Last week’s challenge: Conclude The Tale!
This week’s challenge is deceptively simple.
I want you to write one amazing sentence. A sentence that is part of a larger story but is not itself a story — a sentence that makes you want to read forward and backward, but is itself a capture of the tale. Just a slice.
(And then, next week, folks will choose a sentence to build an entire story around.)
Write one sentence — no more than 100 words, please.
Drop it in the comments below.
And that’s all you need to do.
But make that sentence as amazing as you can make it.
Go.
Eva Therese says:
When the rain finally came it started as a cool drizzle, barely more than a mist, which turned into a downpour that flooded the scorched and cracked earth and made the temperature drop like a fever breaking.
September 26, 2014 — 4:20 PM
Ashlee Jade says:
I like this one. It really captures the mood and how that first proper rainfall feels.
September 27, 2014 — 12:12 AM
Laurie Jameson says:
The tree’s skeletal fingers stroked the ground as if to comfort the girl who lay below.
September 26, 2014 — 4:21 PM
Kevin says:
Wow, I love this. Dark, powerful, and succinct.
September 26, 2014 — 5:16 PM
Laurie Jameson says:
Thank you very much Kevin.
September 26, 2014 — 5:59 PM
Chloe Turner (@TurnerPen2Paper) says:
The way forward wasn’t much more appealing, but there was less chance of being garrotted by an angry librarian, and there was no obvious sign of the gymnasts.
September 26, 2014 — 4:24 PM
Lynna Landstreet says:
A lot of these are pretty evocative, but for some reason this one particularly appeals to me… I suppose because it could go in a variety of more or less surreal directions. Depending, I suppose, on how literal the threat of garroting turns out to be…
Also, I initially misread “angry librarian” as “angry libertarian”. I’m not sure which version I like better.
September 29, 2014 — 11:54 AM
JJ Toner says:
I liked this one too. It’s specificity helps rather than hinders, and I’m married to a librarian. Those gymnasts sound vicious, or are they friends?
October 3, 2014 — 11:45 AM
EC Moore says:
I’ll tell you what happened, Cory got sick of himself and because Cory got sick of himself he got sick of his life, and we were a big part of that life, so he had to run away because the way he saw it, he had tricked us into loving him.
September 26, 2014 — 4:29 PM
Lawerence Hawkins says:
The way this sentence rambles tells a lot about the narrator and the setting vibe of the story. Kudos!
September 26, 2014 — 11:05 PM
EC Moore says:
You got it, thanks for the kind words.
September 27, 2014 — 3:21 AM
jonathan27lew says:
“Houston, Tranquility Base here, the Eagle has…GOOD CHRIST, WHERE DID THA–“
September 26, 2014 — 4:38 PM
miceala says:
I LOVE THE CONSTRUCTION OF THIS SENTENCE. Yes. Good. Yes. :p
September 26, 2014 — 7:48 PM
Lawerence Hawkins says:
Whoops. Love it.
September 26, 2014 — 11:05 PM
jonathan27lew says:
Thanks, guys!
September 27, 2014 — 2:55 AM
mangacat201 says:
This is fantastic. Starts out so innocuous, ends so predictably, but create an extraordinary amount of tension along the way.
October 12, 2014 — 12:44 PM
angelacavanaugh says:
I received visual confirmation through the thin spiral of wires that had been nestled into my cornea.
September 26, 2014 — 4:38 PM
Cathy Rakov says:
The Englishman helped me sit up and fed me toast points with tangerine marmalade that dripped on my white dress but I didn’t mind because the marmalade tasted so delicious I even scraped bits from my hem and licked it off my finger and felt so much better that the fog finally lifted from my head, but the frail-sounding Englishman wasn’t frail at all, he was beautiful, and the spitting image of Sir Paul McCartney at twenty, then he sang “I Wanna Hold Your Hand” in falsetto while we danced the monkey and fell to the floor laughing.
