#RomanticFridayWriters - Linky Sign Up - Challenge No 37- 'Yes, no, oh alright then!'

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#RomanticFridayWriters - #AtoZChallenge - Flash Fiction - 'J is for...'

Welcome to RomanticFridayWriters!

RFW is about short short writing or flash fiction (usually 400 words), less for poems, with some romantic element. It's not Romance of the happily ever after variety, but Romantic, where it's about the story, the issue, with some romantic relationship involved. Our stories are edgy, sometimes dark, and often don't have the HEA ending! 

So here we go! RFW Dribbles (50 words), Drabbles (100 words) and Droubbles (200 words) and more (400 ish)...for your enjoyment - a laugh, a cry...

It's widely agreed that most fiction (unless it's solely about animals) begins and ends with human characters: their frailties, virtues, conflicts and expectations. In our stories for the A - Z Challenge the writers attempt to more closely observe the people around us...

Today I have another vignette in the life of Bosco and Geni in Afghanistan...

J is for 'Just the thought...'

Just the thought of seeing her for maybe the last time broke him up inside. Was this the last time he'd see her face? He had to savour each moment.

'Geni,' he began, 'we've started something here. I know a war zone isn't the ideal place for love to grow, but I need to tell you before you go - I love you.'

Geni looked up from cutting her steak. 

'Bosco? What did you say?' Her ears must be losing it from too much artillery fire. Big tough guy Bosco? She put down her knife and fork and considered him.

Funny she'd not noticed the new lines around his eyes, the way his face was cut into sharp angles, the distracted way he ran his hands through his hair.

'Bosco?' she asked in wonder. 'Perhaps you do love me.'

'I love you Geni. Here in Afghanistan we lose people every day. I don't want to ever lose you.'

He reached across the mess table and took her hands. He brought her greasy fingers to his lips and kissed them, one by one, ignoring the sniggers from his mates. He rather enjoyed the way they bashed their knives and forks on the table, braying for more. It gave him courage.

'I want to spend the rest of my life with you.'

She leaned her elbows on the table and reached across to kiss him. The clatter all around got louder and louder. 'More! More! More! More! The soldiers were enjoying the show.

Then the sirens began...

©DeniseCovey2012

Words 247 

Image
                                                                          

Denise, (L'Aussie) writes short stories, flash fiction, travel articles and newspaper profiles while working on her Great Australian Novels, one of which is set in Afghanistan. She's the founder of RomanticFridayWriters. Her writing blog is L'Aussie Writing. She'd love you to visit her there for her A - Z Challenge on the theme, BLOGGERS WERE CHILDREN TOO! 

#RomanticFridayWriters - #AtoZChallenge - Flash Fiction No 5 - 'E is for Elvira...'

Welcome to RomanticFridayWriters!

RFW is about short short writing or flash fiction (usually 400 words), less for poems, with some romantic element. It's not Romance of the happily ever after variety, but Romantic, where it's about the story, the issue, with some romantic relationship involved. Our stories are edgy, sometimes dark, and often don't have the HEA ending! 

So here we go! RFW Dribbles (50 words), Drabbles (100 words) and Droubbles (200 words) and more (400 ish)...for your enjoyment - a laugh, a cry...

It's widely agreed that most fiction (unless it's solely about animals) begins and ends with human characters: their frailties, virtues, conflicts and expectations. In our stories for the A - Z Challenge the writers attempt to more closely observe the people around us...

E is for... 'Elvira...'

Elvira was hurting all over. The mattress was lumpy and scratchy; her sides ached from tossing and turning. She felt something biting, stinging her face. She groaned, clapping her hands, trying to scare whatever it was before she was eaten alive. ‘Ouch! Pesky little creatures!’ she snarled through clenched teeth. She slapped at the air a few more times, then groped around, looking for a light switch.

Her water glass fell with a clunk and a splish onto the wooden floor. ‘Darn!’ she whispered as loud as she dared.

Ha!’ Finally her fingers found an object and she pressed hard. ‘Whoops!’ She clamped her hands over her mouth. The radio blared, filling the night with foreign chatter. She felt a knob and turned...silence…

She looked around in the semi darkness, alert to strange sounds seeping in through her tiny window. She held her head in her hands, gathering her thoughts, waiting for her heartbeat to settle. 'Oh Frank you stupid fool. You should have listened to me just this once!'

