The first paragraph challenge is back! There are prizes! Are you ready?
In order to celebrate the publication of the second edition of How to Write a Novel (preorder now, available tomorrow!!), I’m bringing back the grandaddy of them all, the big kahuna, the one, the only… SIXTH Stupendously Ultimate First Paragraph Challenge!
Is your first paragraph the best of them all? ENTER THIS CONTEST TO FIND OUT.
Before we get to the prizes, let’s talk about the pride of being among the very prestigious finalists of competitions on this blog. Here are just some of a few of the now-published authors who were once contest finalists:
Victoria Schwab! Michelle Hodkin! Stuart Neville! Josin L. McQuein! Michelle Davidson Argyle! Joshua McCune! Natalie Whipple! Terry DeHart! Jeanne Ryan! Peter Cooper! Travis Erwin!
Will you be next on this illustrious list?
Oh yes, the prizes.
- The finalists will win a query critique from yours truly (or other agreed upon prize of similar value).
- In additional to a query critique, the WINNER will receive a $100 gift certificate to the independent bookstore of their choice (or other agreed-upon prize of similar value).
Here’s what you need to know:
- Please post the first paragraph of any work-in-progress in the comments section of THIS POST. If you are reading this post via e-mail you must click here to enter. Please do not e-mail me your submission as it will not count.
- The deadline to enter is this FRIDAY, OCTOBER 18 at 7pm ET, at which point entries will be closed. Finalists will be announced… probably Monday. I think. Hopefully. When the finalists are announced you will get to exercise your democratic right to vote on the stupendously ultimate winner.
- PLEASE SPREAD THE WORD ABOUT THE CONTEST! The more entries, the more satisfaction you will have when you crush them with your first paragraph.
- Please please check and double-check your entry before posting. If you spot an error in your post after entering: please do not re-post your entry. Don’t worry about typos. I make them all the time!
- You may enter once, once you may enter, and enter once you may. If you post anonymously please be sure and leave your name (no cheating on this one).
- You must be at least 14 years old and less than 178 years old to enter. No exceptions.
- I’m on the Twitter! And the Instagram! And subscribe to the newsletter while you’re at it! I will be posting contest updates. (Okay maybe not Instagram but you might see what I’m cooking for dinner as I stress eat while reading the entries).
Don’t forget to pre-order How to Write a Novel! I’m very excited about the new edition and it will be available soon as an audiobook too!
Here! We! Go!!
Need help with your book? I’m available for manuscript edits, query critiques, and coaching!
For my best advice, check out my online classes, my guide to writing a novel and my guide to publishing a book.
And if you like this post: subscribe to my newsletter!
Denise Senecal says
Hundreds of miles of land suddenly torn asunder, a thousand feet higher on the north side than the south, a jagged break twisted its way into the unknown west. The cavalry patrol drew up and halted at the edge of the rugged Breaks. They looked down into the spires and turrets and onto the sun-blasted plain beyond. Away to the west rose the rough escarpment of the Dark Land. The Nameless Land. The Necromancer’s Land.
Denise Senecal says
At the spring house door on the Wagner ranch, Dick Johnson dipped his bandana into the bucket. Wringing it out, he tenderly washed Abby Wagner’s face and kissed her.
“You’re like those fields out there, you know.” He teased her, his eyes sparkling.
“How’s that?”
“You’re both just waiting to be planted.”
Abby blushed and cuffed his sleeve. “Your mother would box your ears! And Mary would be appalled.” She arched her eyebrows, dropped her jaw, planted her fists on her hips, mimicking Mary’s shocked expression – and laughed at the picture of her sister’s righteous indignation.
Karen Skedgell-Ghiban says
A mourning dove cooed into the still morning air and dew glistened upon the cemetery lawn. Jennie added a bouquet of iris and sweet rocket, freshly cut from Mom’s garden, to the corpses of flowers blanketing Clara Ann’s grave. Millie wept softly behind her for her murdered friend and troupe partner.
Veronica Dean-Bonnichsen says
The people of this world continue to live in their oblivious state. The moment I learned who I was, everything around me made sense. It’s hard now for me to look at things without my witch eyes. Inside the small farm house is a family of five. All of them are nestled warm inside; the mom and dad are watching television, the baby is sound asleep while their preteens are texting and talking on their cells. Some part of the thought makes me long to be a part of that simplicity again. I’m outside in the bitter cold air. The fire in front of me is blazing, but it does not make me feel warmth. The familiar scent of burning flesh swirls around me; on the flying ashes-a mix of sweetness and burnt hair.
