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When I was...
...a young boy...
...my father...
ATE AN ENTIRE FUCKING LEMON. HE DIDN'T SQUEEZE IT ONTO ANYTHING. HE DIDN'T CUT IT INTO PIECES. HE DIDN'T EVEN SKIN IT. HE JUST STUFFED THE ENTIRE LEMON INTO HIS MOUTH AND SWALLOWED. I HAVE NEVER SEEN ANYTHING SO HORRIBLE IN MY LIFE.
...to see a marching band...
...a young boy...
...my father...
ATE AN ENTIRE FUCKING LEMON. HE DIDN'T SQUEEZE IT ONTO ANYTHING. HE DIDN'T CUT IT INTO PIECES. HE DIDN'T EVEN SKIN IT. HE JUST STUFFED THE ENTIRE LEMON INTO HIS MOUTH AND SWALLOWED. I HAVE NEVER SEEN ANYTHING SO HORRIBLE IN MY LIFE.
...to see a marching band...
>>GaPJaxie
>>Pascoite
>>thebandbrony
>>Griseus
Thanks for the feedback. Been a hot minute since I really participated in one of these rounds.
Was hoping I would get a medal or the Most Controversial badge with this one. Didn't expect to get both. Also didn't expect to be completely surrounded by GaPJaxie entries. I saw how you triple-dipped, ya filthy animal!
Now, the only thing I feel the need to explain with this entry is how it happened. Because it's not often that you get a premise like this. The inspiration was two-headed. First I was struggling to come up with a premise, period. Scrambling for ideas is always a struggle with these mini rounds, but that's part of the fun. Anyway, I tend to have a few books on the side, always reading something, and on that day I was a decent way into Sabbath's Theater by Philip Roth, which I was loving. The protagonist is a complete lech who, sometime after the death of his mistress of more than a decade, commits a certain obscene act near her grave in the dead of night. I thought, "What a distasteful and perverted act, and yet in his own demented way he must be deeply in love with her." Sure, you could call it love. You could also call it obsession, but there are few other words that I think might fit.
As for the title, it's sort of a reference to "Concerto for Left Hand Alone," but more directly it's a reference to a section from Underworld by Don DeLillo, which is presumably a reference to the composition. I also happened to be reading Underworld while brainstorming, and used the grimy New York setting from certain parts of that massive novel for inspiration. I figured, ultimately, that I wanted to write something grotesque and somewhat transgressive, but also heartbroken.
I think I did my job well enough.
>>Pascoite
>>thebandbrony
>>Griseus
Thanks for the feedback. Been a hot minute since I really participated in one of these rounds.
Was hoping I would get a medal or the Most Controversial badge with this one. Didn't expect to get both. Also didn't expect to be completely surrounded by GaPJaxie entries. I saw how you triple-dipped, ya filthy animal!
Now, the only thing I feel the need to explain with this entry is how it happened. Because it's not often that you get a premise like this. The inspiration was two-headed. First I was struggling to come up with a premise, period. Scrambling for ideas is always a struggle with these mini rounds, but that's part of the fun. Anyway, I tend to have a few books on the side, always reading something, and on that day I was a decent way into Sabbath's Theater by Philip Roth, which I was loving. The protagonist is a complete lech who, sometime after the death of his mistress of more than a decade, commits a certain obscene act near her grave in the dead of night. I thought, "What a distasteful and perverted act, and yet in his own demented way he must be deeply in love with her." Sure, you could call it love. You could also call it obsession, but there are few other words that I think might fit.
As for the title, it's sort of a reference to "Concerto for Left Hand Alone," but more directly it's a reference to a section from Underworld by Don DeLillo, which is presumably a reference to the composition. I also happened to be reading Underworld while brainstorming, and used the grimy New York setting from certain parts of that massive novel for inspiration. I figured, ultimately, that I wanted to write something grotesque and somewhat transgressive, but also heartbroken.
I think I did my job well enough.
Honorable Mention:
A lot of roaming sentences like this one. Sort of unruly. With minifics it's expected that there will be either mostly dialogue or none, and this entry leans more towards the latter. I would even say there's too much of the little dialogue we get, because the meat of the story is Nicky's thoughts and actions, not what he's saying. But putting so much emphasis on thoughts and actions gives the prose some major breathing room to flex its muscles, which this entry certainly does. It houses what has to be easily the chunkiest paragraph out of the whole roster, and it's a lot to take in.
