A First, a Second, Nine Hits

A whole glut of winners to report

Cedric Popa wins Children in Need $200
Cedric Popa fourth in CIN

Fleur Chapman second in Children in Need $100

Seven BCers make last 12 of CIN Comp

Tom C (two in the above 7) acceptance at "Heavy Glow"
Tom C acceptance at Litbits
Tom C acceptance at American Drivel

Missy acceptance at Cadenza

BCer acceptance at "Clever"

A large number of BCers made the named long-list for CIN
and they all had at least one story in the anthology but
these are NOT being counted as HITS, merely as "Notes"

A First, a Second, Nine Hits

A whole glut of winners to report

Cedric Popa wins Children in Need $200
Cedric Popa fourth in CIN

Fleur Chapman second in Children in Need $100

Seven BCers make last 12 of CIN Comp

Tom C (two in the above 7) acceptance at "Heavy Glow"
Tom C acceptance at Litbits
Tom C acceptance at American Drivel

Missy acceptance at Cadenza

BCer acceptance at "Clever"

A large number of BCers made the named long-list for CIN
and they all had at least one story in the anthology but
these are NOT being counted as HITS, merely as "Notes"

CIN Finalist

The 12 stories in the CIN Anthology Final

A Muse Lost
Claude Romarin
Falling In
Geoff Says Farewell
Imaginary Things
Not Killing Lembit
Pavel's Grey Painting
Six Uses For a Hedgehog
The Nest
The Undressing of Ursula Nelmes
The Year of the Card Player
When the Colours Exploded

Congratulation to

Vanessa Gebbie (2)
Tom Conoboy (2)
Cedric Popa (2)
Cally Taylor (2)
Colin Upton
Laurie Porter
Fleur Chapman
Michael J Hulme

These were the best 12 stories from 345 and the winners
(chosen by competitor votes)

were

Cedric Popa
Fleur Chapman
Vanessa Gebbie

who win £100-£0-£25 respectively

Third First Prize in a Week!

Boot Camper Cally Taylor wins $200 Hellen Mullin Award


Our 21st First Prize of the year

CIN Anthology

For some reason Blogger is changing the colour of the latest CIN Anthology


No idea why Blogger doesn't want to show the GREAT cover
to our BC-CIN Anthology but you can see the real thing at


http://www.7thquarkmagazine.com

Fast Work if You Can Get It!

Feeling good after last night's H E Bates 1-2 for Boot Camp but even better knowing that last Thursday-Friday's Childen-in-Need marathon produced 346 stories, that every one has had 5 critiques, some as many as 10, that I critted the whole damn lot of them, and, and, and, at 01:15 Thursday Night into Friday I printed off the first copy of the Anthology!

I deliver the PDF this morning and the anthologies will be in my sticky paws by close of business.


How's that? A week earlier than the pros did it last year.

The Marathoneers


Adam Warren
Alex Keegan
Alex Wire
Antony Davies
Barbara Godwin
Bonzo Browne
Cally Taylor
Caroline Davies
Cedric Popa
Christine Tothill
Colin Upton
Dan Malach
Fleur Chapman
Joel Willans
Kenneth Shand
Laurie Porter
Louise Graves
Michael J Hulme
Nancy Saunders
Nigel Allison
Ralph Hockley
Tom Conoby
Toni Peers
Vanessa Gebbie

Burco Con
Dave Prescott
Kirsty Davies
Jacob Andelin

Alexander Fox
(Secretary)

Special thanks to Lexie Fox for staying up the whole thirty hours to send out the prompts by email.
Thanks to Kirsty & Jacob who were unable to take part but nevertheless raised sponsorship monies.
Thanks also to “Burco” who was taken ill early in the night, and to Dave who was “distracted”.

Boot Camp Wins 1-2 in H E Bates

Lexie Fox wins this year's H E Bates ($400) and recently-returned Rob Howe is $300 Second.


Our 20th First Prize in 2006

N-N-N-Nineteen

2006 74 Prizes 19 Firsts 11 Second 8 Third, 36 Finals $7,500


An update, Lexie shortlist turns into a $200 First at Earthworks

Our 19th First Prize in 2006

Children in Need

We have 350 stories to plough through (250 done) to get a longlist, then shortlist

(I now HATE flashes)

Money raised is over £5,700 closing on £6K

Another First Prize and a String of Hits

Lexie wins a First Prize worth $490 from Women Writers Network

Cally places in an anthology

TomC gets a story on Rutland Radio

lex has a story in an EarlyWorks Press Anthology

Lee has an acceptance for Southern Ocean Review (or did I already mention that one?)

