Winner 55 Word Challenge: Week Twenty-Four

Winner 55 Word Challenge:

Week Twenty-Four

 

 

Wow, this was a difficult choice this week. I liked them all! I was worried that with just “horror” art, some writers would bow out. You all rose to the occasion, which is good, because I have another artist lined up next week, whose work is pretty dark, but awesome. Lovecraftian comes to mind with some of the art from Thomas Arensberg. A special thank you to William Cook for inspiring such great stories this week.

As difficult as it was, I did narrow the list down. So here goes…

 

Honorable Mentions:

@J_M_Blackman Once again Jalisa awed me with her entry. I found the last line especially poetic.

@StuffedO I always wondered what happens to the odd sock and now I know. I think this would make a wonderful children’s story, especially if it is revealed what he does with the socks.

@DavidALudwig Again, another great story that was vividly told. It’s not easy to combine photos, but I think you did a great job here!

Winner:

@CaraMichaels

Another great story that combined two photos… at least I think they did. Read it below.

 

FREEDOM

Where will you go that I cannot follow?

The chair beneath my feet wobbled.

There is no safe haven left to you.

Over and over, I could hear his spite, his triumph. I would never be free until he finished with me.

Unless¬—

“God forgive me.”

I tightened the noose.

Kicked the chair away.

Freedom.

@caramichaels
55 words (without title)

 

Monthly Winner:

 

 

 

Also, this is the end of the month, which means there is the monthly prize to give out. So... I have gone over the winners for this month and my favorite story was last weeks winner, @solimond

This one still makes me giggle. It probably shouldn't have, but it did. I'm demented like that.

Mama would be angry if she saw Marissa’s face. The girl smiled in the mirror, adjusting the mask with a stained hand.

 

What mama didn’t know, wouldn’t hurt her. If she found out, Marissa would have to go back to that smelly old hospital.

 

She pushed the body under the bed. No one would know.

 

Cara, I will need your email address to send you the gift card and Nellie, I'll need a mailing address to send you the bumpersticker. Just send me a DM. Cara, you can snatch the winners badge.

Thank you everyone for joining in the fun this week. Next week is my birthday and I have some special prizes planned. It’s going to be a celebration, so be sure to check back.

If you are an artist and would like to be featured, contact me at jezri@writing.com. Put #55WordChallenge in the subject line. If you would like to donate to help with prizes, I have a donate button on the upper right side of this page. I would like to do a Kindle Fire giveaway at Christmas, but I can’t afford it on my own. But such is life.

See you all next week and enjoy the holiday weekend!

 

 

 

Winner 55 Word Challenge: Week

55 Word Challenge: Week Twenty-Four

55Word Challenge

Week Twenty-Four

 

Welcome back to the #55WordChallenge. This weeks contributing artist is William Cook. His art is amazing! It is also scary and a little bit disturbing. So of course I love it. I am sure you will find it inspiring.

That's the good news! The bad is that William is busy with several projects and can't judge this week, sooooo you are stuck with me. Boo, hiss, boo! Muahahaha! This is going to be fun.

For those that are uninitiated, the 55 Word Challenge is a contest to write a story in 55 words or less. Not an easy task, but fun and I have been blown away by some of the entries. See for yourself, all the past contests can be found here.

The challenge begins at noon Eastern time every Wednesday and ends at noon Thursday. The story is based on one of three photo prompts and can be written in any genre you choose. My only request is no porn. I don't want to hear graphic details. If it is erotic, make it titillating, not obscene. I know that can be done and done well.

 

The story is to be posted in the comment section below, along with your twitter handle or email address, so I can contact you if you are the winner. If you don't want to list your email address, send it to me at jezri@writing.com. I promise I won't distribute it, but if you are the winner I need a way to notify you and to send you your prize.

And what does the winner get? This purty badge for one. For two, a gift card for $5.00 from Amazon. (The prize will be rewarded within about week and sent to your email.) Also new, I will be offering a monthly prize to the story I liked the best between the winners. That will be announced at the end of the month who gets this.

If you are an artist that would like to have your work featured, let me know!

Photo Prompts:

Just hanging Around

 

In The Shadows

 

 

Creepy Eyes

 

 

 

William Cook is a writer/illustrator from NZ. Debut novel: 'Blood Related,' published by Angelic Knight Press December 2011. 'Blood Related' re-release by Black Bed Sheet Books, Halloween 2012, sequel 'Blood Trail' - 2013 release.

