SUMMER 2014 SHORT STORY CONTEST

[Nazi Flower Power]

Damn... I missed the deadline.
When is the next contest due?

It depends on how long it takes to get a 3rd set of scores or if we just decide to declare Nerotysia the winner. (I would be OK with declaring Nerotysia the winner and Respubliko 2nd place.)

When this one is done, I am planning to start a new contest with the deadline approximately 2 months from when I post the thread.

[Forsher]

Any further news from Kannap?

[Nazi Flower Power]

Any further news from Kannap?

Not that I've heard. Let me send another TG.

[Nazi Flower Power]

OK, we need another replacement judge. Anybody interested?

[Laerod]

I can do it. I haven't read any of the entries or verdicts.

[Nazi Flower Power]

I can do it. I haven't read any of the entries or verdicts.

Sweet! Thank you.

[Laerod]

Got the first half done, but I'll be taking a break for the night and do the rest tomorrow. I don't like posting results until they're all done, so everyone gets to wait.

But yes, there is light at the end of the tunnel.

[Laerod]

Right, to be clear, I think the scoring is an inappropriate means of evaluating writing. The scores end up out of sync with how I would have ranked the stories on their own.

Characters 12/25
Alex didn’t really win me over. I’m buying his mopey attitude, but painting him as a talented artist felt cheap. His “friend” was shallow and while I’m sure that was the intention, the characterization fell flat. This is in contrast to the verbally abusive father, who felt like he had an actual reason for being included in the narrative without personally wanting to be there. So I’m going with 6/15 for Alex, 6/10 for the side characters.

Plot 18/25
As far as narrating a suicide goes, this was ok. The handling of the “friends” felt like it could have been done better (Andy felt like you put a gun to his head to have him show up and read his lines and the text from Steven made Alex come across as a creepy stalker rather than someone I should feel sympathy for).

Setting 10/15
There’s nothing spectacular about the setting, so I’m giving 10/15 because I’ve decided that’s a decent “it works” mark that still leaves room for settings that blow me away.

Creativity 3/15
It’s not very creative, though to be fair, I think scoring people on that is a bad idea. Anyway, maybe I’ve just experienced too much of what happened in the story first hand or by proxy for me to see it as anything but generic, but 3/15 is all I’m willing to give regarding creativity. It is, in essence, a story about a teen killing themselves and there isn’t much flourish to it.

Style 2/15
I didn’t really enjoy reading it. The descriptions felt like someone was ticking off a list and they were occasionally repetitive. I’m giving two points because I’ve read things that have made me want to claw my eyes out and this didn’t reach that level.

Grammar and Spelling 0/5
If I could give negative points for something, I totally would do it here. Not putting any spaces after punctuation was seriously not ok. On top of that, there’s a couple errors regarding singular and plural as well as verb tenses.

Overall Score 45/100

Characters 22/25
Mostly well-described and fleshed out. Other than the narrator and Prince they felt a little too stereotypical though, particularly the father.

Plot 24/25
The plot works like a charm. While the question of whether Mary and Prince will get together or not looms throughout most of the narrative, them being kept apart until a decision is made doesn’t feel contrived or drawn out.

Setting 15/15
The setting is cleverly conveyed through the use of dated vocabulary in addition to regular description.

Creativity 10/15
Creativity… As I said before, I don’t like scoring this. It doesn’t feel generic, but as I pointed out, some of the characters felt a little too stereotypical. Historical fiction generally has to borrow, so it feels like it should do worse than completely original settings. The final interaction feels quite well conceived though.

Style 12/15
It’s mostly something that isn’t difficult to read. Usage of atypical vocabulary is also a plus. However, there were a few instances where it felt like there were too many instances of “they said”. A “they shouted” or other relevant variants might have helped, particularly when there was limited dialogue in the exchange.

Grammar and Spelling 2/5
I’m a stickler for spelling and grammar and I’m going to hold everyone to a pretty high standard (though pointing out any errors in my judgment calls will be met with harsh glares and muttering). Overall spelling and grammar are good, save for a punctuation error or two and the occasional “who” where a “whom” should have been. There’s also one part where a few words are missing, something about Mary going on the ride with Prince.

Overall Score 83/100

Characters 15/25
This is a mixed bag. Todd was rather bland and the kidnappers felt utterly cliché. The scientists were rather cliché too, but at the same time it felt like it worked.

