IntShoWriMo 2015: Day 21: Firefly in the Moonlight

IntShoWriMo 2015: Day 21 Prompt:
While hiking in the wilderness, you come across the body of another hiker. In the corpse's hands, you find a note. — REDDIT

Word count: 20k+

Akpan

IntShoWriMo 2015: Day 20: Sound of a Gallows Trapdoor

IntShoWriMo 2015: Day 20 Prompt:

"Imitation precedes creation." Pick a scene from any novel and recreate it using your own characters and possibly, an original setting. - Akpan

Word Count: 20k+

Scene: Roland and Cuthbert's Visit to Rhea's Hut (From Wizard & Glass - Dark Tower IV by Stephen King)

Akpan

IntShoWriMo 2015: Day 19: Speaking To a Dead Line

IntShoWriMo 2015: Day 19 Prompt:

Children's stories are often allegorical and presented in a straightforward manner. Today, take your favorite children's story, fairy tale, or myth and complicate it. Use the original as a jumping-off point to introduce wild elements, unlikely back stories and off-center characters. - Poets&Writers

Word Count: 2k+

Akpan

IntShoWriMo 2015: Day 18: A Loaded Gun On a Hair Trigger

IntShoWriMo 2015: Day 18 Prompt:

Write a story about a world where people actually get plugged into a writer's mind to read his story, thereby sharing the writer's original experience while creating the story. - Akpan

Word Count: 2k+

Akpan

IntShoWriMo 2015: Day 17: Norma

IntShoWriMo 2015: Day 17 Prompt:

A blizzard masks the horror of a small town killing spree. - Writing.Com

Word Count: 2k+

Akpan

IntShoWriMo 2015: Day 16: Considering the Alternative

IntShoWriMo 2015: Day 16 Prompt:

Two objects sit before you: a golden hammer and a cup of what seems to be water. A note on the wall says: "Go ahead, make your choice. The outcome will decide whether you're ready or not." Ready for what? What is this place? Why these objects? Which will you choose? - WritersDigest.Com

Word Count: 2k+

Akpan

IntShoWriMo 2015: Day 15: Curiosity is a Provable Fact

IntShoWriMo 2015: Day 15 Prompts:
You’re a private investigator who is down on his or her luck and hasn’t had a client in months. Suddenly the phone rings. It’s a kid. The kid proposes a silly case to you. Normally you wouldn’t take such a ridiculous job (from a kid, no less), but you need the work, so you accept. But what you uncover during the investigation is a much, much bigger problem than the kid (and you) ever expected. — WritersDigest.Com

Word Count: 2k+

Akpan

IntShoWriMo 2015: Day 14: Hell's Own Movie-Show

IntShoWriMo 2015: Day 14 Prompts:
When she returns home, your character finds the window broken and a meteorite burning a hole in the rug. — Writing.Com

Word Count: 2k+

Akpan

IntShoWriMo 2015: Day 13: The One Without the Fangs

IntShoWriMo 2015: Day 13 Prompt:
Write a story about a breed of vampires who exhibit a strong aversion to (human) blood. Yet feed on something else which is just as fatal to humans as blood-sucking. — Akpan

Word Count: 2k+

Akpan

IntShoWriMo 2015: Day 12: Sharp Edge of Reality

IntShoWriMo 2015: Day 12 Prompt:
Ah, back home and time to relax. Long weeks are brutal. Is that the television you hear? Well you haven’t been home all day so you decide to check it out, thinking you left it on. As you enter the room you see the television is indeed on. And you’re already sitting there watching it. What’s going on here? — WritersDigest.Com

Word Count: 2k+

Akpan

IntShoWriMo 2015: Day 11: Stuck in a Flawed Groove

IntShoWriMo 2015: Day 11 Prompt:
You sit at the same coffee shop sipping vanilla lattes watching the world go by, one day a female barista asks you want you think about as you watch the people walk by, you respond with 'Do you wanna know?' — REDDIT

Word Count: 2k+

Akpan

IntShoWriMo 2015: Day 10: Only a Fool Believes He's Dreaming Before He Wakes Up

IntShoWriMo 2015: Day 10 Prompts:

While you dig the soil for a flower-bed, you find a magical dragon bone. — Writing.Com

You had that dream again. The one where the beast with the drooping hands and wicked fangs stares you down from your window. Except the windows open this time—and you’re awake! What happens next? — WritersDigest.Com

Akpan

IntShoWriMo 2015: Day 9: The End of One Episode

IntShoWriMo 2015: Day 9 Prompt:
During your trip to Turkey, you check into an old hotel. After settling yourself you notice a weathered chest in the corner. Upon opening it, war relics from the First World War and the Ottoman Empire lay before you. What stories do you find? — WritersDigest.Com

