Yikes! It's October already!
Time for the Annual Deseret Morning News Worst Beginning Sentence Ever contest!
Yes!
OK, kids. By now you know the drill. Our contest is based on the Bulwer-Lytton contest (www.bulwer-lytton.com) created by Professor Scott Rice of San Jose State University (home of Sammy the Spartan!) in memory of Victorian novelist Edward George Bulwer-Lytton, a prolific Charles Dickens wannabe who first penned that infamous mother-of-all-opening-line-
cliches, "It was a dark and stormy night. ... "
Your mission (should you choose to enter our contest) is to write something that rivals anything written by our boy Edward. This year's Bulwer-Lytton contest winners are excellent models, including the grand-prize winner, from Jim Guigli of Carmichael, Calif.: "Detective Bart Lasiter was in his office studying the light from his one small window falling on his super burrito when the door swung open to reveal a woman whose body said you've had your last burrito for a while, whose face said angels did exist, and whose eyes said she could make you dig your own grave and lick the shovel clean."
Irene Buttuls of Lytton, British Columbia, contributed this winner: "Christy, lounging in the gondola which slipped smoothly through the enveloping mist had her first inkling that something was afoot as she heard pattering hooves below (for our story is not in Venice but Switzerland with its Provolone and Toblerone) and craning her not unlovely neck she narrowed her eyes at the dozen tiny reindeer, pelting madly down the goat trail."
Christin Keck of Kent, Ohio, scored with the following entry: "She looked at her hands and saw the desiccated skin hanging in Shar-Pei wrinkles, confetti-like freckles, and those dry, dry cuticles — even her 'Fatale Crimson' nail color had faded in the relentless sun to the color of old sirloin — and she vowed if she ever got out of the Sahara alive, she'd never buy polish on sale at Walgreen's again."
Here are the rules:
1. Your sentence must be original.
2. Your sentence must be just that — a sentence. The judicious use of semicolons and colons is fine, of course, but there should be just one period. (A word of caution: Long sentences can be daunting in the extreme to our judges. Remember that "brevity is the soul of wit." Whatever that means.)
3. You may submit more than one sentence.
4. Your sentence can be rooted in any genre: romance, horror, children's fiction, mystery, western, historical, sci-fi or fantasy. And speaking of fantasy, maybe this year we should have a special "Talking Unicorn" category. Like I always say, you can never have too many opening sentences featuring talking unicorns!
5. Also, I think we should have a "Dark and Stormy" category, just so we can pump some new life into that old war horse.
6. Your entry/entries must be received by Oct. 18.
If our judges like your sentence, we will print it and also your name in the paper. I wish we could offer you an all-expenses paid trip to the land of the Talking Unicorns, but until we can find a sponsor, you'll have to accept our profound respect instead.
So here's to Edward!
We look forward to hearing from you.
E-mail your entries to acannon@desnews.com; or mail them to her attention at Deseret Morning News Features Department, P.O. Box 1257, Salt Lake City, UT 84110.