Plot 10/25
The plot is a mess. The sequence where Todd is being tortured is ironically the only one that’s not confusing. There’s a bunch of questions but no answers and no sufficiently satisfying reason for there not being any answers.

Setting 7/15
The lab is the only part of the setting that comes across as believable. The rest feels as though it’s painted in hurried strokes.

Creativity 10/15
Well, it’s rather creative by grace of being original. The newspaper article at the end felt a bit cheap though and could have been better developed. I also have to take some points off for the cheesy rehash of the Alien catchphrase.

Style 5/15
This was a bit painful to read. The way of writing was way too descriptive in parts and the newspaper article at the end did not feel like a newspaper article at all. The only time the style of the piece really shone was during the torture session: The shouting and constant repetition of values set the pacing and helped establish the sense of urgency the characters felt. But even that was marred by the faulty formatting near the end.

Grammar and Spelling 0/5
There’s about three mistakes right off the bat and a couple more down the road.

Overall Score 47/100

Characters 8/25
There’s not really many to go by. Crystal is rather Mary-Sueish, but the setting also justifies this somewhat. The parents not being a big part of the narration mostly works, but the story could have done with more characterization of minor characters that represent the world order back on earth. I would have liked to see more of the characters Crystal interacts with. As it stands, they come across as lifelike as the computer she used.

Plot 15/25
I liked the idea of it. Crystal realizing how she’s just an asset and then planning to leave is a pretty good idea for a story. The problem is the implausible things that happen to make it work.

Setting 10/15
The idea is good, but the setting… It’s poorly established and the consequences and implications of placing prices on children feel like they could have been explored better. Also, I have severe difficulties imagining that they’ve managed to (have robots) build a city, decide on a leader, and have a press conference with earth but still haven’t named their city.

Creativity 13/15
I liked how this story took what feels like a fresh idea and rolls with it.

Style 2/15
The writing feels more like a (poorly written) encyclopedia article than someone relating events that happened to them. Having Crystal narrate the story seems like a good choice, but then it gets switched up by having a part about her parents which is written differently. Also, it inexplicably switches between the two when Crystal is narrating the story again.

Grammar and Spelling 0/5
Again, if I could give negative points, I would. There were enough errors in the first three paragraphs for me to decide on awarding zero points and it didn’t really get better. I recommend finding an editor to deal with the grammar and spelling errors.

Overall Score 43/100

Characters 23/25
For the longest time I figured it would only be “character”, but then Death showed up. Death was a wee bit bland; it felt like a bit more effort could have been put into exploring them or establishing Death’s character. But that’s a minor quibble.

Plot 25/25
It’s short, but to the point.

Setting 14/15
There’s clearly a lot more that could have been done to establish the setting, but the narrative gives enough to take in so that it became unnecessary. Where some other stories failed to convince me that unmentioned details were unimportant, this one put the condition of the narrator square in the center of my attention and eclipsed any questions I had.

Creativity 14/15
Having Death contemplate what it must mean to be out of a job after an apocalypse was quite interesting. My only real quibble is how Death didn’t feel very unique when compared to the narrator. Granted, they both reached the same destination, but I feel the separate paths they took to get there warranted some more exploration.

Style 14/15
Overall it was a decent read with nothing that felt out of place.

Grammar and Spelling 5/5
I didn't see any mistakes.

Overall Score 95/100

Characters 12/25
The characters start off ok, but eventually they felt off. Particularly the Warden. He felt very cliché by the time of the riot and the other prisoners didn’t so much feel like characters in their own right as they felt like stepping stones for the plot. The only thing most of them had setting them apart were their names, and that wasn’t enough without a compelling reason.

Plot 10/25
This was mostly ok, but eventually the “twist” ending felt like it came out of nowhere and had little to no connection with the rest of the story. Finding a ruined city didn’t adequately explain any of the things happening to the prisoners.

Setting 10/15
The setting is decently described, but doesn’t manage to blow me away.

Creativity 10/15
A prison with prisoners trying to figure out what was going on was interesting, but the ending was bland and uninspired. I saw it coming and desperately looked for something that would take me somewhere else.

Style 5/15
The beginning felt too wordy and there were about two run-on sentences throughout. It got better later on.

