DISCUSSION -- The 75 word Challenge, April 2011

[Parson]

Teresa, I just thought I'd let you know that I spent 2 hours going over this the day I got home from surgery, so now I will feel no more guilt for you writing your story with one hand.

-------------

Short List:

Boneman: Cold Hearted Love
No One: Ghost in the Machine
Culhwch: Beastly
Chrispencate: Rubaiyat in a Djinn bootleChel: Love is Blind
Bob S. Sr.: Reunited
Mosaix: Love Conquers All
Waffle: Forever Love
Pschotick: Paranormal Romance
The Judge: The Song of Orpheus

Two winners:

Perpetual Man: Titles are just a word, Mothers are Forever.
Ursa Major: Paradise Lust

One Vote:
Ursa Major: Paradise Lust

--------------

Note: Once again we had so many stories from the dark side. I was longing to a hear something bright and cheery with love that would last a life time. I know it can and it does.

 

[Allanon]

Ahhhhhhhhh! I'm gutted, I misread the challenge this month and thought I had until today to post it!!!!

Urgh! Well, I read the stories and there were so many good ones. I went with the one that originally caught my eye which was alchemist

Can we have a thread in here for the stories that have missed the deadline maybe?

 

[Teresa Edgerton]

You can post your unused story here as soon as the voting is over, Allanon.

Parson -- Ouch. Condolences on the surgery. Can we ask why they were operating on you, or is that too personal?

 

[alchemist]

Wow, Allanon. Thanks very much for the vote; I hadn't even had a mention yet, so a whole juicy vote is fantastic.

 

[Ursa major]

Many thanks for the vote, Parson (particularly as it seems to have been the result of a mini-tie-break).

I hope whatever scar(s) you have will soon heal.



And thanks for the mention, TEIN.

 

[The Procrastinator]

My "short list" this month:

Paranoid Marvin
Hex
HareBrain
Perpetual Man
Boneman
No One
Brev
TheDustyZebra
OneBigPotato
cornelius
chrispenycate
TEIN
Bob S Sr
HoopyFrood
Stormfeather

How unwieldy can you get. So for the first time I made a Shorter List:

Boneman
No One
TDZ
OneBigPotato
Cornelius
Hoopy
Stormfeather

And the ultimate winner for me was No One, Ghost in the Machine. Haunting!

Well done all, very high quality, we are spoiled for choice!

 

[The Judge]

Well done all, very high quality, we are spoiled for choice!

We always are!

Thanks you for the short list mention, Parson -- I hope you're recovering well from the op!

And a big thank you, Tonk, for the vote! And also thanks to my mystery voter! That's far better than I expected this month. *dances a little jig around the house*


We're still way behind on usual voting, though, with only 24 to date. Is everyone skiving off? The Brits amongst us have an extended Easter thanks to the Wedding and the bank holiday on Monday, but where's everyone else?

 

[Chaoticheart]

Okeydokey. After many many many many maaaaannny rereads, I was finally able to come to a decision. My shortlist was:

Boneman
The Judge
Ursa Major
GreenKidx
No One
Stormfeather

But in the end my vote had to go to No One - Ghost in the Machine.

My reasoning? Feeling mainly. They were all great, but Ghost in the Machine felt almost transcendent when I read it. That probably sounds a bit cheesy, but honestly it's the only way I could think to describe it.

And thanks to Arkose for the mention

 

[Arkose]

After some consideration I was able to shorten my list to Ursa Major and Boneman. Both are well written and I wouldn't change a thing about either. I really had a hard time between these two stories but in the end I am going with Ursa Major. I never thought I would actually be shocked by a story while expecting science fiction and fantasy stories and days later it just sticks out further than the rest. Great job to Boneman and Ursa Major this round!

 

[GreenKidx]

I just wanted to properly thank Lucky Lola, Slack, Boneman, and Chaoticheart for the mentions! It always floors me to think a story I wrote could stand out, among a crowd of 40-50+ brilliant others, enough to be mentioned! Truly exciting!

