FLASH CHALLENGE: November '12

[kailhofer]

The Guilty Monster Challenge:



Just last night I watched an old '70s episode of The Incredible Hulk after not seeing one in probably 15-20 years. I always liked that show, but I had never really thought about why: it's all about the guilt.

"David" Banner appealed to me in a way that "Bruce" Banner in the comic books never did. In the show, David lost his wife in a car crash because he wasn't strong enough to get her out, so he became a researcher on those moments when humans get super-strength in a crisis. Thinking he was on to something, he dosed himself with waaay too much gamma radiation, and unwittingly created the "Hulk" inside him.

Having a monster within rarely works out well for someone, and that's how it went in the show. He's blamed for the murder of someone who loved him (supposedly caused by the monster), and has to flee from town to town as he tries to find a way to cure himself, always afraid the beast within will come out and hurt someone, or that he'd be caught and the truth revealed.

That's a load of guilt for a person to carry, and it really endeared me to the character back then and still today. His guilt created the monstrosity and then the monstrosity continued to create guilt in the person. Then again, perhaps it was just the mournful piano music at the end of each episode that kept me thinking of David as a human being trying as hard as he could to get better and help others, but regardless, it was all very human in my opinion, and that's where we're going with this challenge.

The task this time is to take an everyday, generic monster--vampire, werewolf, mummy, kraken, bog monster... or whatever, so long as it's generic and not copyrighted--and give it guilt. That should be an excellent exercise in characterization and entertaining to read.

Are you up for the challenge?


REQUIREMENTS: (1) Your story must tell a tale of a generic monster riddled with guilt that can't stop being monstrous; (2) No comedies, parodies, or farces; (3) You must have at least two characters that "talk" to each other in some fashion. (4) 1,000 words or less, not counting title, byline, or "The End"; (5) The characters, setting, and story must be fictional and not previously published, even in these challenges; (6) One entry per author; (7) Give your story a title and a byline; and (8) Keep it clean. Rated 'PG-13'. (Basically, think, "Could I see this on CSI?" That allows a lot, really.)

CHARACTERS & SETTING: No copyrighted characters or settings, or references thereto. Famous, non-copyrighted fictional characters like Santa Claus, or religious figures such as the Devil, named angels such as Gabriel, or gods like Thor, etc. as supporting characters at best and at my discretion. The Wicked Witch and Dracula may be in the public domain, but don't expect me to allow them. No person that was ever a "real life" human being may be used as a character, but can be referred to, as in "President Kennedy had declared it would be so." Except as noted above under non-copyrighted fictional persons, character names may not be copied from fiction or real life, even if changed, i.e. Char-less Darween. All non-copyrighted settings are ok. Famous, unique sites like Stonehenge may be used over and again. No fan fiction or sequels, so don't bother putting your story in the Land of Oz or that great place you thought up two challenges ago.

DISQUALIFICATIONS/REFUSALS: If, in my judgment, any requirement or rule is missed, I won't post the story for voting, but authors are free to resubmit with changes until the deadline. Should a story be initially accepted and posted in the challenge, but then later judged by me to be in violation, the story may be disqualified and removed from contention at any time before contest end. Authors who feel a story may be in violation should send me a PM and state their case.

HOW TO ENTER: Stories must be sent by PRIVATE MESSAGE, and NOT posted into a thread. Just click the 'PM' button at the bottom of this post and paste your story in the message. You are responsible for doing your own formatting, and leave an extra line between paragraphs, just like when you see them in the 'zine. I will allow different colors, but not changed fonts or sizes, artwork, or any other embedded or external links.

DO NOT send a regular email to me.

Stories will be posted "blind"--without the author's name on them. All the story titles are literally tossed into a pith helmet and chosen at in random order. When the poll closes after the voting week, I'll post a list of the stories and who wrote them. All entries will then be reposted in the Flash Archive with the author's byline.

Entries from new authors are strongly encouraged. C'mon. Give it a try!

