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Claw Your Way to the Top People think being a supervillain is just about having powers. Like the ability to shoot laser beams out of your eyes or bench press a truck will somehow make people care about you. Really, none of that matters. Cars can go faster than anybody, laser pointers are part of daily life, and even your average dog has superhuman senses. See how much respect that gets them. What you need to be a supervillain is the will, the driving ambition to take control over the world around you. Take myself, for instance. I walk into a building, and everyone's attention is immediately on me. I don't even have to say a word. I'm a sleek and deadly predator and they love me for it. My raw animal magnetism transforms every move I make to excellence – if I stabbed you in the hand, you'd be the one apologizing. Cream rises to the top. Food? Drink? Shelter? Immediately supplied. No promise or threat required. And if my minions start getting too cocky, I leave a dead animal on their doorstep. A bloody reminder that they exist to serve at my pleasure. So once I wake up from my nap, I think I'll take over the world. But I have to admit, it'd be a lot easier with opposable thumbs. ------------- I wrote this as my entry to the contest Figment is running with Brandon Sanderson. Sanderson picks the finalists, and the grand prize is a consultation with his editor. Unfortunately, to get to the semifinals, I need to be able to win a popularity contest first. If you want to help a goon out, grabbing a free account and giving me a [heart] would really help out.
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Nov 24, 2014 02:42
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| # ? Apr 26, 2024 10:19 |
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You have 1000 words, why aren't you using them? This is tiny, and it's not really a story at all. For a story you need characters and conflict. You've got half a character and no real conflict. Ask yourself these simple questions: 1) who is the character? 2) what do they want? 3) why don't they have it yet? 4) how do they overcome 3? You may be saying "I CAN'T DO THAT IN 1000 WORDS THAT'S WAY TOO SMALL" but trust me, dozens of people do it in the 'dome every week. This isn't a story so much as a monologue, and monologues without context are boring. Write a story. If you're stuck on the cat idea (ugh okay whatever, see below) then show us the cat stalking a mouse or something, but frame it like a big battle between titanic forces. Also, the tone is all over the place. Are you trying to be silly or frightening? Also also, don't be cute with the prompt. Editors hate that. If you say "write 1000 words about love" a bunch of people will write 1000 words about hate and then look confused when they don't win. It said to write about a supervillain, not a cat. Yeah yeah that's the joke, but it's being cute with the prompt and as somebody who has marked a lot of stories, I know how much it can drive the judge up the wall. Half the entrants will try to do something 'clever' that doesn't actually do what it was supposed to. Hell, write about a cat who is also a supervillain due to magical radiation or some poo poo and I bet people will love that (a cat that can mind-control people or fly around with laser eyes or something dumb like that: people will go crazy over it), just make sure it's actually a supervillain. SurreptitiousMuffin fucked around with this message at 02:59 on Nov 24, 2014 |
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Nov 24, 2014 02:56
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The entries are public, so I had a chance to look at the competition. This is currently the top rated story, for instance. As far as I can tell from a sampling of sixty or so entries, what I'm doing with the prompt is pretty different. Admittedly, it's entirely possible there are one or two along the same lines I may have missed. If I did, though, they aren't in the most highly voted 25. And, well, Sanderson loves twist endings. I'm playing to the audience a bit.
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Nov 24, 2014 04:27
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Since you are ignoring criticism, I will say more bluntly that I don't find what you posted to actually be a story.
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Nov 24, 2014 05:03
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Um, okay. I still think it's a terrible idea but if you're set on it, go ahead. My point still stands that a 250 word monologue is vastly less interesting than an actual story. There's nothing here. It's fluff. 1000 words is tons for a good piece of flash fiction. So the cat is in the yard stalking a bird, except in its head it's the big evil genius criminal laying a cunning trap for its adversary. It's actually doing something, rather than just talking about doing things. String it along a little, have the suspicion that something is right dawn on the reader, then have the twist come in at the end. You need to set it up more, and you've got a ton of spare words. Parts of your current thing could definitely be recycled into internal monologue, but it needs some more context to fully be a satisfying story.
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Nov 24, 2014 05:06
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The story you linked, the one that has the most votes right now, is an example of a twist ending. A very predictable and cliched twist ending but a twist ending all the same. Your story doesn't have a twist ending, it has a punchline. I wouldn't even really characterize it as a monologue. I guess it technically is but really in terms of length, formatting and content its a joke. You've got a set-up, a series of statements that misdirect the reader, and then there's a punch line that is intended to humorously subvert our expectations. That's a joke. A story would have character(s) in some sort of conflict(s) leading to some kind of resolution(s).
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Dec 1, 2014 06:53
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| # ? Apr 26, 2024 10:19 |
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Dec 1, 2014 13:50
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