Megan Trotter says
Andromeda sat on the bank of the City of the Dead watching the black sand trickling into her sandals. The gray water lapped against the shore, but unlike the waters back home, they refused to wash up a single shell or piece of sea grass onto the beach. There was nothing living in these depths. Andromeda sighed and straightened one of her bent knees so that her foot slid toward the water. As soon as the edge of her sandal touched the surface, small sparks shot up, and a shock that made her toes curl pulsed through her body until she jerked her foot away.
Vanessa MacLaren-Wray says
The car door was open, so Tom slid into the driver’s seat. The ancient Beetle smelled damp and dusty at the same time. Probably the door had been hanging open all night. Tom leaned out to pull the door closed, and allowed himself an anxious glance up and down the road. Yeah. OK. No one. It was early yet, the fog still hanging among the gnarled walnut trees. Plenty of time. And anyway, Mr. Bell was always late to first period during basketball season.
Kim Harnes says
His headstone reads Graves Chancellor Thorpe—a name totally foreign to me since I always called him Chance. He was born, he lived seventeen years, and he died. When you’re young and full of life, you never think your time on this planet can be snuffed out like the sizzling end of your Uncle Gabriel’s last cigarette; burning hot one second, a pile of ash the next. Just that quick. Just that deliberate. Just that final. When you’re young and full of life, you go to parties and football games. You have sex in the back seat of your parent’s car, and you make sure this time you get rid of the condom so you don’t hear your step-dad’s bellow ascend the stairs from the chair he barely leaves except to “fix things” at Mrs. Baskin’s house, or see your mother’s face all squinched up in church-lady scrutiny. When you’re young and full of life, you live balls-out at full speed as though you’re immortal and you’ll never die. The sad thing is, death gets us all.
Lidija Hilje says
With my knees on the ground, and the muddy, damp soil clinging to my fingers, I pushed the last summer bulb in with my thumb. Planting summer bulbs as early as November was a serious gardening offense, but I needed to keep myself busy. Maybe the flowers would be forgiving by next June. Maybe I’d be forgiving by next June, too. Honestly, I had no idea. I couldn’t envision what June would be like, what any of my life would be like, now that I’d learned what Ben had done. And not knowing what lay ahead petrified me. Dealing with uncertainty was not my strong suit. After all, I was an actuary — I predicted the future for a living. What irony that now I couldn’t even foresee my own.
Janice Mayne says
Lying to the United States Army about your age generally wasn’t a good idea. But as Ann Garner saw it, boys were getting away with it every day–so what if an underaged nurse slipped in here or there? Besides, she was only stretching her years from twenty to twenty-one, barely a stretch at all.
Mikaela says
The best thing about our lab was the giant windows that allowed us to gaze out over the quad, stealthily judging everyone below us. Under his breath, mouth near my ear, Liam asked, “Who would you do?” Our favorite game. “Him… or him?” He pointed in turn at two twenty-somethings, probably grad students like us.
Wendy says
Most people hear about something tragic and say, “Oh, that’s horrible.” They go on about their business, and live their lives.
I’m not most people.
I don’t just hear about tragedy.
I feel it.
Literally.
My mama says I’m too empathetic, but my dad says I have the feelings of an angel. Empathy, angel, it all boils down to one thing – I’m cursed. I see things before they happen.
Raymond Christopher Qualls (R. C. Qualls) says
“Today is February 26, 2037, and this is Free Radio News. Since the assassination of President Jesus Alberto Rodriquez at his inauguration on January 20th by a right wing religious group known as the Forthrights, seven more states have passed resolutions in support of the group’s action, bringing the total approving of the president’s assassination to 27. The states supporting the group, predominantly in the South, Southwest, Midwest, Great Plains and Alaska, are the same ones that voted for an Assembly of States resolution to rewrite the Constitution after Jesus Rodriquez was elected president in 2036. Since his assassination, several states across the South and Great Plains declared themselves independent from the United States due to the refusal of the Federal government to convene the assembly, despite their numbers falling short of the 34 required by the Constitution. Chaos reigns in both national and international markets as some of these states continued moves to set up their own unified government and seize federal facilities within their borders. I can’t help but say this, but God help us all!”
