Topic: Fortnightly Writing Competition - Write About What You Know! (Voting)

[Sinitrena]

Plot: SilverSpook - Finally a story from SilverSpook that wasn't inherently confusing! (sorry) I don't really see how it fits the topic, though. (Contrary to his first story here in this thread, that actually told us something that might, with some elaboration, match the topic.) However, I'm wondering why you decided to use the name "Drumpf" - obviously a derivation of Trump - for your president but kept the name of the german chancellor, Merkel, intact? Also, why "a 5th-Reich"? If anything, it would be a 4th-Reich. Using 5th-Reich implies that the current Germany is or is referred to as the 4th-Reich, which is not only effectively wrong, but also rather problematic, considering the meaning of 4th-Reich. (see wikipedia: Fourth Reich and Nazi Germany: Name)

Atmosphere: Baron - This story shows how the pressure of all the daily tasks we need to do makes it more and more difficult to do even one of them.

Word-Choice/Style: Baron - As always, Baron's story offers unusual and interesting word choices and descriptions that make it possible to feel with his characters. But to be honest, it does get rather purpely prose here: "I am a bear in my den hibernating.  I am a mouse in a pink nest of cozy insulation.  I am a caterpillar in my cocoon, metamorphosing into a beautiful butterfly.  When dawn cracks the egg of night like a humourless drill-sergeant-chef I will emerge from my chrysalis like a phoenix, changed, improved, and energized by my hiatus from the world." That was probably a bit too much.

Grasp of Subject Matter: Baron - Well, we all know procrastination, don't we? (Though how much of an expert we are might vary.)

Enthusiasm for Subject Matter: Baron - Neither the character nor the author seems particularly enthusiastic about this subject, more depressed or opressed by the sheer number of tasks that need to be done and sleep and laziness seem to be more in the way than anything else. But I'm really not even sure what SilverSpook's subject is or how his story relates to the topic at all, so this was an easy vote.

[SilverSpook]

Yes, the point is that Merkel's austerity-peddling government IS the 4th-Reich, just ask Greece!!  Come on!   

(JK I actually just forgot how many Reichs there are/have been and I had to do some fiction writing that I get paid for, so unfortunately the fact-checking for this one took a back seat.)

Drumpf is a spin-off of John Oliver's roasting of Donald Trump, which I had thought was fairly solidly part of consensus TV reality, but apparently John Oliver might need to have a ratings-review next fiscal quarter since not everyone clicked that Youtube or tuned into HBO or got it virally injected through a Facebook needle.  That's the problem with multiple geographies, cultures, nation states.  You never know what media and/or infotainment people are exposed to who are reading any particular piece of internet writing competition fiction, and so what will confuse them.  Which is why we need Clinton to win: so the Illuminati can install the New World Order!  Then with a global monoculture in place, everyone in Germany and Zimbabwe and Antarctica will get my obscure hipster American references!  Then "The Spook" is gonna Win Win Win again! 

Plot: Sinitrena
Atmosphere: Baron
Word-Choice/Style: Baron
Grasp of Subject Matter: Sinitrena
Enthusiasm for Subject Matter: Sinitrena*

(*Chrome keeps trying to autocorrect your name into 'Retsina'.  Apparently you are a fine Greek resinated wine! )

[Ponch]

Plot: Silverspook
Atmosphere: Sinitrena
Word-Choice/Style: Baron
Grasp of Subject Matter: Sinitrena
Enthusiasm for Subject Matter: Silverspook

[SilverSpook]

Somebody come vote a flush !Baron* so that Baron doesn't have to pixel art up trophies and carry the heavy cross of FWC again, even if it IS Lent. 

*Not Baron for not-programmers.

[kconan]

Baron Wins!  The coveted RED expert stamp is your trophy:

...Sinitrena gets the silver stamp for second:

...and SilverSpook takes third:


Perhaps I left this comp theme a little too open-ended, but I enjoyed the entries all the same.   Thanks for playing and voting everyone!  The reigns are now handed over to this round's top word-meister, Baron!

[Baron]

Edit

Wait, what?  It's still the 22nd in like half the world!

