THE OUROBOROS BITES HIS OWN TAIL.
Ahem.
What I mean is, hey, once in a while someone emails me with an idea — “Hey, I think this would make a neat flash fiction challenge!” — and sometimes, that actually pans out. A lot of times, I fall asleep on my keyboard and accidentally delete your email. Sorry!
So, I thought, let’s streamline this process a little.
This week, your challenge is to come up with a flash fiction challenge.
Go to the comments.
Drop in a 100-word-or-less idea for a flash fiction challenge. If I like one and end up using it in the future, I’ll toss you some kind of prize — an e-book or e-book bundle or something. (And here’s where I am shameless and remind you that with coupon code ARTHARDERMF — which is to say, Art Harder, Motherfucker, not ARTHAR DERMF — you can get 25% off my gonzo writing e-book bundle, thus dropping the total cost for eight books down to $15. That coupon expires 6/23.)
(Oh, also — don’t forget the Awkward Author Photo contest runs till Tuesday.)
So, drop in your ideas — one per person, please, if you have it — into the comments below.
You’ve got one week: due by Friday, 6/26, noon EST.
(One more shameless plug: I’ll be at Seton Hill this Saturday, 6/27, in Western PA giving a big-ass writing talk if you care to hear me “Tell It Like It Is.”)
luckdancing says:
My topic is recursion…
June 19, 2015 — 10:49 AM
SamKD says:
Couple weeks ago I was driving while listening to Symphony Hall and set myself the challenge of “write a story about a bear and an oboe.”
June 19, 2015 — 10:52 AM
fadedglories says:
A real Romance between 2 very different creatures/people; if it’s werewolves or vampires you must deal with the desire to devour your mate. It can be weird, scary, SF, Fantasy …whatever.
But It must be LOVE, sex is optional, and must have a happy ending for both characters.
June 19, 2015 — 10:56 AM
todddillard says:
Write about things that drop or fall. It could be a whale tumbling to the earth, wondering if it’ll be their friend. It could be Bey dropping another album. A gaze. A raindrop colliding with a windshield and wondering why oh god why as a wiper smears its puddly carcass across the windshield. The trajectory of most of a bottle MacCallan 25 spilling onto a litter of kittens. Wanting to drop something because it’s hot but also covered in Gorilla glue. Gravity, all shapes, all sizes.
June 19, 2015 — 11:01 AM
Carla Lewis says:
A woman who has been released, after five years, from a mental institution ( for stalking her neighbor) is targeted by a serial killer, who likes to wine and dine his victims. The woman, naturally, becomes fixated on him.
June 19, 2015 — 11:05 AM
Mark Gardner says:
Here’s a twist on the collaborative multi-week flash fiction challenge: start with a 500 – 1000 word story with a great ending. The following weeks, people pick a story and write 500-1000 words BEFORE the story they chose.
June 19, 2015 — 11:05 AM
Adan Ramie says:
I love it, Mark!
June 19, 2015 — 11:07 AM
Mark Gardner says:
Thanks, Adan.
June 19, 2015 — 11:11 AM
DrunkenSpace Captain (@FunnyNotFound) says:
Love the idea of writing a story from end to beginning. Awesome idea, Mark.
I double stamp this suggestion.
June 19, 2015 — 1:25 PM
lazelle says:
That’s awesome I vote for Mark!!
June 19, 2015 — 3:26 PM
SC Rose says:
That sounds like fun!! I think I’m just going to go ahead and do this… lol
June 19, 2015 — 4:42 PM
Mark Gardner says:
Don’t tell Chuck, I posted this second idea before rereading the post and seeing that was verboten.
June 19, 2015 — 4:52 PM
SC Rose says:
I didn’t even catch that! lol No worries, your secret is safe with me. 😉
June 19, 2015 — 4:57 PM
Adan Ramie says:
Something heinous is growing out of your main character.
June 19, 2015 — 11:06 AM
Robert Sadler says:
I’ve had this thought for a long time and have been resisting the urge to bother you via email.