September 26, 2014 — 4:41 PM
cavalaxis says:
She gritted her teeth, her awareness torn between the familiar sting of the line slicing into her palm, the strange sensation of the bones in her shoulder separating, and the bright agony of the tentacle wrapped around her thigh, each little sucker with a hook dug deep into her flesh.
September 26, 2014 — 4:42 PM
leedunning says:
Springtime had come to the Abyss.
September 26, 2014 — 4:45 PM
Jen Spear (@blackskymetro) says:
There was a lesson in this somewhere, probably something along the lines of always get a receipt when you make a deal with the devil.
September 26, 2014 — 4:47 PM
sincerelyxdonnaxb says:
I LOVE this so much that I’m nerding out right now! I love the biting humor in it and I would read the story around this in an instant.
September 26, 2014 — 10:03 PM
Raven Blackburn says:
I love this one. Sounds like something I would read.
September 27, 2014 — 5:26 AM
SamuraiCowgirlMel says:
Yesssssss. Chomping at the bit for a story surrounding this one.
September 30, 2014 — 11:53 AM
Jack Soren says:
His short dark hair was tousled and his gray suit looked like he’d pulled it out of a tin can.
September 26, 2014 — 4:47 PM
brice says:
In her hand, i could see my organ donation.
September 26, 2014 — 4:49 PM
Lawerence Hawkins says:
That caught my damned attention. Bravo!
September 26, 2014 — 11:04 PM
Rose_Red says:
Holy crap
September 27, 2014 — 12:54 AM
colinjkeats says:
so many ways to take this. kudos!
September 27, 2014 — 3:07 AM
Brice says:
Thank you all for the kind words.
October 1, 2014 — 7:21 PM
cavalaxis says:
So then I says to him, I says, ‘Here, hold this feather and youse can fly!”; we was eating elephant for *weeks*!
September 26, 2014 — 5:12 PM
David says:
Thrice the ground beneath him rumbles, and as explosions bring the world to heel, he stumbles forward, a stranger in this war-torn land.
September 26, 2014 — 5:33 PM
ronnieleek says:
Today I watched a man die.
September 26, 2014 — 5:33 PM
smithshack71 says:
The house had no trash, no decaying food, not one dirty dish, and yet crawling along the grain of new floors, that covered old stains, were maggots.
September 26, 2014 — 5:55 PM
Opal says:
The earth shook, and in the heights of fury, shrugged her army to life.
September 26, 2014 — 5:57 PM
Steve Collington (@satyrelite) says:
The last image of her parboiled his eyes, weeping molten plasma down tracks of ashen tears.
September 26, 2014 — 6:04 PM
Leigh says:
I have never wished the death of another living being like I did the rooster who lived next door to us in Bocas del Toro.
September 26, 2014 — 6:06 PM
momdude says:
Your line captured my Muse’s fancy, Leigh. Thanks for the thought-seed!
http://pauljwillett.com/2014/10/09/flash-fiction-bocas-del-toro/
October 10, 2014 — 2:49 AM
Johann Thorsson says:
Handguns under pillows of the sleeping paranoid morphed that night into silver-gray scorpions that turned on the owners, stingers slipping into sleepers’ ears and then with a muted thud slipping off beds in search of others sleeping prone.
September 26, 2014 — 6:13 PM
smkay70 says:
It took Dominick three hours of wandering the streets wondering what type of fuckery was afoot–and who was responsible for it–before it occurred to him he might be dead.
September 26, 2014 — 6:17 PM
mangacat201 says:
That took a left turn at entirely the right pace. Loved the tone.
October 12, 2014 — 12:46 PM
Richard Steele says:
The invisible man stood in the river watching fish bump into his legs.
September 26, 2014 — 6:19 PM
Pavowski says:
“Take my hand,” he said, unscrewing it and placing it in mine.
September 26, 2014 — 6:26 PM
miceala says:
Well that did not go where I thought it would… Nice job! 🙂
September 26, 2014 — 7:46 PM
JJ Toner says:
Yes!