Karen Custy says
The big black shiny sedan pulled up outside the little white frame house on the corner. The little girl watched with intense curiosity while the driver stopped on the road. His huge arm hung out the driver’s side window resting on the door. He wore a short-sleeved light blue shirt and she noticed how tanned his arm was. He wore a brown fedora that hid his face. She felt a chill run down her spine as she counted two more men in the car.
Just then the screen door of her house slammed and her father stepped out into the sunny morning. She heard him curse and then make his way to the car while totally ignoring her. She heard her mother say something through the door and that was followed by quiet sobbing. The little girl was confused as she watched her father climb into the back seat and the car drove away. Little did she know this would later be referred to as her fathers’ Lost Weekend.
Cynthia Hoppenfeld says
Gwyneth stands on stage for the curtain call of Carousel, still trembling from the tangled emotions she has endured playing this small and, to her, unbearable part of the used and tossed-aside lover Mrs. Mullin. It is opening night, and Carousel is the last musical of the season. It’s been a torturous summer for Gwyneth, despite a triumph on another stage, hundreds of miles away from the one on which she is now standing. She has, at times, in this theater, her own theater, felt herself invisible, but tonight she has determined to become visible again.
Neil Larkins says
These are all pretty good. Will be envious of whoever wins.
Alison Huff says
Bell’s disappearance was sudden. To make matters more difficult for Seraline, not one tangible clue was left behind in the wake of her sister’s absence. Everything remained exactly as Bellamy had left it. There were no signs of foul play. No unfamiliar fingerprints marred the surface of any object she owned. Not one item in her home appeared out of place and as far as anyone could tell, nothing was missing. Except for Bell.
Sonja Gustafson says
It had happened again. Amy had had that dream – well, nightmare – again. Clones. Cloned men marching. There were always four. She could never see their faces, but the way they marched through the street just felt sinister. Eerie. Ominous. It was like looking at something moving in a room full of mirrors without the mirrors. Like watching a bulldozer in human form. Like seeing an enemy regiment approaching and the only thing that could be done was wait for the piercing sting of fatal bullets shot from their weapons. Their pace never slackened. Their resolve never waivered. The only possible end seemed to be death for all persons they encountered. It felt so real, Amy wondered if she needed to be vigilent even when awake.
Karen Mittan says
How I wish I’d stayed awake!
Katrina Nichols says
Driving the family car when I was age three was the first time I remember really “going for it.” It wasn’t an exciting car, simply a pale yellow, 1971 Datsun 510 sedan my parents purchased new two years before. My mother came to pick me up in it at my grandparent’s house, where I had stayed the night. And we had almost left for home without my favorite toy – a plastic Dachshund I pulled behind me by a little string. Left alone in the backseat, engine running, I grew impatient. I had seen mom drive many times. How hard could it be?
Bobbi says
We all begin in water, the warm slosh of the womb, but I believe it was the sea that gave me life, the frigid North Atlantic surrounding my island called Newfoundland, a jagged rock that rose from the depths into the cruel weather. My parents hailed from long lines of fisherfolk. My mother, a woman whose hands were rarely free from silver scales and slimy innards; my father, a man who lived his life combing the ocean for cod and died doing the same, he and his two brothers swallowed up by the icy black water when I was barely eleven. A tragedy in a town of six hundred souls, but hardly the first and certainly not the last seafaring misadventure to be borne. The sea takes what she will people were often heard to say. But before I knew loss, I knew only happiness.
Linda Lowen says
My mother hasn’t killed herself. Words painted on a wall are not a suicide note. It’s not her heart in that box. The message scrawled across the dining room looks like blood, lines and loops fresh and glistening. But it’s not like TV or the movies. Blood doesn’t spread out. The drips and splatters on the hardwood floor hold their shape. They’re red beads, festive and gleaming in the room where where we once gathered for holiday dinners. Sweet Cherry Red. Thanksgiving Cranberry Red. Riding Hood Red. The red of fairytales, a story seeking a happier ending in a world that’s fair and good.