Nightwriter gets two poems into Southern Ocean Review (one hit)

Tom and MJH get into Cautionary Tales "Best of 2006" Anthology


That takes us to 18 First Prizes in 2006

Total Winnings $7,300

FIRST PLACE

01 Colin $200 First Place in Slingink's Eurofiction
02 Mike Joint-Winner in 7Q FF9
03 Dave Joint-Winner in 7Q FF9
04 Lexie Wins Adult SS of the Year ($600) in "Killie"
05 Cally Wins Dark Tales ($60)
06 Fleur wins 7Q FF10
07 Hazera wins Doorknobs & Bodypaint First Place
08 Alex Wins Pencil Bantry $300
09 Lexie Wins Cotswold Prize $1,000
10 Cally wins Bank Street SS Prize $140
11 Alex wins Lichfield Prize $250
12 ColinU wins Cadenza $400
13 Caroline wins Kings Lynn Poetry Prize ($200)
14 Gabiotas wins FirstWriter $400
15 TomC wins at "All About Writing"
16 TomC wins $200 First at 7Qs Frantic Flash 11
17 TomC wins $300 First at JBWB
18 Lexie wins Women Writers Network $490




SECOND

01 Lexie $150 Second Place in "Dame Throgmorton"
02 TomC gets $100 second in JBWB
03 Dave PR 2nd in 7Q FF10
04 Cally Joint second in Writers Dock Comp
05 Lexie $300 second place Philip Good Memorial Prize
06 Cally in Woman's Own (Prize Value estimate $250)
07 Colin Second in FlashFiction Comp $50
08 Lexie 2nd in City of Derby Comp $400
09 Tom gets $200 2nd in Twyford with CIN Story
10 Calvin Lord 2nd 7Q FF11
11 ColinU 2nd at New Horizonz ($20)
12 Nighttwriter 2ns Aber Valley $60

THIRD

01 Lexie in 7Q FF9 Third Place
02 Lexie 3rd in 7Q FF10
03 Tom's $25 3rd in Oz
04 Lexie $200 3rd in The New Writer
05 Alex $150 third place Philip Good Memorial Prize
06 DavePR 3rd in 7Q FF11
07 Lexie 3rd at Mere ($150)
08 Lexie 3rd in Jo Cowell $100

4ths, HRs, NAMED FINALISTs

01 Alex Night Train Yates Comp, Last 12 "Floating"
02 Alex Poem in "Out of Love" Anthology
03 Laurie (Nartje) in "Out of Love" Anthology
04 Lexie, State of Being" HR at HISSAC (only winner is announced)
05 Lexie, second story finalist at HISAAC
06 Colin finalist in HISAAC
07 Colin HR in JBWB
08 Cally in Final of Belvedere
09 Lexie in Fish Anthology ($100)
10 Lexie last 140 of 1800, Fish
11 Haz named in Best of the web shortlist
12 Lexie Final of Writers Forum
13 Alex last 3 in Carve "Overseas Writer"
14 TomC HR'd in Bank Street SS Comp
15 TomC 4th in Twisted Tongue
16 Alex at Philip Good Memorial (second story placed 3rd)
17 Lexie at Philip Good Memorial (second story placed 2nd)
18 Cally HR in Lymm Festival $20
19 Colin Finalist, $40, dinner at Frome
20 Cally Finalist Flash FictionComp
21 TomC finalist, ditto
22 Britbird shortlisted in Pier Pressure
23 Colin HM in Momaya III, in Anthology
24 Fleur "too late" in FF11 but into 7Q
25 Cally runner up at Mere ($30)
26 Cally Shortlisted at Slingink TBA
27 Cally shortlisted Helen Mullen Award TBA
28 Caroline short-listed Bournemouth Literary Festival
29 TomC named on Wells Shortlist
30 Lexie named on Wells shortlist
31 Lexie named on Wells Shortlist
32 TomC 2nd story shortlisted (Top 6) at JBWB as well as winning!
33 Lexie Short-Listed at Fish (Results TBA)
34 Fleur Short-listed at Fish (Results TBA)
35 BCer in last 4 of H E Bates (TBA)
36 BCer in last 4 of H E Bates (TBA)




00 Laurie recently left but was also HR'd at Bank Street (not counted)

Lexie also recieved $25 & $10 payments


Winnings in Dollars, £ = $2, Euro = $1
for simplicity of calculation

Here We Go!