Then of course there's... the thing you should never do in public.
Nicky is a sick man. Not necessarily a bad man, but a sick man. We know very little about his relationship with Albertine, although I'd hesitate to say they might not have loved each other. There had to be something there, or else this wouldn't be happening. It's not normal, though, for widows and widowers (at least as far as we know) to do what Nicky does, or maybe to even contemplate it. The psyche captured here is a particularly disturbed one, driven mad from grief, and there's something shameless and filthy about it. It's an explicit portrait (maybe too explicit) of the grotesque, in the way that social outcasts are sometimes considered grotesque.
It works more as a prelude than a self-contained narrative. There's a great deal about Nicky and Albertine's marriage that we ought to know about. I'd say it's still an effectively grotesque portrait, though.
With no one to interrupt him, with no one to tell him he shouldn't do it, he started thinking about Albertine, considering her face, her curves, how she looked when she got out of the shower, and his mind sank into the image.
A lot of roaming sentences like this one. Sort of unruly. With minifics it's expected that there will be either mostly dialogue or none, and this entry leans more towards the latter. I would even say there's too much of the little dialogue we get, because the meat of the story is Nicky's thoughts and actions, not what he's saying. But putting so much emphasis on thoughts and actions gives the prose some major breathing room to flex its muscles, which this entry certainly does. It houses what has to be easily the chunkiest paragraph out of the whole roster, and it's a lot to take in.
Then of course there's... the thing you should never do in public.
Nicky is a sick man. Not necessarily a bad man, but a sick man. We know very little about his relationship with Albertine, although I'd hesitate to say they might not have loved each other. There had to be something there, or else this wouldn't be happening. It's not normal, though, for widows and widowers (at least as far as we know) to do what Nicky does, or maybe to even contemplate it. The psyche captured here is a particularly disturbed one, driven mad from grief, and there's something shameless and filthy about it. It's an explicit portrait (maybe too explicit) of the grotesque, in the way that social outcasts are sometimes considered grotesque.
It works more as a prelude than a self-contained narrative. There's a great deal about Nicky and Albertine's marriage that we ought to know about. I'd say it's still an effectively grotesque portrait, though.
Honorable Mention:
So once again we have a female student getting schooled by a presumably more knowledgeable authority figure. And once again we examine a peculiarity of what we might call the postmodern landscape, but this time taking on that classic Emerson saying about how there is no history, only biography. The lack of objective truth in a world where there are many sources, but many of them are mutually exclusive.
Personally I would've much preferred if Alex and her advisor talked about something that has far shakier historical ground than the Battle of Kursk, such as the life of Socrates. Socrates was no doubt a real person, but our only accounts of him come from people who supposedly knew him and talked with him, but who were not Socrates. I supposed that's not putting enough emphasis on the "biography" part of the equation, though. Anyway, Alex and her advisor don't seem to know much about WWII, which I suspect was intentional. Even the advisor's more enlightened viewpoint is racked with ignorance and oversimplification, which could very well contribute powerfully to the message here, but the advisor is written as too much of a mentor figure for me to put confidence into this. Also weird how Alex, inexplicably, equates a famous YouTuber with major military figures from 70+ years ago. Seems like a really bad point of comparison.
There's a lot to unpack here, certainly. It's more or less a Socratic dialogue (bringing up that prick Socrates again, I know) about the nature of objective truth, and how history is ultimately written by people who are able to write about it in the first place. Even primary sources can be hard to trust with this thing in mind. Sort of reminds me of Melville's The Confidence Man, but not as abstract, and honestly I think the modern references in this entry undermine it. Alex and her advisor could be having this conversation in 2020 or 1980, it shouldn't make too much of a difference. And, like >>Pascoite, I find myself tumbling down a rabbit hole with this line of thinking.
That must be saying something, though, that we're thinking about it as much as we are. It is, if nothing else, a story of big ideas squished into a cage fit for a hamster.
“True,” her advisor said. “Read enough of these books and you’ll notice that a lot of things get blamed on people who aren’t around to disagree.”
