The Word Cloud

Have conceived a wizard wheeze, a challenge to one's writing skills:

Write a complete story in a single sentence. You are allowed a title, but the story itself must be a single sentence, normally constructed (ie, not a 500 word opus without punctuation).


Example:

From the diary of Sir Montague Fotherington-Bongwater, K.F.C.

Had to call out the Fire Brigade to get the groundskeeper down off the flagpole; still, at least he finally managed to get the fountain unblocked.


Please post your efforts below, and feel free to comment upon the efforts of others.

Short Stories:- Many writers wrote short stories, cut their teeth on them if you like. There are various definitions and I won’t debate which is right. They are normally something like two thousand to five thousand words long and need to tell a story. Often they are a slice of life, often there is a twist in the tail. For me they are a story which is short.

Joanne Harris, in her foreword to Jigs and Reels says that a short story can startle, ignite, illuminate and move in a way that the longer format cannot. They provoke questions whereas novels try to answer them. I agree. They are different and to do them well is a challenge. Sticking with JH, note that although she had been writing (“trying to” – as she puts it) short stories for years, it is only as a successful novelist that her short stories finally found their way to publication.

I usually log onto the IMDB after I’ve seen a movie I like and check out the credits. It’s interesting to note that a lot of films started their lives as a short story. Clearly I don’t mean the action CGI stuff or equally the Harry Potters, rather it’s more predominant in older films; but it tells us something.

Competitions:- Personally I am a fan of writing competitions. They provide what I call “forced motivation”. Forced motivation is essentially working towards an externally imposed goal. For someone with a contract to fulfill the motivation is there in their face and doubtless other places from time to time. For those who write while aspiring to be published discouragement usually carries no consequence outside their own head. By which I mean there is no-one to shout at us, cajole or encourage us if we flag, or become despondent, or just slack off. A competition provides something to aim for, so I like them.

We get a lot of helpful and constructive advice from the population of the Word Cloud, both from the professionals/successfuls and from the aspiring amongst us. This is a good place, principally about writing. I think we should be appreciative of the Writer’s Workshop for establishing and running the site for us. Also we should bear in mind that they have a living to make and can’t dedicate much time to things like competitions, certainly not biggish ones. Besides, writing is a self reliant sort of thing.

With all this in mind I set up a short story competition cum challenge. I made some rules, not too onerous but enough to level the playing field, I hope. There are no incentives other than the pleasure of participating and for the winners; the pleasure of winning is the only prize. It’s a democratic selection in that it is an election amongst peers, which should smooth out any personal preference if say I was to judge it myself or any other one person did.

I have written this blog to say that there are seventeen short stories here:

http://www.thewordcloud.org/groups/profile/3757

and I think they are rather good and worth a read. To vote for a winner you must have participated, but anyone can read, enjoy and comment and I encourage you to take a moment to look. There is genuine talent in this community. If you think you might have wanted to participate, then encourage me and I could be motivated to set up another. Or perhaps you might like to try your hand.

Just wondered how everyone was getting on who is entering AlamP's Challenge. It always takes me an age to find it when I come back to it. So I thought I'd post a link again, to help anyon else having the same problem (or maybe it's just me.) Anyway, here it is:

http://www.thewordcloud.org/groups/profile/3757

I've written my entry this weekend and managed to cut it back to within the word count allowed. I've still got a couple of weeks to leave it and then do a final polish before it's time to post it.

Good luck, everyone.

Paradise Falls needs to breathe before my final plunge into it and releasing it upon an unsuspecting Harry and his crew. So I have decided to challenge myself, which is unusual because normally I abuse myself but you don't want to know about that... do you...?

Anyway... the idea is this;
I am going to write 30 chapters in 30 days at 3,000 words per chapter. Now the cool part about this is that I write well over 3,000 words when I drone on and on and on in my blogs, so when I get the bit between my teeth I can so do this. Granted the 30 chapters are not going to be perfect, I'm not that good, but what they will have is the makings of a quick book.

And this is where, dear loyal if distinctly misguided, followers you come in;

I am going to predict, in my own twisted and sick way,  the future.

I am going to write thirty "blogs" on any subject you chose but from my dystopian vision of the future. And I'm going to make you laugh (or cringe). And I am going to do one a day for a month, non-stop. I shall duly return the rough blog to you by PM for your approval and once all thirty are written, I shall undertake the editing, correcting, implementing your suggestions and generally cleaning up necessary before I part with my hard-earned cash to Harry for formal lessons on rewriting it so it works!

So, ideas please for chapters. 

To get you started here are some of the subjects I have in mind already; "Space Travel", "Entertainment (Books, TV, Films etc.)", "Football", "Politics", "Health Service" and... "The Sex Industry".

So... do you reckon you can help?


Ez