EDF's November Calendar

Here is the calendar of stories to be published in November by Every Day Fiction.

November’s Table of Contents
Nov 1 Richard M. O’Donnell The Inheritance
Nov 2 Stephanie Scarborough 8-Bit Procrastination
Nov 3 Jessa Marsh Us In Tapes
Nov 4 Barbara A. Barnett Mind Games
Nov 5 Ben Werdmuller Meaningless Battles
Nov 6 Alexander Burns With the Band
Nov 7 Aaron Polson Faith
Nov 8 Celestine Trinidad Fifty-five Percent
Nov 9 Christian Bell The Art of Stealing Sharks
Nov 10 Grá Linnaea Your Own Personal Genie
Nov 11 Mark Partin Sergeant Smith
Nov 12 Patsy Collins Overlooked
Nov 13 Brian Dolton El Mystera Del Tempo
Nov 14 Gwendolyn Joyce Mintz Game On
Nov 15 Oonah V Joslin Dock
Nov 16 Ian Rochford Dog People
Nov 17 JR Hume Tears of the Android
Nov 18 Laura McHale Holland Invasion
Nov 19 Jennifer Tatroe Daddy’s Girl
Nov 20 David J. Rank Friday Midnight Five Stars
Nov 21 Stef Hall Back from the Hills
Nov 22 Nora Offen Lessons Learned
Nov 23 K.C. Ball The Maple Leaf Maneuver
Nov 24 K.C. Shaw Fall or Fly
Nov 25 Deven D Atkinson How the Human Got His Free Will
Nov 26 Bob Jacobs Broken Waters
Nov 27 Finale Doshi The New Pet
Nov 28 Wanda Morrow-Clevenger Heineken Haze
Nov 29 Jameson Parker Layaway
Nov 30 Frank Roger Mirror, Mirror

Lost in the Northern Latitudes

BLOGGING

So I haven't blogged in a while. Wish I could say I finished my book. Hahahaha. But I'm working on it. Working out the 1948 plot. Actually thought it was in good shape and yes, structure-wise it is but as for the language...well, got a way to go. But today has been a good day getting back into it after spending two and a half days in Quebec with my son.

QUEL QUEBEC?

Okay so I know absolutely know no French other than firme le bouche (sp? My apologies) But I can't believe how much fun roadtripping in ca is. The highway up to Quebec City is gorgeous even in a non-stop drizzling rain. It seemed to take it us forever but I have to say the colors were amazing. So many patchwork quilts out there climbing up into the mountains.

QC was a complete surprise. I didn't know what to expect but whatever I expected I got so much more. Our hotel was downtown in the old area of the city, the great ancient wall visible as we stepped out into a drizzling rain. We walked through the arched opening and it was like walking into Europe with charming narrow curving streets, other century buildings, and on the air: French! I did not take French in school (I know it's obvious) but had no idea about the LILT in a merci and bon jour. Lovely. Also that quarter of the city kept going on and on, no Disneyland this, but a real place.

Second day Nick and I went to Maison Bellanger-Girardin which is a small stone house on Avenue Royale in Beauport. I've wanted to visit there ever since my cousine Claire told me that she and her father had visited and both felt that it was possible that the Nicolas Belanger who lived in the house when it was just a cabin is an ancester of ours. Unfortunately all the information was in French and therefore nothing was proven to me, but I still got a thrill being in the house. Even if this Nicolas Belanger isn't OUR Nicolas Belanger, our family most likely lived in a house just like this before heading down the Mississippi to Houma.

Montreal was wonderful too though we had less time there. We ate at a quaint little restaurant called Le Caveau just around the corner from the Hilton Garden Inn where we stayed. No Trish. We did not stay at the Ritz Carlton despite the snapshop! We also visited a huge church on a hill that had a lovely garden and promised a fab view of all of Montreal but we did not make it to the top.

