Less than twenty-four hours to go until our latest competition closes for entries and the stories have continued to come in.
As usual, we have had entries that range across the styles and genres and what has been striking this time around has been the quality of some of the first lines.
As mentioned before in these blogs, first lines are crucial - they grab the attention of the judge, the editor, the publisher - and a good one means you grab the attention right from the off.
That is not to say that stories cannot start in a less dramatic way: some of the best I have read were those which drew you in slowly and inexorably to the writer’s world. But equally, a striking first line sets the tone right from the off.
Whichever way you do it, good opening lines are crucial and certainly we have seen some absolute crackers this time around.
John Dean March 31

THE latest winners have been named in the February Global Short Story
Competition - and this time it is a clean sweep for the UK.
With the first two competition winners coming from Australia and Canada,
this time the winner is David Aldus, from High Wycombe, Buckinghamshire, who
wins £100 for his story Time’s Ticking Clock.
Judge Fiona Cooper, the respected North-East writer, said: “The writer of
the winning story writes like a master of language. The story is tight and
economical in time and scale of action, yet manages to span and explore
complex and thought-provoking issues. There is humour and tragedy in equal
and complex measures. It’s great.”
The runner-up is Grandma’s House, by Mark Frankel, of London, who wins £25,
of whom Fiona said; “This is a lovely, many-layered story spanning years. It
has to be re-read, just to make exactly sure about the bittersweet twist to
it. Excellent.”
The commended story was Interview, by Don Nixon, of Albrighton, near
Wolverhampton, of whom Fiona said; “A thoroughly accomplished story - you
can smell the place and smell the fear, and the supreme arrogance of the
main character builds up very convincingly.”
Well done to all three of you.
The March competition closes on March 31 and already Canadian writers are making a strong showing. They clearly want to taste victory again!

John Dean March 24

I know a lot of you will be waiting for the results of our February competition. Well, this note is to say that we plan to announce them next week.

Have a good weekend.

John Dean

One of the entries which has just come in illustrated beautifully one of the most important aspects of starting a story - remember that it’s not the start.

Sounds a daft bit of advice but all stories begin in the middle of someone’s life when much has already gone before, when people‘s lives are already well under way.

The trick for the good writer is to give that sense from the very beginning of the story and this one started with a line that did just that. It gave us the idea that much had gone before, that it was set in a community with its own idiosyncrasies and histories. That is good story writing. It immediately draws us into the world in which the story is about to unfold.

Talking of unfolding, there is still a fortnight to enter the March competition and Fiona is hard at work judging those from February. We’ll make the announcement the moment we know the result of her deliberations.

John Dean March 18

I went onto the Internet this morning, keyed in the words ‘short stories’ and received the news that there were 364,000,000 pages to go at.

That is an astonishing figure and does underline the way that the Internet has helped revive what was an endangered art form.

There was a time in that shadowy pre-history age before the Internet when short stories were all the rage but, as they became less popular with readers, more and more publishers turned to other genres.

Recent years, however, have seen a revival in the short story’s popularity, as mentioned in previous blogs here, and I really do believe that the web can take a lot of credit for that.

We hope that we are playing our own small part in that revival and that the more competitions we stage, the more entries we receive and the more writers who secure prizes, will only add to that success.

And maybe writers’ success in competitions like ours can provide that vital bit of extra confidence that writers need. I heard the other day that a writer who won a previous competition that we ran two years ago has just secured a major book deal, and is now being tipped for a glittering career. It can happen.

We have been sent several emails suggesting one or two people are struggling to register.

We have checked our system out and it seems to be working OK but if you do experience difficulties do please let us know so we can sort your problems out. I can be contacted on deangriss@btinternet.com

Thanks

John Dean March 12

As mentioned in earlier blogs, we are grateful to those people supporting our competition. We are not a huge organisation so every bit of help we can get is much appreciated.

Those helping us range from writing magazines, literary organisations and competition sites to the leaders of writing groups. We are also very grateful to Darlington Arts Centre for its continuing support - it is a place that believes wholeheartedly in encouraging writers.

Another supporter I would like to mention is Sally Quilford, who has directed quite a few people to our site.

Her generous support is typical of the way the writing community works - we do everything we can do help each other. Community is the right word indeed.

Sally’s site is at http://www.sallyquilford.co.uk and she says: “I strive to make it a place where writers can go for tips, information about competitions and markets, and for advice.”

It’s well worth a visit.

Back to our competition, we have had one or two recent queries from writers coming back to enter another story having done so in a previous month. Because of the way the system is set up, you need to re-register as a new person if you do that - best tip is to take your last log-in name and add a number to it.

We do operate a facility on the site which means you can let us know if you are having problems - we try to answer every query and we can always find a way around any problems.

John Dean March 10

Still experiencing a slow start to the March competition but I am delighted to say that we have added another country to our list of entries - so welcome Spain.

Actually, this blog is more of a plug for one of my own works. Before I was picked up by Robert Hale for my crime novels, I tried writing children’s fiction.

I had a book accepted by a London company which put out all the publicity ahead of publication - then went bust.

So, my father and I self-published and sold out. Now the book has been reissued, complete with a new cover by my fellow Certys director Mark Etherington.

Haghir The Dragon Finder is a comic fantasy, taking the premise that nothing is as it seems, and is an affectionate parody of children’s fantasy tales.

First published in 1994, it is now available for sale at www.lulu.com/content/661828

Ok, plug over!

John Dean March 7

We’ve had a slow start to our March competition after the late rush in February, which gives me the chance to reflect on an element of writing that comes through time and time again in the entries.

Short stories can be many different things but many writers approach them rather like a novel in the way they structure them.

By that I mean that their short stories are a series of small chapters, maybe only a few lines but representing a development in the story.

This requires really effective writing because, whereas in a novel you might have eight or nine pages to recount an incident, that luxury simply does not exist in a short story.

If you take our competition, our limit for a story is 2,000 words. Sounds a lot but not if you let your episodes run too long.

So, how do you achieve such tight writing? Well, it might be that you describe a location in a line rather than a paragraph, produce only sparing details of your character or recount a conversation in four snatches of dialogue rather than a page.

Many winning short story authors in competitions around the world have been those who achieved such effective writing.

All of this is not to say that when you write a novel, you can waffle on to your heart‚s content. Indeed, the disciplines of short story writing can be invaluable when you tackle a novel. Whatever you write, every word must do its job. it’s a good mantra to live by.

John Dean March 6, 2008

Entries closed at midnight (British-time) on Friday for our latest monthly competition and I am delighted to say that, after a late rush, we had our highest number of stories yet.

The stories have now gone off to Fiona Cooper for judging and we hope to announce the results in a couple of weeks or so.

I know Fiona is enjoying reading the stories and is impressed by a lot of what she is seeing - her comments when announcing the winners for the first two competitions reflected that.

And now it starts all over again with the March competition open for entries. What particularly pleases us is the wide range of nations now represented.

What also delights us is the fact that one or two writers are entering again with different stories.

We welcome you all.

John Dean March 3, 2008