Short fiction published in the following anthologies:

Masters of Horror Anthology, 2010 - http://triskaidekabooks.co.nz/
Putrid Poetry & Sickening Sketches 2011 - Collaboration of the Dead: http://amzn.com/1463748027 (+ cover art)
Sketchbook of the Dead: 2012, Deaf Mute Comics - http://www.deafmutepress.com/
Dark Light Anthology: 2012, MARLvision Publications and Carl Hose:
http://www.carlhose.net/index.html

http://www.bloodrelated.wordpress.com
Follow me on Twitter - @williamcook666

Member of the Australian Horror Writers Association & the Horror Blogger Alliance


Shameless Promo:

6 short stories that are cannibalistic in nature.

If you have never read one of my collections and are looking for something to sample before buying, this would be a great addition to your library.  It is FREE on Kindle, Nook, Kobo and Smashwords

 

Winner 55 Word Challenge: Week Twenty-Three

Winner 55 Word Challenge:

Week Twenty-Three

 

@Angelique_Rider Great ending line. I read it to my daughter, who wore the mask and blood for this photo and when I read that last line, her eyes widened. Then she asked, Vampire or Zombie?

@postupak It’s the last line in this one that got to me. Great job!

@theglitterlady This sent shivers through me… and made me wonder, would nightshade taint meat?

 

Special, special mention to @WakefieldMahon and his unintentional, chilling story. Dental boo-boos are the worst!

I was out with a dental boo-boo yesterday. Sorry I missed the prompt. Great entries from everyone!

 

Winner:

 @solimond

Oh. My. God. This one made me giggle. It probably shouldn't have, but it did. I'm demented like that.

 

Mama would be angry if she saw Marissa’s face. The girl smiled in the mirror, adjusting the mask with a stained hand.

 

What mama didn’t know, wouldn’t hurt her. If she found out, Marissa would have to go back to that smelly old hospital.

 

She pushed the body under the bed. No one would know.

 

 

55 words

@solimond

 

Okay, Nellie, DM me your email address so I can get the gift card out to you. It's usually within a week, but sometimes, (here lately) a little longer. Also, grab yourself the badge and show it off to everyone.

 

If anyone would be interested in judging/donating photos, let me know. See you all next week!

55 Word Challenge: Week Twenty-Three

55 Word Challenge

Week Twenty-Three

 

 

Welcome back to the #55WordChallenge. I don’t have an artist lines up this week, so the photos are courtesy of my daughters’, Rylie and Sarah. Rylie is a princess in the making and Sarah… well, she takes after her mama. I feel sorry for the unsuspecting public.

 

For those that are uninitiated, the 55 Word Challenge is a contest to write a story in 55 words or less. Not an easy task, but fun and I have been blown away by some of the entries. See for yourself, all the past contests can be found here.

 

The challenge begins at noon Eastern time every Wednesday and ends at noon Thursday. The story is based on one of three photo prompts and can be written in any genre you choose. My only request is no porn. I don't want to hear graphic details. If it is erotic, make it titillating, not obscene. I know that can be done and done well.

 

The story is to be posted in the comment section below, along with your twitter handle or email address, so I can contact you if you are the winner. If you don't want to list your email address, send it to me at jezri@writing.com. I promise I won't distribute it, but if you are the winner I need a way to notify you and to send you your prize.

 

And what does the winner get? This purty badge for one. For two, a gift card for $5.00 from Amazon. (The prize will be rewarded within about week and sent to your email.) Also new, I will be offering a monthly prize to the story I liked the best between the winners. That will be announced at the end of the month who gets this. 

 

 

 

 

 

If you are an artist that would like to have your work featured, let me know!

Photo Prompts:

 

 

Winner 55 Word Challenge: Week Twenty-Two

Winner 55 Word Challenge

Week Twenty-Two

First off - this was difficult. I loved all the entries and seeing some new faces. There were so many to cho0se from. I wish I could give  a winner for each picture instead of just one overall. And the poems! What a pleasant surprise! I agonized over who to pick. I kept going  back and forth!

Honorable Mentions:

Kudos to Jennifer Mandell  for incorporating all THREE  photos! Wow!

Funniest is definitely DGH. I have a soft spot for political humor.

 Winner:

J.M. Blackman.  I loved her interpretation on the third picture, numbing and sad. How often does that happen? That someone's creativity gets beat down over time?

"Monochrome"

 If he’d have understood the concept of walking to the beat of his own drum, he’d have tired of the rhythm by now. But the lack of color in his life had sapped his individualism, had lobotomized his emotion. And he was only one more drone, a static complement to the black and white universe.

@J_M_Blackman

55 w.o title

Thank you to everyone that entered and special thanks to Miranda Gammella for judging and her wonderful photos. See you next week.