Here’s mine:
You (Chuck) find a youtube or movie clip. For example, a fight scene from an action movie.
The challenge is to write the scene as it would appear in a novel. I think it would be interesting to see how different writers would portray the action. What details and movements are important enough to call out in text? What internal thoughts can be added to the characters? How do you keep the pacing on point with the scene? How many different ways can you say “Character A punches Character B in the face”?
June 19, 2015 — 11:06 AM
Mark Gardner says:
That’s a nifty idea.
June 19, 2015 — 11:09 AM
Robert Sadler says:
Gracias.
June 19, 2015 — 11:10 AM
Mark Gardner says:
Another idea: It’s collaborative, because writing is already solitary enough. Write a singe-person perspective 500 – 1000 word story featuring at least four characters. Each week, pick a story and rewrite it from a different character’s perspective.
June 19, 2015 — 11:08 AM
SC Rose says:
Oooo! I like this one, too! I really want to try this! You’ve got some great ideas!!
June 19, 2015 — 4:46 PM
Mark Gardner says:
That’s because I’m a huge fan of collaborative writing!
June 19, 2015 — 4:52 PM
J.T. Carlton says:
THE WORST CASE SCENARIO: Writing a good inciting incident can be tough. For this challenge, we’re going to take conflict to the extreme. Start with a character, in some kind of situation. Toss in a liberal amount of the worst possible shit that could happen to him or her. Shake hard and serve on ice.
June 19, 2015 — 11:11 AM
katemcone says:
I *really* like this one. It reminds me of the advice “get your character in a tree, set fire to the tree, get your character out of the tree” (3-Act Summary by Billy Wilder).
June 19, 2015 — 11:45 AM
bethbishopwrites says:
I made a Tumblr of out of context toddler quotes, and there are many many bots that follow it. Most of the names are a combination of nouns, adjectives, and adverbs. Example: tenaciousbasementwerewolf. I planned to make my friends choose bot names for their characters and character backgrounds the next time we got together for pen-and-paper DnD, but it works well for a writing challenge too.
My challenge is to choose a bot name (from a list I would provide or a famous bot, such as the bot that tweets when anyone with a U.S. Congress email address edits Wikipedia) and create a story with that bot name as inspiration.
June 19, 2015 — 11:15 AM
Catkins says:
tenacious basement werewolf is the best band name ever
June 19, 2015 — 4:54 PM
Pavowski says:
You’ve done the opening line contest before – create an opening line, then another writer picks up that opening line and writes to it.
Invert it: one week we all write a closing line to a story, and the next week we write to somebody else’s ending.
June 19, 2015 — 11:21 AM
caszbrewster says:
I dig this.
June 19, 2015 — 1:45 PM
Fred G. Yost says:
Thumbs up from me. Sounds like a fun challenge.
June 19, 2015 — 3:12 PM
SC Rose says:
I like it!!
June 19, 2015 — 4:58 PM
Pavowski says:
Or another: Wolf in Sheep’s Clothing. Write a story about somebody masquerading in a place where they do not belong. (The motivation of eating the unsuspecting sheep you’re hiding amongst would be optional.)
June 19, 2015 — 11:23 AM
caszbrewster says:
You’re bringing your ‘A’ game Pavowski.
June 19, 2015 — 1:45 PM
Matthew X. Gomez says:
A sheer trip down the rabbit hole- the TVTROPES Challenge. Go to TVTROPES. Get three random tropes. Incorporate all three into a story. Say 1500 words.
June 19, 2015 — 11:24 AM
katemcone says:
Oh, this would be so much fun!!!
June 19, 2015 — 11:46 AM
Matthew X. Gomez says:
Thank you!
June 19, 2015 — 11:54 AM
Mark A. Sargent says:
The only problem here is that I would never get out of TVTROPES in time to actually write something. That place is like a black hole – once you start looking it’s all over!
June 19, 2015 — 12:03 PM
john freeter says:
This.
June 19, 2015 — 3:10 PM
Dae says:
That is EXACTLY what I was going to say. xD I love the idea, but I know I’d fall down the rabbit hole and never climb back out again.