So once again we have a female student getting schooled by a presumably more knowledgeable authority figure. And once again we examine a peculiarity of what we might call the postmodern landscape, but this time taking on that classic Emerson saying about how there is no history, only biography. The lack of objective truth in a world where there are many sources, but many of them are mutually exclusive.
Personally I would've much preferred if Alex and her advisor talked about something that has far shakier historical ground than the Battle of Kursk, such as the life of Socrates. Socrates was no doubt a real person, but our only accounts of him come from people who supposedly knew him and talked with him, but who were not Socrates. I supposed that's not putting enough emphasis on the "biography" part of the equation, though. Anyway, Alex and her advisor don't seem to know much about WWII, which I suspect was intentional. Even the advisor's more enlightened viewpoint is racked with ignorance and oversimplification, which could very well contribute powerfully to the message here, but the advisor is written as too much of a mentor figure for me to put confidence into this. Also weird how Alex, inexplicably, equates a famous YouTuber with major military figures from 70+ years ago. Seems like a really bad point of comparison.
There's a lot to unpack here, certainly. It's more or less a Socratic dialogue (bringing up that prick Socrates again, I know) about the nature of objective truth, and how history is ultimately written by people who are able to write about it in the first place. Even primary sources can be hard to trust with this thing in mind. Sort of reminds me of Melville's The Confidence Man, but not as abstract, and honestly I think the modern references in this entry undermine it. Alex and her advisor could be having this conversation in 2020 or 1980, it shouldn't make too much of a difference. And, like >>Pascoite, I find myself tumbling down a rabbit hole with this line of thinking.
That must be saying something, though, that we're thinking about it as much as we are. It is, if nothing else, a story of big ideas squished into a cage fit for a hamster.
Honorable Mention:
An entry that starts really strong and kinda fizzles as it continues. Which sounds hard to do in a minific, but you'd be surprised. But no, there is some great humor here. Pratchett and Vonnegut have been mentioned by others, and reading this did give me some crazy Vonnegut vibes, like something out of Cat's Cradle, which might also explain the humorous-but-insightful tone. I'll be damned (which is fine, I'm used to being damned) if the author hasn't read any Vonnegut. Simple but punchy syntax with a punchline seemingly lurking around every corner. It cuts, but in a clownish way.
I also hope tenure someday gets abolished, so I'm naturally prone to find the highlighted exchange funny.
The message, however, feels somewhat jumbled, the more I think about it. At first it reads like a satire of academia, which is great, academia is easily and justly mocked, but then it becomes a satire of meme culture, which is weird because meme culture already satirizes itself (the postmodern landscape do be like that), and then it becomes... something about existentialism. Or how the vast majority of stuff people upload to social media is totally not worth keeping. While social media and meme culture are certainly interlinked in the CURRENT YEAR, the former is considerably less self-conscious, and things that lack self-awareness are best fitted for satire. Like much of academia.
Expand, remove the most timely of references (the California wildfires from 2020 specifically feels almost in bad taste), and connect these two scenes (because it's really two scenes, although the first is more of a prelude) and you've got a nice slice of comedy on your hands.
“It’s a great undertaking for the history department,” said one guest, “but if I may ask, what is that practically good for?”
“Well,” said the professor, “it got me tenure.”
An entry that starts really strong and kinda fizzles as it continues. Which sounds hard to do in a minific, but you'd be surprised. But no, there is some great humor here. Pratchett and Vonnegut have been mentioned by others, and reading this did give me some crazy Vonnegut vibes, like something out of Cat's Cradle, which might also explain the humorous-but-insightful tone. I'll be damned (which is fine, I'm used to being damned) if the author hasn't read any Vonnegut. Simple but punchy syntax with a punchline seemingly lurking around every corner. It cuts, but in a clownish way.
I also hope tenure someday gets abolished, so I'm naturally prone to find the highlighted exchange funny.
The message, however, feels somewhat jumbled, the more I think about it. At first it reads like a satire of academia, which is great, academia is easily and justly mocked, but then it becomes a satire of meme culture, which is weird because meme culture already satirizes itself (the postmodern landscape do be like that), and then it becomes... something about existentialism. Or how the vast majority of stuff people upload to social media is totally not worth keeping. While social media and meme culture are certainly interlinked in the CURRENT YEAR, the former is considerably less self-conscious, and things that lack self-awareness are best fitted for satire. Like much of academia.