Emilio D'Alise says
Patterns. Humans are attuned to patterns. Gin recognized the tactical elements in the pattern of movements she saw. She didn’t want to, but her training made it impossible not to. The three men were good, moving independently and not at the same time, never looking directly at their target yet keeping her centered as they closed in. The target. Gin looked at the girl from under the brim of her baseball cap; young, probably a college freshman. There was nothing about her that set her apart from other students loitering in the small park next to the library. Gin looked back at the team targeting the girl. They moved with the confidence of practiced actions. They stopped advancing once the perimeter allowed for no chance of escape. Surveillance. Surveillance or waiting for an opportunity.
Ann says
A little more than an hour ago a human heart stopped beating. No more breath. No more sound. A life cut short. And Tom knew those piercing, pleading screams would never leave him. A scar on his memory forever.
Erin says
Eliza reaches for the piece of paper from Lawyer What’s-His-Name with a trembling hand. She blinks away the image of another pair of shaking hands: her father’s when the alcohol had started to wear off. He’d hide it by gripping whatever implement was closest: the tv remote, the handkerchief he’d pull from his pocket and use to wipe his brow, the handle of his medical kit. Eliza tries to hide it by gripping her father’s will.
Judith Mercado says
Make no mistake. Dagny Dominique Argañaraz hated that, at twenty-eight, she had to move around in a high-tech chariot, otherwise known as a wheelchair. On her better days, she could still use a cane, but those days were getting fewer and fewer.
Abigail Cossette Ryan says
I had spent three days perched in a gnarly oak tree watching for monsters, and I was bored. My branch extended over a little river, commanding a clear view of the river and the fields on either side—not that there was anything to see. Cattle lazed peacefully in tall green grass to my left. Plowed earth filled the world to my right. Behind me, if I looked, I would see the distant blue ridge of the Phas Mountains. A pretty view. The river in front of me was wide, lazy, and had many places where the banks dipped low. And many other places you could swim in deep, clear pools if you didn’t mind the rumors of massive scaled beasts mauling cows.
A. A. Woods says
I can’t see the room, but I can feel it. It crackles with unspoken threat. Gamers spark against one another like live wires, like restless ghosts in the darkness of my world. The crowd in front of me echoes against the roof of the cavern, smelling of metal and sweat, takeout and cheap deodorant. They laugh and taunt and joke with the abandon of old friends. But beneath the whip-crack, bravado-laced voices is that familiar hum of excitement. Curiosity hangs like a fog. Everyone wonders who will step up to the Obaki Mat and rise to the challenge.
Unfortunately, none of those voices are Damien’s.
Kathryn Peck says
“That’s the yeti’s bed. Yours is over there.”
I let go of the handle of the strange blue box I was about to open, and spun around.
“Who’s there? Oh my God, who said that? What the heck?”
“Oh, I do so apologize for my manners. You must be frightfully confused. Please allow me just a moment.”
My head whipped back and forth in the room, trying to pinpoint the origin of the voice. I could smell the delicate perfume of flowers, along with a deeper, earthy scent, but there was no-one in sight.
A pair of lips appeared in front of me, covered in a blackberry lipstick just like mine.
Electric blue eyes followed, then a pale face, framed by ringlets of glossy black hair.
“I’m afraid I’ll have to make my own introduction. I am Miss Violet Jessamyn Bell, formerly of Charleston, currently a student of our fine academy. We are to be roommates.”
The voice had fully transformed into a girl. The antebellum voice and old-fashioned curls were perched atop a smoking little body dressed in some tight and pricy creation straight out of Teen Vogue. What the heck indeed.
Jordan Estrada says
“You are the patron saint of the Region Beta paradox,” Elaska told me at Rigel.
I had to ask her what that meant. Now that the internet is gone, you can’t look things up anymore. Even if the worldwide network of servers wasn’t vaporized, we are definitely out of network range.
Since we’re in space, I thought Region Beta might be an astronomical zone, but it isn’t. Elaska explained that the paradox is a psychological phenomenon where your brain unleashes coping strategies to deal with big problems, but little problems don’t trigger the same response. The result? It’s the little things that bring you down.
Kevin shaub says
Ian unbuckled his belt and grimaced as he eased off the chair, dropped his black leather pants, and turned his butt to the computer screen, the sole light in his office.
“Well, at least he spelled it right.”
The tattoo appeared to be blistering.
