Well, it finally happened, everyone. The worst case scenario struck this weekend. I received political satire as my genre for the 2nd round of the NYC Midnight Flash Fiction Challenge 2014.
As usual, I went to bed on Friday night without looking at my assignment–the last thing I needed was to be kept up half the night with swirling ideas. Around 4:30 a.m., my nerves woke me up. Unable to stand it, I turned on my tablet to find out what my new prompts were:
Blank.
My mind went blank.
Then it quickly screamed:
Ugh, I had so been hoping for comedy or sci-fi. Or, heck, even romance. ANYTHING but political satire, because 1) I don’t know jack about politics, and 2) I’ve never tried writing satire.
I ended up throwing myself back into bed, curling up in the fetal position, and battling between despair and anger for a solid hour. It. Was. A. Disaster! In fact, for a serious moment, I even considered throwing in the towel and giving up…
But, darn it, I’m competitive. And I wasn’t willing to just roll over and die. So I got over myself, and I went to work.
Thankfully, I happened to overhear a rant about a current event the day before, so I had a topic to use as my story’s inspiration. I pulled up Google and began educating myself on it. I spent most of Saturday morning reading articles and watching a Congress hearing on C-SPAN.
I know, it sounds borrrring, but surprisingly, everything I read and heard was fascinating. Better yet, it was mockable. There was one particular quote that inspired my story’s entire theme. Hint:
After a wicked case of Distractionitis (Facebook, Twitter, chores, etc.), I battened down the hatches and whipped out a first draft.
Now, normally I will revise a first draft at least a couple of times before I send it to my mom, AKA, Mrs. Harsh Beta Reader. This time, however, I broke tradition and asked her if she’d come over to my house to read it/help me revise it. I didn’t want to waste time revising a story I had zero confidence in.
To my complete shock, she loved the first draft. In fact, she was crying she was laughing so hard at some of my jokes. I cried with her, but I think that was more out of relief than humor 😉 We edited the story to a semi-solid draft and I sent it off to a couple of other beta readers, one of whom had way more experience in political satire than me.
Their critiques came back positive, but the one who had political satire know-how said my story was too funny. Satire is supposed to suggest, not slap the reader in the face with comedy.
So, I revised it and tried to tone things down.
Tried.
Honestly, I would’ve needed to start completely over to make my story more “satire” funny than “HAHA!” funny, and I wasn’t going to do that. It was late and I was exhausted. Plus, I liked my story–for what it was–and I figured the chances of getting any points for it in the competition were slim-to-none. So why not write a story I liked–even if it didn’t meet the traditional standards of satire?
On Sunday morning, I sent my beta readers a polished version. One of them still thought the humor needed to be toned down and a specific aspect needed to be deleted, while the other thought the story wasn’t as funny anymore and thought that specific aspect needed to be emphasized.
So, I decided to leave the story as is. HA! I ran through it once more and submitted it. Done and done!
Now, is this the best story I’ve ever written? NOOOOO! Will it get me points? NOOOOO! Am I proud I sucked it up and wrote a political satire? YES!
One of the main reasons I do this competition is to push my boundaries and experiment with various genres. And although political satire wasn’t one of the genres I wanted to experiment with, I’m glad I did. It challenged me in ways I’ve never been challenged before. Plus, I learned a lot about a current event I wouldn’t have known much about otherwise.
Hopefully people will read my story and enjoy it, even if it doesn’t fit the traditional political satire standards. I plan to post it here in a few days. For now, here is the title and synopsis:
“OPERATION DISNEY”
BRIEF SYNOPSIS: It’s the 21st century and time for a new, inviting strategy for the Secret Service. But Director Peterson’s plan might be too Disney for special agent Prouty.
***
Okay, normally, I don’t offer explanations for my stories. But since this is a political satire and not all of us are on the up-and-up of various current events, I wanted to give you one to–hopefully–improve your reading experience.
Operation Disney is based off of Julia Pierson, the recently resigned Director of the Secret Service.
Since she was hired back in 2013, there have been multiple security breaches. Some of these include: An armed man hopping the White House fence, running across the lawn, and entering the property through an unlocked door. A construction worker/felon being allowed to share the same elevator as the President (and snap photos of him with his phone). And, finally, a series of gunshots echoing outside the White House that were blamed for a car backfiring (five days later, a maid found a window in the President’s private residence damaged from bullets).
On top of all of that, Pierson made this comment (and it’s this comment I based the tone of my story off of):
Hopefully that explanation helps some of you enjoy Operation Disney more! Thanks in advanced for reading and providing feedback. I appreciate it.
Photo credits:
http://www.omgfacts.com/lists/7722/A-man-survived-the-Hindenburg-disaster-by-bailing-out-the-window
http://www.studentbeans.com/mag/en/campus/the-25-stages-of-writing-an-essay
http://www.i-am-bored.com/forums.asp?page_num=1&action=read&q_id=71067&ct=10
So, for those of you who don’t know how the contest works, here’s a quick overview: There are 25 heats, each with approximately 40 writers in it. Each heat is then assigned a genre (drama, comedy, fantasy, romance, horror, etc.), a location where the story must take place, and an object that must appear at least once. We then have 48-hours to write a 1,000 word story.
I can’t tell you how relieved I was. Suspense is my FAVORITE genre to write, and it’s where my mind has been with my YA manuscript, so I didn’t have to shift gears too hard. And the prompts didn’t seem difficult. A truck stop can be made creepy/dark, and a diamond ring can be thrown in all sorts of ways. Easy peasy.