The noises were back, louder and louder, the chants seeping into her room. She threw back the moist covers and staggered to the window.

What she saw both terrified and excited her. 

Thousands of people were moving into the town square, waving flags and placards. Some were in Arabic, some in bad English, but they all had the same message. A whiff of revolution was in the air. She was going to see history in the making.

But history was going to have to wait.

And so was Frank. He was going to be damn sorry he fired her.

She staggered back to bed and fell into an exhausted sleep, the strange chanting hovering around the edge of her consciousness. Just as dawn was breaking the sounds changed. She heard the call to prayer echoing across the rooftops. The city was waking up. Somewhere on top of a minaret there was a muezzin calling the faithful to pray. But did he have to use a microphone? 

She was still woozy with fatigue when her feet hit the floor. The sounds she’d heard through the night were now gaining in tempo.

She was going to get the story of a lifetime.

With bleary eyes she watched the first peep of light on the horizon. She could just make out quaint orangey rooftops crammed close together like hotels on a Monopoly board. She could see tiny figures like ants moving around the square below. A rush of excitement flowed through her body. She grabbed her cameras and did a quick check.

Rifling through her backpack, she found her mobile phone and called Frank's number.

‘Elvira, where the hell are you?’

‘Cairo.’

©DeniseCovey2012

Words 440

                                                                          

Denise, (L'Aussie) writes short stories, flash fiction, travel articles and newspaper profiles while working on her Great Australian Novels. She's the founder of RomanticFridayWriters. Her writing blog is L'Aussie Writing. She'd love you to visit her there for her A - Z Challenge on the theme, BLOGGERS WERE CHILDREN TOO! 

#RomanticFridayWriters - Linky Sign Up for Challenge No 32 - The Perfect 9.5.

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#RomanticFridayWriters challenge no 30 for Friday January 27 - 'Learning to dance when it's over...'

#RomanticFridayWriters - Challenge No 29 - New Year's Resolution!

#RomanticFridayWriters are a talented bunch! Check out who got published in 2011 and 2012. Do you know more?

I've wanted to do a post about the exploits of our RomanticFridayWriters members for some time and now seems to be a good time, in between challenges!

Many of us, when we're not honing our craft by writing our 400 word poems or prose, are writing with the goal of publication, whether e-publishing or traditional publishing. I will give you the success stories I know and I'll ask you to update us all on applause-worthy successes I didn't hear about. I have used members currently posting or who have been absent whilst preparing to publish and I'm hopeful will return to posting on RFW. Some have been in touch.

So here in no particular order, is what I know of your publishing exploits. I'm not going to go to the trouble of linking them all. You can click on their link in the member's linky on the right.

• Ms Queenly has been extra busy finishing/editing her WIP. I happened to trip over her on twitter so asked for an update. Her mss has now been submitted. Good work Ms Queenly! We applaud you and wish you every success!
• Francine Howarth e-published 3 stories in 2011 and has a traditionally-published book out in July 2012. Her most recent e-book Regency Romance, Scandalous Whispers, is set in England. It is replete with officers and gentleman still! Read more about Francine's publications here:  http://francinehowarth.blogspot.com/. You will also find the full list if you click the Indie Lair badge on our right sidebar. Any indie author is welcome to promote their book at Indie Lair.

• Marsha A Moore is currently doing promos for her marvellous short story, Le Circe de Magie, out in January 2012! The artwork on the cover is Marsha's own, so she is one super-talented lady.  It is currently available free on Smashwords. Every success for your story, Marsha. I enjoyed your snippets from The Tranquil Lake when you shared them on RFW.

• Kiru Tyre has been super busy. She's an author of passionate romance novels. She has already published His Treasure through Breathless Press. It is also available as an e-book through Amazon. We haven't heard from Kiru for awhile as she was busy preparing her second novel for publication. So now we have A Valentine Challenge coming soon - out on January 30. On February 10 she releases His Strength. Kiru is currently asking if any RFWer members would like to host her on her up-coming blog tour. Contact Kiru directly if you'd like to help out.

