Firstly, sorry for being so late with the June and July results. The number of entries received for the First Chapter comp that ended in June was more than double received in previous competitions and took a long time to process! Then summer holidays came along but finally the results are:
June 2016
Only one story made the grade for this month. I’m afraid we felt that the rest of the entries all lacked any real emotional depth or humour and either relied on punchline endings, just sort of petered out, or felt like they were part of something bigger and weren’t a complete story in their own right. Have a read of David Gaffney’s blog about writing flash that has an impact to really try and master the form.
The winner is: Cath Barton for How to be a winner
Congrats Cath – very apt title it turns out! We loved the humour in the voice and the off-kilter feeling of it and were never quite sure if it was an unreliable narrator or not. We’re still undecided now.
Read It
July 2016 Shortlist
- Dancing Partners, Diane Simmons
- Flight of an Eagle, Sally Lane
- Mortal Envy, Michelle Scowcroft
- Sister of the Dead Girl, Annie Dawid
- Two-Faced, Boo Singh
- The Locked Box in my Cupboard, Annie Dawid
- The Power of Prayer, Gwenda Major
The winner is: Michelle Scowcroft for Mortal Envy
A very different take on the theme that surprised us right from the start. Great use of imagery and language.
Read It
The runner up is: Sally Lane for Flight of an Eagle
Nice sense of dread, claustrophobia and suspense with a great ending that left us wondering.
Read It
Congrats to the winners and shortlisted writers. August results will be posted in the next couple of weeks. There’s 3 more deadlines to enter for 2016 then for 2017 there will be slight change and there will be fewer deadlines. Instead of monthly, the comp will have 6 deadlines a year so every 2 months instead of every month. Themes will be online in December 2016.
If you’d like to learn more about flash fiction writing then there is a new online flash fiction course coming in November 2016. More info on that very soon.