Expand, remove the most timely of references (the California wildfires from 2020 specifically feels almost in bad taste), and connect these two scenes (because it's really two scenes, although the first is more of a prelude) and you've got a nice slice of comedy on your hands.
Honorable Mention:
Feels almost unfair to highlight the opening line, because it implies that the story peaks early, but this is quite the kicker of an opener. Tahira is quickly established as a relatable character, young, troubled, sort of emotionally disturbed, and who can blame her for wanting to head out the door of life early? But of course the question of replacement is where this becomes a science-fantasy yarn, with a great deal of ambiguity added to the mix.
This is an unusual method for someone to commit suicide and "be reborn," as it were. We get to know a good deal about Tahira, and we get the impression that she had a depressing life in adolescence, although some things don't quite add up to me. For one, her request for a change in height. And why only two inches? If I was 5'9" (which I am), and I wanted to grow taller, I would wanna be like 6'2" or something. A noticeable change. Nobody gives a hoot about the difference between a 5'9" man and a 5'11" man. And also, I have to wonder about the logistics of these rebirths. They're not called clones, even though they basically are (in the wacky sci-fi sense of the word), and for some reason the reapers have assigned death dates for people. I'm not sure how that works. Is it like the expiration dates in Blade Runner but for ordinary people?
Even so, with all my questions, this is certainly one of the more enjoyable entries. It's stoic, dryly humorous, kind of sad, and gives us a glimpse at a macabre world that seems to walk the line between fantasy and science fiction. The opening and ending sections in particular are juicy to read.
“Excuse me.” After a moment, Tahira cleared her throat. “I’m here to die.”
Feels almost unfair to highlight the opening line, because it implies that the story peaks early, but this is quite the kicker of an opener. Tahira is quickly established as a relatable character, young, troubled, sort of emotionally disturbed, and who can blame her for wanting to head out the door of life early? But of course the question of replacement is where this becomes a science-fantasy yarn, with a great deal of ambiguity added to the mix.
This is an unusual method for someone to commit suicide and "be reborn," as it were. We get to know a good deal about Tahira, and we get the impression that she had a depressing life in adolescence, although some things don't quite add up to me. For one, her request for a change in height. And why only two inches? If I was 5'9" (which I am), and I wanted to grow taller, I would wanna be like 6'2" or something. A noticeable change. Nobody gives a hoot about the difference between a 5'9" man and a 5'11" man. And also, I have to wonder about the logistics of these rebirths. They're not called clones, even though they basically are (in the wacky sci-fi sense of the word), and for some reason the reapers have assigned death dates for people. I'm not sure how that works. Is it like the expiration dates in Blade Runner but for ordinary people?
Even so, with all my questions, this is certainly one of the more enjoyable entries. It's stoic, dryly humorous, kind of sad, and gives us a glimpse at a macabre world that seems to walk the line between fantasy and science fiction. The opening and ending sections in particular are juicy to read.
Honorable Mention:
I'm very torn on this one. For a minific it's quite ambitious in how it illustrates its characters and how much high-fantasy lore it manages to pack inside its little frame. Yet the story being told is kind of an odd one, and not in a compelling way to me. Indeed, if I was Vardani I'd be angry at the fact that the last few minutes of my life didn't make a lick of sense.
We're immediately presented with three characters, and honestly I had a hard time separating Vardani and Gethric at first. Doesn't help that they more or less serve the same purpose in the end. The Duke is more fully realized, and weirdly enough so is Margane, despite being a spooky "Bloody" Mary type and also being dead for most of the story. There are too many characters and too many moving parts in this for me. Much has already been said about the odd nature of Gethric's dwindling strength, but I just wanna also note that the whole "sacrifice" thing seemed to have come out of nowhere. It would make sense that the Duke wouldn't tell Vardani about it, but we should at least get some clue in the narration that this was his intention.
Overall it could be a high-fantasy yarn with a mean horror edge if given a larger word count, to fill in the gaps and such, but I'd say this suffers more from the word count restriction more than any other entry. It does at least serve as an exercise in world-building under tight circumstances.
