Toot!

Time to pull out my own horn and make a little noise.

I got an honorable mention in a "first 200 words" contest. Per the title, I submitted the first 200 words of the novel I started during Nanowrimo 2009. The venue was not, I will admit, highly competitive, but still...honorable mention. And I was the first honorable mention too! (Not that the honorable mentions were ranked, necessarily.)

Here are the comments I got on my submission:

Great example of revealing a ton about the story and character in 199 words. Surprising twist at the end. Will an agent turn the page? You bet! Unanswered questions include: how did she die and why is she hanging with a grungy character? Even though the challenge of the protagonist is uncertain, it doesn’t matter in this case because the voice is so clear and edgy. "Stream of consciousness” writing works in this case.

And here is the submission:

It was as good a day as any to try and outrun the police, January decided. She’d been pulled over 6 times in 18 months (once on her birthday) and been issued 2 warnings and 4 tickets: speeding; talking on her cell phone while driving; speeding and talking on her cell phone (that one was expensive); and speeding and driving with a suspended license. It was as if the cops had nothing better to do than to pester normally safe drivers who happened to be in a rush, or who had to coordinate last minute dress details for the Spring Formal on the run.

January had always wondered what it would be like to hit the gas and lose the cops before she could get another ticket, or have to sit through another Saturday of all-day driving school. Well, this was it! The flashing lights were in the rear view mirror and the driver was accelerating. She only wished she were the one behind the wheel and not this shaggy low life with a loaded gun on the front seat and a bag of pot in the glove box.

Just another one of the downsides of being dead, January thought.