I’ve gotten a lot of people telling me how much they loved the previous Game of Aspects challenges, so —
WE SHALL DO IT AGAIN.
And we’ll do it even bigger this time.
But! Before we do, I need your help.
Or, someone’s help.
I want to do this game of aspects thing as a website. Like, imagine that there’s a website that every time you click it, it gives you a new combination of flash fiction story seeds based off these types of lists. Maybe there’s a front page that lets you customize some aspect — maybe no front-page. I dunno. Anyone out there savvy enough to talk me through this? You can hit me up in the comments or at my terribleminds-at-gmail-dot-com email address. My thanks in advance, you wonderful humans.
Now, onto the game.
This time, again you can either go do the Random Number Generator at Random.org, or you can instead use a d20. Not a d10 this time, word-whippers. A MOTHERFUCKING d20.
So, let’s get on with it. You know the drill — you’ve got three categories below
You’ve got Subgenre / Conflict / Element to Include.
Pick one from each category either randomly or by your own hand (though randomly is the most fun), then write a flash fiction short story no longer than 1000 words. Post at your online space, link back to it in the comments here, and voila. Easy-peasy, George-and-Weezy.
Oh, EDIT: Due by Friday, October 5th, noon EST. I won’t pick favorites until after that weekend is over, as I’ll be in Loverly Georgia (state, not country), at the Crossroads Writing Conference.
Once again, as I’m having so much fun with this, I’ll send my favorite story a prize.
No idea what the prize is. We’ll just call it a MYSTERY BOX.
On with the lists!
Subgenre
1. Men’s Adventure
2. Dieselpunk
3. Post-Apocalyptic
4. Southern Gothic
5. Comic Fantasy
6. Superhero
7. Hardboiled
8. Wuxia
9. Weird West
10. Wild West
11. Yuri
12. Whodunit
13. Science-Fantasy
14. Magic Realism
15. Spy Thriller
16. Black Comedy
17. Alien Invasion
18. Time Travel
19. Twisted Fairy Tale
20. Fanfiction
Conflict / Problem
1. Lover’s Quarrel!
2. Civil War!
3. Heist Gone Wrong!
4. Assassin!
5. Abduction!
6. Exiled!
7. Haunted By The Past!
8. Sins Of The Father!
9. Betrayed!
10. A Changed World!
11. Trapped!
12. A Quest For Something!
13. A Quest For Someone!
14. Revenge!
15. Enemies At The Gate!
16. Family Thrown Apart!
17. Disease!
18. Lost!
19. Get The Band Back Together!
20. Sanctioned Competition!
Element to Include
1. Unicorn
2. Sentient Supercomputer
3. Sea Monster
4. Plane (or Spaceship) Crash
5. A Dead Body
6. A Summoning Ritual
7. A Hallucination
8. Flying Monkeys
9. A Hologram
10. The Devil
11. A Dirty Magazine
12. An Ancient Sword
13. The Restless Dead
14. A Gourmet Meal
15. A Severed Hand
16. Poisonous Snakes
17. A Black Hole
18. Some Manner Of Werecreature/Shapeshifter
19. A Talking Tree
20. Heaven
Mike says:
Love this concept.
5 – 10 – 20 prompts?
20 seems too easy. I would prefer site gives no more than 10 to choose from
October 1, 2012 — 3:40 PM
John Vise says:
hee, Hard-boiled, Heist gone wrong, with poisonous snakes.
Sadly, some of this was inspired by real life and no, I won’t say which parts.
http://wp.me/pJy7b-4z
October 1, 2012 — 3:55 PM
T.A. Saunders says:
Been awhile since I’ve done a Flash Fiction challenge, so I thought I’d jump in. The first two rolls I got went hand and hand pretty well, but the third one kind of made me scratch my head for a while trying to figure out how to make it work. I got: Post-Apocalyptic/Disease!/A Talking Tree
http://fictionfoundry.wordpress.com/2012/10/01/hangmans-tree-chuck-wendig-flash-fiction-challenge/
October 1, 2012 — 6:55 PM
Jamie Wyman says:
19, 19, 1. And here it is. “Someone Like You” http://jamiewyman.blogspot.com/2012/10/aspect-ratio-flash-fic.html
October 1, 2012 — 8:20 PM
Jared Domenico says:
3, 13, 14 which are….
Post Apocalyptic, A Quest For Someone, and A Gourmet Mea-
Wait, this is the Beyond The Beef quest from Fallout: New Vegas. I’m rerolling.