BACK IN VERMONT

Listening to Sam Cooke and wasting a little time blogging. Someone told me we're supposed to get three INCHES of snow tomorrow. Is that even possible? Except last night after dinner, something white and wet came down and it wasn't snow, it wasn't hail, I have no idea, but at breakfast I heard the term mixed winter? Could that be right?

Story Up at 10Flash today

TIN STAR TOWN

I have a new piece up at K. C. Ball's 10 Flash, issue 2, called Tin Star Town. It takes place in Globe Arizona, one of my favorite towns on our way to Sprucedale. No idea why I find it so evocative but I do. "Monsoon," a longer story, also features a paragraph about Globe.

I think jewelry plays a part and all those shows Tim and I watch on cable, "How It's Made" and discussions of steel, copper, bronze. Globe is a copper mining town at the foot of the mountains just east of Phoenix. And one of the metals I like to work with when I bead is copper. I love the look of it and I've learned that it's an indispensible commodity in our world. Copper is used for communications, as an alloy ingredient. I don't want to look all this up, so this is just off the top of my head. Let's just say that for me metal rocks.

VERMONT

So I'm here and working. And it's been raining almost every day since I arrived. It's a good thing, I suppose, since that means I stay in my little studio room and write instead of getting out with my camera, taking pictures. But it's all good. It can't possibly rain for the whole four weeks, can it?

Since I just wrote a piece about what to do when your car goes off a bridge, I've got my eye on the river outside my window. Picked a marker rock to see if the water rises. In Arizona this can happen in an afternoon (again referencing Monsoon!), and I can tell by the steep banks on both sides of Gihon that it's likely to rise with the rain. Regardless, it is beautiful and I feel truly blessed.

EDF's October Calendar

Every Day Fiction's October Calendar is up at FFC. Here's what's coming up.

Oct 1 K.C. Ball /Canticles
Oct 2 Alexander Salas /The Hungry Squirrel
Oct 3 Donna Gagnon /Ilker Drennan
Oct 4 Scotch Rutherford /Harvest Moon
Oct 5 Matthias R. Gollackner /Real World Heroism
Oct 6 Harry Steven Lazerus /We Had No Right
Oct 7 Megan Arkenberg /Grown from Man to Dragon
Oct 8 Jim Steel /Enemy of the Party
Oct 9 Mickey Mills /Trajectory
Oct 10 John A. Mackie /Destination: Beach
Oct 11 Rachel Lim /Water Bottle Musings
Oct 12 Fred Meyer /Blind Spots
Oct 13 G.T. MacMillan /Evidence
Oct 14 Sarah Hilary /Invisible Mend
Oct 15 Essie Gilbey /The Love Stone
Oct 16 Erin Ryan /Fark Those Takkloving Aliens
Oct 17 Wayne Scheer /Stripped of Innocence
Oct 18 Martin Turton /A Song for Cara
Oct 19 Krystyna Smallman /Miss Flossy and the Ferals
Oct 20 Karl El-Koura /Beat-Down
Oct 21 C.L. Holland /Beauty Sleeping
Oct 22 Eric V. Neagu /The Vegetarian
Oct 23 Shelley Dayton /Identity Crisis
Oct 24 Kendra C. Highley When Mom’s Sick
Oct 25 Sharon E. Trotter /The Haircut FIRST PLACE WINNER OF FFC'S STRING-OF-10 FLASH FICTION CONTEST
Oct 26 Karel Smolders /Brains
Oct 27 Stef Hall /Fingers
Oct 28 B. J. Adams /A Hearty Breakfast
Oct 29 Patrick Perkins /Feeding Time
Oct 30 Barbara A. Barnett /Dumping the Dead
Oct 31 Stefan Bachmann /The Pale Lean Ones

Buds Up

Sarah Hilary's After a Long Illness, Quietly At Home at Right Hand Pointing.

Robert Swartwood's Phantom Energy at Wigleaf.

Jonathan Pinnock's Mid-Life Crisis at Boston Literary Review.

Alexander Burn's Twit-Tales at Twitter.

Erin Kinch's The Wall at Hypersonic Tales. (Podcast!)