So far the official pledges (2/3 of participants) for the Children in Need Marathon are up to 3,600 UK Pounds so we are still in the running to collect £5,000

There are 28 people paid up and raring to go.

You could help the cause by ordering an anthology £5 plus UK postage or by sonosring either the group of Alex K (I need the sponsors!

With the practice stories we expect to go well past 500 stories/poems and over 250,000 words


Think of us in the wee small hours. When you get up for work tomorrow we will have been writing for 12-13 hours and have 17-18 to go


Alex

Another Fine Placing

We were disappointed this year not to get a BC story or two in the final for Bridport, or at least in the last 50.

Good news, our own "MJ" has just received a letter, forwarded from his old address

He made the last fifty from 4,793 entries

That is a seriously good hit. Our 72nd Prize/Place.




alx

More Prizes, More Hits

Chrissie has an acceptance at Bright Lights Cafe

Caroline has a poem accepted for December's Poetry Monthly

Lee has an acceptance for Southern Ocean Review

Lexie wins $100 Third Place in Jo Cowell

and a BCer is in the final four of H E Bates (results TBA)

That takes us to 210 Hits for the year and 71 Prizes/Places, at least $6,810


Meanwhile the Children in Need Practice Sessions have produced 130 Flashes/Poems!

More Hits, More Prompts

A double hit for Nightriter (counted as one) and a hit for CLT takes us to 204 for the year


PROMPTS

Who Will You Believe?

Playing Bridge in a Morgue

I Can Count to Ten

Nature v Nurture

Trailer Park Boys

The Borderlands of Sience

CRASH

Deep Simplicity

Blood

Almost Like a Whale

Get a Load of This

Storm Warning

Five Days That Shook the World

England Made Me

The Letter From Miss Powell

Dead Rock Stars

Surviving the Sword

Lord Gnome's Literary Companion

Al Quiet on the Western Front

Phoenix Prize Deadline Extended

Please note the deadline for the Phoenix Prize (short stories under 4K) hs been extended to the end of November

£6/£200

See http://www.7thquarkmagazine.com for details


BC Prompts, Tuesday

Breakfast With Androids

Mesopotamia, Bicycles

Brodie's Owl

Fever

Three Days' Growth of Beard

Don't Look Now

After the First Rise of Green Light

Touring Brian

Goodbye to All That, Hello to This

The Truth (With Jokes)

Sex Slave Apprenticeship

On Being a Cow

Howling at the Moon

The Town and the City

Another of His Thrilling Tales

Boiled Beef, Carrots & Gravy

Florence Nightingale HEART Stanley Livingstone

More Success & Bonfire Day Prompts

Lexie and Fleur are shortlisted at Fish for the Story in a Page Comp (results TBA), ClaireLT has a hit at "Mama" taking us to 69 Prizes/Places for the year, 202 Hits



Here Are Today's Prompts


I Have Never Travelled, I Have Never Been Here

iPod, Mobile, Headband, Belt

It was late, late in the evening

Learning German

Letters for the rich, letters for the poor, the shop on the corner, the girl next door

National Euthanasia Day

On the darkening wind a pale face floated

Sometimes a man aims high and things go well

The Importance of Not being Caught

The Smell of Roasting Hedgehog

Timothy Winters Comes to School, Eyes as Wide as a Football Pool

Who Wants to Be a Milionaire?

Yes, yours, my love, is the right human face

You Walking Away from me towards the school

A Guy Called Guy

An Inconvenient Truth

An Old Man Playing Football v 13 Indian Waiters

And the whispers of wind in the evening sky

Catherine's Wheals

Ears Like Bombs and Teeth Like Splinters

Everyone's pain has a different smell

Fire!

Got a Rocket in Your Pocket

Great Production. New Story Machine?

Good month for me so far, three stories, two flashes, six poems, 8,179 words.

I'd like to rest, but I'm grabbig this while it's here!