THANK YOU ALL!

 

[Hex]

!!!!
I got mentions! thank you so much Boneman, chrispenycate, Moonbat, TEIN and The Procrastinator! I'm sitting here grinning like an idiot.

There were so many brilliant stories that it seems strange to pick a list, but I did a list anyway:

HareBrain
mygoditsraining
Gary Compton (putrid eyes - nice)
Boneman
No One
Brev
digs
TDZ (brilliant - it made me laugh out loud)
goldenapples (although I read it differently from PM, as a darker story)
Culhwch
Moonbat
The Spurring Platty
Lucky Lola
HoopyFrood (gave me goosebumps)
Ursa Major

And lots of others too, who I had to leave out because the list is so embarrassingly long as it is... (that was my short list, believe it or not).

In the end, it was HareBrain I voted for, because the story was perfect (and what Lucky Lola said, really, with "tentacular" and the enormous pants).

 

[Boneman]

Thanks to all for the mentions and shortlisting and even going one to one with Ursa. It has been a great month for stories - we do seem to be improving every time (which makes choosing so much harder every time!).

 

[Perpetual Man]

Phew, seem to be struggling to do stuff this month... but I'm getting there in the end.

Many thanks to Procrastinator and Parson for the mentions (and tie-break in one case!!!) and thanks to TEIN, delighted to get a vote!

As to my vote, concentration was letting me down a it, but my final four came down to Precise Calibre, Nixie, Ursa and TJ.

In the end I did not concentrate I just closed my eyes and went with my gut... one of the stories seemed to be really under my skin, in a good way so the vote goes barely to Ursa...

 

[Ursa major]

Thanks for the votes and comments, Arkose and Perpetual Man. Much appreciated.


And thanks for the mentions, Chaoticheart and Hex.






(And to add the cherry to the cake, No One has as many votes as me at this point. )

 

[TheDustyZebra]

My thanks to TEIN, Procrastinator and Hex for the mentions!

I'm going to get around to voting, and making shortlists and all that, I promise!

 

[HareBrain]

Thanks for the votes, Hex, Moonbat and Lola. It meant a lot to my mother that her story could be told at last.

My own shortlist, (longer than in most other months even though it leaves out several others I thought deserved recognition):

Hex
Boneman
No One
Digs
TDZ
Chrispy
GreenKidX
Ursa
The Judge

I was strongly tempted by Ursa's seventy-two virgin goddesses, but in the end Chrispy's djinnah had me.

 

[No One]

(And to add the cherry to the cake, No One has as many votes as me at this point. )

And absolutely stunned I am!

Thanks to Hex and to Parson for the mentions (and here's hoping Parson's surgery was nothing too serious).

Secondly, to suddenly see three mystery votes and the votes/kind words of Procrastinator and Chaoticheart...well, that's really made my day to say the least. Many thanks to you fantastic five!

Thirdly, there's 24 hours left and plenty of votes, so for the love of all that's holy don't let me win! I'll be a terrible winner, all up in everyone's faces, saying, "Look, I won! I'm better than you! Ahahahaha!". That sorta thing.

You have been warned.

Yet to cast my vote. Time has been something of a factor, but also the sheer difficulty of choosing. Lots of great entries...

Oops, HB has snuck in a generous mention too! Thankee sir.*

 

[cornelius]

Thanks for the short(er)list mention, The procrastinator

 

[chrispenycate]

Thank you, Parson and Procrastinator, for the mentions; and a huge hug for HairBrain.

I really don't think this month's effort warranted it; trouble was, I'm totally devoid of romance. So it was pure masochism attempting a romantiv poem (all right then, verse; you'll accept that?) when I'm no poet, either (actually, I suspect the two are linked; even a worldworn, cynical poet longs for the romantic ideal. I just sort of missed out on that side).

So, good honest slog and craftmanship can still gain support, even when it's a shallow fake unbacked by emotion.

Perhaps I should go into politics.

 

[Aun Doorback]

Shiver me timbers! Nixie's got my vote