Winning stories to 'START' competition

http://erewashwriterscompetition.weebly.com/winners-2013.html


Winning stories to 'START' comp, judged by Dan Purdue, published on website  

RESULT for 'START' Flash Fiction Competition 2013

This information will also be posted to the competition website as soon as I am able to access it.  http://www.erewashwriterscompetition.weebly.com/
Problems with Weebly at present.

Our thanks to Dan Purdue  http://lies-ink.blogspot.co.uk/  for judging the competition entries and providing his book as part of the first prize Somewhere To Start From and you can find this on Amazon http://tinyurl.com/SoToStFr

You can read Dan's report for the three final entries on the competition website (will be posted there soon).

Winning entry - The Castle by Tony Oswick

Second Place   - The Weight of Stones by Jenny Long

The competition was to have provided first and second places only, but I'm pleased to say an
Honourable Mention has been awarded to You Start by Fiona Faith Ross.

SHORTLIST                                                                                                   

Bonds by Jane Connop
Bubby by Gail Aldwin
Caught Unawares by Jan McGeachie
Descending and Ascending by Tim Craig
Don’t Start by Brian Webster
Fresh Start by Barbara Hill
It Started with a Kiss by Keith Havers
Judgement Day by Jilly Gardiner
Room Nineteen by Jim Hamilton
Start by Steve Clough
Start by Esther Doel
Start by Joan Phillipps
Starting Over by Ros Collins
The Castle by Tony Oswick
The Darkness, Waiting by Sinead O'Hart
The Fright of their Lives by Rob Tye
The Leather-Clad Phoenix by Heather Price
The Portrait by Cathy Lennon
The Weight of Stones by Jenny Long
You Start by Fiona Faith Ross

LONGLIST

Don’t you Start by Lyndsay Fisher
Follow Me by Sadie Wikiel
 Fresh Start by Linda Hardy
Incendiary by Renay Allen
Over the Brink by Devika Rajeev
Riot by Lyndsay Warner
Start from Scratch by Julie Kilpatrick


Remember, you may not have won this competition but by entering it you have gained a complete story. I suggest you read Dan's report, read the winning entries and read your entry with a critical eye.  Ask yourself if your entry could be improved then either send it somewhere else, or expand on the idea to make a longer piece of work. 

We are currently inviting entries to the following competitions and would be pleased to receive your work.  Please see the links for full details, rules of entry and entry form:

http://erewashwriterscompetition.weebly.com/2013-burst-flash-fiction-competition.html

http://erewashwriterscompetition.weebly.com/2013-open-short-story-competition---maria-smith.html

http://erewashwriterscompetition.weebly.com/2013-full-stop-short-story-competition---helen-baggott.html

Entry form  http://erewashwriterscompetition.weebly.com/entry-form1.html

Thanks to all who entered this competition.

Kind regards,
Debbie

Shortlist and longlist for START Flash Fiction competition

Shortlist and longlist is below. 

Names have not been included in order to keep the final part of the judging process anonymous.

Names will be added to these titles when the results are known.

I am in the process of emailing you all to confirm if your story is shortlisted, longlisted or not on either list.

As per my email, you are all eligible to be in a December draw. I've organised a draw which is a free-entry, no writing necessary, name-picked-out-of-a-hat draw. Prize will either be a book about writing or one free entry to one of our competitions in 2014 (not decided yet). Two names will be picked out and each will receive a prize. I can only enter you for this if you reply to my email. Don't panic if you've not had an email to reply to yet, I am still working through the list. I'll let you know at a later date on this blog when I've finished working through the list and if you've not been contacted by that time, then is the time to contact me about it.

Thanks to all for sending your entries and do keep writing. Remember, you now have a complete story of approx 500 words. Don't waste the idea you have there, see if you can still use it, perhaps tweak it, improve it or expand it into a longer piece of work. Once you've re-worked the idea, you may find you could submit it again to another of our competitions, or to another market.

We have three further competitions for 2013:
http://erewashwriterscompetition.weebly.com/2013-burst-flash-fiction-competition.html

http://erewashwriterscompetition.weebly.com/2013-open-short-story-competition---maria-smith.html

http://erewashwriterscompetition.weebly.com/2013-full-stop-short-story-competition---helen-baggott.html


SHORTLIST                                              LONG LIST

                                                                   Don’t you Start
Bonds                                                         Follow Me
Bubby                                                        Incendiary
Caught Unawares                                      Riot
Descending and Ascending                       Over the Brink
Don’t Start                                                 Start from Scratch
Fresh Start                                                  Fresh Start
It Started with a Kiss
Judgement Day
Room Nineteen
Start
Start
Start
Starting Over
The Castle
The Darkness, Waiting
The Fright of their Lives
The Leather-Clad Phoenix
The Portrait
The Weight of Stones
You Start


Best wishes,
Debbie

Swimming the shortlist

You may have noticed I've had a break from the A-Z Blogging Challenge.  I'm still on that break, that's why this blog doesn't start with whatever letter of the alphabet the blogging challenge is at.

If it was an 'S' letter day I'd be well ahead of everyone else and sitting here all smug and pleased with myself. This is because a) the sun shone today so I went to the pool and swam and b) I'm in the final stage of contacting those not on the shortlist for the START competition that Dan Purdue is judging.  You can read Dan's words about the judging process at http://lies-ink.blogspot.co.uk/

For those of you not on the shortlist, I am pleased to say I've organised a free-entry December Draw.  Details of this are in the email you will receive either today or tomorrow.

More soon.

I is for I

I have decided I won't be posting in the A-Z Blogging Challenge anymore.

It's a fab idea, but I prefer to post once a week only.

