Fortnightly Writing Competition: THANK YOU FOR THE MUSIC (Results)

Started by Sinitrena, Fri 30/03/2018 00:04:55

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Sinitrena

Still no votes from FormosaFalanster but I think I waited long enough. Thank you to those of you who did vote.

But before I count the points, let's add my own votes to it:

BEST CHARACTER: Baron for Gage Foley
BEST PLOT:  Baron
BEST WRITING:  WHAM
BEST ATMOSPHERE:  WHAM
BEST MUSIC:  WHAM


And that leads to the official results:

In third place, with 5 points, we have FormosaFalanster. Congratulations, you win the bronze medal of written music.

This story had an interesting concept, combining the acustic element with the visual. It gives us a protagonist who seems to disconnect from the world outside his car, only interacting through what he listens to and what he sees - which gives a slightly surreal atmosphere. Unfortunately, it also makes it difficult to distinguish what is actually happening. Does he have a relationship with the announcer on the radio? Does he really commit suicide? Also, describing music through clours makes it easier to describe, which is in a way good - finding a way to describe something that is difficult to describe - but it is also a shortcut.

Our second place goes to WHAM with 6 points.

My favourite this time around. This is a wonderful horror story that gave me goosebumps. It explains very little (why thy want to enter the creature, what the creature is, why the narrator survives, what the creature wants, and so on) but this story concentrates on the mystery and the feeling of doom; and for a horror story, less is often more.

And Baron wins first place with 9 points.

Somehow, you all three managed to write stories that leave a lot of question, in your case it is mainly why. WHAM already asked this: Why the killing? Why the purple hair? We get absolutely no motivation from Marks. It felt a bit like you forgot to write a paragraph. But I did like the glimpse at how the members of the band are influenced by the murderer on their trail.

Thanks to all three of you for taking on this challenging topic.

See you next time.

FormosaFalanster

Oh I'm so sorry guys, I was so busy I still had no time to contribute more... Anyway thanks for the feedback, it's not so bad for something I wrote quickly. I will make sure to contribute more seriously in the future Congratulations WHAM and Baron!

Baron

Well, to be fair, WHAM's was my favourite as well.... (roll)  I humbly accept the victory.  I had to cut a poorly written segment speculating that Gage's disappearance somehow linked him to the murders (and also Elvis and Area 51), but it might have indirectly made things any more clear.  As for Marks the stalker/murderer's motivation, I preferred to leave him an enigma.  Not just to play with the reader's perception through his eyes, but also to make his crimes more incomprehensible (the band members, after all, also had no idea why he was coming after them).  The best we can speculate is that he is a crazed super fan.

The purple hair was a somewhat feeble attempt to tie all the incidents together so that it would be obvious that there was one stalker, not a series of unfortunate coincidences.  The weirdness of it was also supposed to lend weight to the insanity of the unprovoked crimes.  I had contemplated attempting to tie the crazed super-fan in to the band's highschool acquaintance quoted in the first article, but it seemed too obvious without awkwardly giving Marks a pseudonym and then trying to explain it afterwards.  Also the band would know him, so he'd be apprehended pretty quickly....

I will be the first to admit it was not my best outing: WHAM should've won!  WHAM WHAM WHAM WHAM WHAM WHAM WHAM WHAM! ;-D

I'll try and get a new competition together soon. 

WHAM

Woo! 2nd only to Baron. I can deal with that!
Congratulations, and THANKS FOR THE MUSIC, Baron!
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