Coming In A Baker's Dozenth

And it's finally pitcher time

At the beginning of June I entered my first writing competition, the 1,000-Word Flash Fiction Challenge, a fun endeavor run by NYC Midnight. Thousands of writers world-wide are given a set of prompts: a genre, a setting, an object, a specific number of words, and 48 hours in which to complete the assignment.

I posted my submission in my post NYC Midnight Reunion, and looking back on it, it’s kind of cringy, but again, it was my first attempt so I’m excusing myself.

Per the NYC Midnight website: “When the competition begins, writers are placed in groups and judged against other writers within their same group. Each group receives its own unique genre, location, and object assignments (see past examples on our FAQ page). After two challenges, the top five writers who score the highest advance to the next challenge. In Challenge #3, writers are placed in new groups and given a new genre, location, and object assignment.

The top three writers from each of the groups in Challenge #3 advance to the fourth and final challenge of the competition where they are given the final genre, location, and object assignment…”

Much to my surprise, I placed in the first round, thirteen out of fifteen, meaning I got three points. So while it seems unlikely the “thousands of dollars in prizes” will be mine, I’m thrilled to have placed at all, and kind of shocked, honestly.

Even better, the competition sends feedback, with each judge identified by their judging number in brackets. (I’ve left their typos as-is. I can’t imagine how many of these they had to do, so no judgment from me.)

''WHAT THE JUDGES LIKED ABOUT YOUR STORY - {2450}  Alice's charcater and thought process shines through in her dark humour, with the first person narration allowing this to come across naturally, such as commenting on the loss of the security deposit for drink stains. There is a nice mixture of sentence structure, with the use of short sentences well handled and cutting superflous words.  

{2364}  Nice creepy and interesting story here. I loved that opening and how the ending brought us back to it. I also really liked what the mystery was and how it completely affected the Alice’s life (literally). I love that Rob stole that money and that Jim had figured it out somehow and chose Willow House to reveal to his partners and presumably out Rob. It all comes together nicely in this story. 

{2429}  You did a great job of telling a complete mystery. Even as the truth came to light, it felt natural and made sense with the clues you left earlier in the story without being obvious.  

WHAT THE JUDGES FEEL NEEDS WORK - {2450}  It felt like there were too many suspects/characters which the reader would have to remmeber only for them to become irrelevent to the story. It might be an idea to cut some of them and focus more on Rob and Jim's relationship to make it clearer they have a previous relationship/connection. Since they're all in a room, Alice could note maybe how the other suspects had a motive as she'd been noticing some tension between the guests, maybe remarking how the issue of money brings that out in people, which could tie in well with Rob's reasoning for carrying out the crime. Occasionally some sentences that are telling the reader what is happening which they can already infer from the dialogue/context of the situation, for example on page 4 'I told him what I'd been thinking' is almost superflous since the next line of dialogue conveys all of this,  

{2364}  One thing that I think could heighten this story more is to eke out the information about Rob’s connection to Jim and the others in a less linear way. Even though we realize that this is happening in Alice’s head, it might be nice to have the way it’s given to the reader less directly For example, as soon as we know that 20 years ago was when Rob got his inheritance, we know he’s involved. Maybe in that first mention, she only thinks of the money and that 20 years ago was when her grandfather died and Rob moved in or bought the place next door (but not how he bought it). Then next, something more about the inheritance. Have a look at where and how this information could be presented to suspend the discovery a little. Also, some of the things that Alice remembers/discovers could be seeded earlier – Rob set up their computers at the BnB, his inheritance could be mentioned when she says her lent her the money for repairs, etc., so that when we get to her piecing it together it isn’t all new info to us. I was really curious about Rob and Alice’s “best friendship” over 20 years. Neither married, never hooked up with each other? I found the convention of only using double quotes for dialogue at certain points and otherwise making it part of the sentence interesting, but I couldn’t find a neat reason for the back and forth. I wonder if this could be more clearly delineated. Small thing: “Fourth” is usually capitalized when referring to the holiday. Another small thing: a horse wouldn’t “buck” its reins. They would fight, pull, resist, etc., but that would be different from bucking. At the end, think you can lose the “seemed to” when the carousel horse bucks. Alice is already drugged and could be experiencing that. Final thought, does Rob not worry about how two deaths back-to-back around him and his property will look? 

{2429}  With Rob being revealed as a thief and murderer, I would recommend spending a little bit more time on his characterization, even if it's just through his relationship with your protagonist. It would make the shock and betrayal more impactful.

In my defense, their genre definition said mysteries needed a lot of characters, so I put too many in. Plus I was trying to include as many of the blasted Historic Commission members I’ve been dealing with in my house renovation as possible on my bad guy list.

I found their feedback to be helpful and generous. For whatever the entrance fee was—fifty dollars, maybe?—this is a remarkable opportunity to practice writing outside of my comfort zone, with a two-day window, so no perseverating, and a way to stretch my brain and, hopefully, skills.

In my former life I often mourned the loss of professionals training dogs to a standard other than their own. Competition Obedience got a bad rap for punitive training methods, but those weren’t necessary. By eschewing competition, we gave up being judged by any standard other than our own. The quality and reliability of training suffered because of that. Self-proclaimed experts sprouted up everywhere, but there was no proof, because there was no pudding.

Writing is a little like that. It’s easy to sit and write in an echo chamber, fixing and fiddling endlessly, using the same muscle group over and over again, listening only to one’s own opinion about whether something is, or is not, good enough.

These writing competitions are working to someone else’s standard, several people’s, in fact, and that’s fantastic. They’re not coaching, they’re judging, though not in a mean girl way, and that’s immediately helpful when it comes to learning how people respond to one’s writing. What’s more, they’re asking us to write in genres we not only may not usually write, but we may not ever even read.

Now that’s stretching.

Before I got my results back from the 1,000-word challenge I entered the 500-word challenge. Genre: Horror. Action: Fluffing a pillow. Object: A projector. I sent it in last week.

The day after I got my feedback from round one of the thousand-word challenge I got my round two assignment. Genre: Comedy. Location: A toy shop. Object: A cage. I sent that in yesterday.

This is a wonderful type of learning, at least for me, with just the right amount of nervousness and stakes, nothing too serious, and a lot of hard thinking for a very short time.

I highly recommend it to any of you wanting to give it a try!

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Morning Teaistisms

It is finally reliably iced tea weather, and I’m here for it. I’m also up all night if I drink too much of it, so I ordered the Barry’s tea in decaf, and am keeping a pitcher of it in the fridge.

A very satisfying way to drink a not particularly good tea.