'It was a dark and stormy night'

[Lazlo]

Famous words, usually referring to a clichéd opening lines to a story - most often by Snoopy (from the Peanuts cartoon). What you may not know is that those words were originally penned in 1830 by an author called Edward George Earl Bulwer-Lytton (1803-1873).

To honour the name of Bulwer-Lytton, there is an annual contest, in which: "entrants are challenged to submit bad opening sentences to imaginary novels".

The result is comedy gold. Some examples that tickled me:

Runner-up
"Hmm . . ." thought Abigail as she gazed languidly from the veranda past the bright white patio to the cerulean sea beyond, where dolphins played and seagulls sang, where splashing surf sounded like the tintinnabulation of a thousand tiny bells, where great gray whales bellowed and the sunlight sparkled off the myriad of sequins on the flyfish's bow ties, "time to get my meds checked."

Children's Literature: Runner-up
Dorothy had reasons to be nervous: a young girl alone in a strange land, traveling with three weird, insecure males badly in need of psychiatric help; she tucked her feet under her skirt to keep the night's chill (and lewd stares) away and made sure one more time that the gun was secured in her yet-to-develop bosom.

Purple Prose: Winner
The mongrel dog began to lick her cheek voraciously with his sopping wet tongue, so wide and flat and soft, a miniature pink fleshy cape soaked through and oozing with liquid salivary gratitude; after all, she had rescued him from the clutches of Bernard, the curmudgeonly one-eyed dogcatcher, whose own tongue -- she remembered vividly the tongues of all her lovers -- was coarse and lethargic, like a slug in a sandpaper trenchcoat.

Science Fiction: Runner-up
Lightning flashed from the blue-black sky of this alien world and shattered the engines of the spaceship, destroying Reninger's last chance of escaping and reminding him of the time his sister returned from New York with the tips of her hair dyed blue, except for the part about the lightning and the spaceship.

... and loads more at the main site: Bulwer-Lytton Fiction Contest 2008 Results

Now, for anybody making it this far here is the best bit: a couple of classic short stories found on the web. They take about 20 minutes each to read, so you've got no excuse .

The ones who walk away from Omelas by Ursula K Le Guin
The Nine Billion Names of God by Arthur C Clarke

[SoggyFox]

in each edition of Interzone, they have a few exaples of bad prose.

personally I'd start with Harry Potter book 1 through 7.

[SilvaFish]

ARGGGH! Could only read the second one, work doesn't like the first one!

Good though!

[Lazlo]

ARGGGH! Could only read the second one, work doesn't like the first one!

Good though!

I've PM'd the contents.

[SilvaFish]

I've PM'd the contents.

Thanks, that is one weird story, the first one.

[Lazlo]

"She walked into my office on legs as long as one of those long-legged birds that you see in Florida - the pink ones, not the white ones - except that she was standing on both of them, not just one of them, like those birds, the pink ones, and she wasn't wearing pink, but I knew right away that she was trouble, which those birds usually aren't. "

The 2009 results are in .

2009

[nickb]

Oooh, chance for a list............

How about the best opening sentences in literature?

1. Pride & Prejudice
2. Tale of Two Cities
3. Moby Dick
4.

[SoggyFox]

Oooh, chance for a list............

How about the best opening sentences in literature?

1. Pride & Prejudice
2. Tale of Two Cities
3. Moby Dick
4.

the opening lines from Neil Gaimans Stardust always make me smile, don't think its great literature but just well written.

[Lazlo]

4. Snow Crash - Neal Stephenson.


"The Deliverator belongs to an elite order, a hallowed subcategory. He's got esprit up to here. Right now, he is preparing to carry out his third mission of the night. His uniform is black as activated charcoal, filtering the very light out of the air. A bullet will bounce off its arachnofiber weave like a wren hitting a patio door, but excess perspiration wafts through it like a breeze through a freshly napalmed forest, Where his body has bony extremities, the suit has sintered armorgel: feels like gritty jello, protects like a stack of telephone books."

[John Touhig]

Greens awarded for book title & author....



1. "Amerigo Bonasera sat in New York Criminal Court Number 3 and waited for justice; vengeance on the men who had so cruelly hurt his daughter, who had tried to dishonour her."


2. "Punctually at 6 o'clock the sun set with a last yellow flash behind the Blue Mountains, a wave of violet shadow poured down Richmond Road, and the crickets and tree frogs in the fine gardens began to zing and tinkle."

3. "The house stood on a slight rise on the edge of the village. It stood on it's own and looked out over a broad spread of West Country farmland."

4. "Dr Iannis had enjoyed a satisfactory day in which none of his patients had died or got any worse. He had attended a surprisingly easy calving, lanced one abscess, extracted a molar, dosed one lady of easy virtue with Salvarsan, performed an unpleasant but spectacularly fruitful enema, and had produced a miracle by feat of medical prestidigitation."

5. "It was a cold day in April, and the clocks were striking thirteen. Winston Smith, his chin nuzzled into his breast in an effort to escape the vile wind, slipped quickly through the glass doors of Victory Mansions, though not quickly enough to prevent a swirl of gritty dust from entering alone with him"



5 easy ones to start you off