NOTE: ONLY REGISTERED MEMBERS who have posted at least one message may submit a story. Without that one post, the system will not let you send a PM.

DEADLINE: Stories should be in by 9 p.m. Central Standard Time (GMT-6), Sunday, November 25, 2012. The stories will then be posted for voting at approximately 10 p.m. Voting will close on Sunday, Dec. 2 at approximately 9 p.m., GMT-6.

VOTING: Stories are rated on a scale of 0-10 in whole numbers in 6 different categories by filling in scores in a form that is posted by me immediately following the post containing the stories for this challenge. Voters copy and paste the form into a PM and send it to me for tallying. One vote per user (that is, per ip address), and authors may not vote for their own story.

IF YOU WISH TO SCORE A ZERO FOR A STORY, YOU MUST ENTER A ZERO IN THAT POSITION ON THE VOTING FORM. A challenge entrant who does not vote for the other stories will receive a 10% deduction in their own score at the time of contest close, and the other stories will be given marks equaling whatever their story's average is at the time of contest close.

If more than two stories are tied at the end of voting, there will be a succession of one-day runoff votes until a single winner is chosen or the number of winners is reduced to two.

WHAT YOU WIN: Writers get improved short fiction skills, increasing their chances in the marketplace, without the lengthy investment in time a longer story would take. That, as well as bragging rights and pride--there is stiff competition each month amongst some great stories.

LEGAL STUFF: I'll try to do my best lawyer impersonation: By entering this challenge you are technically granting Aphelion: The Webzine of Science Fiction and Fantasy perpetual electronic rights only to post and archive your challenge entry. Aphelion would rather not lay any claim on them at all, but by posting them on a public site, they'd legally count as being published no matter what.

Ok. A real lawyer would have been less interesting. I tried.

[kailhofer]

As long as it's not a copyrighted "legend" in those books or movies.

[Lester Curtis]

I'm not talking to any of you freaks until you've seen Cloud Atlas. This is sci-fi as it should be. Richard, you will love the references to eastern religions. See it in the theater OR ELSE! (or else what? oh, yeah, I won't talk to them...)

I guess you won't be talking to me for the rest of my life. I have "Cloud Atlas" in my Netflix queue -- in the 'Saved' section -- availability date unknown.

A ticket to a single movie in a theater would cost me the same as (or more than) a whole MONTH'S worth of Netflix movies -- and I can stretch out at home in my Lazy-boy with a glass of brandy at my elbow and smoke all I want. With no rude audience members making noise, no traffic or parking, and no noxious popcorn-stink, and I can go take a leak in the middle without missing anything.

[kailhofer]

Vampires used to be evil. Sleek and sexy in a 'kill you as soon as look at you' way. Now they are just poor, sparkly, misunderstood woobies who have the burden of living forever.

I love that term, Woobies. I had never read it before. Pity they're pathetic gits and not scary monsters, because I would have loved to see a story using that name as the monster. Alas.

[kailhofer]

you instructed: (2) No comedies, parodies, or farces; (3) Yo

WHY???????????? It takes the fun out of it and cuts down on the possible variable creativity.

This is a difficult thing to explain, so let me fumble through it here.

In a nutshell, I think it's a cheat.

By using the conventions of a farce, a writer "gets around" the focus of the exercise, thereby never facing the heavy lifting it would take to reach the goal. That is, sometimes these challenges are just for the fun of writing and to keep us all involved as well as feeling creative. However, more often than not, they are intended to help us train ourselves as writers to meet the requirements of the publishing world by building skills we need or honing ability in trying to produce certain output. I'm not going to claim to be an all-knowing writing guru, but that's the way I see it.

If we don't use this challenge as it is intended, do we build on our ability to create a great character filled with guilt? In all honesty there's a chance, but probably no, especially if it's a spoof piece. I don't think there's anyone here, me included, who can say their characters are always great and need no improvement. Also, we need to know how to put that guilty soul into a compelling story--and that's no small feat. They only way I know to do that is to practice.

