Chrissy

Nice one, Libby.

PS The odd layout is courtesy of the Den. It’s not some artistic effort on my part, though it could be due to my failure to understand Den formatting. 🙂

Here’s the opening scene of a drama. 349 words

The scene is a contemporary kitchen. Magnets hold lists to the fridge. Children’s paintings are on the walls. MARCUS, 70, sits at the table, idle, and SAM, 40, stands at a counter, preparing food. Marcus wears his hair longer than Sam and has a brass bangle and a leather bracelet on one wrist.…[Read more]

Thanks for that @clebs, great to see your enthusiasm. Some good thoughts there. I’m bogged down in various commissions with time running out fast at the moment, but will gather this all together asap

Another hugely entertaining tale of the rails, and very informative too. Thanks Richard.

Fab Elle. These are great.

These are terrific @elle. Congratulations!

I’m happy to provide prompts. @Squidge has offered as well, so we could start with hers and I’ll do the next round?

Perhaps the next prompter could put their name forward during current prompt month IYSWIM.

OK, I’ll go first:

Sunday morning
A late breakfast, tea and toast, the paper folded at the cryptic crossword. 22 down, Kathmandu hippie hospital, 9 letters. Michael scratched his head with the pen. Just an average Sunday.
The doorbell rang, startling him. Nobody called on Sunday. Nobody called on any other day for that matter, not since he’d p…[Read more]

Thanks, Sandra.

I was thinking a PM to the setter would be the easiest way, and not putting too much responsibility on a smallish group of people, but we can always try it for a while and see how it goes.

An alternating competitive-non competitive challenge is an option, but how would we decide who set the prompt for the non-competitive months?

That would be a nice touch, Sandra. He’s 18 and it’s his pride and joy.

I do that too, Sandra.

Thanks Sandra. The ‘mate’ was an attempt to show gender. Always tricky in first person. I’ve never been on a motorbike so your observations are most useful, as are your suggested tweaks. Much appreciated.

Thanks Bella. I’m relieved it works for you and thanks for all the tweaks. Definitely should be ‘they would come for me.’ Great catch.

Good thought, thanks Libby. I do like the idea of regular writing prompts, but at the moment we seem to be struggling to assemble enough entries for the competition, so whether we could maintain both I don’t know. What’s the general feeling towards non-competitive prompts as well?

I like @Squidge‘s suggestion.

How about having both a competition as you’ve outlined it @Daedalus
and also a non-competitive prompt/challenge as a separate thing, also run every two months. It may be just me but I can see things becoming confusing if the one process variously includes a competition and a non-competition!

If there’s no judging…[Read more]