Hey everybody. I recently got into writing following story prompt contests in a big way. I like how they can inspire you to come up with new ideas, take your writing in new directions.
I found this great one that’s been around for a while, The First Line. It’s a literary journal founded in 1999 that holds a quarterly contest. The premise is simple: they give you a first line, and you can write any story you want as long as it begins with that line.
I took that challenge this fall, and I won!
The line was: “What should we do with the body?”
Yep, that hooked me.
The short story I wrote off the prompt is title “Dead in Space” and follows a supply station monitor whose simple day goes very wrong when space pirates show up. It’s just a little story, very light on the sci-fi, but with a big twist.
This is something of a milestone for me, since this is the first time I’ve been published in a for-pay journal, instead of a freely distributed one. Unfortunately for you, my loyal fans, that means you gotta pay to read it, along with all the other winning stories for the year. There’s a lot of good writing in there, so it’s well worth the money.
Anyway, if you’re interested, here’s the link.
It’s Vol. 23, Issue 3, available in print for $6.oo USD, or PDF download for $3.oo USD. If you feel like reading some great stuff and supporting a journal that helps writers, give it a go.
As always, thanks for reading.