He wiggled back into his pants and tucked in the mesh tank top, regretting he hadn’t stopped off at the condo to change…
(Italics) “Turn around. Drop me off at Channel Three.”
“Yeah, I thought you looked familiar,” the cab driver said. “From the magazine, right…?”
Ian rubbed at his temples where the lingering thoompa thoompa of the Whisky a Go Go syncopated with the unbearable throbbing on his posterior. He rummaged through the stash of airline liquor bottles in his bottom desk drawer, found some Advil and the samples of Adderall a Beverly Hills plastic surgeon had slipped to him at a party. The joint he’d save for the drive home. He couldn’t find the Evian, but figuring a shot of Bacardi would be counter-productive—and he’d never make it to the water cooler—gingerly settled back into his chair and chewed a fistful of pills in the dark.
He was reconsidering the rum to wash down the residual grit in his teeth when he heard yet another replay of the President’s chopper crashing into the 70th floor of the McFarland Commerce Complex.
He leaned back on the headrest, shut his eyes, and exhaled. “‘Of all the gin joints… in all the towns… in all the world…’”
J.A. Busick says
The debris field was not very large. The metal and ceramic composite of the wrecked ship’s hull were twisted, cracked, and shattered–dispersed in the vast emptiness of space through a volume of just a few hundred square kilometers. Some of the wall panels for lighting and environmental controls still glowed faintly. Others, badly crushed or mangled, simply drifted dark and cold through space, or sparked across malfunctioning circuits. Interior objects — furnishings, display panels, small tools–winked like dim fireflies with the reflected light of their backdrop of stars.
Bill Swan says
Bree
I am falling, falling through time in a stocha, down, down in a curving translucent tunnel with colors that pulse and fade and you expect to hear loud electronic alarms but actually can hear nothing because the silence is too loud.
I twirl, I spin.
My mission: to find the creator, inventor of The Elsom Drive: The engine that counters gravity, that has made possible the first of what surely will be many fleets of star ships.
Molli Nickell says
“After all I’ve done for him” is the shared lament of Lola, Jeannie, and Elaine, reunited at their 40th college reunion. Trapped in abusive marriages, they’re stunned when Nancy, the fourth member of the group arrives, glowing with happiness in the aftermath of becoming recently widowed. Even more astonishing is her confession of how poor Fred had died suddenly after consuming tainted potato salad. Wink! Wink! Within the next few months, Lola, Jeannie, and Elaine are forced into marital situations which motivate them to join forces and, one-by-one, bump off the schmuck husbands. And, they almost get away with it.
R Keelan says
A slave’s life was hard, but it wasn’t hopeless. Even in this callous Vaelan Empire, it wasn’t that. I was the proof: the sun was barely up and I’d completed most of my work for the day. The rest of the household was awake, but for now, I was alone.
Almost.
Oluseyi Onabanjo says
Olodumare[1), the supreme creator looked down upon the newly formed earth. Olodumare was not unhappy, but not satisfied with the sight of vast marshes sloshing over the conjoined continents. Just about where the armpit of Africa would eventually reveal itself, a single palm tree pointed heavenwards. Olodumare pulled together a column of rain and melded it into a shimmering chain. The chain had one end anchored in heaven and the other end was untethered, buffeted by the still-shapeless clouds as it tried to point at the solitary palm tree. Heaven teemed with freshly formed gods and assorted grades of spirits, all born fully formed but yet to mature. They spoke a multiplicity of languages, possessed fearful powers and were already struggling to assert dominion over each other. In the moments (or possibly ages) that it had taken to form the rain chain, a set of gods called “oriṣas[2]” banded together (though “banded” is a strong word to describe their liaison). They had the advantage of a common language, one that lent itself uncommonly well to hurling abuse and by extension, to casting spells. This tongue would eventually become known as Yoruba.

[1] Name given to one of the three manifestations of the supreme being in the Yoruba pantheon of Gods
[2] Pronounced “oreeshas”
P.S. Broaddus says
Mikey noticed the cicadas first. He knew they were cicadas because he heard them often enough in Orlando. Except, not so…loud. He cracked one eye. How long had he been out? Moss filled his view. Thick, green, furry moss. Mikey scrambled to his feet. Dead leaves stuck in his brown hair and dirt clung to his shirt. He whirled in a circle, expecting to see the drab, narrow alley through the industrial park, or McGalliard Street, or asphalt or concrete.