So, by skipping on the work intended, I personally see it as the easy way out rather than a genuine effort to meet the challenge. I am in no way saying it didn't take skill to do the comedy piece. In fact, it may have taken more skill to do the farce. However, it never faced the real dilemma. Facing that dilemma is what forces us to grow and improve our skill.

I suppose it is sort of like Captain Kirk cheating on the no-win scenario. His nature fought the choice, but real life did eventually make him face it with the "temporary" death of Spock.

Looking at it another way, if a professional editor assigns a writer a story for their magazine and said writer instead writes a comedy spoof, there is an outside chance if it is very well done that the editor will go for it, but far more likely, that editor is going to not buy the piece. More likely yet, the editor may drop that writer from his or her list of freelancers. Markets want the pieces they want, and if we as writers are unwilling to bend to meet the requirements of said market, we do ourselves no favors.

Did that make sense?


PS. I think December's challenge should deliberately be a comedy one, lest anyone think that comedy isn't hard, especially for what is usually a Holiday theme.

[Lester Curtis]

I love the theater in all its disparage grandeur. When I saw Cloud Atlas the audience was literally clapping in the 'victory' segments, crying along with Tom Hanks, and after the movie a woman rushed in to the bathroom and hollered "Did ya'll see Cloud Atlas?? - was that the best movie ever or what" and rushed back out into the foyer. Movies are fun here in the Romney Belt.

I thought you weren't talking to me . . . guess you were just kidding, huh?

I'd forgotten to add that Netflix has no dress code. So, on those really hot, sticky nights, I can watch the movie wearing nothing but my glasses.

[Lester Curtis]

Getting back to the topic of the challenge, I wish Nate weren't restricting us to traditional monsters. I think the old ones need a vacation, and it'd be fun to do something fresh.

[Lester Curtis]

Getting back to the topic of the challenge, I wish Nate weren't restricting us to traditional monsters. I think the old ones need a vacation, and it'd be fun to do something fresh.

I think the term was 'Generic... or whatever'. I think that gives a lot of wriggle room.

'Generic' -- meaning, 'of the genre.' Traditional.

IIRC, I got my entry booted last year because I used were-foxes instead of were-wolves. Close cousins not allowed.

[kailhofer]

Getting back to the topic of the challenge, I wish Nate weren't restricting us to traditional monsters. I think the old ones need a vacation, and it'd be fun to do something fresh.

I read it as "Any non-specific monster from previous works". So I think he's saying you can do a 6 legged insectoid, he just doesn't want to see Arachna from (made up title here) "The Spider's Creed" book/movie, because that previous work would have already done the character setup, and it becomes fan-fiction at that point. I don't think he's pushing extra hard that it can ONLY be one of the "famous tropes".

There are all manner of generic monsters: giant sharks, demons, sirens of the deep (mermaids), boggarts, gremlins... Many a thing has plagued mankind.

[Lester Curtis]

This is not like Nate to be this late. I hope nothing is wrong and he's alright!

Does anyone have his phone number to call and check on him? (Don't post his contact info on the forum).

Late for what -- ?

[Robert_Moriyama]

Did anyone hear from the Evil Ice Gnome (may his name be forever revered) yet? Nate, post something - so these other guys will quit drivelling on and on!

His Member Status screen says he hasn't been active in the Forum since November 18th. Which one of you miscreants frightened him into hiding with your obviously-autobiographical monster story?

[kailhofer]

Thanksgiving is the busiest time of the year in the newspaper business as Black Friday sales approach. So many inserts to get in there and shipments to get out. Inkjet addressing machine gave out, 24-ft truck broke down, boss wants everything painted to impress a potential client next week, and every underpaid worker is just about at the breaking point. I've been putting in 14 hour days, but now that die is cast. Time off!

Did I miss responding to anyone?

[Lester Curtis]

I've got something, now, at almost the last hour -- having it reviewed by a friend before I send it in. *Fingers crossed*

[Lester Curtis]

My entry is now in the out-box.