October 2, 2012 — 1:33 AM
Jim Franklin says:
I got ‘Twisted Fairytale’, ‘Revenge!’ and ‘A severed hand’ and the following is exactly why I shouldn’t write children’s books.
Naughty Rob, Bob and Todd get their comeuppance in – ‘The Three Naughty Friends’
http://www.thezombiechimp.com/2012/10/02/flash-fiction-three-naughty-friends/
October 2, 2012 — 10:37 AM
Andrea Speed says:
Well, here’s my fiirst attempt. I might try another before the deadline, because this was fun. http://andreaspeed.com/2012/flash-fiction-the-last-job/
October 2, 2012 — 10:32 PM
Colleen Simpson says:
And here it is – http://cmsimpson.blogspot.com.au/2012/10/marrietta-and-wreck-of-partying.html
October 3, 2012 — 12:04 AM
Gary Weller says:
And here I thought this story combination would be easier.
Science-Fantasy / Enemy at the Gates / The Restless Dead.
I submit for your approval,In Memoria Tempest Cupido
Cheers!
October 3, 2012 — 10:12 AM
Steph Sinkhorn says:
Behold, my contribution to the madness. Science-Fantasy / Assassin! / An Ancient Sword
http://maybegenius.blogspot.com/2012/10/chimera-flash-fiction.html
October 3, 2012 — 10:37 AM
Kelly Johnson says:
The random number generator gave me 6.Superhero / 19.Get the Band Back Together! / 8. Flying Monkeys.
Here’s how they came together! http://countlesslives.blogspot.com/2012/10/flash-fiction-night-off.html
October 3, 2012 — 11:32 AM
The Haunted Sultan says:
A southern-gothic-quest-for-something-sentient-supercomputer-seven-hundred-word-kapow
http://sometimeswhenyou.wordpress.com/2012/10/02/gramma/
October 3, 2012 — 1:26 PM
Seabrooke says:
Great fun! I used Michael Woods’ random generator he posted at Abulafia Wiki and got Superhero / Abduction / Sentient Supercomputer. How could I resist.
Here’s my piece: http://seabrookeleckie.wordpress.com/2012/10/03/the-fuse-flash-fiction-challenge/
October 3, 2012 — 5:36 PM
Chris Mackey says:
Long time, no writey for the Wendig.
Magic Realism / Trapped! / A Summoning Ritual
/ Wal-Mart
http://hauntedchurches.wordpress.com/2012/10/03/terrible-minds-flash-fiction-the-epic-game-of-aspects-redux/
October 3, 2012 — 5:37 PM
Sporkdelis says:
Ok, here’s my try.
The Brother and Sister
http://sporkdelis.wordpress.com/2012/10/03/the-brother-and-sister/
October 3, 2012 — 6:10 PM
Beth L. says:
Here we are, magic realism, revenge, and a talking tree, featuring prominently in “Voicemail”.
http://knotachance.tumblr.com/
October 3, 2012 — 10:26 PM
Josh Loomis says:
The d20 of Destiny rolled a 20 (Fanfiction), a 3 (Heist Gone Wrong!) and another 3 (Sea Monster).
Time for more Magic: the Gathering fiction, then! Behold, the following tale, written for and about SCIENCE!
http://www.blueinkalchemy.com/2012/10/04/flash-fiction-the-blistercoil-harness/
October 4, 2012 — 8:18 AM
Jeremiah says:
Well the random number brothers assigned me:
9. Weird West
1. Lover’s Quarrel!
17. A Black Hole
I had to dig around in my brain for a while but I finally came up with something. Then I had to slice it down to 1,000 words so it came out a bit leaner than I was hoping, but I’m still happy with it.
http://www.jqpdx.com/2012/10/04/apology/
October 4, 2012 — 9:45 AM
Cate Morgan says:
The gaming gods declared I must word wrangle the aspects of Spy Thriller, Family Thrown Apart, and Poisonous Snakes. (Really? Did it have to be snakes?) Fellow Penmonkeys, I give you a little ditty I call “I, Spy”:
http://catemorgan.wordpress.com/2012/10/04/the-flash-strikes-back-i-spy/
October 4, 2012 — 1:40 PM
Chelsea says:
Magical realism, disease, ancient sword
I give you:
http://chelsearthompson.wordpress.com/2012/10/04/laboure/
October 4, 2012 — 5:43 PM
Derek McCullough says:
http://ideallyrealistic.com/2012/10/04/whack-a-mole/
17, 9 , 17
Alien Invasion, Betrayed!, Black Hole
These are some of my first words of fiction. Here’s to writing more… and more.. and more.