I can worry about redrafting, edits, and reewriting when I'm old.



PROMPT BLOCK


Take 1-2-3-all of these


The more of these you use the more you will find an amazing story in you


but read the whle thing a few times first and let the phrases sing to you, get into your consciousness.

Yesterday from the same set of prompts I read two 120+ stories that used ALL the prompts. One turned out to be a dark murder story, the othr was about a Falklands veteran walking on a beach1

But on my walk I find three : I employ more people than Henry Ford : The poor little children vomited and wept : Rabbits. Deer. Because of a principle. : She is behind : I would have heard them : Red than Dead. Because the Ruskies : Women marched. Held Hands : Via Aldermaston : Twelve thousand men : Trucks, concrete. Frighted away : Travel steerage by air : To slip back into France. Because of an Austrian : To rest. Because they walk : To my right : To less effect, obviously : Though I loved Cairo : They marched so close to my house : I've been to paralysed to write : It was really terrifying : Then returning I found that my house was not ready : The trip back was something : Who got away : The trickling sun, the sprinkle : The sun was like a spirit : The sun slits through leaves : When I turn away, my shadow : Were footsteps, horseshoes : The root was not quite right. : The path was old. Through the trees : The path is well-trod : The missiles went, the concrete : The chaps are drilling again : Talking on her mobile. : Strategic Air Command, the skies : Soldiers drilled. Left-Right : Snorting. : Reclaimed, relaid and fox and stoat : Polythene bags of shit : The little tea-house, and scones; : The key to all our futures, better : Plover rush. Because of Sarajevo. : Past the cruise-missile silos : November. Glorious : Morning run : Missiles came. Because they could. : Left, a crow sits quietly : Is in front of me. : In little bags : I know they pick up shit : I knew that : I imagined my own death : I hear dogs. : I came to take a photograph : He's pullovered, green : He doesn't look : Hanging from saplings : Had buried many. Thrown down wells : grilling on the chain-link fence : Got ten cartons of cigarettes in Karachi : Glorious again : Four hundred years deep : Faintly pleasant, it was : Eyes front. Missed the Golden : Essex ran for London. His men : Early morning light through trees. : Dear Brother : Cut Ties, Cut Fences. But still : Chopped in bits. Because times changed : Catch the sun, pause, it's pleasant : But she is halting : But I was disappointed : But graffiti too. Because he is bored. : Beneath my feet : As though he is alone : As I pass, my shadow : Approaching : And turn inside out : And talked to themselves and never, never stopped : And rabbit, cow, deer alive, mosses : And on my return : And making planes that glide : And laughed and ran up and down and sang : Americans, steam-rollers, giant : All horrible. Because of a King. : A treaty signed, not here, away

More Good Competition News

The Fish One-Page Historical Short Competition announced its final 16 today

On that list two Boot Campers and a former Boot Camper!

Keep Going!

Still riding the whirlwind. 5,500 this month (early on the third)


Here are today's prompts:



