Improving our 75 Word Stories -- READ FIRST POST

[The Judge]

Dusty, just realised I'd forgotten to respond to your piece.

I liked the story, which hit theme and genre squarely, and it was in my very short shortlist. I don't know much about Rip van Winkle, other than he slept for a long while, but that was enough. I only got the link from the last words of your story, so it acted a bit like one of my twist-in-the-tail entries, and when I re-read it I saw the clues you'd planted earlier which I enjoyed on an intellectual level. However, it didn't quite grab me enough for the vote. I agree pretty much with everyone above -- it was a little too bare in its setting/context for me, and with no emotional appeal it needed to be perfect to get the intellectual vote.

Hugh's point about time lag/losing pace hadn't occurred to me in those terms, but I had noticed a kind of vague over-wordiness in it, as if you wrote it in a rush and, pace Jane Austen, you didn't have time to make it shorter. Looking at it properly now, to my mind it would have benefited from much of the "What would you feed it?" paragraph being dumped, and going straight into returning it at once, without the delay of taking it to school. You could still have had the slorts giving it whiskers, as the children could have said something about feeding it before the adult says it has to be returned.

So good idea, but not quite up there with your best work.

 

[Bashfull]

I hope nobody objects to me posting my efforts for the last 75 word story challenge on here. I was too late to enter but would appreciate any feedback.

Rupert snorted as Mrs Turner tucked into trifle; the porker continued conversing with Captain Smith.

Pointedly, Rupert waved the dessert cart away. He could stomach the sight of this giggling glutton not a moment more. He would take the air – no doubt for years after Mrs Turner’s coffin crippled her pallbearers.

The ship shuddered. Rupert fell amidst crystal glasses, porcelain plates, and silver cutlery. The dessert cart crashed into one of the Titanic’s life-rings.

 

[Danny McG]

I like this one Bashfull.
My only questions are, were there life rings or belts actually inside the restaurant on the Titanic? (Just wondered how the dessert trolley could hit one as I thought they'd be out on deck).

Also, did they use dessert trolleys in the Titanic? I know you see them on modern holiday cruisers but, back in the day, liners were well staffed and I assumed they had lots of serving staff.(theoretical only on my part, I haven't bothered to look anything up before mindlessly blurting these questions )

 

[The Judge]

Hi Bashfull. Welcome to the Improving thread!

I'm a bit of a stickler when it comes to voting in the Challenges, and one of my perennial gripes is that some stories don't to me appear to meet the theme and/or genre. I'm afraid your story would be one I'd put aside for that reason, since I can't see the SF or fantasy genre aspect in it, and I'd also be in two minds whether there was quite enough there of a sea voyage to meet the theme.

Perhaps more importantly, I'm not convinced there's a proper story here, with a beginning, middle and end that are all connected, as to me it's more of a vignette. There is of course the irony that Rupert believes he will outlive the gluttonish Mrs Turner, whereas in fact he's likely to go down with the ship and she will survive, but irony alone isn't enough to create a story, I don't think. As it stands, the glutton gorging herself and Rupert's disgust and decision to leave, which take up the bulk of your word count, have no connection with the fate of the ship. (Incidentally, you also missed a trick by having her eat a trifle instead of a water ice, which would have added another layer of irony, and might have helped pull the story together a little more.)

As Joshua has said on the other thread, there is a knack to the 75 worders, and they can take a bit of getting used to. I'm confident you'll soon grasp it, though, as you'll be building on a sound technique. You write well, with some nice touches of description and word use (though I'd go easier on the alliteration personally!), you've grasped the importance of a grabbing opening line and a good ending, and Rupert's voice comes through loud and clear. Those are all vital things in the Challenges, so you're more than half-way there already!

If you'd like another practice run before the next Challenge starts on the 1st, have a look at some of the previous Challenges and find another with a theme and genre you like, and produce a story for it and put it up here. Also, have a read through some of the entries in the past and see how the ones which get the votes are written.

In any event, it's great seeing you here in the Challenges and I look forward to reading your future entries!

 

[Bashfull]

Thanks, Judge and danny. Much appreciated. The inspiration for the story came from an Erma Bombeck quote: "Seize the moment. Remember all those women on the Titanic who waved off the dessert cart."

I'll take a look at past challenges.

 

[TheDustyZebra]

I'm in favor of any story that can evoke Erma Bombeck.

However, I would have to agree that the SF/F element is missing, as well as the things that tie it together into a story. Nothing new to add there, so I won't.

