“It’s a race! It’s a race! I’m weeing! I’m weening!”
Well, it isn’t a race, but I’m pleased to say that I’m one of those that were picked by popular vote in the “Almost an Inkling Writing Contest!” New prompt is up this week; the hint is “a One Minute Mystery.” You should check it out!
Click over to the contest home page to watch a video in which I talk about the winners and to download a .pdf of the winning entries!
Week 1 was:
Through Mysterious Doors
This week, we entered the world of microfiction with stories of up to 333 words that involved portals into other realms. Our writers took a character through some kind of gateway or past some threshold into a secondary world unlike our own.
POPULAR RUNNER-UP:
Eugene Sullivan, “The Stairwell”
POPULAR WINNER (tied):
Brenton Dickieson, “One Step Into Dawn”
POPULAR WINNER (tied):
Olivia Jakobitz, “Through the Porthole”
LITERARY WINNER Second Runner-Up:
Cheryl Cardoza, “Fairy Rings”
LITERARY WINNER First Runner-Up:
Anne Whitver, “Never Trust a Clock”
LITERARY PRIZE WINNER:
Laura Crouse, “Lot’s Wife”
A Pilgrim in Narnia 
Congratulations! I don’t think I can express myself adequately, but (an attempt) – your artistry produced a quietly devastating, searing effect. (And now I have gone on to enjoy your allusive, vigorously – and darkly – humorous dragon tale.)
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Hi David–thanks for the note. My story this week is peculiar, and really for geeks who like the same kinds of stories I do.
What I like about your dragon tale especially is the way you use words to capture another era, yet there are no archaisms. I mean simple (saxon) words like worm, cave, ruddy, kiln, wrath….
Do you think, somewhere deep with the chasms of this world where dragons awake the rebirth of their world, there is a draconian liturgy that roles in the bellies of these great beasts? That’s the question your story inspired.
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Thank you!
What a fascinating idea of a draconian liturgy (waking or sleeping, a sort of transposed sustaining of the time between)!
Geeks, indeed – I felt things zipping over my head that eluded my grasp, and would probably need A Reader’s Guide to squeeze out every drop, but that teasing is inviting, too!
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Congratulations! I wasn’t able to get to all the other submissions, and so sadly missed yours. But fortunately you won, which means I’ll get to read it later. 🙂 My own story “Mud” earned a kind honorable mention from Sorina in the video, for which I’m grateful. By God’s grace I was able to slip another story in for last week’s prompt, and I’m excited to read more of the other submissions.
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Yes, it was cool to be a part of this, and I suspect the e-book will be priced at 99cents or something.
Your story “Mud” made me sad. Thanks for blogging it so it is nearby. Phrases like “I too am tired of my world.” and “New water on thirsty ground. And your new name here, to be followed by many glorious titles.”
Did you put in a Dragon story?
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It certainly deserved an honorable mention! I’m glad you followed the suggestion to make it available again! Mud’s savoring of a novel beauty, only to have its precariousness and need revealed, struck me with fuller force on rereading. (Lovely tangential anxiety about all those glasses of water over the mattress before their passage to the Other World!)
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Thanks, both of you. I like to think that the blue king perceived the boy’s feelings of depression and helplessness, and purposely nudged him into a hero role for his own good. Unexpected acts of kindness are always powerful to me. Heh, one of my friends wondered if the boy wasn’t just playing pretend with a goldfish bowl — not what I intended, but perhaps also not inconceivable!
I did submit a dragon story, “The Minnesinger” (a medieval German term for a type of bard). Reading the above comment about dragon liturgies makes me sad I had to cut out (for word-count reasons) a section of my story that ruminated on dragon religious beliefs from a 16th-century German perspective. An amusing aside, at least to me, but not strictly vital to the plot or tone, so it had to go.
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David, I was particularly intrigued by the ritual in your story. Is that ritual one that you invented or does it come out of the lore?
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Everything is invented, except of course for the Black Forest being in Germany. There’s a few more references in the full version that make the setting clearer, and that took a tiny bit of research from me. But otherwise, I was just trying to imagine what fey songs and dragon songs might be like.
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Very cool. Funny connection with the “liturgy” comment I made in the other David’s comments! I look forward to seeing an extended edition.
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After this week’s judging (whatever its outcome) might you look into putting the ‘longer recension’ on your blog?
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Sure, I’ll definitely consider it. The submitted version is a bit tighter, but the full version flows better, I think, and is probably easier to follow. Thank you for your interest!
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congratulations on the portal contest. have winners been told anything about the licensing of rights?
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Howdy! Was fun to win. I watched the video and our piece can appear in a collection this fall, which is nice. I haven’t had a NanoFiction piece in circulation yet.
I suspect it will be standard licensing: no money, but a free Ecopy, allowed to post on my own blog a year or so after publication. I wonder if there is also something going on for winners–a podcast at the end, methinks.
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yes! fun!!
I wonder, owing to digital pub, things have changed so much of late, re licensing.
…………………….
apology for lowercase, owing to increasing repetitive stress and carpel tunnel syndrome coupled with arthritis.
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Congrats, my friend! I absolutely love your stories and voted for you both times. XD
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I voted for you once, but not knowing you were you, if you know what I mean!
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^_^ that warms my insane little heart so much!
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I enjoyed “Raised by Dragons”, though the second paragraph was rather hair-raising (I have a couple vintage paperback grimoires, the decades-old gifts of well-meaning friends, which – superstitiously? wisely? – i’ve never dared to look into). But, could you, here or there, give ‘the rest of us’ a hint about where we might read more about “a certain dragon-connected wizard from my canon” – or is discovering that for oneself a Task for the Blog-explorer Errant?
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I wouldn’t overrate superstition….
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He’s on a roll…! Congratulations on “Popular First Runner-up”!
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Thanks!
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