June 19, 2015 — 4:05 PM
mannixk says:
I dig the RNG. Use it to get a city, animal and weapon to incorporate into your story. The city must appear as a city, the animal as an animal and the weapon as a weapon. In other words, no clumsy chef named Panda tripping over a crate of bottles in his new bistro The Moscow Kitchen.
City:
1.Vancouver 2.Tokyo 3.Amsterdam 4.San Francisco 5.Guadalajara 6.Munich 7.Cairo 8.Moscow 9.Sao Paulo 10.Bangkok
Animal:
1.Killer Whale 2.Meerkat 3.Cheetah 4.Panda 5.Shrew 6.Emu 7.Komodo Dragon 8.Moose 9.Capybara 10.Elephant
Weapon:
1.Cross Bow 2.Handgun 3.Frying Pan 4.Rope 5.Hunting Knife 6.Broken Bottle 7.Golf Club 8.Poison 9.Katana 10.Rocket Launcher
June 19, 2015 — 11:24 AM
Mikey Campling says:
Tear yourself away from your keyboards and screens, take a bus ride and as you walk down the aisle, take note of one person from the front and one person from near the back. Pick two people who seem very different from each other. Now, imagine that prior to this journey they were the best of friends. What’s happened that has driven a wedge between them? The main challenge is to complete this assignment without being arrested and/or beaten up.
June 19, 2015 — 11:34 AM
Jonathan Dayton says:
Take a random object ( insert random list) and write a story from the POV of the object. The event could be from a second random list.
Examples: half empty bottle of whiskey in a church confessional or operating room.
June 19, 2015 — 11:36 AM
UEL ARAMCHEK says:
A new rule or method of play is added to a classic game or sport which makes it unfamiliar or alien. A chess piece is added which has a mind of its own. Conditions are defined by which the soccer ball can defeat both teams. The flash fiction piece shows us the consequences of this change.
June 19, 2015 — 11:48 AM
ashleyakagaoan says:
That’s interesting! I like it!
June 19, 2015 — 8:50 PM
grahamwrites says:
I see a lot of discarded crap at the side of the highway on my commute every day: single gloves (always single, strangely), blown-out tires, machinery parts, dolls’ heads (a few times), other assorted toys, planks of wood. I wonder where they come from. What course of events has led to their being there? And therein lies the brief – 1,000 words or less around some object (not a dead body, of the human or animal variety) discarded on/thrown to the side of the road. It can be how it got there, what happened next or somewhere in between.
June 19, 2015 — 11:48 AM
C R Smith says:
Shoes…. always a single shoe. Why are so many shoes littering the medians and sides of roads everywhere? How does someone lose a single shoe? Shoes are kind of important to most people, and having only one would make walking uncomfortable. A friend of mine has a not-so-healthy obsession with photographing the various single shoes he finds on his commute to work.
Sorry to tangent your idea but this single shoe thing has been mothering me. I might need medication….or whiskey
June 19, 2015 — 12:37 PM
ashleyakagaoan says:
I always wonder about the shoes. Love that idea.
June 19, 2015 — 8:40 PM
fadedglories says:
Me too.
When you see a single shoe it sets up so many questions. I can’t think of another personal object that starts your imagination roaring in the same way.
I vote for this, it’d be great to see where we all ended up.
June 20, 2015 — 3:54 AM
elctrcrngr says:
My kid asked me one day why there were always so many mattresses on the freeway. This was in San Antonio where, for some reason, it is a huge problem, causes lots of wrecks. I made up the story of The Mattress Man, who drives around all day, tossing them off the back of his pickup. Then we actually saw a PU with, like, 15 mattresses stacked on top of the PU bed. Weird. Anyway, flash fic based on something strange you’ve seen another driver doing in the car next to you on the freeway
June 19, 2015 — 3:51 PM
Mikey Campling says:
So it’s not just me that wonders about that stuff! Thank goodness for that.