K. C. Ball's Tin Man at Big Pulp.

About a Banff...

One whole week with writing on the menu? No dry cleaning to pick up, no salads to toss, no television to distract, what else could a writer ask for?

Nothing really, but I got more. MORE in caps and bold. A terrific writer in Joan Clark, as available, knowledgeable, and wise a mentor as anyone could ever want. A workshop setting between gorgeous peaks to stir the imagination. And peers with skills, ideas, and a desire to help. I cannot begin to explain how important these few days in the Canadian Rockies have been in putting me on the course to finishing my long unrevised novel. I finally feel capable of and joyous about the task.

The site itself, of course, is amazing. The Banff Centre sits on a mountain maybe a half mile or so above the little village of Banff. It's a large complex with lodgings for artists of all kinds, several places to eat, comfortable classrooms, and access to many trails, activities, and resources.

My room was a nice-sized hotel kind of thing (blond, modern, clean lines) with so much storage I could have stayed a few months before I filled up every cubby hole. King-sized bed, long sleek desk, a breakfast table, A COFFEE POT, and in my case, a very short walk over a pedway into the dining hall.

Buffet set up with food for every imaginable picky appetite, veg, vegan, non-dairy, bland, spicy. Made to order omelettes every morning. Banquet every night. Fabulous views courtesy of floor to ceiling windows all around. Easy to eat there. No money needed. Just slide your "artist's card." My meal plan made it through the whole week, with only breakfast the last morning having to charge to my room.

The program.

In our building, the writers in the Writing with Style Program have their own lounge. This is Workshop Central with mail slots for each writer. Two computers and a printer available 24-7. This is where readings are held (8 slots each night, unbelievable quality of material) Tue-Fri nights at eight. Welcome party and so-long party also fit nicely into the space.

The classrooms are located across the street--well, a new building is being built in the middle of that street, but somewhere beyond the backhoe are the classrooms. And as is perfect for writers, "The Kiln" coffee house is right there in the building, lattes and sandwiches available until 7:00 every night with the swipe of that card.

The people.

Robert Kroetsch. Writer in Residence. Making sure you felt as if he'd been waiting for YOU to walk through the door.

Edna Alford, retiring director (and founder too I think) of Writing with Style program. What a wonderful, supportive, passionate woman. She made certain that every writer felt comfortable and respected.

And of course, Joan Clark, an extraordinary mentor. Funny, casual, down-to-earth, with-it-attitude, in addition to being a pioneer for Canadian literature and an inspiration to all writers. I sound a little star-struck because I am.

My fellow writers in the historical fiction group: Helen, Jane, Alanda, Voula, Chandra, and Doug. Amazing talent, intelligence, and sincerity. Love you all.

It was a terrific experience for me. I feel now that I can actually get my novel What Came Before into the kind of shape it needs to be to begin sending it out. This is my goal and now I feel one step closer to achieving it because of my time at Writing in Style.

Leaving Banff today...

No time to write about this extraordinary adventure right now because I do have to pack which I am avoiding by uploading pictures, cropping them, auto correcting, and well, just staring at them.

BUT....I'll just get them up here, a couple, and move on with my morning. More later on the "week that was" and all the amazing people I've met.



I do miss Tim and I will be happy to be home for a week until my next adventure. Next week: Vermont.

Amazing! Banff and Joan Clark

When I signed up to come to Banff to write for a week and get some guidance on my novel, I did it somewhat blindly. There wasn't much information on line about the offered Program, Writing in Style, and even less about the specific workshops offered. My choices were poetry, memoir, short fiction, and historical fiction.

Poetry, uh, no. And memoir? Impossible! I can't remember any thing from before I was 45. That left short fiction and historical fiction. I know I have a lot to learn about writing short, and I would certainly benefit from such a session, but that wasn't my goal in seeking out a residency. My goal was and is to finish my novel, so that left me with historical.

