February 2010 Flash Fiction Voting Thread B

[DailyRich]

A Wizard of the Sorcery by Rich Matrunick

One small slip of POV ("In front of Saint Michael were the black sedans that had dogged their footsteps across city after city," when everything else is first person), but overall I liked this. Got a real Shadowrun kind of vibe from it. I take it the boy is lost?

Abyss Above Elves by Michael Aaron

For being joined in media res, you sure did a great job making it feel like we knew these characters. Maybe it's the fact that their fitting into the classic fantasy tropes made it easy for us to fill the blanks. The best thing I can say is that I want to read the rest of this.

A King Above the Truth by Victoria A. Rogers

It's well done, but it feels like there's something missing to it. It doesn't feel like the argument is resolved, or that anything really changes from the beginning to the end. It reveals a bit of history, but it all feels like prelude to me.

Prophecy Above Might by SallyC

The ending is pretty telegraphed, and reminds me of the joke about the man who has faith God will save him from a flood, and refuses rescue by a car, a boat, and helicopter, only to drown and have God tell him, "I sent you a car, a boat and a helicopter, what were you waiting for?" But it's a clever way to deal with the hand you were dealt with that title. I do think you could drop or modify the first sentence in the second-to-last paragraph -- it's a litte too on-the-nose.

Sword of Knowledge by Hereford Eye

Here's another story where the end feels more like a beginning. I want to see this lad put that sword to use and find out women are far too unfathomable even for all-knowing swords.

A King Above Secrets by Mike Hazelwood

Not sure who we're really supposed to place our sympathies with here. It seems like the Whisperer is a shady (no pun intended) character, yet it feels like we're meant to think the king is being duped by the book as well. Maybe that's the intent?

Princess Above Blood by Christopher Alen

Wonderfully poetic myth here. And kudos for working in all the other words from the list!

[zachariah]

ZOMG Here's the comment I had already written about 'Prophecy Above Might':

A carbon-copy of one of my favourite old cheesy jokes, which ends with God talking to a recently-deceased Priest. This Priest resisted all attempts to save him from falling to his death, confident that God would come to the rescue. “I don’t know what went wrong,” God says, “I sent a boat, a helicopter, some hikers...”

You know what they say, great minds think alike and fools seldom differ.

[SallyC]

[b]
Prophecy Above Might by SallyC

The ending is pretty telegraphed, and reminds me of the joke about the man who has faith God will save him from a flood, and refuses rescue by a car, a boat, and helicopter, only to drown and have God tell him, "I sent you a car, a boat and a helicopter, what were you waiting for?"

Spot on! I confess - that joke was in my head all the way through.

[Daddy Darth]

A King Above Secrets by Mike Hazelwood

Not sure who we're really supposed to place our sympathies with here. It seems like the Whisperer is a shady (no pun intended) character, yet it feels like we're meant to think the king is being duped by the book as well. Maybe that's the intent?

I was certainly hoping the reader would have sympathy for the King and the truth was in the Book - no duping intended.

Curious if anyone picked up on the name of the daughter Ornamentia - we always think we are so clever dont we? Seemed like a good cliche name for the princess who never really gets a speaking part. I tried to sprinkle some cliche in there w/out going crazy.
Cheers all

Currently sitting at 666 posts!!! It is a Human number it the number of the Beast. Rock on Iron Maiden!!!

[SallyC]

A Wizard of the Sorcery
Wonderfully dark and moody. I struggled towards the end with a lot of unanswered questions. I would love to read a fuller version - this was just too much of a teaser.

Abyss above Elves
Loved the concept of elves in space. My problem was that it read like a trailer: lots of action and hints, without giving a full story.

A King Above the Truth
Nice writing - a little thin on story.

Sword of Knowledge
Wicked. Not sure I got all the in jokes, but it was fun trying. I hope the sword differentiates between what a particular woman wants, as opposed to generic woman, otherwise the hero is going to be in deep water even sooner than he expects.

Princess above Blood
Sorry, this didn't work for me - went right over my head.

King above Secrets
I liked this fine, as far as it went. It feels more like a first chapter than a stand-alone.

[MrBF1V3]

Here are my comments, maybe there's something useful in it.

A Wizard of the Sorcery by Rich Matrunick/Sterling13
An interesting take on the whole demon hunter paradigm, worthy of more than a little thought. Yes, they can be defeated, but it will cost you. Not sure what that has to do with the title though.

Abyss Above Elves by Michael Aaron/Zachariah
There is a lot going on, but there's a lack of completion here. Will they do the right thing? What would that be? The writing is picture perfect though. The characterization is great too.

A King Above the Truth by Victoria A. Rogers/NickeeCoco
I was kind of wondering about that myself. You kind of telegraphed the end, but that wasn't a bad thing. The big story will be the reaction of the next group to come out to put someone else's face on ... Good job.

Prophecy Above Might by SallyC
Good story, well written, Sorry to say it doesn't really stand out for me. The flashback, which is most of the story, gets a bit predictable.

Sword of Knowledge by Hereford Eye
Written with grammatical accuracy, peppered with sideways references and puns, and with a weathered eye at storytelling. This must be the work of HE. If only the story could have lasted long enough to share some of that stainless steel wisdom. For that matter, how about a novel? I have no doubt it would be one of a kind. I kind of liked this one.

A King Above Secrets by Mike Hazelwood/DaddyDarth
A good introduction. Well written and hinting of a whole world of mideaval intregue which we can only begin to guess at.

Princess Above Blood by Christopher Alen
A good effort, but seiously lacking in detail. This is a short story, at the least, maybe even a novella. You have too much for the word limit. Very creative, an interesting kind of world you made.

B5

[Sterling13]

Many thanks for the comments, guys. I realized pretty early on that my idea had grown far beyond the limits of a flash piece. What I wanted to make sure was that I at least got the "mood" I was going for... which seemed to work pretty well.

As to a few unanswered questions:

The Title:
I drew "Wizard of Sorcery" in the title picker... which, to me... well, that title doesn't mean ANYTHING. In my story, the pov character is my wizard. "Sorcery" I decided to turn into a quantitative thing... its a zero-sum magic that is transferred/taken, etc.

The cliche:
I actually took out a bit and changed the ending because I thought the hidden cliche might be too obvious. Would it have been more apparent if I mentioned that Marrander wore a gray trenchcoat and kept the ending where he and the being in the church fell down the hole together, allowing John to escape?

So, yeah... the basic cliche was Lord of the Rings.
John = Frodo
Jacob's Cross = The One Ring
Marrander = Gandalf (the name is a referrence to Mithrandir)
The black sedans + passengers = Nazgul
The church = Moria (notice how the way is shut behind them with stone... though, in this version, its Gandalf that shuts the door)
Cadadras = A combination of Saurman and the Balrog. He's named after the snowy mountain range that the fellowship tries to pass before Moria (Caradhras).
There's also a few more things sprinkled in... one being the "What madness is this?" line from Marrander, making reference to the "...abandon reason for madness?" line from Gandalf in Saurman's tower. And Marrander making reference that he cannot carry the cross (ie, the one ring).

The rest of the questions (Jacob's cross, etc, etc.):
Well, I'm working on a longer version (that lacks a lot of the lord of the rings references and plot structure, actually), which I'm going to try submiting elsewhere. We'll see how that goes