June 21, 2015 — 8:44 AM
Mark A. Sargent says:
Take something fantastic and make it somehow seem mundane in the context of the story. You can make anything seem fantastic if you spin it right, but what’s it look like without the spin? For example, a land that draws lots of excited tourists to see their herds of wild unicorns… only to the locals, they’re just ill tempered horses with horns, who gave you the idea they sparkle and grant wishes to virgins?
June 19, 2015 — 11:58 AM
Catkins says:
I don’t care if it doesn’t win, I’m doing this for a challenge anyway. Amazing
June 19, 2015 — 4:57 PM
Russell says:
You discover an earth shattering secret. To reveal it would save the world from war, hunger and disease. Keeping mum and capitalizing on this knowledge would make you the richest person on the planet.
June 19, 2015 — 12:03 PM
Anna says:
THINK OUTSIDE THE BOX. Think about who you are as a writer and write down five things that are typical of your work. Do you write strictly science fiction or literary pieces? Is there always humor in your stories? Is style more important to you than plot? Then write a 1000 word piece not using any of those elements. Really get out of your comfort zone and try something different. Smash that box into a thousand pieces and burn them, smear your face with Forbidden Ink, and do the Dance of Vigorous Plotting. (I like the zydeco-music version.)
(I had a long discussion about this with a guy from my critique group and ended up trying something that was very much not-me, and I actually ended up with a pretty cool story. I’m not saying that you should imitate someone else. The resulting story should still be recognizable as you, just with a bit of a twist.)
June 19, 2015 — 12:03 PM
Mark A. Sargent says:
But I like my box. It’s where I keep all my comfy plot stuff. I might do the ink smeared dance, though, that sounds like fun.
June 19, 2015 — 12:06 PM
katemcone says:
I propose the following:
THE COUCH POTATO CHALLENGE. Use your channel-surfing/netflix marathon habit to produce a story! Pick each of these from a different TV show: a) Main Character b) Sidekick c) crisis OR mission c) genre OR setting. Combine and see what happens.
For example:
Cordelia Chase (from Buffy/Angel) + Pete Lattimer (Warehouse 13) + Must Concoct A Three Course Meal (Top Chef) + While Solving A Murder (Murder Mystery/Police Procedural, like Castle)
Of course this can be altered to be more streamlined, but should include at least two characters, a crisis, and a setting.
June 19, 2015 — 12:06 PM
ashleyakagaoan says:
Fun idea!
June 19, 2015 — 8:49 PM
katemcone says:
Thanks! I think I should have clarified that they don’t have to be “the” character but the same archetype…
June 22, 2015 — 9:47 AM
Ken McGovern says:
I like mixing up my art to art harder motherfuckers (all rights reserved by the Wendigo Cheese Factory). That being said, the challenged issued will be to choose a song title from any artist and any time (60’s, 70’s, 80’s, etc.). The title of the song you choose becomes the title of your story. Write a story of 1500-2000 words using the songs themes or creating your own. A few examples that come to mind – Crazy Baldhead by Bob Marley & the Wailers, Green Manalishi by Fleetwood Mack, Fade Into You by Mazzy Star, Beat It by Michael Jackson, Burn One Down by Ben Harper, Man on the Silver Mountain by Dio or perhaps Beneath, Between & Behind by Rush. Whatever title grabs you take it and run.
June 19, 2015 — 12:08 PM
katemcone says:
This one would be a lot of fun! I’m imagining “Carry On, My Wayward Sons” by Kansas, “Bohemian Rhapsody” by Queen, or “Back in Black” by AC/DC.
June 19, 2015 — 12:53 PM
Katherine Hetzel says:
Done this one – it’s a real challenge to take the familiar song title and turn it into something other than the story of the song itself, if you see what I mean?
June 19, 2015 — 1:37 PM
Fred G. Yost says:
I love the idea of art begets art (one of my other ideas for this challenge was to find a public domain piece of visual art, preferably obscure, and challenge folks to write something inspired by the picture/photograph), and most of my writing is song inspired, but I think I might have trouble picking just one.
I’d almost want to set up a spotify playlist that everyone could contribute to, and after the songs hit 1000+, each writer would hit the ‘Shuffle Play’ button to get a random song title to work with.
