Sandra, this is an atmospheric depiction of the personalities within a family, all so economically written. I’d never heard of furanocoumarins. What an interesting thing to discover! You built tension with all the possible problems resulting from letting children loose in the kitchen, then there was a fine twist at the end. Very e…[Read more]

I loved each dragons – real, metaphorical, and felt. This was a delicious prompt to sink teeth into. Thanks lotsly, @seagreen 🙂

Thank you, @Seagreen for the comp. I enjoyed doing my pastiche of The Big Sleep. I find that kind of thing a useful exercise. Recently my own  sentence structures and vocabulary have seemed stuck in a rut. Studying someone else’s gives a necessary jolt.

It’s a fun thing to do if other Denizens want to…[Read more]

Apologies for the day-late decision making. I’ve been oout and aboout with my egg, enjoying our midterm break from work and school, and foolishly saved the reading until the final day of the month because I wanted to take in each piece at the same time, rather than read as submitted, and also to give everyone who could, a chance to…[Read more]

@Seagreen: This very enjoyable story reveals the rich history of a relationship, shown with a clever use of Elizabeth English and rhythm. There’s a satisfyingly wide range of emotion, including the delicious LOL comedy of “Thine exuberance I shall…[Read more]

@Seagreen thank you for the kind words.

Thank you too @Sandra for your congratulations.

Right, now I must try to think of a comp theme that will be as good as Seagreen’s …

@Seagreen, great prompt. I’m motivated to return to working on the story for that antagonist.

Thanks for the prompt @Seagreen. Gave me a chance to work out the back-story for one the main antagonists in my WIP.

I too went on a Google search over @alex‘s piece, for the exact same reason 😄😄 It’s too funny you…[Read more]

Thanks for the comp @knickylaurelle. I enjoyed it in spite of it bringing back a few awful memories.

They are all…[Read more]

@squidge – I enjoyed this far-away, fantastical dream sequence, with its lightly pressing sense of isolation, elusive understanding, and finally, lucidity.

@athelstone – Gorgeously streaming subconsciousness with this one,…[Read more]

A reminder that everybody is free to change choices until the group closes.

Those rigs have a fascination even for a landlubber like me. The meeting of elements perhaps. At sea but fixed -…[Read more]

What impressed me most, on top of all the individual skills displayed, is that every piece is such a distinct rendition of the author’s voice. I’ve read most of you before and could recognise you in…[Read more]

Good heavens!! What happened to April? I completely forgot I’d set a competition, was somewhat startled to discover it was May, but I do like this – rings some bells since, apart from invisible, April seems to have been a retrospective month, for more than me.

So without further ado, I’m handing the baton for May’s competition to you -…[Read more]

I think it’s quite hard (impossible for me) to tailor a novel according to a detailed framework and I will often start with only the inciting incident, the external problem the MC has to fight/solve and the antagonist forces, whether they’re people or circumstances, then let the story develop a first draft…[Read more]

Re the being in the character’s head, and the explanations like ‘standing next to me’, I think you’ve cut to the heart of my question re YA vs MG…[Read more]

A cracking bunch of entries. I hope you enjoyed writing these as much as I enjoyed reading them. As usual I was struck by the many different ways they all responded to the theme.

1) @johnalty. I…[Read more]

Because…[Read more]