Grammar and Spelling 0/5
I stopped counting how often dialogue ended in a period before the dialogue tag. You might be able to argue it’s a stylistic thing until you get to the “Cause.” which was utterly inappropriate no matter how you turn it. So while I’d give negative points for spelling here too, if I could, it wouldn’t be very far below zero.

Overall Score 47/100

Characters 3/25
Overall, they were very disappointing. The narrator is the only one we get any real insight into and even that fell short.

Plot 3/25
The idea of having a bunch of deaf people that can somehow hear attempt to take over a country isn’t so bad, but the execution was terrible. There was far too much telling rather than showing and a lot of the plot points simply made no sense. I kept asking myself “why can the narrator ‘hear’ anything?”, “why are the deaf attempting a revolution?”, and “how did they pull it off?”.

Setting 1/15
I can’t remember there even being one, it’s so poorly described and established. The narrative of a deaf person struggling against those different from them wasn’t enough to excuse that.

Creativity 5/15
The concept is rather interesting. But there was so little time spent exploring it…

Style 2/15
The formatting was terrible and added to the chore of reading. Things like “(but I am not. Continue in reading)” didn’t feel particularly justified either.

Grammar and Spelling /5
Again, if I could give negative points then I would. The spelling and grammar were a chore to read through. I strongly recommend finding an editor for writing in English.

Overall Score 14/100

Characters 23/25
There’s not much to go on, but it works.

Plot 25/25
Tight, to the point, and has an ambiguous ending that doesn’t feel out of place.

Setting 14/15
Properly described minimalist setting.

Creativity 11/15
Like I said, I hate this category. It’s a good idea but doesn’t feel fresh or overly original, even if it is excellently executed.

Style 14/15
This mostly hits the right spots, but there was one instance where “drumming/drummer” felt repetitive and some of the descriptions could probably have used colons rather than periods separating the sentences. “The rain got harder” felt rather awkward too.

Grammar and Spelling 1/5
The list in the beginning needed a colon and probably should have used commas instead of a semicolon. This is all a bit iffy, so I’m taking off only one in total rather than one for each. There’s a missing apostrophe at some point, “test my tongue could move” is missing an “if”, and the description of the father’s bald head is a run-on sentence.

Overall Score 88/100

Characters 5/25
There were characters, they had names, but that’s all I really know. There was little to no characterization and they all felt like cardboard cutouts with different names written on. Silk in particular was very poorly introduced.

Plot 5/25
I had no idea what was going on, why anything was happening, or who wanted what done. “Twists” came out of nowhere and weren’t properly established. Characters suddenly disappeared and had been sought after for a few days… The whole thing is a mess.

Setting 4/15
Again, I have no idea what’s going on. There’s a decent amount of care put into describing specific areas where people are, but there’s no sense of how it all ties together and there’s nothing else carrying the weight of storytelling to make up for that.

Creativity 2/15
Reading this it felt like I was sifting through a pile of pages ripped from various spy thrillers. It didn’t feel original at all.

Style 9/15
I didn’t really enjoy it, but it also didn’t irritate me too much. The way some things were described felt a little awkward at times though.

Grammar and Spelling /5
A couple misspellings and the failure to capitalize proper sentences after a colon leave me feeling like awarding 0 points for spelling is adequate.

Overall Score 25/100

[Respubliko de Libereco]

Thanks!

Also, woohoo, second place.

EDIT, regarding Forsher's grammar mark: I'm pretty sure that capitalization after colons is one of those things which varies by country and style guide. Assuming Forsher is from a commonwealth country, I don't think he should be expected to capitalize after a colon.

[The New World Oceania]

I'll do the tallies when I get home (I have an obligation to make myself useful in some way).

[Nazi Flower Power]

Wow, Laerod, I never knew you were such a stickler for grammar!

I can believe that I had a couple of missing words cos I didn't proofread or edit, and I do sometimes have that problem when I am typing too fast, but damn... I feel like I should make you an honorary Nazi, even if you don't believe in National Socialism.

[Laerod]

Wow, Laerod, I never knew you were such a stickler for grammar! :lol:

Hey, if I expect zero mistakes in a thousand page novel, I expect less in a short story =P

[Nazi Flower Power]

Wow, Laerod, I never knew you were such a stickler for grammar!

Hey, if I expect zero mistakes in a thousand page novel, I expect less in a short story =P

I guess we are lucky you couldn't give negative points.

But thank you for helping us wrap this up.