Sarah Schwartz says
At the end of her shift, Jin Torkjelsson stripped off her latex gloves and strolled toward the dockside door. She stood in the drizzle under leaden clouds and watched a seiner’s crew siphon the day’s catch of sardines into the plant. When the fishing season ended next month, Jin would hop on a bus with nothing but a last paycheck and the smell of the river to remind her of this place.
Paula Robinson says
Owen was forbidden to visit the scrapyard, but he went anyway. As often as he dared. He would squeeze himself out of the bathroom window and run as fast as he could away from the house on Orchard Street that smelt of boiled cabbage. He kept checking over his shoulder to make sure his foster father wasn’t following, belt in hand. Owen only slowed to a trot when he saw the bus on the horizon, looming like a giant tombstone above the scrapyard’s other abandoned vehicles.
Elise says
Raven didn’t like school, but she liked the schoolhouse. Not the big cinder block one with the yellow buses parked out back and the rusty, muddy pickups out front, the one full of yelling kids and tired teachers and paper to the brim. No, she liked the quiet one, full of frogs and broken glass and beer cans, the one that you had to climb through a field to get to, a field that used to be a parking lot. Chunks of paintless asphalt waited there to trip you up and bees buzzed in the hot, sharp grass, but Raven knew how to avoid them both. It really wasn’t hard, if you remembered to keep to yourself. That was the golden rule, in this country.
Nell Campbell says
Carissa was the first to notice the half-dead boy struggling along the shore’s edge. She was mending crab pots while Sam and Pa prepared the wooden vessel for painting, scraping off flaking paint and meticulously going over every joint looking for damage or decay. They always started getting ready for the new season as soon as Pa felt it was “tolerable warm.” This meant Carissa was bundled up for shore work except for the tips of her fingers, which she needed to keep free for the knot work.
K. Anderson says
We would all end up killing someone. That’s what they told us on the first day of medical school. Professors occasionally opened teaching segments with the phrase, “The first time I ever killed a patient…” Some tried to be witty, while others were somber. But regardless of the delivery, such stories always roused our attention. We resolved never to make the same mistakes.
Michelle Stockard Miller says
I know it’s a little strange that I carry this around with me, but since I killed her and took her hand, I can’t part with it. They say (Who are they, by the way?) that a serial killer always takes a souvenir, but is this what they meant? I’m not sure, but this is the memento I wanted. Plus, I like to take the hand and have it caress the top of my head the way my mother did when I was a child. I am in kind of a dilemma though. The hand is starting to rot and it smells really bad. I’m afraid I will have to part with it soon. So I must go around looking for a replacement. Where do the motherly women gather? The grocery store is where I will go, I think.
G.E. Sevenau says
I’ll always remember the how-and-the-when I met Josh Dupree on account it was the first time in my life I thought I’d get my ass good and kicked. Right from the start I had to fight with myself over whether or not it was good for my health to be friends with Josh. It seemed like no matter what, if he was around, I would end up having to do something I didn’t want to do. The worst of it was football. Josh loved football more than anything. I couldn’t stand it though, almost as much as being poor. I guess I was just scared of getting hurt. There were other reasons I hated it though. Like, it didn’t help that a guy had to always put in more work than he thought he could handle. Anyway, what I’m about to tell you happened around the time our new hokusy-pokusy coach showed up out of nowhere and we weren’t sure whether the season would count because we didn’t have enough players. That was when I met the old, indian woman, too.
Qi says
“What about pork chops and rice?”
The girl tapped her father’s menu, impatiently. “Do they have pork chops?”
He patted her shoulder, as he shook his head. “Shh.”
But, his parents had already heard; and so had the other patrons at the Jewish Community Center’s Mitzvah event.
Mackenzie Contesti says
I am late. The fall air comes at me cold and fast as I speed walk across downtown Birmingham’s broken pavement. Buildings are a blur of brick and glass in my peripheral vision. One after another, I pass by the shops and tall apartment buildings. Just eight years ago, this part of town was run by the lowest of society the poor, the homeless, the addicted, the Dregs. Once riddled with bodies uncaring if they were asleep or dead, this street is now flowing with life. The stores have been reopened, homes have been built, but the broken ground I walk on is still the same.