The meaning hit Vardani like a blow and she had only time to see the realization flash across the eyes of the two men, and she saw death written there.
I'm very torn on this one. For a minific it's quite ambitious in how it illustrates its characters and how much high-fantasy lore it manages to pack inside its little frame. Yet the story being told is kind of an odd one, and not in a compelling way to me. Indeed, if I was Vardani I'd be angry at the fact that the last few minutes of my life didn't make a lick of sense.
We're immediately presented with three characters, and honestly I had a hard time separating Vardani and Gethric at first. Doesn't help that they more or less serve the same purpose in the end. The Duke is more fully realized, and weirdly enough so is Margane, despite being a spooky "Bloody" Mary type and also being dead for most of the story. There are too many characters and too many moving parts in this for me. Much has already been said about the odd nature of Gethric's dwindling strength, but I just wanna also note that the whole "sacrifice" thing seemed to have come out of nowhere. It would make sense that the Duke wouldn't tell Vardani about it, but we should at least get some clue in the narration that this was his intention.
Overall it could be a high-fantasy yarn with a mean horror edge if given a larger word count, to fill in the gaps and such, but I'd say this suffers more from the word count restriction more than any other entry. It does at least serve as an exercise in world-building under tight circumstances.
Honorable Mention:
So from what I can tell this is The Island of Doctor Moreau crossed with... Invasion of the Body Snatchers? I'm not sure what else could've happened at the end there, yet I was never given enough of a reason to believe it could happen in the first place. To agree with >>GaPJaxie I do like the horror atmosphere; reminds me of a Val Lewton production, with the horror being unseen. There is something almost spiritual going on here. And to hopefully bring some light to >>Pascoite 's comment about the redacted names, it could be that I had recently gone through Two Years Before the Mast, but I can't say it's unheard of for a work of autobiography to keep the names of real people hidden with em dashes. And given the first-person narration this is meant to be read like a memoir or journal.
Of course, that raises the problem of what the hell the narrator could've done or how they could've reacted to what happens at the end here. This is one of those classic shocking swerve endings you find in a short story, except I'm not sure how everything leading up to it explains it. I'm also not sure what happened immediately afterward. Is Mrs. H— a zombie now? Is she possessed? How does that work? Mind you, my reading comprehension skills are not the best; one time I thought a girl in one of these minific rounds had literally turned into a tree. But I know I'm not the only one confused by this turn of events.
You gotta admit, though, having "sequel" be part of your title in a minific round is a ballsy move. And I still like the setup. I'm just not convinced that the payoff adds up.
Although I had already witnessed Mr. Valdemar answering my questions from the nethermost regions of the grave, the hollow, utterly inhuman voice which replied, without our guest's tongue or lips moving, sent a shuddering down my spine. "Yes. Leave me alone, for I am dead now."
So from what I can tell this is The Island of Doctor Moreau crossed with... Invasion of the Body Snatchers? I'm not sure what else could've happened at the end there, yet I was never given enough of a reason to believe it could happen in the first place. To agree with >>GaPJaxie I do like the horror atmosphere; reminds me of a Val Lewton production, with the horror being unseen. There is something almost spiritual going on here. And to hopefully bring some light to >>Pascoite 's comment about the redacted names, it could be that I had recently gone through Two Years Before the Mast, but I can't say it's unheard of for a work of autobiography to keep the names of real people hidden with em dashes. And given the first-person narration this is meant to be read like a memoir or journal.
Of course, that raises the problem of what the hell the narrator could've done or how they could've reacted to what happens at the end here. This is one of those classic shocking swerve endings you find in a short story, except I'm not sure how everything leading up to it explains it. I'm also not sure what happened immediately afterward. Is Mrs. H— a zombie now? Is she possessed? How does that work? Mind you, my reading comprehension skills are not the best; one time I thought a girl in one of these minific rounds had literally turned into a tree. But I know I'm not the only one confused by this turn of events.
You gotta admit, though, having "sequel" be part of your title in a minific round is a ballsy move. And I still like the setup. I'm just not convinced that the payoff adds up.