Not really a bad choice for me since I've written a couple shorts that fall into that category, but since there is an historical element in my novel, the fit seemed perfect. So I signed up and here I am. I didn't know what to expect.

I knew very little about the Banff Center--er, CENTRE, I'm in Canada don't you know--but the program offers a room, wi-fi, printer service, and food available that I don't have to cook, so I was good to go, up for anything.

I feel very lucky. Who I got was Joan Clark. She's written several books, including The Victory of Geraldine Gull,The Dream Carvers, Latitudes of Melt, and An Audience of Chairs plus a new one just coming out. I don't know the title, but I'll find out.

Wow, does she know her stuff...and I'm not talking about just the history part, research, authenticity, accuracy, but listening to her talk about process has made me sit up and listen. I guess it's been a long, long time since I was in a writing workshop and I'd forgotten the juice that comes from sitting around a table with seven writers.

And though I haven't seen a bear yet nor had a beer, I'm pretty happy with the whole set up. Now I get to go and write! More pictures on my Facebook Page!

Chalk Dust up at Night Train Magazine

So thrilled to see Chalk Dust up at Night Train today. If you get a chance to stop over and read it, that would be terrific. Here's the link: Chalk Dust.

EDF's September Calendar

Sep 1 Jonathan Pinnock Hidden Shallows
Sep 2 Sarah Hilary Burial of the Bells
Sep 3 Clinton Lawrence The Old City
Sep 4 Joel Willans A Friggin’ Star
Sep 5 Margaret Karmazin Diamonds in the Rough
Sep 6 Ellie Tupper Mandala: A Dish of Lime-Vanilla Ice
Sep 7 KM Rockwood Shredded
Sep 8 James Hartley Breakfast
Sep 9 Gargi Mehra The Beauty
Sep 10 Ben Loory The Wall
Sep 11 Melody Beacham Under My Skin
Sep 12 John Jasper Owens Mute Point
Sep 13 Fred Warren Weightless
Sep 14 Sheila R. Pierson Steak and Potatoes
Sep 15 Krystyna Smallman Consuming
Sep 16 Martin Turton Minding Matthew
Sep 17 Lori Simeunovic In the Cards
Sep 18 Anna Sykora Your Guarantee of a Human Bean
Sep 19 Aaron Polson How to Burn a House
Sep 20 A. S. Andrews Alien Life
Sep 21 Garry Grierson The Bull and Bucket UFO
Sep 22 Eric Del Carlo Frankly
Sep 23 Lossie Reeves Addie and Boog
Sep 24 Ann Wilkes Grey Drive
Sep 25 Cathryn Grant So Lucky
Sep 26 John Wiswell Frankenstein’s Monsters
Sep 27 Cate Gardner Strange Tooth
Sep 28 Debra Easterling Annapolis Eyes
Sep 29 Lee Hughes The Backtrack
Sep 30 Oonah V Joslin The Devil’s Within

HINT FICTION DEADLINE TODAY

It's August 31 and all hint submissions need to be sent to Robert Swartwood, editor of the H.H. Norton Anthology of Hint Fiction by midnight EDT tonight. The link to the guidelines is here. Check it out and get to work.

Dog Party Amidst the Smoke and Ash

Rodeo had a Dog Party yesterday. The guests included Harley and Ian, two wild and wacky Weimaraners; Lucy, whose provenence is cloaked in shady secrets despite her grand dame manners, and Sky of the azure blue eyes who conjures up summer ranch adventures since that's where she came from. These aren't great pictures since the dogs were roiling all over the yard, in and out of the pool, dashing in circles as if there was a rabbit on a stick somewhere about 10 feet in front of them. But I have to share because, well, it was hilarious and Hillary (Rodeo's MOM) wasn't here.

Yes, Danielle, I'm getting back to work.

La Canada Fire through Will's Eyes

Will's photos of the La Canada fire, his house in the path. Will and Lynne spent much of their night up on their roof. Here's what Will had to say on FACEBOOK this morning.