55 Word Challenge: Week Twenty-Two

55 Word Challenge:

Week Twenty-Two

Welcome back to the #55WordChallenge. This weeks judge and contributing photogtapher is Miranda Gammella. Miranda is a regular here and I love her stories,  but I had no idea she was an amateur photographer. Amateur? Wow, I am impressed. The three photos that she selected for the contest are amazing.  I think you are going to have fun with this.

For those that are uninitiated, the 55 Word Challenge is a contest to write a story in 55 words or less. Not an easy task, but fun and I have been blown away by some of the entries. See for yourself, all the past contests can be found here.

The challenge begins at noon Eastern time every Wednesday and ends at noon Thursday. The story is based on one of three photo prompts and can be written in any genre you choose. My only request is no porn. I don't want to hear graphic details. If it is erotic, make it titillating, not obscene. I know that can be done and done well.

The story is to be posted in the comment section below, along with your twitter handle or email address, so I can contact you if you are the winner. If you don't want to list your email address, send it to me at jezri@writing.com. I promise I won't distribute it, but if you are the winner I need a way to notify you and to send you your prize.

And what does the winner get? This purty badge for one. For two, a gift card for $5.00 from Amazon. (The prize will be rewarded within a week and sent to your email.) Also new, I will be offering a monthly prize to the story I liked the best between the winners. That will be announced at the end of the month who gets this.

If you are an artist that would like to have your work featured, let me know!

Photo Prompts:

LET THE WRITING BEGIN!

M L Gammella has been writing on and off since high school, where she was often found scribbling in her notebook instead of following along in class. She is currently working on her first paranormal suspense novel that began during NaNoWriMo of 2011. When not picking away at her novel, she participates in several flash fiction contests throughout the week. M L Gammella is also co-creator of the Daily Picspiration (#DailyPicspiration) blog where herself and other authors create new stories every day based on photo prompts. When she's not writing, she can be found toiling away as an office manager or what she prefers to be doing: spending time with her husband and their three pets (and taking way too  many pictures of them).

Check out M L Gammella's writing on her blog, the Daily Picspiration blog, or Facebook:

Winner 55 Word Challenge: Week Twenty-One

Winner 55 Word Challenge

Week Twenty-One

We had a lot of great entries in 55 Word Challenge. I want to thank Sue Mydilak for the  photo prompts and for judging. She has been extremely busy getting her novel, Birthright, ready for publication and illustrating for my Children’s book, The Tooth Adventures of Fanny Nightsky.  I know this decision could not have been easy for her. Be sure to check out her artwork out at Zentacular Art. Some amazing work.

Drum roll please.

Honorable mentions:

@postupak :The clock door opened, the clock door closed, the clock door opened, the clock door closed.

@MarthaBechtel: for a moment I tasted brackish water, lost in the vision

@CaraMichaels: “So I’ve been missing.”…“For two hundred of our years.”

Winner:

@Angelique_Rider 

Congratulations Robin! You can all read her story below.

Passage of Time

Night is upon me again; my time to shift and change both myself and time. When I morph into my Raven form, time warps and stands still, until I allow it to move forward again. Entire lifetimes come and go while I am changing to my true self. Consider this – tomorrow may be eons away.

Robin, DM me your email address so that I can send you your gift card. Let me know if you want Barnes & Noble or Amazon.

Thank you to everyone that entered. Check back next week, where we will have another guest artist and judge. If you are an artist and would like to contribute, please let me know.

55 Word Challenge: Week Twenty-One

55 Word Challenge

Week Twenty-One

Welcome back to the #55WordChallenge. This weeks judge and contributing artist is Sue Mydliak. I am a huge fan of Sue's and am so proud to have her work here today. I really hope you find her photos and paintings inspire your muse.

For those that are uninitiated, the 55 Word Challenge is a contest to write a story in 55 words or less. Not an easy task, but fun and I have been blown away by some of the entries. See for yourself, all the past contests can be found here.

The challenge begins at noon Eastern time every Wednesday and ends at noon Thursday. The story is based on one of three photo prompts and can be written in any genre you choose. My only request is no porn. I don't want to hear graphic details. If it is erotic, make it titillating, not obscene. I know that can be done and done well.

SPECIAL TIME WARP CHALLENGE!When I was going through trying to fix some links on the Challenge page I discovered something. I skipped from Week Seventeen to Week Nineteen.  Week Eighteen has mysteriously disappeared. Work something into your story that involves some kind of a time warp. Make it scary. Make it fun. Make it insane.

The story is to be posted in the comment section below, along with your twitter handle or email address, so I can contact you if you are the winner. If you don't want to list your email address, send it to me at jezri@writing.com. I promise I won't distribute it, but if you are the winner I need a way to notify you and to send you your prize.