June 19, 2015 — 3:10 PM
kimberleycooperblog says:
A short story using as many homonyms (words which are spelt the same but have different meanings) as possible. Eg hail (frozen rain) and hail (get someone’s attention with a greeting).
June 19, 2015 — 12:21 PM
52lettersinthealphabet says:
Wow 🙂 This is really interesting! I’ll have to remember it.
June 20, 2015 — 1:45 AM
Cabocalla says:
The main character is driving down the road with the radio on. The vocalist of a familiar song begins to sing directly to them.
June 19, 2015 — 12:25 PM
mannixk says:
This is a super creepy/cool idea. You should write this no matter what.
June 19, 2015 — 12:41 PM
Jemima Pett says:
Take the last line of your last week’s flash and make it the first line of this week’s – but in a different genre.
Alternate: take the first line… and make it the last one of this week’s. I might do that anyway.
Have a good week all – I’m off to celebrate my father’s 100th birthday – even if he didn’t make it. Check out White Water Landings if you’re interested.
June 19, 2015 — 12:26 PM
Miranda says:
A rabbit, surrounded by trees in the middle of a forest, standing on his hind legs and nosing upwards toward the glowing motes that are swirling down toward him. Are they fairies, fireflies… or something more sinister?
June 19, 2015 — 12:39 PM
Jemima Pett says:
In the unlikely even anyone’s interested – I did do the second version of this for Friday 26th. It’s a Pete and the Swede story 🙂
Should be live in one hour.
http://jemimapett.com/blog/2015/06/26/friday-flash-fiction–disappearing-act/
June 25, 2015 — 6:28 PM
C R Smith says:
Take a genre cliché and flip it 180 degrees. Werewolf pacifists, non-sexy vampires, aliens intent on peacefully living with humans despite the humans desire to eradicate them, ghosts that hate being seen by the living and try to escape detection. There are a boatload more.
June 19, 2015 — 12:44 PM
katemcone says:
Yes. This one. I love this idea.
June 19, 2015 — 12:51 PM
StarNinja says:
Zombies must escape rabid unreasoning zombie hunters, the evil empire that wins and how they do it, a post-apocalypse that’s nicer and more colorful than the pre-apocalypse, The Great Evil that must stop the Chosen One from saving the world! So many ideas!
June 19, 2015 — 7:56 PM
Fred G. Yost says:
Dirty Dealing: your character wakes up with a headache and a hole in their memory, a bottle of whisky in one hand, and a contract signed in blood in the other.
June 19, 2015 — 1:10 PM
Carl says:
The Spam Challenge: Go to your email spam folder. Take care not to open any malicious attachments, but take the subject line of a random spam email and write a story based on it.
June 19, 2015 — 1:27 PM
caszbrewster says:
hahahaha! that might be really interesting. Lots of insurance murder mysteries and trips to Nigeria.
June 19, 2015 — 1:47 PM
Katherine Hetzel says:
Colour your world; find a paint chart where the colours are all named (Best ones I’ve found are the Valspar range in B&Q in the UK). Pick a colour that you’re drawn to and note the title of it – that’s your prompt. Use it as a title, a theme, an object within the story… do with it what you will.
Been tried and tested in our creative writing group recently, so I know it works.
June 19, 2015 — 1:34 PM
Fred G. Yost says:
This sounds fascinating. Oooh! It looks like there’s a Valspar picker online. http://www.valsparpaint.com/en/explore-colors/painter/color-selector.html
June 19, 2015 — 3:03 PM
DrunkenSpace Captain (@FunnyNotFound) says:
A choose your own adventure story spanning three or four weeks of challenges.
Write 500-1000 word beginning to a story. End the section with the character about to make a choice. Include a list of 4 or 5 choices at the end of the story. Following weeks, pick someone else’s story to continue based on the choices you pick for the character from those given in the previous segment.
