UPDATE: THE LINKY WILL BE OPEN THROUGH HALLOWEEN! Add your stories now!

The day is here!

How to participate (and rules)
1. The theme is FEAR. Post a short scene (400 words or less) with a character who is afraid. Scared. Terrified. Petrified.

2. You may write a new scene on the topic, OR you may post a scene from your WIP or book. This includes completed and published works.

3. All scenes should be clean (i.e. no sex, limited violence and language).

4. Post your scene TODAY or any time this weekend, and add it to the Mr. Linky BELOW. Be sure to link your post back to the blogfest here (http://jordanmccollum.com/halloween-scarefest/) so your readers can read other entries, too.

5. Read, enjoy, and comment on other entries!

Want the badge? Copy this and paste it in the HTML of a blog post or your sidebar:

Want it bigger or smaller? Change the number at width="300" to adjust the size.

The Linky!

Use your name (or your name@your blog’s name, or your blog’s name), and the link to your post (i.e. http://myblog.blogspot.com/2011/10/my-post.html) and NOT your blog (i.e. http://myblog.blogspot.com).

Read, comment and share!

Blogfest badge photo by William Warby

It’s the Halloween Scarefest! Post a scene, 400 words of less, of a character who’s afraid (and see the blogfest post) to join in!

This scene is from Façade (you can read the award-winning first chapter here), about two-thirds of the way through the novel.

Setting the scene: Katya Mikhailova is the Soviet cultural attaché in Paris. After she was injured in a bombing, she briefly worked with the police and an American liaison for her own reasons—but she gave them a false name so they wouldn’t know about her position at the embassy. Now she’s tricked them into returning her to the embassy before they could find out her identity.

But the American isn’t letting her get away that easily.

Please note this is basically an unedited rough draft!

As soon as the door latched behind me, a deep sense of unease sent my stomach plummeting. The hair at the nape of my neck stood at attention. Something wasn’t right here. Everything looked the same as when I left, but there was something I couldn’t put my finger on that put me on my guard, a sharp edge to the air.

And then the hand clamped over my mouth.

My heart froze. I could almost see myself ready to lash out with elbows and hands and feet—but I forced myself to breathe through the panic. Thinking clearly was the only thing that could get me away from this attacker, not blind luck.

“I don’t want to hurt you.” His voice was a shade above a whisper. Frank.

My heartbeat redoubled, but still I fought off the urge to fight back. He hadn’t hurt me yet, and he’d just said he wasn’t planning to. No reason to change that by trying to use force.

I shook my head to free my mouth, and Frank moved his hand a centimeter. I stared straight ahead, unwilling to turn and look at him. I spiked my tone with sarcasm. “What took you so long?”

“You’re going to have to explain yourself,” he said.

“Explain what? That I couldn’t trust you to keep me safe anymore?”

“No, not that, Miss Mikhailova.”

The chill of danger in the air finally leached into my veins. I looked to the mirror above the vanity. My lips were still stained red from the beet borshch, but the rest of my face was as pallid as death.

He’d found out the truth and he’d come here to kill me.

Picture by Valentin Serov

If you’ve been in a store in the last six weeks, I’m sure you know Halloween is coming up. And to celebrate, I’m hosting a Halloween blogfest! Yep, here’s your chance to find an automatic topic, and get lots of visitors to your blog—and find great new blogs to read yourself! That’s right, it’s a HALLOWEEN SCAREFEST!

How to participate (and rules)
1. The theme is FEAR. Post a short scene (400 words or less) with a character who is afraid. Scared. Terrified. Petrified.

2. You may write a new scene on the topic, OR you may post a scene from your WIP or book. This includes completed and published works.

3. All scenes should be clean (i.e. no sex, limited violence and language).

4. Post your scene on Friday, October 28, 2011, and add it to the Mr. Linky on my post that day. Be sure to link your post back to the blogfest here (http://jordanmccollum.com/halloween-scarefest/) so your readers can read other entries, too.

5. Read, enjoy, and comment on other entries!

Want to sign up? Just leave a comment on this post if you’re planning to participate (not required, but appreciated!). The official sign up will be posted on here on October 28!

Want the badge? Copy this and paste it in the HTML of a blog post or your sidebar:

Want it bigger or smaller? Change the number at width="300" to adjust the size.

Blogfest badge photo by William Warby

This entry to the blogfest is a bit late; I was traveling for the memorial service on the posting day and didn’t get the time to write like I’d hoped.

The prompt for a piece of flash fiction is: “It’s Independence Day and something unexpected happens . . .” So here we go!

You’d probably think dancing in the arms of Lord Edward Westing, Earl of Sussex (etc.) would be utterly thrilling. But you’d be wrong.

Bertie, as we all call him, is seventeen with bad teeth and worse acne. He’s a little obnoxious, but he’s a good dancer, he’s fun at parties, like tonight’s Carraresi Feast Day ball, and he’s family, if distantly.

He spins me into a dip and I glimpse the glass dance floor, and the orange sunset reflected in the sea below us. This year’s venue, an open-air gazebo over the gulf, is the best I can remember, and the evening’s just begun.

The music winds down and Bertie whips me into one more spin. “You’re getting rusty,” he says. “Hope you’re not planning to impress anyone.”

I look away. There’s someone I want to impress, but I doubt he’s here. I try to surreptitiously scan the crowd, but my eyes are drawn to the white wake cutting through the gold gulf not far away. Heading straight toward us, fast. My stomach plunges faster than it did when Bertie flipped me.

The boat speeds up. I realize my grip on Bertie’s hand is so tight he can’t even squeeze back—then the speed boat leaps out of the water onto the floating bridge, the only way on or off our little island. Two masked men clamber out of the boat, carrying assault rifles.

“Dove è la principessa?” one demands.

La principessa. The princess. Me.

They want me.

Rough and sketchy, but isn’t that always the way with flash fiction?

Photo by Alyson Hunt

Last year, I volunteered to trade manuscripts with a stranger. If I remember correctly, her manuscript was one of her first completed novels—and just a few short months later, Deanna Barnhart‘s running a very successful writing blog, with an awesome blogfest this month:

Today, we’re supposed to post a writing question, so here’s mine.

I’ve been studying writing craft since I was a teenager—which isn’t a super long time ago (I’ll just tell you, I’m 28), but still, I couldn’t seem to exactly remember how I learned to write. A couple months ago, it came to me: the Internet.

In the mid-nineties, there was this website on writing craft. It might have even been an ezine. It had some pretty good stuff. The site color scheme was red and black, and it might have had a grayish color background.

The only concrete writing advice I can remember from the site was to edit (what a concept!) and a story one student had written that involved postcards and balloons. It had a sleepy beginning, but the author of the article (who wasn’t the author of the story) suggested the story author add two sentences to the beginning of the story that would help highlight the poignancy of the postcards to the readers.

I think I came across the site again a few years ago, so it might still be out there. I also think it had some form of the word “write” in the name and URL.

My question: where can I find this website?

Last week was our first Writing Wednesday. Maybe one of these articles will help answer your question!

• James Duckett – How to use semicolon
• James Duckett – How to use i.e. and e.g. correctly
• Tristi Pinkston – Targeting Your Audience
• Betsy Love – Clarity
• Alex Hoagland
• Brainstorming and Plotting: The Beginnings

Even if you can’t help me find that website, be sure to come back next Wednesday for Writing Wednesday II, to share your favorite blog posts on writing!