• Roland Yeomans is the most prolific member I know. At last count he had published about 11 e-books in 2011, most of which I've read. One of my favourites is The Legend of Victor Standish. You know by reading Roland's RFW entries that his prose is darkly lyrical and mesmerising. What on earth (or in hell) has he got in store for readers in 2012? Well, I just nipped over to his blog again and see he has Last Exit to Babylon on today's post. Go have a read. It's scary/awesome, and that's just the cover.

• Joy Campbell is another member we've not heard from for awhile. She too has been busy publishing books/stories. I know of two - Hardware, which I was lucky enough to win, and Don't Get Mad, Get Even. Now I see she has another coming out in 2012, Distraction. Go Joy! But please come back and share with us!

• Donna Hole likes to write short stories, but she is also working on a novel, Not Her Mother's Fate. Donna had a short story published in 2011 for Open Heart Publishing, an Honest Lie and probably others I don't know about. Donna is busily submitting more and more short stories and I wish you every success in 2012 Donna! I'm sure we'll be jostling for position in many anthologies.

• Denise Covey (ahem, that would be me), like Donna, is primarily a short story/flash fiction writer even though I have 3 novels in various stages of dress/undress. I've had success publishing in Australian Women's Fiction Magazines and various online anthologies. The latest was Vine Leaves Literary Journal which I'd encourage you to submit to. They take prose/poetry/art works. On my L'Aussie Writer blog I have several places to submit in my right sidebar. Don't forget RFWer though. 

• Kittie Howard is another RFW member we haven't heard from for some while, due to her penchant to take trips with her husband and her determination to get her Christmas story e-published in 2011. She met that goal and I was delighted to download and read Remy Broussard's Christmas over Christmas. What's next Kittie?

So there you have it. I know at least one of our super talented poets is published or about to be, but I couldn't find any reference when I was searching your blogs for this information. I think our dear Adura Ojo is about to spring some good news on us. I may be wrong. I know Adura keeps up with the posts, so please update girl!

DISCLAIMER: 

Now if anyone has been missed out by my lack of knowledge or lack of memory (rather a lot going on in this head of mine ATM) please leave a comment, tell us all about it. Anyone I have mentioned and have printed misinformation, please set me straight. I just wanted to laud your efforts in the publishing world and look forward to hearing more successes. 

You can tell us about your rejections if you want. We all have those. Helps us not to feel like we're the only ones wallpapering our office with the R slips!

Don't forget to post this Friday for New Year's Resolution prompt!

Denise (L'Aussie)

#RomanticFridayWriters - Challenge No 28 - 'Ties That Bind'

Inaugural Guest Post - Cathy Olliffe-Webster - on writing Flash Fiction and a link to a fabulous flash story!

Pull up your laptop and write!

Hi all, Denise here!

I got the idea for RomanticFridayWriters from my weekly participation in #Fridayflash. It is where I cut my flash fiction teeth. However, the stories are usually quite dark at #ff, so I was having a discussion with my Pommie mate Francine and ran the idea by her – why can’t we start a weekly flash fiction group for romantic writers? So, we sprinkled a little fairy dust and RFWer was born!

  I met some absolutely awesome writers in my weekly forays into #fridayflash. (I still participate when I can! It’s where I practise my paranormal, weirder stuff!) The flashiest writer I’ve ever met lives in the woods on the Muskoka River in Canada. Her stories taught me a lot, so I’ve asked her to guest post for us this week. And she’s indulging me by linking to my requested favourite story by her, Ruby Tuesday. She posted it maybe two years ago and it’s still ringing in my head, so that means it resonated with me big time! And it has a romantic element!

So take it away, Cathy Olliffe-Webster!

  Hi there! I'm here today to talk about how Friday Flash changed my life. 

  Really, it might sound a bit cliched, but I can’t put it any different than that. Before Friday Flash, I was an ex-reporter who missed writing and dabbled in blogging. Since Friday Flash I actually have the cojones to call myself a Writer, with fifty-plus short stories to my credit and a novel in progress.

I now have friends all over the world, including Denise who so kindly asked me to write for her – friends who mean as much to me as my childhood friends, as much as family members and colleagues.