Word Count: 2k+

Akpan

IntShoWriMo 2015: Day 8: When Daylight Leaves

IntShoWriMo 2015: Day 8 Prompts:
You cut a deal with death, you will die in 200 days but until then you will have unlimited fortune and happiness. It's day 180 and you've just met the love your life. — REDDIT

Word Count: 2k+

Akpan

IntShoWriMo 2015: Day 7: Survival is a Business of the Mind

IntShoWriMo 2015: Day 7 Prompts:

Marian Bartsch and Joey Costagli meet on his first day at work. One of them had a rough childhood. Write their story. — CreativeWritingPrompts.Com

Word Count: 2k+

Akpan

IntShoWriMo 2015: Day 6: Chalk-Writing in a Storm

IntShoWriMo 2015: Day 6 Prompt:
You are a private investigator who can travel through time and to parallel universes. You are hired by people who want their "what if?" scenarios answered. — REDDIT

Word Count: 2k+

Akpan

IntShoWriMo 2015: Day 5: A Choice of Deaths

IntShoWriMo 2015: Day 5 Prompts:

Use this plot in a short story: Darkness held a vague terror among these people, even the bravest among them. - Chinua Achebe

Write a story about the end of the world as we know it in which the undead - vampires, werewolves and zombies - dictate the scheme of things. But somehow, one group of the undead gains the whip hand over the others. - Akpan

Word Count: 2k+

Akpan

IntShoWriMo 2015: Day 4: An Eternity of Nights

You went to bed like any other night and were out like a log in minutes. But when you woke up, you weren’t at home. You were in a car (that wasn’t yours), wearing clothes (that weren’t yours), and holding a bag full of money (that wasn’t yours). Suddenly, a police car turns on its lights to pull you over. What do you do? — WritersDigest.Com

Write about an ancient gypsy curse. — Writing.Com

Word Count: 2k+

Akpan

IntShoWriMo 2015: Day 3: In The Shadows Walks Something Dark

You are going on a blind date for Valentine’s Day. In case the date is a dud, you have your best friend on standby. Your friend is to call you at 9:30 on the dot. If the date is going well, you answer and use the phrase “I already took care of that.” If it’s not, you answer and claim your friend has an emergency. The date is going well and your friend calls at 9:30 as planned— only problem is, the friend calls with a real emergency. What is it and what do you do? —WritersDigest.Com

Sit in the rain with your eyes closed. Describe the setting based on hearing and smell. —Writing.Com

Word Count: 2k+

Akpan

IntShoWriMo 2015: Day 2: Like Death Warmed Over

IntShoWriMo 2015: Day 2 Prompt:
Sometimes we pick up a book or read an article at the exact moment it's so needed. Write a story in which one of your characters is going through a difficult time and picks up a book that changes his outlook. Have your character become so connected with the book that he feels like it was written for him. Who knows, maybe it was? — Poets&Writers

Use this plot in a short story: A man was judged according to his worth and not according to the worth of his father. — (From Chinua Achebe’s “Things Fall Apart”)

Word Count: 2k+

Akpan

IntShoWriMo 2015: Day 1: 200 Kinds of Fool

IntShoWriMo 2015: Day 1 Prompt: "Write a story about a lady who buys a picture in a pawnshop and then kind of falls through it into a parallel universe. (From Stephen King’s “On Writing”)"

Word Count: 2k+

Akpan

A Note on the IntShoWriMo 2015 Theme

"There Are Other Worlds Than These"

I'd like to officially unveil the theme for this year's challenge.

The 2015 theme has a scifi-fantasy feel but be assured, there's no conspiracy going on here. It's not a plot to twist anyone's arm and force their pens on genre(s) totally out of their league.

The phrase “There Are Other Worlds Than These,” (which is a quote made by Stephen King in magnum opus, The Dark Tower) should turn our minds to one of the most basic axis on which fiction rotates and that is 'our Earth is only one of a million Earths existing in a parallel line.

As you set yourself up to pen 30 stories in the month of June, look at every one of those stories as a foray into parallel universes; into places different yet similar in queer ways, to ‘our’ own Earth. And while you're at it, do try to make the settings, characters and plot believable.

Because you really do believe, “There Are Other Worlds Than These.”

Keep your pens bleeding.

Akpan

IntShoWriMo 2015 Badges Are Up

Official IntShoWriMo Badge

Copy any of the two latter badges for your blog/site

Welcome to yet another celebration of the short story genre. The month of June is upon us and besides anything it might mean to different folks around the World Wide Web for us it can only spell one thing: IntShoWriMo.

We got a brand new logo and customized badge for this year's run of the challenge and both are up for grabs to anyone participating.

One mighty good thing about IntShoWriMo is that you ain't obliged to paste your stuff online just get the stories down any way you can. The event is surefire way to keep your story writing gears oiled and a fine excuse to stock up your fiction writing arsenal. You never know when one of those stories will literally save your life.