So I got to work.
I decided to email the story to my mom anyway. I had to. It was already past 1 p.m. 15 hours of my precious 48 were gone. I couldn’t waste anymore time on a story that was potentially useless. As I waited for her feedback, I began revising.
Feeling kind of stupid, I made the change. And poof! Everything came together.
Seriously, my right eye wouldn’t stop twitching!
Overall, I’m satisfied with the final outcome of my story. It’s not my favorite one, but I’m still proud of it. I promise I’ll post it for you all to read in a few days, after I receive confirmation from NYC Midnight it’s okay to share. Until then, here is the title and brief synopsis:
Don’t forget! The early entry deadline for the 
Before I entered these contests, I assumed my writing skills were at their best…WRONG! In just two measly challenges, my abilities have grown exponentially. I’m actually kind of embarrassed by what I considered my “best”. I won’t even let my friends or colleagues look at my old work.
First off, I received the final results for the 
More than achieving this seemingly impossible feat, I’m proud of the three stories I wrote for this competition (“Chasing Monsters,” “Over the Edge,” “Into Paradise”). Not only did I work extra hard to make each one entertaining, unique, and meaningful, but I forced myself to step outside my comfort zone and take on topics that were scary, disturbing, and/or heartbreaking. I truly learned so much about myself as a writer. More importantly, I learned that if a story demands to be told, then I need to check my insecurities and fears at the door and tell them. I shouldn’t hold back. I need to take the plunge and just go for it!
Yeeee-ha!
KIDDING!!!
I began working on draft 2 yesterday and…ugh. Guys, there’s A LOT of things to fix. A lot, a lot. But, it’s okay. I’m eager to roll up my sleeves and get to work. And now that life has finally calmed down, and the NYC Midnight Challenge hoopla is over, I can dedicate all of my energy to my revisions.
How was your week? I’d love to hear!
Since I skipped last week’s Music Monday, I thought I’d share with you a couple of songs that inspired “Into Paradise,” my final entry for the 
Overall, I had a good week…though, much of it was spent recouping from last weekend, after the 
To be honest, I wasn’t sure what people would think of my story. I based the entire thing off a rather sensitive topic, so I knew there was a risk of rubbing someone the wrong way. But, so far, people have told me I handled the topic in a respectful, gentle, even hopeful manner, so I’m pleased. That was my intention, after all. In fact, I purposefully kept my setting for Into Paradise vague, even misleading. I didn’t want people to be focused on where/when this was happening. I wanted them to be focused on my protagonist and the difficult choice she had to make.
It doesn’t really matter. Like I said, the setting wasn’t the focus. And, either way, people have told me Into Paradise is a heart-wrenching, yet touching story. Even comforting. So, I’m good 🙂
Anyways, now that this harrowing short story journey has come to an end, it’s time for me to put all of my focus back into my manuscript. Unfortunately, due to making it this far in the NYC Midnight Short Story Challenge, I doubt I’ll be meeting my spring deadline for a first draft 😦 But don’t worry. I’m bound and determined to have a solid draft ready to query by the end of summer. So, it’s time to roll up my sleeves, stomp on those 
How was your week? Better tell me now! I’m going into the zone with my manuscript starting tomorrow and will be in la-la land for awhile.
Yep, that about sums up how I feel after the 3rd and final round of the 
“Open” genre meant I could pick whatever genre I wanted. And I knew without a doubt I’d be writing a suspense, horror, or drama (or mixture of all three). So, I got to work. I received the assignment at 10 PM MST, and by 1 AM, I had an ugly first draft. I forced myself to go to bed after that, but by 4 AM I was up again. I was so anxious! I grabbed a cup of coffee, gave myself a pep talk, and returned to work. And I didn’t stop for over 13 hours. I even forgot about that tiny, but important step in my plan to eat. Whoops. I remembered breakfast, but I spaced eating anything else until after 3 PM. That’s when I stood up to get some water and had a serious, “Oh crap, I’m gonna pass out” moment. LOL! Yeah, I’m an idiot. I snagged an apple and a lot of peanut butter, took a shaky breath, and returned to work. I had to. The clock was ticking!
Honestly, I couldn’t have made it through the agonizing day without my mom. She. Is. Awesome! She came over around noon and sat there with me to edit my story. We read it again and again and again, chopping and tweaking and fine-tuning until I had a solid draft to send to my beta readers. Somehow, I was right on schedule with my battle plan, and I sent it to them around 2 PM. Within an hour, feedback returned from all four of them. Overall, their critiques were positive! But, as expected, there were problems too. So I spent a couple of more hours revising.
I know I had until 10 PM to send my story in, but I was literally sick to my stomach from exhaustion. I just wanted the burden off my shoulders. So I hit the submit button and FINISHED!
I hope others, including the judges, feel the same emotion we did. If not, oh well. This is one of those stories that truly means something to me, so if others don’t care for it, it’s okay. I will still hold it near and dear to my heart.
Okay, so now that my initial excitement and shock has worn off, I’ve become a big bag of nerves. I’m just not sure how I’m going to handle this last round. I only have 24-hours to produce a 1,500 word story. 24 hours!!! That’s just downright insane. I mean, during the past two rounds, it’s taken me 24-hours just to think of an idea and write a rough draft. Like, rough…Ugh, this gonna be intense, guys.
Thank you to everyone who has sent me a nice note this week. You guys are so awesome and supportive.
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