The 2009 winners of the Bulwer-Lytton Fiction Contest have been announced — this is the contest wherein entrants are required to write the worst opening sentence to an imaginary novel. Many of the entries are variants on “It was a dark and stormy night,” as this was indeed the opening sentence of the novel Paul Clifford, penned by the contest’s namesake, Victorian novelist Edward George Earl Bulwer-Lytton (1803-1873).
Below are a few of my favorites. Many more can be read here.
Runner-up, Detective:
The dame sauntered silently into Rocco’s office, but she didn’t need to speak; the blood-soaked gown hugging her ample curves said it all: “I am a shipping heiress whose second husband was just murdered by Albanian assassins trying to blackmail me for my rare opal collection,” or maybe, “Do you know a good dry cleaner?”
Tony Alfieri
Los Angeles, CA
Runner-up, Fantasy Fiction:
Towards the dragon’s lair the fellowship marched — a noble human prince, a fair elf, a surly dwarf, and a disheveled copyright attorney who was frantically trying to find a way to differentiate this story from “Lord of the Rings.”
Andrew Manoske
Foster City, CA
Miscellaneous Dishonorable Mention:
No man is an island, so they say, although the small crustaceans and the bird which sat impassively on Dirk Manhope’s chest as he floated lazily in the pool would probably disagree.
Glen Robins
Brighton, East Sussex, U.K.
0 responses so far ↓
There are no comments yet...Kick things off by filling out the form below.