IT WAS A DARK AND STORMY NIGHT - 2024

2024 - GRAND PRIZE

It was a dark and stormy night are the first words of an 1830 novel by Edward Bulwer-Lytton that have become a metaphor for bad writing. The Bulwer-Lytton Fiction Contest (BLFC) is an annual celebration of joyful, deliberately awful writing in which the "winners" are those who compose the worst possible opening sentence to a novel or other literary genre. For more information on the BLFC, please see the DARK AND STORMY NIGHT post of July 8, 2014.

From thousands of entries, the BLFC's Panel of Undistinguished Judges has chosen the following "Winners" and Dishonorable Mentions: 

2024 - Grand Prize 

She had a body that reached out and slapped my face like a five-pound ham-hock tossed form a speeding truck.

Lawrence Person, Austin, TX 

 

Adventure - Winner

As Nils Nordgrund struggled mightily treading water to stay afloat, while grimly watching from a distance the Norwegian oil tanker he captained slowly sink in the treacherously dark and stormy seas off Murmansk - he gave no thought to whether the Giants had any chance at a pennant win this year. 

Rex Allen, San Rafael, CA

Dishonorable Mention

However unlikely an event, Lucy's flight had made a water landing, and as she clutched her seat cushion, which was useable as a flotation device, she waited patiently for the life boats to pick up the Plutonium-class members, active military personnel, parents traveling with small children, and those passengers with special needs.

Joel Phillps, West Trenton, N.J.

Crime and Detective - Winner

She was poured into the red latex dress like Jello poured into a balloon, almost bursting at the seams, and her zaftig shape was awesome to behold, but I knew from the look on her face and the .45 she held pointing at me, that this was no standard client of my detective agency, but a new collection agency tactic to get me to pay my long over-due phone bill.

Jack Harnly, Sarasota, FL

 

Dishonorable Mention

That sweltering Friday evening she not so much walked but slithered into my shabby strip mall P.I. office, showing off all her curves, and I knew then I was in for a weekend of trouble because Dave's Reptile Emporium next door, from which the ball python had escaped, was closed until Monday.

Douglas Purdy, Roseville, CA

 

Purple Prose - Dishonorable Mention

Vera Windrush, ever the romantic, looked at the sea foam washed up on the shore, and imagined the life of some giant, seafaring marshmallow tragically cut short after being rammed by a Pacific Princess cruise liner. 

Art Ellis, Ottawa, Canada

Romance - Dishonorable Mention

Like looking for a missing needle in a haystack (a scenario Belinda had never quite grasped because of the absurdity of having a needle in a haystack in the first place since no one does needlepoint in a barn), the futility of searching for exemplary qualities in her ex left her exhausted and exasperated.

Ann Franklin, Lubbock, TX

Science Fiction - Winner

With the long-awaited legalization of human cloning and the availability of goodly amounts of the DNA of its founding fathers, America in 2035 found itself entering a new golden age - one in which Nathan Hale at last had more than one life to give for his country, Benjamin Franklin was on hand to get the damn Post Office back on track, and Alexander Hamilton could finally play himself on Broadway eight shows a week.

G. Andrew Lundberg, Los Angeles, CA

Vile Puns - Dishonorable Mention

After thousands of years of ruling the netherworld, the Devil was starting to show his age ....... and though it honestly didn't bother him that his horns were a bit less pointy, his wings a bit more droopy, and his fangs a bit less sharp - if anyone mentioned he was losing his hair, there would be hell toupee.

Mark Meiches, Dallas, TX