October 4, 2012 — 9:21 PM
Raphealite says:
I finally settled on post-apocalyptic, heaven, and haunted by past. This story flowed from my thoughts to my hands easily and eagerly, so much so that it was hard to contain the story to exactly one thousand words. I would like to expand this story one day, but for now, here it is:
http://adaydreamerswish.blogspot.com/
October 4, 2012 — 9:56 PM
Sue DeNymme says:
I rolled 7 (Hardboiled), 5 (Abduction!), and 4 (Plane/Spaceship Crash), which worked out pretty well. The result is at:
http://suedenymme.wordpress.com/2012/10/05/a-game-of-aspects-its-not-the-fall/
October 4, 2012 — 10:47 PM
Bookewyrme says:
I finally, FINALLY managed to wrestle my three aspects (Black Comedy, Assassin!, and Poisonous Snakes) into submission. So I present:
Bloody Snakes!
http://bookewyrme.straydreamers.com/epic-flash-fiction-challenge/
As always, big thanks to Chuck for putting this on! Big fun. 🙂
October 4, 2012 — 10:50 PM
Jeff Ellis says:
This week I got Wuxia, Haunted by the Past, and Flying Monkeys. I took Gift of Wukong a little further and even let some people beta read it. I hope the extra work shows!
You can find my piece here: http://firstwordproblems.wordpress.com/2012/10/04/the-gift-of-wukong/
October 4, 2012 — 10:55 PM
Joyce Juzwik says:
Post-Apocalyptic/Revenge/A Dead Body. I offer you A Matter of Honor
http://jfjuzwik.blogspot.com/2012/10/a-matter-of-honor.html
October 4, 2012 — 11:07 PM
Anthony Sweet says:
Here we go!
Comic Fantasy / Get the Band Back Together! / A Dead Body
“The Trouble With Harpists”
http://gamefulwording.tumblr.com/post/32925327127/flash-fiction
October 5, 2012 — 1:40 AM
Angela says:
I rolled Weird West, Assassin!, and Gourmet Food. Enjoy!
http://badpenmanship.com/flash-fiction-contest-the-bloody-boondoggle/
October 5, 2012 — 1:53 AM
Lara Britt says:
I have no idea what a d20 is or how to work the randomizer. I picked three that would fit the characters & setting of my WIP and created a spin-off scene. Whodunnit-Trapped-A Changed World.
http://larabritt.com/2012/10/05/wip-preview/
October 5, 2012 — 6:21 AM
Jon says:
Random.org gave me Alien Invasion/A Search for Someone!/A Gourmet Meal.
I give you Endgame.
October 5, 2012 — 9:24 AM
Amber J. Gardner says:
This was by far the strangest thing I ever wrote. My randomly chosen aspects:
Alien Invasion; Revenge; Sea Monster
http://amberjgardner.wordpress.com/2012/10/05/flash-fiction-challenge-epic-game-of-aspects-redux/#more-586
October 5, 2012 — 11:34 AM
Ian Brown says:
So I sort of botched my entry, but only realized that today while editing. I rolled 19 – Twisted Fairytale, 12 – A Quest for Something, and 13 – The Restless dead. I didn’t realize there was also a Quest for *Someone* category, so my quest for something turned into looking for another character. It’s also 62 words over the word limit. >_< But regardless, I wanted to share it anyway, so here it goes:
http://www.humming-rain.com/2012/10/05/flash-fiction-the-wolf-and-the-girl/
October 5, 2012 — 11:55 AM
Mike says:
Wow – lots of entries, will be a challenge to read even a fraction of them.
Mine was Southern Gothic, Trapped, The Restless Dead. A little over at 1165 words
http://www.ravensview.ca/ravens/2012/10/southern-hospitality.html
October 5, 2012 — 11:55 AM
Lara Britt says:
Ooops! Just looked at the original rules again. I listed Changed World and Trapped, but they are both of the same category. Ahh! But The Devil (Lucifer) and a dead body (that the hikers belong to) are in the third category. And I’ve got two out of the first category as well: Whodunnit & Wild West. Hope that gets me out of jail free. http://larabritt.com/2012/10/05/wip-preview/
October 7, 2012 — 4:07 AM
Remi Jones says:
Who won?
October 25, 2012 — 11:54 AM