 

[Parson]

I'm in the same boat (pun intended) as Dusty I haven't anything to add to what Her Honor said; but I have to add that I just read your avatar name as "BashBull" which I thought would make a pretty good handle as well.

 

[Joshua Jones]

I have to concur with the above as well. I tend to be pretty liberal with theme and genre (as my entry this month attests), but it would have gotten the ax from my listing as well, because this seems pretty firmly historical fiction. This, of course, is a fine genre, but not within the scope of this challenge, or for that matter, the forum.

Setting the genre aside, I agree with the positive and negative comments above, though I would add that the alliteration moved beyond neutral into negative, because I felt some of it was a bit forced. And, while I am a lover of pithy words as well, I thought some of them may have distracted from the story.

Overall, though, I thought it was a good story with a fair amount of potential, and I think you will be competitive sooner rather than later. I look forward to seeing what comes next!

 

[Bashfull]

Thank you, Joshua. I am afraid I was naive as, having read the historical fiction thread, I thought it was within the scope. Your (plural) feedback is useful.

 

[The Judge]

Actually, we've had historical fiction as a genre at least once before in the 75s, as well as alternative history, and either one may well crop up again in the future, so don't bin your historical leanings! And, of course, it's possible to tie in real history with a fantasy or SF genre with the addition of time-travellers or aliens, so history can still be there as long as the story meets the genre in other ways.

Personally when the genre is something like fantasy or SF, I prefer to see the SF/fantasy elements as integral to the story, but I know most voters aren't as fussy as I am, and sometimes simply a veneer -- eg having orcs in a story which would be identical if the creatures were in fact human -- is enough.

 

[Joshua Jones]

Actually, we've had historical fiction as a genre at least once before in the 75s, as well as alternative history, and either one may well crop up again in the future, so don't bin your historical leanings! And, of course, it's possible to tie in real history with a fantasy or SF genre with the addition of time-travellers or aliens, so history can still be there as long as the story meets the genre in other ways.

Personally when the genre is something like fantasy or SF, I prefer to see the SF/fantasy elements as integral to the story, but I know most voters aren't as fussy as I am, and sometimes simply a veneer -- eg having orcs in a story which would be identical if the creatures were in fact human -- is enough.

Good to know; I have not seen historical come in yet, and I assumed with the name of the forum that we didn't do it here. Learn something new every day...

 

[Luiglin]

Actually, we've had historical fiction as a genre at least once before in the 75s, as well as alternative history, and either one may well crop up again in the future, so don't bin your historical leanings! And, of course, it's possible to tie in real history with a fantasy or SF genre with the addition of time-travellers or aliens, so history can still be there as long as the story meets the genre in other ways.

Personally when the genre is something like fantasy or SF, I prefer to see the SF/fantasy elements as integral to the story, but I know most voters aren't as fussy as I am, and sometimes simply a veneer -- eg having orcs in a story which would be identical if the creatures were in fact human -- is enough.

I still think the tale I wrote for one of the historical 75s where the Dark Lord was responsible for the extinction of the dinosaurs to be entirely valid.

 

[Joshua Jones]

I will put mine out there too. I did get a fair bit of love with mentions and a couple votes, and I think it wasn't quite Fantasy enough (it was more like "fantasy"), but I am curious if, apart from genre concerns, if there were any other issues with this story. So, feel free to confirm if genre was the biggest issue you had, or if there was something else.

Thanks!

Out of the Frying Pan…

Elizabeth sniffed the air, scanning the horizon. The sea was still, but something wasn’t quite right. She readied her harpoon.

The deep erupted in a swarm of tentacles. Before she could shout “Kraken!”, Elizabeth was underwater. She stabbed the cephalopod and surfaced, gulping air.

Another abomination emerged, maliciously draining the ocean. Elizabeth, back onboard the Acheron, stared defiantly at the beast.

Then, it spoke.

“Pick up your toys, Elizabeth. Bath time is over.”

“But Mom…”

 

[The Judge]

Good to know; I have not seen historical come in yet, and I assumed with the name of the forum that we didn't do it here. Learn something new every day...

As well as lots of different aspects of SF and fantasy (eg paranormal romance, weird western, magical realism, post-apocalyptic, myth/legend, vampires, dark fantasy, fractured fairy tale, comedic space opera, new weird, dystopian, fable and gas lamp fantasy) we've had a number of other challenges from outside the SFF genre such as ghost stories, detective novel, hardboiled/noir, love stories, tall tales, metafiction, absurdist fiction, tudorpunk (no, we've no idea, either) and the still-agonised-over and never-to-be-repeated "in the style of Rudyard Kipling"! We've had quite a bit of variety over the years!