Voting period ends on close of business Wednesday, March 23rd!

I demand a recount, or at least a deferment. 

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Original Post

Wow, I got through those in like fifteen minutes -I think that's a record!   I wonder if this will result in a surge of voter participation....   Here are mine:

Plot: I liked them both, but Sinitrena I think built more suspense before the quick conclusion.  And what is a plot without suspense, I ask?

Atmosphere:  I'm going with SilverSpook, who did a good job of mimicking a conspiratorial internet chat thingy.

Word-Choice/Style: It's no secret that I'm a sucker for SilverSpook's stringing of social-economy-era buzzwords like beads on a necklace around the neck of a beautiful woman.  My favourite this time was the punny "fences bigger than American border walls."

Grasp of Subject Matter:  I think SilverSpook seems to have a surprisingly firm grasp of flouting alphabet spy agency algos, sexbot phishing scams, and the immigrant ancestry of Republican primary candidates.

Enthusiasm for Subject Matter: Probably Sinitrena, since her hobby appears to be running off and joining the circus....   I've juggled a bit myself in my day, and I can appreciate the importance of rhythm over all else around you.  Plus, SilverSpook doesn't really seem all that enthusiastic about the coming USAnian exodus.  What's wrong with 40 years in the desert in atonement, man?

[kconan]

My business closed earlier, but I should have waited for you to vote!  Regardless, my vote breaks the tie you just created and I still crown you Champion...

...though now Sinitrena is allowed to share the red Expert stamp trophy with you, and SilverSpook gets upgraded to Silver.

[Sinitrena]

JK I actually just forgot how many Reichs there are/have been

I assumed as much. But I thought I'd point it out anyway.


Congratulations, Baron! See you next round.

[Baron]

Well, I guess I should acknowledge the victory, but rest assured that I will be discussing via PM with kconan the terms "optics" and "collusion". 

The way I count it was a seven-seven-six vote split, which in my books pretty much constitutes a dead heat.  In the ideal world I think we should have left voting open a little longer, but I accept the authority of the contest organizer to call it as he sees fit.

In response to Sinitrena's comments about purple language, I think you would appreciate the edits I made.  In my first draft I had this Disney Acid Trip where I went off into this really silly/crazy/weird dream about a four-legged potato named Whiskers and cigar-smoking pile of cat vomit that can tell your future if you let it hold your hand.  But it was pretty purple and it really got off topic (and really needed to be rewritten), so in the end I just cut the whole thing.  So basically the version I submitted is actually less purple then it could have been.

In condolence to SilverSpook: I thought your piece was clever and insightful, and leaves the reader with just enough information to draw their own conspiratorial conclusions about what happened in the end.  I think you hit the nail on the head why you're not winning these things, though.  With such an international community here you really can't make assumptions about universal media experiences, which can make your sophisticated observational humour seem confusing or arcane to those not in the loop.  The age-old adage of "know thy audience" is as important now more than ever.  Basically you'll always be writing for Sinitrena (an ex-circus carney of German extraction who used to make glam music-videos back in the 1980s) and myself (an ex-banana republic dictator currently in exile in the Arctic), and often for Ponch (a motorcycle driving ninja-vigilante from Texas), kconan (a freak mutation of one of my cloning experiments currently running amok in Asia), JudasFM (a muscle-bound gear-head who runs her own chop shop in the Inland Empire), WHAM (aristocratic spawn of one of Europe's most powerful banking clans who now makes his living as a dangerously seductive exotic dancer), Stupot+ (a 300 year old Cornishman cursed by some old shinto god-spirit to walk the Earth for 1000 years searching for his lost mojo), and sometimes a few random others with even more bizarre background stories.  I'm not telling you how to write your stories, 'cause I really enjoy your style and substance as it is, but it's something to bear in mind when entering this particular competition.

All right, I'll climb off my rock now, smash the tablets, and move on.  As I write this the power has gone off due to an insanely intense ice-storm (stupid Arctic exile.... ), but when I get back on the grid I'll post this and get another competition up and running.








(Did you think I forgot? )






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The Fortnightly Writing Competition!