Monday 20 June 2016

SHORT STORY ENTRY: Bath Flash Fiction Award

Dear all,

Here's one more short story entry I can now blog as the long list has been published. To see the long list and find out more information so you can try yourself next time please go to: 

Bath Flash Fiction Award
www.bathflashfictionaward.com
(The maximum word count was 300)


This was a little idea I had that although I couldn't develop I really wanted to do something with. I couldn't spend time on it to produce a longer piece and I didn't want to leave it to rot either so truthfully, I knew it wasn't properly rounded and finished but I enjoyed the visual in my mind so much I couldn't resist entering it!

This makes 19 competitions I have entered this year so far and I have drafts of another 25 shorts that if I finish them I can enter into competitions during the second half of this year. Some like this one are very short but some are between the 5k and 10k word count mark. Some (perhaps like this one... ) I know haven't been great but I've still enjoyed the process and learnt a lot from entering, and others I am quite proud of (even though I know they aren't brilliant, I think they show a bit of development in my storytelling or have been very useful exercises in trying out new ideas or techniques) and I have even managed to not cringe at them after re-reading several weeks later!

Anyway, I'll be blogging shortly on the topic of word counts and how entering competitions this year has helped me develop the critical process of slashing out lines. 



No More I-Spy

‘It’s so stupid! Why Trafalgar Square!’ Ellie turns to her mother and raises both arms into the air. She looks like a despairing sports coach seeing their best player mess up. For a nine-year-old she carries the aura of existential frustration quite majestically.
‘It’s only a film,’ Ellie’s mother says, trying to make light of the perceptive child critic.
‘If I wanted to sell secrets mum… if I was a spy, that would be the last place I’d go; like, there are soooo many cameras and people,’
What secrets? Ellie’s mother thinks, privately petrified of Ellie’s potential, which grows more demanding by the day. How does she know to think this way?
‘I’d pick the path by my school fields, it’s like, in the middle of nowhere, like, really,’

Ellie doesn’t need a response; her eyes have returned to study the screen. Ellie’s mother on the other hand would love some answers. A Sunday afternoon film on BBC 2 shouldn’t cause this much distress. Is this the moment she knows she will lose her? Have they somehow detected her intelligence? How long before they begin to start sending her codes on the back of her corn flakes? Ellie’s mother wonders if she should start hiding the newspapers so Ellie can’t find the crosswords. Ellie’s mother loves her of course… but why doesn’t Ellie ever want to see the Prince kiss the Princess?

Have a great week, 

R.G Rankine
www.rgrankine.com
www.thinkingplainly.com