Lots of activity during the night in our little neighborhood. The fire burning its way down the hill toward us. Neighbors evacuating. As we watched from our roof we saw others silently standing or sitting on their roofs...watching, waiting. A flare-up here, a pop, a crackle...heat. As light comes so does hope that today's aerial assault will be victorious.

Friday Bulletins

The hills of La Canada are going up in flames. The Moffitts are packed and ready to leave at a moment's notice. This is serious stuff. Pray for everyone in the SoCal fires.


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Second, hmmmm. Over at Robert Swartwood's http://www.robertswartwood.com/?p=294 he's giving away a free copy of the "an old issue of Futures Mysterious Anthology Magazine, issue 33, published in 2004, which contains my [Rob's] story “Persistence” …"If you comment on his post about something you are persistent about, he will enter your name in a drawing to win a copy of the magazine. SIGNED.

Rim Shot at 3 A.M. + String of 10 INFO!! + Hint, Hint! It's almost over!

RIM SHOT

I feel so lucky to have a story at 3 A.M. Check it out when you have time. Rim Shot at 3 A.M, click here to read: RIM SHOT.

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FLASH FICTION CHRONICLES STRING OF 10 CONTEST
And I've been reading contest entries for the FFC String of 10 contest--our first ever!!! This weekend I sent the top eleven out to six other judges to rank them from thebest to least-best and make comments. Hopefully, I will receive these back by the end of this week and be able to notify everyone as to the results sometime next week.

CONTEST OBSERVATIONS
These observations are more about me and my reading experience than about any one entry. However, I am sharing them with you so that if and when we sponsor a fresh new contest, those who read this and enter will be at a distinct advantage.

1)Titles
All fiction stories benefit from a well-thought out title. A title should reflect the overall story if possible. One classic rule says that a title should be the character's name (Antony and Cleopatra, Ethan Frome, Moby Dick) or the setting (Howard's End, Mill on the Floss, Our Town), both character and setting (The Old Man and the Sea, Alice's Adventures in Wonderland), or they reveal theme, in abstraction (Sound and the Fury, War and Peace, From Here to Eternity) or suggest theme in a specific object or event (The Golden Bowl, Light in August, The Sheltering Sky), or character or setting that reflect theme (The Heart is a Lonely Hunter, Paradise Lost, The Grapes of Wrath).

Titles should enhance the story, add to it in some way, yet not telegraph so much that there is no surprise left at the end. Specific ambiguity? Is that possible? I think so. This is even more important when writing short fiction. Whenever there is a word limit as in this 250-word contest, every word MUST count. The title gives the writer another way to set up, entice, and pay-off the reader, and title words are FREE, above and beyond the word count of the work itself. So use a title. Writing isn't just random thoughts. It's thinking carefully about all the ways you can help the reader have an emotional response to your story.

2. Surprise
Many stories lack surprise and surprise is what jolts a reader into having an emotional response. I don't mean just a twist ending either. Surprise is more than that.

First, surprise comes to the reader when a setting is specific and interesting. When there is no setting established at all, the reader is left in a blank empty space, and readers, like Mother Nature, abhor a void. A writer can engage a reader with a few small details that create a unique place in which the story can exist.

Second, surprise comes to the reader when a character is unique. When there is something different than we expect about the person, his attitude, his way of speaking, even his appearance. A wise teacher once told me (and our class) to always do something unique to a character, give him a headache, a limp, a funny haircut that reflects in some way who that person is. Actually he used "a toothache" as an example, and I watched a movie in which the character had a toothache throughout and that toothache paid off in the end in his own behaviour. I thought aha, Gordon's toothache! Dang. I can't remember what it was, something by Russell Banks I think.

Third, surprise --and delight--happen when the language is full of vivid specific detail, images that pop off the page, clear and precise and visual.

Fourth, surprise happens when an ending provides both the unexpected and a sense of the inevitable. The reader might guess from the title, the specific character traits of the hero, the dangerous setting, that the story may end badly, but the reader should not know the exact details of that ending (I am thinking here of The Old Man and the Sea here or Of Mice and Men).

