Mini-Contest
#8
The
eighth mini-contest was held in April 2009. This
mini-contest was an exercise in worldbuilding through use
of key details. It challenged contestants to use detail to
turn a bland, generic sentence into a sentence that evoked
physical setting, time and place, mood, and (if relevant)
character.
We received 93 entries from 56 authors. (Authors were
allowed to send us two entries.) Two reading judges
selected 10 contenders from all the entries received. Five
prize judges labeled one entry as their “favorite” and
rated the rest as either “yes,” “maybe,” or “no.”
Our first and second place winners and one honorable
mention have never been published in OTP before. The other
authors have placed in either mini-contests or short story
contests, and their works once again impressed the judges,
who, please recall, judge every entry blindly. (Meaning,
they have no idea who wrote the entries they are
judging.)
Third Place ($5) by Donald Jacob Uitvlugt
GENERIC:
Billy sat in the chair, waiting for his haircut.
DETAILED: Billy slouched in the hard wooden chair,
studiously ignoring the buzz of clippers around him and not
meeting the gaze of Uncle Sam on the recruiting poster
across from him.
Second
Place ($10) by Jennifer R. Povey
GENERIC: Alex
looked at the stars.
DETAILED: The stars seemed to hang in space bare inches
from the other side of the transparent metal porthole,
although Alex, regarding them, knew they were light years
and lifetimes away.
First Place ($15) by Janet Hartman
GENERIC:
Marie arose and began her daily chores.
DETAILED: Marie forced herself out of bed to face another
morning – stoke the fires, feed the chickens, sweep the
floors, and, worst of all, empty the chamberpots.
Honorable
Mentions (no money, just fame)
Six other entries, one of them from an author who placed in
the top three, scored highly enough to earn an honorable
mention. They are listed below in descending order by
overall score.
GENERIC:
Margaret poured a cup of coffee.
DETAILED: Margaret checked behind the coffeepot for hidden
microphones before pouring her coffee, avoiding eye contact
with the nurse so that she couldn’t read Margaret’s mind.
(by Laura
Loomis)
GENERIC: The
dog stole the bone.
DETAILED: Right under the High Priest’s nose, the mage
hound nipped the Sacred Shinbone of Silverfist off the
altar, and bolted out into the Old City’s labyrinth of
alleys.
(by K. Stoddard Hayes)
GENERIC: The noise of the city woke Geoffrey early.
DETAILED: Long before sunlight pierced the cracks of the
inn’s warped shutters, Geoffrey was jarred awake by
clattering hooves, carriage wheels, and the shrieks of
costermongers.
(by K.
Curran Mayer)
GENERIC: Jane walked up the dark street.
DETAILED: Although it was barely an hour after lunch, the
long night was upon them, and Jane walked along a darkened
street, tugging her coat around her against the winter
chill.
(by
Jennifer R. Povey)
GENERIC: Leonard stood and looked out onto his farmland as
he bit his egg sandwich.
DETAILED: Leonard clucked, ruffled his tail feathers, bit
into an egg sandwich, all the while looking out his window
onto his farm and the flock of stupid humans there.
(by Samuel
Zane Farrell)
GENERIC:
John watched
Kat cross the street.
DETAILED:
I love
California, John thought
and wiped his lips – his heart pounding in accelerando as
Kat slinked across the hot asphalt, her slender legs
weaving silken sin with each footfall.
(by Bryce Albertson)
Congratulations
to the winners and our sincere thanks to everyone who
entered the mini-contest.