Yay!
After 3 years I’ve finally got through to the final round of one of the NYC Midnight Challenges!
My 100 word story about Sleep Paralysis in my favourite genre (Horror!) came in at number 6 in my category. I didn’t even scrape through with an honourable mention! I got a legitimate winning place! I’m delighted that I’m now in a position able to share it with you now. They stipulate that you wait for 10 days after the results area announced before publicly sharing your work.
It’s fair to say I’m feeling very pleased with myself.
Round 1 started out back in April with 5,452 writers in 92 groups. My genre was Romantic Comedy (vile) and had to involve ‘waiting for a number to be called’ and include the word ‘worst’. My entry was called I Found Love in the Same Day Emergency Care Department and it came in 3rd in my group!
One of the judges said “I was bowled over by the impressive, even utilitarian simplicity of style in this submission, that nevertheless managed to relate a warm, even adorable love story between two people close to their worst.”
Round 2 kicked off in June when we were down to 1,380 writers in 24 groups. As I said above, I was ecstatic to get the ‘horror’ genre and my story had to involve the action ‘swerving’ and include the word ‘except’. I went a for a long title again as this works well when words are limited to 100! They allow for a title up to 15 words long. The story was called, Sleep Paralysis: Unexplained phenomenon associated with total immobility and the sense of an evil presence.
My favourite bit of feedback on this one was “I really enjoyed the line ‘she scuttles…’ The sounds that are associated with each of these verbs give such an unpleasant, spine tingling feel to the moment. It’s a wonderful use of language to capture the feeling of approaching horror.”
The final round contained only 192 writers. Everyone got the same assignment:
Genre: Open
Action: Falling in love
Word: enough
I’m reasonably happy with my story but I can’t help feeling that it’s not one of my best. I wrote it during a a long weekend away in a camper van with a good friend. She liked it!
To be honest, just getting through to the last 192 of 5452 writers and receiving such encouraging feedback on my other submission feels like I’ve won already. I’m happy whatever happens next. Writing can be such a mentally torturous activity. You lurch between highs and lows and waves of love and hate for yourself and your work on a daily basis. A negative review on one day can send you spiralling into a storm of self-doubt and impostor syndrome. A single new fan or a tiny positive comment can set you spinning like a top with excitement and pride on another.
But, whatever the outcome of the challenge, there’s not long to wait. The results are in TOMORROW!
In the meantime, here is Sleep Paralysis. I hope you enjoy it:
Sleep Paralysis: Unexplained phenomenon associated with total immobility and the sense of an evil presence.
The hag is here.
My eyes spring wide open. But I am lead. Molten and heavy.
The room is black except for the two glowing red coals staring at me from the form crouched low in the corner.
I swerve my eyes to the flickering orange lettering of the digital clock. 3 am. The hour of Christ’s death. The hour of the devil.
She scuttles. She scurries. She climbs. She pounces.
Heavy on my chest. Hot breath on my face. Pressing air from my lungs. Life from my body.
My eyes bulge. I scream silently.
The hag is here. Again.
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