It is in the details that the reader will be surprised and satisfied because though the writer may have promised an unhappy ending, he ends it with epiphany or an unthought-of-sadness. The twist must NOT be the pulling out of a gun that the reader didn't know a villain had, but rather the pulling out of the gun the reader knew he had, and then decides not to fire.

So yes, twist the ending, but don't create surprise with a non-sequiter. Classic rule from Master Chekov: If there is a gun on the mantle in the beginning, use it by the end. And the reverse is also true, if you are going to use a gun in the end, put it on the mantle in the beginning, but do it all subtly because...

The real surprise should come with the revelation of the human spirit. We need to know the person, the character a little before we can appreciate the surprise. Can it be done in 250 words? Yes.

3) Cliched story plots
Third and last observation for today. It's hard for a new writerto know what a cliched plot is. Everything feels new to him because he hasn't written before. But what's new to the writer isn't necessarily new to the reader, especially an editor. Therefore if you are going to write about illness, revenge, execution, suicide, dead mothers, boy meets girl, Martians landing on the earth, and football quarterbacks, etc, then it is important to pay attention to the details of your story and create unique characters, unusual settings, screwy attitudes, a strong identifiable voice, anything that lifts the cliched plot above the mundane. Most of the time this means a lot of writing practice and thoughtful revision. Reading every line, every word, and doing the revision without overworking it. Not easy, but it comes with working at it every day, just like playing the basoon.

The classic belief in storytelling is that there are only 5-12-24 actual plots in the world, and that's true on some levels. It's what the writer brings to a cliched story that makes it good. This has been proven over and over by Will S, Charlie D, John S, Edith W, Charlotte B, Tommy Hardy, Margaret A, Carole S, Willie F, and even Stephen K.

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HINT FICTION SUBMISSIONS DEADLINE APPROACHES

August 31 is rapidly approaching and all hint submissions will need to be sent to Robert Swartwood, editor of the H.H. Norton Anthology of Hint Fiction soon. the link to the guidelines is above. Check it out and get to work.

String of 10 Over except for the rest of it

I'm back from vacation and pleased to announce the Flash Fiction Chronicles String-of-10 contest received 50 entries. In the internet world, that's not all that many, but FFC is relatively new and we are not HIT champions yet, so I'm pleased.

I've copied and pasted all the entries into MSWord, stripped off names, done word-count checks, (three of the entries were over the 250 word-count limit. Sorry you guys, but you can't win), printed them, shuffled them up, and set them aside.

I'll read them this week-end after I forget all the stray words and titles that caught my eye during the strip-it-of-ID process. Thank goodness, at my age, forgetfulness is without choice!

After I select the top 10, I will forward them to judges to help pick the top three. Each judge will rank the stories I send them from #1 to #10, making their absolute favorite #1, second favorite #2, 3rd #3, down the line. Adding up the "rankings" from each judge will give us the top three winners. The most #1 votes will yield the lowest score and that will be our 1st Place winner, second lowest score will yield 2nd Place, and third lowest 3rd Place. All our decisions are final!

My goal is to comment on all of the pieces (50!!) briefly, so this exercise can be fruitful for everyone, I hope. Remember my comments will be my opinion and if you disagree with anything I might tell you, that's cool. Everyone has a different aesthetic and what doesn't work for me may very well work fabulously for someone else.

With that in mind, please don't email me back with angry protestations. If I receive nasty notes re comments, I will not comment in the future. And I'm hoping that we will be able to do the String of 10 again in the future.

What most writers want and need is feedback so they can become better at the keyboard. A kind word about what works and a clue as to why it doesn't is like Kool-aide to a hummingbird.

LAST DAY FOR SUBS TO STRING-OF-10

LAST DAY TO SUBMIT TO THE STRING-OF-10 CONTEST!

