Name: Laura Chapman In a few short hours, Elliot Lynch would find herself buried under a mound of work. She could hardly wait. She was home to work for Engagements, her family’s wedding and event planning business. Her sister had run the wedding side of the business for years, and now it was her turn. Their father planned to partially retire, and her sister would step into his role. Elliot was more than willing to Read more…
Name: Jesi O’Connell I wake up with a very small, very ticked off firedrake sitting on my chest. “Aw, crud,” I mutter. Sunlight stabs through the light curtains jigging in the breeze. I’ve overslept, big time. Sassy hisses in displeasure and taps me with an indignant foot. Luckily, her claws are as tiny as the rest of her, so I barely feel it. Her red-gold hide is sort of pale, like a washed-out version of Read more…
Name: Melinda Williams My knuckles slam into the head cheerleader’s perfect nose. It feels great. Real great. Well, inside it does. My hand burns like hell. It’s halftime, and the gym reeks of boy—sweat, bad breath, and cheap cologne. Silence drums in my ear so loud it hurts. There are hundreds of faces on the bleachers, and then there’s the basketball team. All staring. At me. Oh, God. The fluorescent lights buzz, telling me to Read more…
Name: Susan Francino Caspric looked down at the servant blocking the door. “Why exactly can’t I come in?” “I have orders from Sir Drake that you’re not to be allowed.” “Oh really?” said Caspric, raising a dark eyebrow. “Well, although you take orders from Sir Drake–” He reached around the servant and put his hand on the door knob. “I don’t.” Caspric stepped inside the library and inhaled the familiar smell of old paper. Shafts of Read more…
Name: Shell Flower The Seventh Annual Rogue Valley Barter Faire was my seventh time in the hell of working my parents’ booth selling organic mushroom burgers as a front for my dad’s pot business and his brother’s psychedelic mushroom business. The barter fair is something most of the kids from town look forward to all year. Unfortunately, most of us slaves, oh, I mean children of hippie parents living in the Rogue Valley dread the Read more…
Name: Tonja Drecker“Dag nab it! Are you going to sleep all day? Those chickens got out again. I thought you done and take care of that!”Uncle Bob grumbled something about feathered birdbrains and goofy lamb tails…or maybe he said something else. It was difficult to understand anything over the thunder of his work boots against the loose floor boards as he disappeared down the hallway.Daniel Bim moaned and pulled the quilt over his head. It Read more…
Name: Ryann Kerekes Standardized testing in high school determines your future. And I scored a perfect 3100 on the test. That had only been done one other time. Okay, so truth be told, I might have cheated. Just a little. Or a lot. Depends on how you look at it. But when they made it so easy to hack into the testing system’s mainframe, they were practically asking for it. If I would have known Read more…
The contest is closed. Please check back on Monday, December 12th to see the top 20 semi-finalists. Here’s how it’s going down … Post the first 250 words of your finished, or not quite finished, manuscript (any genre) to your blogs. This contest is about voice–whether or not your character’s voice matches his or her’s age. So if you mention the age or school grade in the first 250 words, please edit it out Read more…
(click on the picture to get to the post to enter contest) I’m so happy to share with you my interview with our judge for the Can We Guess Your Character’s Age? Blogfest Contest, Gabriela Lessa, editor, literary agent assistant, writer, blogger, journalist, Brazilian, insomniac and word nerd. In addition to being an Associate Editor at Turquoise Morning Press and an assistant at a major New York-based literary agency, she works independently to offer editing Read more…
Well, it’s the last contest of the year, and I’m excited about this one. I’m busy writing my NaNoWriMo project so I’ll just get to the details. Here’s how it’s going down … On December 8th post the first 250 words of your finished, or not quite finished, manuscript (any genre) to your blogs. This contest is about voice–whether or not your character’s voice matches his or her’s age. So if you mention the age Read more…