Thanks to everyone who is following me, has commented and please keep visiting as I will be posting soon with some tips about entering competitions and other useful/interesting information. Hopefully I will also have learned how to post to my blog to offer some pictures too.

Cheery bye for now.

G is for Growth

Growth

Hello. 

As you can see, my blogs are still following the A-Z Blogging Challenge for the time being.
This is while I find my feet in the blogging community with my first blog site.

I've decided today to grace you all with my thoughts about growth.  No, don't worry. We'll not be taking an in-depth look at the blistering, itchy, pus seeping, lump on end of my nose but if you want me to discuss how much taller than myself my children have become then like any other proud parent I could go on and on and on.

Yesterday I packed my sandwiches and a drink and took myself on a trip down to the end of my garden.  It was there I rediscovered the allotment. It's not really a grand thing, just a few boxes made out of other stuff that had been left over from something else.  It was our veggie patch, is our veggie patch I should say, and once I master how to post a photo to this blog, I'll keep you posted of our progress in this area.

Our progress means myself and my youngest son who enjoys gardening.

Btw, if you're looking to grow in your expertise of writing flash fiction and short stories, why not pop over to the writing competition website http://erewashwriterscompetition.weebly.com/
and choose one to enter.  We're currently accepting entries for these competitions:

http://erewashwriterscompetition.weebly.com/2013-burst-flash-fiction-competition.html


http://erewashwriterscompetition.weebly.com/2013-open-short-story-competition---maria-smith.html


http://erewashwriterscompetition.weebly.com/2013-full-stop-short-story-competition---helen-baggott.html


Do you like gardening?

Goodbye and see you tomorrow.

F is for Fun

Earlier today I began thinking about which 'f' word I wanted to choose.

Fabulous, I thought, and I was fuelled into a furiously frisky frenzy. So many flipping fantastic words flying around inside my noddle.

After frittering away fifty minutes frequenting my dictionary, I became frightened this activity would simply leave me a fraught, frustrated and fruitless figure.  I felt I had come to a full stop and considered fetching my friend, Helen Baggott, who is the judge for the free-entry Full Stop competition
http://erewashwriterscompetition.weebly.com/2013-full-stop-short-story-competition---helen-baggott.html

Then I remembered it was Friday.  Helen would be at the fish and chip shop where she chats up the fella with the frier in his fingers.

It was then I realised fear was holding me back from making a decision.

I chose freedom by forcing myself to face up to it. 

I'd had fun in making a selection but once the final countdown had begun, that was it.

Finito.


What would you usually be doing on a Friday if you weren't busy with the A-Z challenge?

E is for Entry

Entry

Despite the bitter cold I noted the sun shone during this evening and it struck me what a wonderful event evenings are when they stay brighter for longer.

That led me to idle for a while and I stared out to the lawn as the light began to fade. A blackbird and a robin made the last call to eat from the bird table in my garden before flitting off to their nests.

To maintain the strict rules of entry to my garden I’ve erected signs in strategic points around my garden. Signs stating ‘NO ENTRY CATS’ and ‘CATS KEEP OUT’ convince me the neighbourhood cat patrol is being kept at several paws length from my feathered friends, as I rarely see any cats. It’s not that I don’t like cats. It’s simply a fact birds have always ruled the roost in my garden.

The competitions I organise also have Rules of Entry. You can find them if you follow these links:

BURST http://erewashwriterscompetition.weebly.com/2013-burst-flash-fiction-competition.html

OPEN http://erewashwriterscompetition.weebly.com/2013-open-short-story-competition---maria-smith.html

FULL STOP http://erewashwriterscompetition.weebly.com/2013-full-stop-short-story-competition---helen-baggott.html

Good evening to you.

Debbie

D is for Dither

Aah, it's that time of day again and today I am mostly having a dither.

A ditherer with desperation am I during a frantic flap through the pages of my dictionary
to ensure the D word I decide to choose today doesn't simply deliver nowt but a dribble of doo doo all over the screen.

I think I have something in my dictionary that will do the deed.  It's the word donation,
because a donation is to be provided by EWG Competitions at the close of the Open Competition
later this year.  http://erewashwriterscompetition.weebly.com/2013-open-short-story-competition---maria-smith.html

These competitions provided a £100 donation to charity in 2012.

See my blog post November 12th, 2012 for more info.
http://erewashwriterscompetition.weebly.com/blog.html

Thanks for reading.

C is for Chortle

Mornin' all.

Now I am the type who'd rather the day didn't pass with out a good chortle.  This morning was no different as I whiled away a few minutes to consider what to write during my newly- aquired displacement activity of the A-Z challenge thingy.

Many an idea popped around inside my head and gave it a right good tickle.  I was sitting here having a chortle or two about these ideas when I remembered the theme to the current competition is the word 'BURST'  http://erewashwriterscompetition.weebly.com/2013-burst-flash-fiction-competition.html

so I'm off now to read a few other A-Zedding blogathoners before I do myself an injury.  

Cheery bye till next time.

B is for befuddled

(this posted on Tuesday 2nd April 0015)

Befuddled.  That was me earlier today as I have only just started this blog and it was starting to lose me.  Not particularly difficult as I am one who can easily become lost, in fact when I was a wee lad it used to be a mission of mine to visit unfamiliar places with a view to doing nowt else except get lost.

Ah well.  Perhaps if you look at the competition website the last thing you will think I am is befuddled as I have listed out all the competitions there for you and if you do have any difficulties, you can email me anytime.

http://erewashwriterscompetition.weebly.com/

I'm off now to seek out some other happy A-Zedders.

See you tomorrow.