June 19, 2015 — 1:37 PM
Rick Cook Jr says:
You’re at a convenience store on the edge of town at midnight. A sketchy person approaches you, frantic, asking for a ride somewhere more than twenty miles in the opposite direction of your home. Despite reservations, you agree. Write the car ride.
Inspiration: I gave a tweaker a ride home earlier in the week.
June 19, 2015 — 2:18 PM
elctrcrngr says:
Oh, aren’t they fun? I don’t know how they talk so fast without making their tongues bleed
June 20, 2015 — 12:42 AM
Kristi S. Simpson says:
Write a story from the perspective of the ‘red shirt’ character. Perhaps a day in the short life of… Maybe they know they are doomed, or not.
June 19, 2015 — 2:25 PM
spoonfedbyaliens says:
OK, this is what I came up with:
In 2016, a collaboration between all of the worlds space agencies (Nasa, ESA and Roscosmos etc) results in them leaving a time capsule on a comet. The comet has a 2000 year orbit, The time capsule is intended to be collected the next time the comet is orbiting near the Earth. Write a 1000/1500 word story that:
1) Mentions the time capsule. (The time capsule does not need to be the stories main focus.)
2) Is set around 2000 years in the future.
June 19, 2015 — 2:43 PM
john freeter says:
Is this a real thing? Because it sounds awesome. The mutant cockroaches dominating the planet should love checking the capsule out 2000 years from now.
June 19, 2015 — 3:18 PM
StarNinja says:
Let’s not forget the intelligent penguins that rule during the new ice age. They never get their due. It’s always those damn cockroaches, you know?
June 19, 2015 — 8:00 PM
Ashley Kagaoan says:
Write a continuation of the last dream you had. Feel free to change the names of persons involved.
June 19, 2015 — 2:49 PM
Senjii says:
The Toothfairy and Easter Bunny team up to murder Santa Claus.
June 19, 2015 — 2:59 PM
Fred G. Yost says:
One more, just because it seems fun.
This Is Why I Was Born:
Your character(s) encounter(s) a situation where they are convinced they will excel or they are attempting to convince others. Weeks/months/years of training, or destiny, or just a highly tuned sense of the dramatic come to what seem to be a logical conclusion. It could be something serious or silly, they could be successful or unsuccessful in their endeavor. You have 1500 words to deal with the fallout from this phrase being written/spoken/thought.
June 19, 2015 — 3:00 PM
Nick says:
How about a memento challenge? Have the random number generator pick the genres (two sounds about right) and the challenge is to write a story from ending to beginning. Maybe 1000 words.
June 19, 2015 — 3:00 PM
Senjii I says:
The tooth fairy and easter bunny team up to murder santa claus.
June 19, 2015 — 3:05 PM
Laura Roberts says:
Write a sexy story without referring to any of the body parts by their real names. Go as euphemistic as possible. Make me laugh!
June 19, 2015 — 3:12 PM
john freeter says:
Done!
https://johnfreeter.wordpress.com/2015/03/29/a-day-at-the-farm/
June 19, 2015 — 3:15 PM
john freeter says:
Take a sad/depressing experience from your life and write it out as a comedy. 2000 words.
June 19, 2015 — 3:13 PM
Susan K. Swords says:
Fic’d from the Headlines: Take a headline from a legit news organization, either hard-copy (if you still read newspapers and magazines like I do) or online, and make it your own. Write your version of the story, in any genre but completely different than what actually happened.
June 19, 2015 — 3:22 PM
rgoose says:
I posted one very similar to this – sorry I didn’t mean to bite your style! Guess I’m not the only one who likes to spring creativity from the real world… And not the only one who actually reads newspapers and magazines hahaha 😉
June 19, 2015 — 5:42 PM
SKSwords says:
Great minds think alike, and all that. I agree that sometimes the strangest fiction can come from the most straightfoward facts. I still like holding a newspaper or magazine in my hands when I read. The smell of the ink and paper is like nothing else!
June 20, 2015 — 9:28 AM
Dae says:
My girlfriend and I are fond of using a tarot deck as prompts, so my suggestion is this:
Use a random number generator (1-78) to pick two cards. The first 1-22 are the major arcana in order; 23-36 are the ace through king of Wands; 37-50 are ace-king of Swords; 51-64 are ace-king of Cups; 65-78 are ace-king of Pentacles.
