Genre: Comedy
Action: jumping a rope
Word: wash
I wrote a story under 100 words called "The Visitor" about a little girl in Kansas teaching an alien to jump rope. Yesterday, the results came out. I, sadly, didn't make it into Round 2, but I received feedback from the judges today. It was very positive feedback, with some helpful suggestions on tightening up the story. One reason I didn't advance was that my story fell more into the SciFi genre than Comedy. I'm planning on revising it with their suggestions and submitting it for publication as a SciFi drabble (the name for a story of exactly 100 words).
Last weekend, I completed a Round 1 story for the NYC Midnight Flash Fiction Challenge. These were my prompts with this one:
Genre: Romantic Comedy
Location: A microbrewery
Object: A toy car
After getting Romance in Round 2 of the Short Story Challenge and Comedy in the 100 Word Micro, I was not thrilled to get Rom Com with this one! These three genre options are my LEAST favorite. Really hoping I can pull better genres in the future. Here's the complete list of genres that NYC Midnight uses:
Action/Adventure
Comedy
Crime Caper
Drama
Fairy Tale
Fantasy
Ghost Story
Historical Fiction
Horror
Mystery
Political Satire
Romance
Romantic Comedy
Sci-Fi
Spy
Suspense
Thriller
They have very helpfully included a definition of each on their site: Genre Definitions
My Rom Com story under 1000 words is titled: "Of Beer and Brides"
Synopsis: Can Jane keep her fiancee happy with the wedding she’s planned in the microbrewery she owns?
I did something a little experimental with the format and switched POV between the two brides. I also didn't try to include ANY speculative elements, so maybe I'll get more points for trying to stick to the genre. I'm really not sure if I have any comedy ability though. The NYC Midnight Flash Fiction Challenge is unique because writers are guaranteed to be in the 2nd Round (happening in August) with the exact same group of writers from Round 1. Then the scores from the two rounds are combined and the top 5 advance to Round 3.
Fingers crossed for a great genre in Round 2!