Tree Struck By Lightning

The Wreck of the Josie B

Flowrers For Algernon's Teacher

Power of Four

The Autobiography of His Best Mate

Fishes

Goldfish are ORANGE

Pins

Stunted

The Email

Majesty, Majesty

Trampled to Death By Kisses

The Saga of Woolworths. Episode 19, Broken Biscuits

Helen, Not So Beautiful

The Thirteenth Tale

Prompt Block

Use IN SEQUENCE,

read, read, read, and read again

allow the connections which the unconscious makes



A mountain range on a day that was twinkling bright and clear - A wedge of broken glass behind him - all I can do is tell what I know - all my life I've tried to put it from me - All my past life is mine no more - and I resumed the struggle - As if the question had been addressed to the causeless uneasiness within him - below, bacon in a skillet - blaming on his boots the faults of his feet - crossing the continental us by night - don't do anything but wait - during the night Sim was born - Eddie Willers could not distinguish the bum's face. - everything resolved and satisfactorily explained - For a long time I would go to bed early. - From the sunset far at the end of the street. - Gas smells awful - he found the corpse covered in a blanket - he grew, steadily. - he lay wailing upon the cold cave stones - he opened a door on darkness - he showed me some of his gold teeth - he was drunk outside Sardi's in a second-hand Rolls-Royce - his blood beat through him a thousand pulses each minute - His head encased in a steel sphere he could never take off - His terrier, Jack - how it ended - How much, how little, is - I can't believe my luck - I can't really say exactly what happened - I did not have time to tell myself - I have eaten the plums - I live in a well - I remember. I remember - I saw a burning tree - I think of you with nothing on - I warn you - I was much too far out all my life - I'm beginning to come round to that opinion - I'm falling asleep - I'm sorry - Imagine you are looking across a desert - In this short life - 'Indeed!" said Mr Jones, "and please - it was a day as fresh as grass growing up and clouds going over - it will not be neatly tied up at the end - it's a murder story too. - I've been right in the thick of it - live like smoke in a well - Mocking and still - Nobody heard him, the dead man - not by me it won't anyway - nothing to be done - now if you don't like that sort of story - on the campaign cot where he had always slept - or if it has ended - or why or just how it began - Pack up the moon and dismantle the sun the moon and dismantle the sun - rain beat very hard against the windows - Reflected the metal yellow of the sky - Remember me when I am gone away - reminded him of unrequited love - Right in the middle of her forehead - "Send me the half that's got my keys - Sometimes, the candle barely out, my eyes closed so quickly - Still two years old and trembling at his feet - "There's been an accident!" they said. - That only lasts an hour - That were in the icebox - the cellar was cold cement and the dead man cold stone - The chain of the hours - The eyes looked straight at Eddie Willers - the first time I ever saw Larry Bartzel - The flying hours are gone - The house where I was born - The light was ebbing - The order of the heavenly bodies - the scent of bitter almonds - The sequence of the years - Then a mile of sea-scented beach - There was a lot Larry said that was gibberish to them - there was a tall blonde with him - there's man all over for you - They may not mean to, but they do - They took my life and threw it on the skip - They were waiting for me somewhere beneath Eden Rock - this is a true story, I can't believe it's really happening - unanswered questions - vapour in a stone throat - Vladimir be reasonable, you haven't tried everything - what are days for? - what you got on me? - what you're starting to read is full of loose ends - When a man is asleep he has, in a circle around him - who had eyes you wouldn't forget - Who is John Galt? - Within our power - Yellow glints caught his eyes. - you better not read it - You might as well live - Your servant's cut in half," he's dead. -

TRY THIS

across the surface of things
After eating they took us to their apartment
although we never did get drunk
And as soon as one approaches your stop
and I was to come back this morning
and nobody hearing it could doubt what it sings
and she expected her husband
And the minutes, the hours, the days.
and the song sings the loudest when you pick out each note
at 12:15 am
Babies are still gurgling, bibbed, in high-chairs, cots, lobster pots,
Bloody men are like bloody buses
boy was he burned up
Brodie and I were in the lounge
but it's a song all the same
but we drank more there and pawed around a while
Chronologically, nobody is old.
clean white sheets
Flashing their indicators
how all the pain falls away.
How the country is so much more right you know,
how we’ve landed on our feet.
I am writing on my bed
I don’t know.
if you listen you can hear it
If you make a mistake
if you stand quietly, at the foot of a garden
I'm almost popping
I'm so full of food
in the middle of a street, on the roof of a house
It is Sunday,
it's a wordless song for the most
it's clearest at night
I've spent in months
Jump off and you'll stand there and gaze
Naturally we slept through Brodie's date
Offering you a ride
Only Mattie Schiff and Brad Sheen are old enough
or crawling around floors that taste (if you get close enough) like blankie and breast-milk.
Perhaps I should start at yesterday noon
so Brodie made a date with her friend for 8:00
so crisp and clear,
so we came back to the hotel, ate, abd lay down
Something about how it’s so good to be here,
sprinklers sprinkling,
that the world is like a sharp intake of breath.
The babe I had was married
the city it sings
the low soothing hum of air-conditioners
the sun up slow and easy,
There's no turning back
This has been the damndest day
This is a young street.
to a place inside you
to burst through screen doors and run out, heading for the hoop.
Two or three appear
we had already drunk until our eye-teeeth floated
we invited them to lunch
what a place this joint is
What is she saying?
when the song reaches out
when the sound cuts more sharply
when we spotted two wenches giving us the eye.
While the cars and the taxis and lorries go by
You haven't much time to decide
You look at them
You wait for about a year
You're tring to read their destinations