Writing Contest at The Clarity of Night

Jason over at The Clarity of Night has announced this morning another short fiction contest over on his blog. This is his sixth contest and they are usually pretty competitive, with one of the contests having 100 entries (I even earned an honorable mention that time).

The way the contest works is that Jason posts a picture and entrants write a maximum of 250 words using the picture as inspiration. The picture he chose this time is a particularly good one. Here is a link to the post announcing the “Halo” short fiction contest. Good luck to all of you who enter.

Here is a list of rules directly from the site:

1. 250 words maximum.
2. Titles are optional, but encouraged. Titles do not count toward your word count.
3. One entry per person.
4. Any genre or style is welcome. If you choose to submit poetry, you must have narrative movement within the poem if you wish to compete with the prose pieces for the prizes.
5. The copyright remains with you, the author; however, you grant me worldwide first electronic publishing rights to post your entry on this blog.
6. Judging will be conducted by me, Jason Evans. For an explanation of judging and helpful hints, see A Note on Judging.

Finally Got My Book

I would first like to say that I pre-ordered the Harry Potter book as a just in case they all sold out. Obviously there was little chance of this happening, but I still didn’t want to risk it. Also, I got a little discount by pre-ordering. Who knew the whole process would be so harrowing?

When our saga left off, our hero (me) returned home from a 450 mile car ride only to discover his book was nowhere to be found. After a frantic search, our hero discovered his book was to be delivered at his work address and not his home address. Comfortable in this knowledge, our hero was able to sleep soundly that night.

When I first got to work on Tuesday I immediately looked for the brown Barnes and Noble box in my inbox and wouldn’t you know, it was nowhere to be found! Crap! I searched around my office and asked any co-workers if they saw it, in case they were playing a prank on me. No, no one saw anything. According to tracking on B&N’s website, the book was delivered. Talk about a bad start to the day.

It’s not like I was worried I couldn’t get another copy of the book, it was just that I’d rather not have to PAY for a second copy. As a last resort, I sent an email to my office to see if maybe someone had received the book by accident. Nope! So, I started to work, telling myself I would give it a few days before contacting B&N. Soon after that, my book was delivered and a few of my co-workers cheered 🙂 .

In a way, the whole debacle made me appreciate the book more. Now I just have to wait for my wife to finish the book before I begin reading. Luckily I have yet to read any spoilers, though I don’t know how long that will last.