Nerotysia wins. Congratulations.

I will probably start another of these in a little while if no one else does it first. I am thinking I might try to get more than three volunteers to judge, and the extras would be back-ups so that I will know who to ask if any of the judges gets busy with RL. I'm also open to suggestions on how to improve the scoring.

[The New World Oceania]

Hey, if I expect zero mistakes in a thousand page novel, I expect less in a short story =P

I guess we are lucky you couldn't give negative points.

But thank you for helping us wrap this up.

Nerotysia wins. Congratulations.

I will probably start another of these in a little while if no one else does it first. I am thinking I might try to get more than three volunteers to judge, and the extras would be back-ups so that I will know who to ask if any of the judges gets busy with RL. I'm also open to suggestions on how to improve the scoring.

Have you thought bat adding a subjective scoring section? Perhaps also increasing the score total, since (just a guess) it might cause the distribution of how many points judges tend to award will become fairer, maybe less harsh, and more honest scores can come out without judges feeling that they're giving scores though or too low. For example, if plot is out of 20, I might give 10, because the plot worked but I didn't quite like it, or 15, because it was good but missed one important element, both scores affected by the fact that I don't want to go too high or too low. With plot out of 40, judges might feel more comfortable giving, respective to this situation, a 22 or a 30/35. It does, however, make lower scores more damning.

[Nazi Flower Power]

I guess we are lucky you couldn't give negative points.

But thank you for helping us wrap this up.

Nerotysia wins. Congratulations.

I will probably start another of these in a little while if no one else does it first. I am thinking I might try to get more than three volunteers to judge, and the extras would be back-ups so that I will know who to ask if any of the judges gets busy with RL. I'm also open to suggestions on how to improve the scoring.

Have you thought bat adding a subjective scoring section?

Yes, that is something we might want to have. Or just give judges the option to hand out a few bonus points outside of the formal rubric.

Perhaps also increasing the score total, since (just a guess) it might cause the distribution of how many points judges tend to award will become fairer, maybe less harsh, and more honest scores can come out without judges feeling that they're giving scores though or too low. For example, if plot is out of 20, I might give 10, because the plot worked but I didn't quite like it, or 15, because it was good but missed one important element, both scores affected by the fact that I don't want to go too high or too low. With plot out of 40, judges might feel more comfortable giving, respective to this situation, a 22 or a 30/35. It does, however, make lower scores more damning.

I'm not sure this would help anything, but I am willing to listen if other people like the idea.

[Super-Llamaland]

There’s about three mistakes right off the bat and a couple more down the road.

This is what you get for writing something in thirty minutes because spotty wi-fi, kids.
Anyways, thanks to all of the judges and Nazi Flower Power, congrats to the winner, and I'll see you in the winter, I guess!

[Nerotysia]

Wow, Laerod, I never knew you were such a stickler for grammar!

Hey, if I expect zero mistakes in a thousand page novel, I expect less in a short story =P

You grammar nazis you...grr...

In all seriousness, though, thanks a bunch for the swift judging.

I'm rather surprised I won. Woo!

As for judging changes, when I first saw the contest I imagined the judges would just discuss which ones they liked the best with each other and then figure out a ranking perhaps. Essentially like a jury. Perhaps it wouldn't work very well though...

[Respubliko de Libereco]

Hey, if I expect zero mistakes in a thousand page novel, I expect less in a short story =P

You grammar nazis you...grr...

In all seriousness, though, thanks a bunch for the swift judging.

I'm rather surprised I won. Woo!

As for judging changes, when I first saw the contest I imagined the judges would just discuss which ones they liked the best with each other and then figure out a ranking perhaps. Essentially like a jury. Perhaps it wouldn't work very well though...

"After careful deliberation, the contest judges have found Nerotysia to be ... guilty! However, they recommend leniency."

[The New World Oceania]

Hey, if I expect zero mistakes in a thousand page novel, I expect less in a short story =P

You grammar nazis you...grr...

In all seriousness, though, thanks a bunch for the swift judging.

I'm rather surprised I won. Woo!

As for judging changes, when I first saw the contest I imagined the judges would just discuss which ones they liked the best with each other and then figure out a ranking perhaps. Essentially like a jury. Perhaps it wouldn't work very well though...

That's what we do with the Improviser, but even then we have a rubric (a lenient one) and the process comes with its own problems.