October 3, 2014 — 11:50 AM
jackiegamber says:
The cops would say it wasn’t premeditated; he hit me, I grabbed a knife, I defended myself; but what I was about to do next, as he squirmed and cried, looking up at me, bleeding out onto his linoleum–I was premeditating the hell out of that.
September 26, 2014 — 6:27 PM
vlazabal6981 says:
Forty miles of rain-soaked dirt road later, it finally hit me—this was really no place for my dinky Ford Focus, no matter who was on my heels.
September 26, 2014 — 6:48 PM
WCT says:
He became aware of his own existence for the first time, it seemed, in a strange, dark place with not one thought or conscious perception to note, but it wasn’t long before questions filled his head.
September 26, 2014 — 6:55 PM
WCT says:
Sorry guys. That kind of contradicted itself in one spot. Oh well, my bad.
September 26, 2014 — 8:18 PM
Rachel says:
The debauchery at the king’s funeral was topped only by Prince Virgil’s coronation.
September 26, 2014 — 7:18 PM
DebE says:
The first time they’d needed to pretend he was dead, the solution had been simple: kill him.
September 26, 2014 — 7:27 PM
miceala says:
This is me throwing handfuls of liking-ness at this sentence! It has soooo much potential for flanking framework, plot-wise! Nice job. 🙂
September 26, 2014 — 7:45 PM
DebE says:
Thank you.
September 26, 2014 — 8:11 PM
Lawerence Hawkins says:
I dig it – it says a lot about the tone and likely events to follow and precede!
September 26, 2014 — 10:44 PM
bethini says:
It wasn’t even a sex thing: there was something about her that made me want to do anything just so she’d find me interesting, because if she found you interesting, then you knew you’d made it.
September 26, 2014 — 7:39 PM
miceala says:
Then finally, the scars would stop whispering.
September 26, 2014 — 7:44 PM
DebE says:
Woo.This is interesting. Literally whispering scars? I’m taking it literally…
September 26, 2014 — 8:12 PM
colinjkeats says:
concisely awesome
September 27, 2014 — 3:04 AM
miceala says:
Thanks!
September 29, 2014 — 3:24 PM
colinjkeats says:
I am going to use this. Will send the link later 😉
October 5, 2014 — 7:43 PM
colinjkeats says:
http://colinjkeats.wordpress.com/2014/10/06/slice/ Thanks miceala
October 6, 2014 — 10:05 AM
Trevor Johnson says:
Hello. I decided to try to work something up using your sentence. Only 50 words total though, which was very difficult. Seven words were yours, I tried to do them justice with the other 43. And it had to be a ghost story also. I don’t have a link because I submitted it to a flash fiction contest. It was written and revised quickly, but it was fun! If you or anyone else is interested, here’s the link to the site hosting it.
http://www.scottishbooktrust.com/writing/love-to-write/the-50-word-fiction-competition
I’ll let you know if the story wins. Hope some others decide to enter, and if you do, good luck!
October 8, 2014 — 12:03 PM
Daryl Castro says:
Winter came on summer and froze us all to death.
September 26, 2014 — 7:57 PM
Helen Espinosa says:
Agonized screams danced on the wind and whipped around her as she stood in the deserted street, the horizon a bright red glow behind her.
September 26, 2014 — 8:17 PM
Mozette says:
Slotting the old key into the lock of the front door of the house, Kevin hesitated as he heard whispers emanating from within the emptiness of the place; as he turned it, the whispers ceased and his gut turned cold – this was a bad idea.
September 26, 2014 — 8:18 PM
Trish says:
This is great and so creepy! I can’t resist haunted houses, I think I’ll try it out.
October 3, 2014 — 7:21 PM
heartslonging14 says:
By the time Ansel was thirty-six years old, he had witnessed one-hundred and four executions.