And what does the winner get? This purty badge for one. For two, a gift card for $5.00 from Amazon or from Barnes & Noble. (The prize will be rewarded within a week and sent to your email.) Also new, I will be offering a monthly prize to the story I liked the best between the winners. That will be announced at the end of the month who gets this.

If you are an artist that would like to have your work featured, let me know!

Photo Prompts:

Goldfish Pond

Clock

Shape-Shifter

Sue Mydliak has been writing for six years now. She got her first start in the publishing world with her Flash Fiction, The Clearing, which appeared in Issue 7 of Mississippi Crow magazine. From there she has had numerous publications of her Horror Short Stories, her latest; Tortured Minds was published in June of 2012 and can be purchased on Amazon. She is currently working on the sequel to Birthright which she hopes to have finished by the end of this year.

 She lives in Illinois with her family and works as a Special Education Paraprofessional working with Autistic students, a job she has had for the past eleven years now.

Winner 55 Challenge: Week Twenty

Winner 55 Challenge

Week Twenty

And the results are in! Elaine (@tollykit) didn't have an easy task of choosing a winner. All the stories were great and I think everyone did a remarkable job. Thank you to all! However, it did have to be narrowed down to four and here they are!

***

I would like to thank everyone for making it so hard to choose; all the stories are wonderful. It wasn't an easy task to reduce them down to 4.
Honourable Mentions:

@RGraceAllen: 'starved of water, wilting, like his heart.' Wonderful image. You can see him waiting and crumpling with disappointment. The poignant sadness of lost opportunities. - makes me grateful for the smart phone.

@MLGammella: A gentle tale. I enjoy the whole premise of the story. The comparison between seed and child was quite simply beautiful.

@michelawalters: This one started out calmly enough. But that last line caught me by surprise, and made me catch my breath at the horror suggested by the words 'he yanked her back towards the house.' You leave us to imagine our own ending to that one, and I suspect it's nothing good.

Winner:

@WakefieldMahon: Managed to convey so much with such simple words. The story is for me completely believable. I particularly enjoyed the idea that they had to find a specific dandelion. I really could picture the scene, and the last line caught at my heart; so much responsibility on any child's shoulders. I was left hoping that for their sake their wishwould come true.

Wishes
By Wakefield Mahon

“The yard is full of them, how will you know which one, Sally?”

“I’ll know.”

Timmy shrugged. At the wise old age of eight, his sister knew far more than he. “What do we do?”

“We blow off the seeds and wish really hard.”

“And then daddy will come home?”

“If we do it right.”

55 words
@WakefieldMahon

Thanks again

Elaine

***

Thank you Elaine! Everyone be sure to check out her photography! She has some beautiful pictures.

Wakefield, you know the drill: Snatch the badge and DM me your email; I don't think I have it from the last time you won. Let me know if you want an Amazon gift card or B&N.

On a side note, I am looking for ideas for new prizes. If anyone would like to donate their book, in exchange for promoting it during the contest, let me know. Or if you would like to help out with offsetting the cost of prizes, there is a paypal button on the side pannel.

Thank you everyone for entering!

Lisa



55 Word Challenge: Week Twenty

55 Word Challenge

Week Twenty

Welcome back to the #55WordChallenge. I've got some exciting news for you. Things are changing this week and  I think for the better. I am going to start featuring artists and helping to promote their work with this contest. So first up is Elaine Hillson, @tolykit, who has been a participant and winner in past challengers. Elaine has offered up three of her photos and will be acting as judge.

For those that are uninitiated, the 55 Word Challenge is a contest to write a story in 55 words or less. Not an easy task, but fun and I have been blown away by some of the entries. See for yourself, all the past contests can be found here.

The challenge begins at noon Eastern time every Wednesday and ends at noon Thursday. The story is based on one of three photo prompts and can be written in any genre you choose. My only request is no porn. I don't want to hear graphic details. If it is erotic, make it titillating, not obscene. I know that can be done and done well.

The story is to be posted in the comment section below, along with your twitter handle or email address, so I can contact you if you are the winner. If you don't want to list your email address, send it to me at jezri@writing .com. I promise I won't distribute it, but if you are the winner I need a way to notify you and to send you your prize.

And what does the winner get? This purty badge for one. For two, a gift card for $5.00 from Amazon or from Barnes & Noble. (The prize will be rewarded within a week and sent to your email.) Also new, I will be offering a monthly prize to the story I liked the best between the winners. That will be announced at the end of the month who gets this.

 

If you are an artist that would like to have your work featured, let me know!

Photo Prompt:

Ice1

Forgotten

Time

Elaine Hillson is a UK photographer and writer; with haiku published in Blithe Spirit. She trains llamas in her spare time.  These photos were used with her permission. Elaine retains the exclusive copyright on her photos.