Geni P says
Ella missed the chickens. When the first light dappled the courtyard of the house she still called home, doves cooed, mice scampered and a sly black kitten stalked her quiet footsteps. But Ella mourned the chickens’ silly, fussy clucking, too loud by half for her late sleeping stepsisters. The birds hadn’t intended their rebellion. But some instincts refused to change.
Heidi Wainer says
Tava cringed as the castle’s windowless turret loomed above her. Her fingernails dug into the palms of her hands. If only her pathetic magic worked right. If she could be more like her year mates, she could ease people’s lives along with the other Atornum Ladies. Numbness spread from Tava’s toes to her shoulders, before fading into a series of shudders. She was going to fail, again. Goddess help her.
Matt Randles says
I never know who I’ll be when I wake up. Except that’s not entirely true; there is a Pattern. I just need to figure it out. And I will. It’s what I do.
The tall man in the grey suit—an off-the-rack number that didn’t fit particularly well—worked his way down the wet embankment. It had finally rained last night, a welcome downpour in that parched city. But Detective Kyle Ward was anything but thankful; tromping down to a swamp of a crime scene was the last thing he wanted to be doing on a Saturday morning. Coffee with the morning paper, some frisbee in the park with Cruise, even cleaning the kitchen—anything would be better. But duty called.
Vladimir Zelevinsky says
In a gray car under a silver oak on an early spring morning a young woman was burning alive.
Elia Sheldon says
William had a lot on his mind these days, which is why taking a walk on the beach after tea had seemed like a good idea. When he was a boy, the beach was his playmate. Now that he was a man, it was his refuge. He had a lot to contemplate. Since his father had died, it was now his duty to see that his sisters, the estate, and its servants were all well managed. He’d known this responsibility would one day be his, but nevertheless he still felt ill prepared. It was his own fault. He’d spent too much time with his friends and his books, and not enough time with his father, who had lectured him on topics such as animal husbandry, servant wages, and marriage prospects. Since this was the private beach for Hancock Manor, William could walk barefoot without calling his family’s reputation into question. The warm sand soothed his feet after a long day of pacing in his library. The breeze blew his hair out of his eyes and then something bright orange caught his attention. It was attached to an immobile human figure lying on the shoreline fifty feet ahead.
Rose says
A single moment. That’s all it takes for your life to change. That’s what Mom says whenever an ambulance flies by. She also says a little prayer for the person inside the ambulance. And for their loved ones. But she never adds that none of those people in that fraction of time, in that millisecond, even know that life will never be the same. I think that’s the harder truth. The not knowing. It happened to me in a single heartbeat, in a heartbeat that wasn’t, and I didn’t have a clue until hours later.
Jessica L. says
She spotted the column of smoke just as the sun was setting. Airis sat up with a jolt as she rounded the bend and finally left the scraggly forests behind. Before her stretched the Frostbed valley. And there, nestled in the valley like a pearl in an oyster, was a collection of red-tiled rooftops surrounded by tall, forbidding walls of white stone and iron. “It’s really here.” She nudged her long-horned yak, Munch, with the toe of her boot as a delighted laugh bubbled out of her chest. Munch pricked his ears and lifted his shaggy head higher. She’d found the impossible village of Darfas. It was even inhabited; she could see shadows moving beyond the reinforced gates and hear the distant, unmistakable sounds of people going about their day – the tolling of the evening bell, the crackle of lightning being summoned to light the lamps. Despite the maps denying its existence, here was Darfas, living and breathing as surely as she did. Her father had been right after all.
Jacqui Jay Grafton says
The biscuit man sits at the kitchen table, talking to Mam.
She looks beautiful, with bright red lipstick and blue stuff on her eyes. Her hair is all curly. She’s just like a fairy princess.
The biscuit man says, “Hello, little Jilly. Have you had a good day at school?”
“It was all right. I wish I had some friends. Nobody wants to play with me.”
“But you’ve got me, haven’t you? I’m your friend. Look what I’ve brought you.”
“Are they Jaffa Cakes?”
“Only the best for my Jilly. Come on, I’ll open them for you.”
I hesitate. “My name isn’t Jilly. I don’t like it.”
He smiles. “OK, Jill, then.”
I stretch out my hand for the biscuits. Mam smiles and goes away.
The biscuit man has scratchy hands and he smells funny.