (good character emotion!). I thought it was a very unique take on the prompt, as well--it's not something I would have thought of. I would have liked to know more about the 'electrochemical command' that Zara got--it didn't really make sense to me. All in all, however, this is an excellent piece of sci-fi. The last line--Zara confessing to her already-dead father--tugged at my heartstrings a little bit, and also gave the piece a nice, circular feel.

Come to Grief

"I love you." 

"You're only saying that because I almost killed you." Zara pulled her hand away from the glass panel, and the crimson circle that would terminate his life support. 

Paralyzed below the neck, the man in the biomedical bed tilted his head toward Zara. "Please... daughter. By law and custom, as my sole relative, only you may end my suffering." His raspy voice raked against Zara's heartstrings.

Zara stared at the husk of a man. Holographic indicators overlaid his medical data. Age: 437. Pulse, blood pressure, brain activity. Diagnosis: Immortality Treatment Rejection Syndrome. Prognosis: progressive paralysis, agonizing pain, death within the year. In his bloodshot eyes, she saw something virtually unknown to modern civilization: real pain. How could she let him suffer in this cold hospital room? She was his daughter: he was her responsibility. 

Zara felt the impulse firing through her neurons: the electrochemical command telling her finger to press the button. 

"No!" She turned away from him. 

"My daughter... Medical science gave me four centuries of life, but has reached its limit. Close the circle. End my suffering." 

"Growing up, I dreamed of a father," Zara confessed. "Someone to love me unconditionally. But you weren't there." She turned to him again. "I made my own way in life -- and quite well! Now you send for me, not to make amends, but merely to press a button?" 

"Then you hate me. Push the button. Give me what I deserve." 

"I don't hate you," Zara said pityingly. "I don't even know you. You're a stranger to me." With one hand, she stroked his brittle hair. With the other, she pressed the button. 

"I love you," he mouthed silently, and then he was gone. 

Zara slumped to the marble floor and cried. "I love you, too."

We look forward to more of y'all's work in the future! See you tomorrow or on Saturday!