Hmmm. I know old age and a concomitant lack of comprehension has been less creeping up on me than galloping apace in recent years, but I'm poleaxed by the fact so many stories this month have left me completely flummoxed. At this rate I shall need TDZ's Space Kittens in the style of Dr Seuss next month, as that will be my intellectual limit.
Anyhow, my short list of those tales which my fading faculties did allow me to understand.
Cascade -- This Holy Place
Culhwch -- The Library At the End Of The World
HazelRah -- As it flashes before my eyes
mosaix -- Think Before You Speak...
Phyrebrat -- Stone Whisperer
Shyrka -- Blood & Echoes
The Big Peat -- Song of a Better Time
TheDustyZebra -- If we shadows have offended...
Victoria Silverwolf -- Echolocation
The vote was something of a battle between Cul and Victoria, but
Victoria finally won on points with her beautiful Just-So-like tale.
TDZ gets a special award for her use of Shakespeare in the title of her story, which appeared to be A Midsummer Night's Nightmare.
Phyrebrat and
mosaix also get special mentions, but in my
Black Book of Egregious Offenders since they both pinched the theme of the story I intended to write (years ago I planned a whole SF detective series about a woman who could see the past by listening to the echoes left in buildings, so the plot is mine I tell you, mine!) and then compounded the offence by writing better stories with it than I would have done, damn them.
Thanks to Messrs pH and m, I had rather to rush out a story with no inspiration, and the result I found somewhat underwhelming. And as is the perverse way of things here in the Challenges it's got me actual votes which have eluded me for the past months when I've written stories I much preferred and thought were better. There must be a moral in that somewhere. So an echoing psychopathic telltale bow for the mentions, short- and long-listings
Coast,
Droflet,
Cascade,
mosaix,
johnnyjet,
CC and
TDZ and a murdering curl-of-the-lip mega-thanks for the stupendous votes
nixie and
Parson (who was the last person I expected to like a tale of an unrepentant serial killer of innocent people!!).