Don't forget the String-of-10 Contest is extended until Tuesday, August 18, Midnight, PDT! 250-words or less using the contest prompt. Click here for guides: GUIDELINES

Deadline for String of 10 has been extended to Midnight 8/18/09

DEADLINE EXTENDED TO TUESDAY, AUGUST 18, AT 12 AM PDT. This extension is due to a server malfunction that occurred during the first two or three days of the contest. We apologize to those who may have had their emailed submissions returned.

Flash Fiction Chronicles is having its very first contest for the best 250-word story written from the String of 10* ( words and phrases) posted below.

PRIZES

1st Place Winner will have his or her story published at Every Day Fiction in October and be paid the standard payment of $3.00 per story. A copy of The Best of Every Day Fiction, 2008 will also be awarded to the winner as well as an "I Write Every Day" t-shirt (see post before this one).

2nd and 3rd Place Winners will have their stories published at Flash Fiction Chronicles in October. There is no payment for publication at Flash Fiction Chronicles. A copy of The Best of Every Day Fiction, 2008 will also be awarded to both 2nd and 3rd place winners.

GUIDELINES

1. Read the contest's String of 10 Writing Prompt posted below*, on the FFC Daily Prompt Page, or at Gay Degani's Author Thread at Every Day Fiction.


2. The contest is open to stories of up to 250 words. Entries over the word limitation will be disregarded. There is no entry fee.


3. Submit via email addressed to flashfictionblog@everydayfiction.com. All entries must be copy and pasted into the body of the email. No attachments will be opened.


4. You may enter as many 3 separate and different stories up to 250-words each. All three must contain at least four words from the String of 10. Any stories without at least four words from the string of 10 will be disregarded.


5. All entries must be in English, original, unpublished, and not submitted or accepted elsewhere at the time of submission. Flash Fiction Chronicles/Every Day Fiction/Every Day Publishing reserves one-time publication rights to the 1st- through-3rd winning entries to be published at Every Day Fiction and Flash Fiction Chronicles.


6. Entries must be received via email by Midnight PDT Tuesday, August 18, 2009. Winners will be notified by September 20. Publication will follow in October.
   

Keep in mind: What matters most is your story, not the prompt words or quotation. However at least four words from the prompt must be used.

*PROMPT

STRING OF TEN: BLOW BACK-STORM-JAUNDICE-STEAM-TATTOO-SENSE OF FUN-CANTALOUPE-STREAKED-UMBER-DRIPPING SWEAT

*QUOTATION

And when is there time to remember, to sift, to weigh, to estimate, to total? --Tillie Olsen

FFChronicles First String-of-10 Contest

For the week of August 8 through August 16, instead of a new prompt each day from Daily Prompts,we are having our very first contest for the best 250-word story written from the String of 10* ( words and phrases) posted at Flash Fiction Chronicles.

PRIZES

1st Place Winner will have his or her story published at Every Day Fiction in October and be paid the standard payment of $3.00 per story. A copy of The Best of Every Day Fiction, 2008 will also be awarded to the winner as well as an “I Write Every Day” t-shirt.

2nd and 3rd Place Winners will have their stories published at Flash Fiction Chronicles in October. There is no payment for publication at Flash Fiction Chronicles. A copy of The Best of Every Day Fiction, 2008 will also be awarded to both 2nd and 3rd place winners.

GUIDELINES

Hints for Success in Submissions to Hint Antho

THE NORTON ANTHOLOGY Hint Fiction Submission period has officially begun.

1) Don't post your entries here at Flash Fiction Chronicles.

2) Email entries to mailto:hint.fiction@gmail.com

3) Read Robert Swartwood's guidelines. As with all submissions in the writing world, failure to follow the guidelines will lead you down the hopelessly dark road to not being read and appreciated. Guidelines are here: HINT FICTION GUIDELINES

4) Send your best work: It's August 2, only the second day after the editor began accepting submissions, and Rob has received over 150+.

5) Attention: South Dakota residents. Gleaned from Robert Swartwood's TWITTERAGE:

What does hurt my feelings is that STILL nobody from South Dakota has visited my
site. I'm going to start a campaign to fix the situation.