  Writing flash fiction in a like-minded group can be a life-changer and, if you have any kind of a writer’s soul at all, you’d be daft not to try your hand at it.

  Jon Strother, the founder of Friday Flash, is a talented writer who blogs at Mad Utopia. He dreamt up the Friday Flash concept as a way for writers to showcase their work, to meet other writers and encourage the writing of flash fiction, much as Denise and Francine dreamt up RomanticFridayWriters to encourage romance writers to hone their craft and have fun doing it in a like-minded group.

  What is flash fiction? ‘Flash’ has nothing to do with taking your clothes off in public. It’s simply a short story, 1,000 words or less. It needs to be a complete story with a beginning, middle and end but other than that, you get an idea and run with it. Being given a weekly theme or prompt as at RFWer gives you a starting place, but that’s all! The rest is up to you to make of it as you will.

  I must tell you, though, writing flash fiction is addictive. Have you found that? I wrote a story almost every week, for an entire year. I wrote one the week I got married. I wrote one on my honeymoon. I wrote when I was sick. I wrote when I was tired. Nothing would dissuade me from meeting the weekly #Fridayflash deadline.

  Some people take an entire week to write their Flash. How about you?

  Not me.

  With a full-time job, two kids, a husband and a great love for the outdoors, I don’t have a heck of a lot of time for writing during the week. Thursday is my Flash night. I start thinking about a story idea on my way home from work on Thursday night. Sometimes I come up with an idea on that drive. Sometimes I don’t. After dinner and dishes I disappear into the bedroom with my laptop, close the door behind me and stare at the blank screen until the first line pops into my head.

  I  write for about an hour and a half. Sometimes less, if it’s a short piece. Sometimes more if I have extra words. (The word limit at #ff is 1,000). Generally, though, it isn’t a long time. When I finish I announce, loudly, “ANOTHER ONE BITES THE DUST!” and haul my laptop into the kitchen where I read it out loud to Dave, my long-suffering husband.

  This is how I edit. By reading to Dave.

  Reading anything out loud is the best way I know of to find mistakes in your flash fiction. They pop off the page when you read them orally. When you read a story to yourself, the mistakes stay hidden because you see only what you want to see. I can’t overstate the importance of reading aloud. Even if there’s nobody else in the house, it’s important to hear the words.

  But having a husband willing to listen and say nice things is very, very nice.

When the quick edit is done I post it on my blog with the Twitter hash-tag #fridayflash. I see you have similar options at RFWer. Social networks are the stuff of dreams for memes! (Yes, we have poets at #ff just as you have at RFWer, but I'm not one!)

  It’s important to travel around the blogosphere to read other writers’ stories after you've posted you own. I comment, then I hype their stories  on Twitter. This cross-promotion is also important to the group process. It helps your work, it helps other people’s work. It’s just win-win all over the darned place.

  If you write to a regular flash meme as at Fridayflash and RFWer, you will eventually begin to see a group of writers whose tastes are similar to your own. You will naturally gravitate to them and eventually you will find yourself in a supportive, friendly circle of people who are just like you.

  I haven’t written a flash for a few months, only because I’m in the middle of writing a novel. I miss it though. Miss the excitement of reading people’s comments about my stories. Miss reading other people’s stories. Miss the camaraderie and party-like atmosphere of Friday nights, a flurry of Tweets and woots and exclamation marks.

  The absolute best thing about being in a group like Friday Flash or RFWer? It hones your ability as a writer. My stories aren’t always fantastic – sometimes they are downright embarrassing. But the steady business of writing every week makes me a better writer. Gives me confidence. And besides, two or three of those stories I wrote were pretty darned good. If I do say so myself.

  And, of course, I do.

Cathy Olliffe-Webster is a writer and graphic artist living in a log cabin on the Muskoka River in Bracebridge, Ontario, Canada.

Thank you Cathy for sharing with us today. I wish you all the best for your novel and the NaNoWriMo experience!

Here is the link to Cathy’s amazing story, Ruby Tuesday.

• What do you think? Did anything Cathy shared resonate with you?
• How do you go about writing your flash fiction?
• Has writing for RFWer made you a better writer?
• What is the best thing about RFWer for you?

Please share your thoughts...

Denise (L'Aussie)