September 26, 2014 — 9:26 PM
Lawerence Hawkins says:
Love this one – evocative and establishes the setting. My only thought is that ‘witnessed’ doesn’t give much of a reflection onto Ansel as a character. “Enjoyed”, “suffered through”, “faced” – a subtle word choice here can place Ansel as a supported, opponent, or potential victim of the setting.
September 26, 2014 — 10:43 PM
hearts_longing says:
Thanks! You’re quite right about how a careful word choice can send the story into completely different directions.
Too bad we can’t write on our own prompt next week, because now I’m imagining all the ways this tale might go and getting itchy to try them out. *wry grin*
September 26, 2014 — 11:04 PM
sincerelyxdonnaxb says:
It took me awhile, but I finally realized that it didn’t matter where you were from or what ethnicity you were, if they could take you, they would, and they ALWAYS did.
September 26, 2014 — 9:58 PM
jwelling says:
She nodded, looked at my name tag, and securing Uzi smiled an entirely different smile.
September 26, 2014 — 10:22 PM
Lawerence Hawkins says:
More than anything and in your name, beloved, I got down on both my knees and prayed to gods that you would hope and need and love and bleed and cry and suffer just as much as I have for you.
September 26, 2014 — 10:41 PM
C. Jai Ferry says:
On her twenty-fifth birthday, Tanya realized that she was the angel of death.
September 26, 2014 — 10:46 PM
Lynna Landstreet says:
Oh, I like that… Very tempted to go with that one when story time comes!
September 29, 2014 — 11:58 AM
JJ Toner says:
There’s a novel in this one. Great first line.
October 3, 2014 — 11:54 AM
OzFenric says:
From this distance, she suspected she could hit his leg; she certainly hoped so, because she had already broken her record for most people murdered in a single day.
September 26, 2014 — 11:14 PM
colinjkeats says:
very koontzy i like it
September 27, 2014 — 3:03 AM
Traylantha says:
The day the freaking AI whirred to life, I realized the mistake I’d made when it’s first word was “Finally!”
September 27, 2014 — 12:06 AM
Ashlee Jade says:
Something must be wrong with her, otherwise, why would she do such a thing?
September 27, 2014 — 12:13 AM
AB says:
I have the choice, to live or die, but I can’t make up my mind.
September 27, 2014 — 12:20 AM
sweetsoleah says:
In the aftermath he knew he had done the right thing, even though it made him the worst person on the planet.
September 27, 2014 — 12:22 AM
lisacle says:
Your sentence sparked a story for me. http://lisacle.wordpress.com/2014/10/03/flash-fiction-challenge-one-really-great-sentence/
October 3, 2014 — 6:25 PM
kristin nador says:
As she watched the descending sun transform the feathered wheat stalks into a succession of copper, flame, and misty purple, rage distilled from her body in concert with the blood weeping off the tips of the Japanese garden claw, his birthday gift to her, held fast in strained, resolute fingers.
September 27, 2014 — 12:48 AM
colinjkeats says:
nice!
September 27, 2014 — 3:03 AM
S. Nathan says:
“I think I’ve figured the subway out by now, though there was a quick stop somewhere at the edge of the Andromeda Galaxy, and I swear I saw the Colossus of Rhodes at some point.”
September 27, 2014 — 12:54 AM
JJ Toner says:
Yay! Douglas Adams lives!
October 3, 2014 — 11:55 AM
Ronit Jadhav says:
Ages passed as Time waved goodbye but the skies of Dawn and Dusk refused to let humanity’s path be paved.
September 27, 2014 — 2:47 AM
colinjkeats says:
Ten seconds was all the time it needed—all the time it took—to change lives forever and permanently change the world; ten seconds we’d never get back but would eternally wish to Hell we could.
September 27, 2014 — 3:02 AM
purplemetal75 says:
Yes, I killed that man.
September 27, 2014 — 3:13 AM
Sandra says:
The court fell silent; Kaleb was the first eleven year old to be charged with Crimes Against Humanity, and the first to plead guilty.
September 27, 2014 — 3:57 AM