All my input this year are going to be scanned and pasted. I'm hoping for 2,000 words a day and I don't want to get stuck typing through all those words. I intend to post mine to maintain a sense of activity on this blog and to reassure newbies participating for the first time of an unseen presence in their private place.

Keep your pens bleeding.

Akpan

T-Concubine

BINTA IBRAHIM
16 year old multiple rape victim with an unidentified child she rescued.

To the 214 rescued pregnant girls so-called “Terrorist’ Concubines.”

Warning to the Reader: Here there be Foul Language.

It's not my fault that I am the way that I am.

So don't judge me if you ain't been up the shit creek I had to paddle.

My sister, I ain't reserve no respect for none of ya'll that don't understand

I suggest you stand back and watch me wriggle thru the eye of this needle.

It's not my fault that I seek solace in your embrace;

That I look up and out and into your face dying for a touch of grace.

Just that your stigma keeps trespassing with the affairs of your mouth.

But I'm here to stay brother, deal with it or haul it down south.

It's not my fault misery selected me over you.

If I did bust that joint has it not crossed your mind ama thrive on your attitude?

When ya'll was all wrapped up in the warmth of fam., I was stolen and abused

You just like them to downtalk but I stand strong and refuse to be reduced.

It's not my fault that those mad dogs threw themselves at me;

So how come ya'll hating on me like I was some colossal freak?

Ya'll should be throwing a party, celebrating the fact that I'm free.

But I am not your expectation and I will survive and bring some style into it.

It's not my fault that I am the way that I am.

It's not my fault that I seek solace in your embrace.

It's not my fault that misery selected me over your brass

So am I asking too much cause I expect some respect for my pain?

Akpan

7.9 TLC

In life, there’s bound to be some pain;

At some point, you're bound to get some measure of hate.

Nature will seldom holla, “I’m turning up the heat in this place,”

Wake up, time's too short to spend mopping around in a daze.

Sprinkle a dash of sunshine on this rubble.

Spit a message of prophecy and refrain from your grumble.

Make the connect; from Africa to the uttermost of Australasia;

Let America arise and do all it can.

Feel the need for change bulldoze the way out for Nepal.

Reach out and unpaint this ghastly picture if you dare;

Let's rock their world with a 7.9 magnitude tender lovin’ care.

Depose doubt and despair with desperate deeds of kindness,

Fight nature's fury with fiery faith flattering furious and fearless.

Bind passion to compassion position stormclouds of hope on this wilderness.

Cause it's impossible to share with an open heart and come up less.

Sprinkle a dash of sunshine on this rubble.

Spit a message of prophecy and refrain from your grumble.

Make the connect; from Africa to the uttermost of Australasia;

Let America arise and do all it can.

Feel the need for change bulldoze the way out for Nepal.

Reach out and unpaint this ghastly picture if you dare;

Let's rock their world with a 7.9 magnitude tender lovin’ care.

Akpan

Day 30: Kensinsi

"Kensinsi" (pronounced /ken sin see/) in Ibibio/Efik (a Nigerian dialect)
translates "forever."

By the way, that's not yours truly in the image above. It's Dad and Mom
who my brothers and I fondly call "Sir & Mma." 1st of July marks 20 years
of Sir's passing. I thought I'd start off celebrating his life early this year.

Kensinsi

You are a never-ending story,

You bought my respect thru the dreams you made real.

Kensinsi

I dedicate my life to illustrate the lil things

You set in motion which turned a simple life extraordinary.

Kensinsi

You are my hero, my shero; you taught me to believe

So I can stare failure between the eyes and still find reprieve

And it's always been that way with you

And me as a kid running around without a clue;

You are the reason I always managed to pull thru.

It will take kensinsi to show I appreciate you.

That's why I owe you,

Kensinsi

Ain't nobody gon' take the place reserved for you, kensinsi;

In my heart I raised two thrones and crowned you King and Queen.

It's all about you can't you see?

With me and you it's kensinsi.

I love you kensinsi nsinsi. (Forever and ever)

Akpan

Day 29: Soul Brother

Beware, Soul Brother

Cause we only got each other.

The day ain't over without the shedding of a bit of blood.

What is is not.

So I struggle ceaselessly

While competition unceasingly

Cast my trophies at the feet of controversy.

Do you see why my brother

Reasons enough you shouldn't sweat the bother

Trying so hard to command respect

When no one expects

To see you succeed

But die the death of a scorched seed

In the very bosom of fertility?

Beware, Soul Brother,

Cause we only got each other.

So I illustrate life in a parable.

Living words on breathing marble.

The essence of truth is defected

And trust relationship's relegated.

If the future got eyes

I pray it can visualize

The past so that it arrive

With a perfect plan

For the race of man.

The goal of our mission

Was to rewrite the story of destruction.

Why can't we get our act together?

Beware, Soul Brother,

Cause we only got each other.

Akpan