Regarding your entry, for me it was the genre question which doomed it, since although Elizabeth is fantasising, the story itself isn't fantasy. In another genre it fitted better, it might well have taken a spot on my short list, since it was well written with a lot of humour, though the trope isn't exactly original.

As to the story itself, I think you needed to make a little more of the abomination and the horror of draining the ocean before the twist is shown -- you could have removed some other clauses which didn't add anything to make room for it (eg "back onboard the Acheron" is a distraction there). In pernickity mode, I'd have used a colon after "spoke" and continued the mother's dialogue on the same line, and I'm in two minds whether you should have a comma in "But, Mom..." since one is usually required before a person's name is used in these circumstances, but here it reads better without it. Actually, I'm in two minds about that line as a whole coming there, since for me it dilutes the impact of the twist, but I can see how you want to make the child-mother relationship clear, since even with the twist it's a tad ambiguous.

Generally, as I say well-written and deserving of the mentions and votes, but for me it fell the wrong side of the genre line.

 

[Joshua Jones]

As well as lots of different aspects of SF and fantasy (eg paranormal romance, weird western, magical realism, post-apocalyptic, myth/legend, vampires, dark fantasy, fractured fairy tale, comedic space opera, new weird, dystopian, fable and gas lamp fantasy) we've had a number of other challenges from outside the SFF genre such as ghost stories, detective novel, hardboiled/noir, love stories, tall tales, metafiction, absurdist fiction, tudorpunk (no, we've no idea, either) and the still-agonised-over and never-to-be-repeated "in the style of Rudyard Kipling"! We've had quite a bit of variety over the years!


Regarding your entry, for me it was the genre question which doomed it, since although Elizabeth is fantasising, the story itself isn't fantasy. In another genre it fitted better, it might well have taken a spot on my short list, since it was well written with a lot of humour, though the trope isn't exactly original.

As to the story itself, I think you needed to make a little more of the abomination and the horror of draining the ocean before the twist is shown -- you could have removed some other clauses which didn't add anything to make room for it (eg "back onboard the Acheron" is a distraction there). In pernickity mode, I'd have used a colon after "spoke" and continued the mother's dialogue on the same line, and I'm in two minds whether you should have a comma in "But, Mom..." since one is usually required before a person's name is used in these circumstances, but here it reads better without it. Actually, I'm in two minds about that line as a whole coming there, since for me it dilutes the impact of the twist, but I can see how you want to make the child-mother relationship clear, since even with the twist it's a tad ambiguous.

Generally, as I say well-written and deserving of the mentions and votes, but for me it fell the wrong side of the genre line.

Wow, that is quite a range of genres... I remember seeing New Weird and Gaslamp before I started entering the challenges, and have heard legends of Kipling and kittens, but what malevolent entity is responsible for Tudorpunk?

I share your dual mind about the last line; I defaulted to clarity because I typically am less clear, and that comma must have appeared and disappeared 20 times before I submitted it, for the exact reasons you describe.

Regarding genre, do you think if I had changed Elizabeth to, say, Odysseus or Achilles, would it fall enough into fantasy? My original version was Odysseus, but I thought Elizabeth just worked better, knowing I was sacrificing some votes for the sake of the story.

Thanks, as always, for your feedback!

 

[The Judge]

Regarding genre, do you think if I had changed Elizabeth to, say, Odysseus or Achilles, would it fall enough into fantasy? My original version was Odysseus, but I thought Elizabeth just worked better, knowing I was sacrificing some votes for the sake of the story.

For me, no, it wouldn't have moved it from fantasising to fantasy, since it would have been merely a change in character name, despite the obvious humour of Odysseus battling sea-monsters in his childhood bath. However, if the genre had been the more general speculative fiction -- which to me encompasses legend in a way "fantasy" doesn't -- using Odysseus would have probably got you inside the genre as far as I was concerned, though then I'd have wanted the story to mirror the Odyssey with Scylla and Charybdis instead of a Kraken, which is a Northern and/or oceanic monster, not a Mediterranean one. Using Achilles -- ie a classical name without real resonance with the sea -- wouldn't have helped in either case for me, unless you had his mother fishing him out by the heel!

 

[HareBrain]

what malevolent entity is responsible for Tudorpunk?

My finest hour!

 

[The Judge]

And there I was, withholding all names, to protect the guilty!

 

[HareBrain]

If I can't have public adoration, I'll take infamy.

 

[Joshua Jones]

If I can't have public adoration, I'll take infamy.

Infamy, yes, and no more votes...