Honorable Mention:
Much like >>Pascoite I was confused at first by the nature of the whole 100% dialogue thing, and the snag for me was that it's not formatted like a chain of dialogue lines from a single speaker. When writing, if you break up a character's dialogue into paragraphs you would not add quotation marks to the end of each paragraph, with the exception of the last one of course. The method used here makes sense in a way, though, since it's meant to be read as a two-sided dialogue but with one of the parties being omitted. I do think that if you want to make this feel like a second-person narrative, like the title seems to indicate, you would remove the quotation marks altogether.
Something I find strange but also curious is that the speaker claims that the word to describe its occupation has yet to be created, but it's clearly meant to be like an angel or the Grim Reaper. Or maybe one of the Grim Reaper's interns. It's one of those things that, like much of the story, seems to take pride in not being wholly shown to the reader. We're being kept in the dark about most of what happens here, and there's a great deal of potential in that. Some very dry humor, a sense of emptiness, and so on. It does, however, feel incomplete, not least because it's so short that it barely makes the minimum word count. Ultimately it feels kind of rudderless. Nothing happens, except for the not-Grim Reaper sending "you" off to Limbo. It's clearly meant to be open-ended, like second-person narratives tend to be, but it's so abstract that I'm not sure I can say it bears any significance. With stories like this where there's little plot or character I expect a strong thematic point, but I'm not sure it has that either.
It is, at the very least, an experiment whose style would not have occurred to most people. There's clearly imagination put into this, although we could've also used another editing pass.
"Yes, there are things even Death does not know."
Much like >>Pascoite I was confused at first by the nature of the whole 100% dialogue thing, and the snag for me was that it's not formatted like a chain of dialogue lines from a single speaker. When writing, if you break up a character's dialogue into paragraphs you would not add quotation marks to the end of each paragraph, with the exception of the last one of course. The method used here makes sense in a way, though, since it's meant to be read as a two-sided dialogue but with one of the parties being omitted. I do think that if you want to make this feel like a second-person narrative, like the title seems to indicate, you would remove the quotation marks altogether.
Something I find strange but also curious is that the speaker claims that the word to describe its occupation has yet to be created, but it's clearly meant to be like an angel or the Grim Reaper. Or maybe one of the Grim Reaper's interns. It's one of those things that, like much of the story, seems to take pride in not being wholly shown to the reader. We're being kept in the dark about most of what happens here, and there's a great deal of potential in that. Some very dry humor, a sense of emptiness, and so on. It does, however, feel incomplete, not least because it's so short that it barely makes the minimum word count. Ultimately it feels kind of rudderless. Nothing happens, except for the not-Grim Reaper sending "you" off to Limbo. It's clearly meant to be open-ended, like second-person narratives tend to be, but it's so abstract that I'm not sure I can say it bears any significance. With stories like this where there's little plot or character I expect a strong thematic point, but I'm not sure it has that either.
It is, at the very least, an experiment whose style would not have occurred to most people. There's clearly imagination put into this, although we could've also used another editing pass.
Seeing as how the show has ended, and with participation numbers at an all-time low, I feel it safe to say that this will be my last go at the She-Ra group for writing. Honestly, I'm rather starving for ideas as to what to even write about. The show was never a great template for fanfic exploration imo, but with time it seems like my options have only dwindled. Maybe it's just my limited imagination. Still, if I'm to participate one last time here, I wanna try to go out on a banger. You could say that I feel it's time to put on my last act and take a bow before the audience. I can at least try.
Hopefully it'll be a good performance.
Hopefully it'll be a good performance.
Wait, the writing period starts now?
Jeez, I didn't think to check.
...
...good thing I have a plan...
Jeez, I didn't think to check.
...
...good thing I have a plan...
A thousand years is a long time, but how long is it really when put in the context of space?
One of the more interesting things about FiM's worldbuilding is how casually anachronistic the technology is. Sometimes we get tech like airships that seems like something out of Jules Verne, or a Karel Zeman film. Feels like someone in 1900 imagining what air travel would be like in 2000, as depicted by someone living in the year 2020.
SAME AS IT EVER WAS
SAME AS IT EVER WAS
SAME AS IT EVER WAS
SAME AS IT EVER WAS
SAME AS IT EVER WAS
SAME AS IT EVER WAS
SAME AS IT EVER WAS
SAME AS IT EVER WAS
SAME AS IT EVER WAS
Paging WIP