One card (either one) represents the protagonist of your story. The other suggests the framework for the story itself. 1500 words.
(This card reference page is a good one: http://www.learntarot.com/cards.htm )
June 19, 2015 — 4:16 PM
Catkins says:
flash fiction community challenge, writers write to reach people, so my challenge is that your story has to reach someone, quite literally: write a short story about something that will cheer up or inspire or otherwise have a connection with people. 1000 words. Then print it out or write it out neatly and put in an envelope marked “open me” and leave this in a public place.
change someone’s life in a small way with your words.
June 19, 2015 — 4:53 PM
Rick Cook Jr says:
Later, on the news, “Bomb scare in New York from suspicious envelope in crowded public space”
June 19, 2015 — 5:16 PM
rgoose says:
HAHAHA that is exactly what I was thinking… Maybe best to not try this one? Then again, this in itself is a great flash fic challenge: a mysterious envelope on a park bench sets off a crazy string of events and just turns out to be an inspirational story about a 3-legged dog! Awesome.
June 19, 2015 — 5:48 PM
rgoose says:
OK, I have one: the Headline of 20/20 Hindsight.
I often find myself reading news headlines and imagining them as THAT news story that marked the beginning of the end of the world as we know it. For example, we start with the first Headlines about MERS outbreak in Korea, then most of the world population is wiped out by it cus it mutates and we look back on the first news reports and wonder “if only we had realized…”
So that is my Challenge Challenge: pick a news headline that seems mundane – or at least relatively small in scope – and use it as an ominous warning of something BIG that ends up happening. You can start from the day that the Headline occurs and narrate the events as they unfold, or you can fast-forward to a radically different future that “all started on the day when…”
1500 words, and an actual Headline/Article must be referenced appropriately so readers can look it up.
June 19, 2015 — 5:37 PM
StarNinja says:
It all began that day. That day when Ralph Roberts died. The stars were right, the signs were fixed. Comcast would rise with new blood.
http://money.cnn.com/2015/06/19/media/comcast-founder-dies/index.html
Who could have foreseen?! The wars of light and sound, a war over minds and hearts! And yea, Time Warner did strike with a mighty fury and sundered the cable world in twain while Comcast fought with desperate rage. Now Comcast alone sits on the Throne of Thrones, ruling the world with an optic fiber fist clenched tightly on our purse strings. Woe to thee, who has yet to see these things. Woe to thee!!!
Ahem, well that was weird.
June 19, 2015 — 8:16 PM
rgoose says:
Haha, well that escalated quickly. I like it.
June 23, 2015 — 3:32 PM
JQ Davis says:
Flip the Urban Legend. 1500 words. Genre of choice. Take an urban legend–the crazed killer in the backseat discovered by the good samaritan, for example and flip out. Make the antagonist the victim (or hero) or otherwise twist the legend.
June 19, 2015 — 6:53 PM
JQ Davis says:
LOL. Flip it (the legend) not flip out. Unless the you really want to. In that case, who am I to spoil your fun?
June 19, 2015 — 6:57 PM
StarNinja says:
“Thanks for picking me up,” said the crazed killer. “It was getting cold and I haven’t eaten in days.”
“Don’t worry. I’ll take good care of you,” said the Samaritan with a devilish grin.
Oh jeez. You’ve opened a door, JQ Davis. You’ve opened a door!
June 19, 2015 — 8:07 PM
JQ Davis says:
POV is always fun to play with. 🙂
June 20, 2015 — 7:10 AM
Marisol Riddell says:
Write a story about how winning a flash fiction story changed your life for the worse.
June 19, 2015 — 8:16 PM
ashleyakagaoan says:
The Last Kiss. Write a story about the last kiss two people share. Why is it their last kiss? What has happened? Who is saying goodbye? Did they say goodbye? Or did fate part them?
June 19, 2015 — 8:46 PM