Read the remaining 7 contestants’ latest writings (click on Home and scroll down – also, you can read their complete writings on the Contestants Page) and vote for one TO BE ELIMINATED based on how well you felt they all responded to the Round 6 Challenge. The challenge required that they incorporate a White Russian and the words “over the line” into their passage (500 words). You have until midnight October 3rd to vote. You can find out who was eliminated and learn what the Round 7 challenge is in a video that will be posted on October 4th 5th. *Tess has immunity this round so she is not included in the poll.
Read Omar 5 here (see “Similar Posts” at the bottom of this post for any earlier entries)
Round 6 Challenge:Incorporate a White Russian and the words “over the line” into your next passage, which should be no more than 500 words.
VI
As Don Don spoke a star shot by
Across the moonless night;
So what, it’s dark, don’t be surprised;
It’s not like it’s first light.
The birds and beasts did long ago
Depart when Claus stopped singing;
They went alone, one by one;
They hadn’t come for swinging.
“No, rat Don, don’t tag along,
Just join me at my side;
I neither lead nor follow;
That’s how the Claus abides.”
The rat Don Don looked up at Claus:
“Dude, man, don’t go freaking;
All I meant was let’s chill out,
It’s just a way of speaking.”
“Sorry, Don, I’m all strung out,
I’ve got this song to write;
I’ve got to post by midnight
On this website called Fourth Night.” Continue reading
Read Coco 5 here (see “Similar Posts” at the bottom of this post for any earlier entries)
Round 6 Challenge:Incorporate a White Russian and the words “over the line” into your next passage, which should be no more than 500 words.
Police ask me if Stavros is man who pays for sex with me. Like they care. Even they go to cabaret for sex. I know stories of police doing sex with marked money and making arrest after if you can believe it. Taxes pay for police to do sex with the butana and then they tell journalistes that Cyprus police fight human traffic.
They put me in prison room and tell me American detective wants interview. I sit on bed to wait. After Frodo I begin thinking about my life. About routina. Every night I go to cabaret at 8 and do dance and consumatsia until 2 or 3 in morning. If man pay Yiannis for me then after cabaret close he take me to house or motel. Then I don’t get to my apartment above cabaret where Yiannis have six of us living until 11 or 12 next day. I rest there because I never sleep good in strangers bed. But sometimes CyTA phone rings from man who want sex after lunch. In daytime its more cheap for them and for me to better because I keep all the money and it sometimes take only one hour.
Different prices for different sex. Overnight sex more expensive and then sex inside cabaret cheaper and daytime sex cheapest. They give more if you let them put it in the zhopa or make sperma on you or take video or do it without condom which is where I draw line and never go over because Ukrainian girl last year got AIDS hear in Limasol. I am lucky not to be beaten yet because many girls I know who refuse to go without condom get beating or rape. Its like that. Continue reading
Read Rhae 5 here (see “Similar Posts” at the bottom of this post for any earlier entries)
Round 6 Challenge:Incorporate a White Russian and the words “over the line” into your next passage, which should be no more than 500 words.
5.
The binding and exigent lust for higher profit margins drove biotech firms into a DNA race to monopolize genome sequences. Although the August 28, 2005 kidnapping of a Harvard undergraduate’s golden retriever was conventionally referred to as the launch of the DNA race, the precursory scurry to patent genes had been as contentious.
Biotech lobbyists had fought for these patents, claiming that the funds required for therapeutic and diagnostic genome sequence research necessitated exclusivity guarantees on intellectual property. But as the technologies improved, practically anyone in a university laboratory could extract the extraneous sugars and proteins and render an isolated genome technologically and uniquely viable.
By late 2024, patents on manipulated gene sequences were irrelevant. More important was exclusive access to an individual’s genes. With its economic and political clout, the industry could have easily pushed through legislation to patent unmodified genes. But they knew legal protection was futile. Sampling a gene required only a quick and painless swab; an individual could easily hawk her or his sequence to any biotech company willing to pay.
Thus the kidnappings and murders began, first in Cambridge, then statewide, nationally, and finally internationally. Genomicide – the murder of an individual for exclusive access to her or his genes – replaced terrorism as the primary official U.S. threat to homeland security. Continue reading
Read Nora 5 here (see “Similar Posts” at the bottom of this post for any earlier entries)
Round 6 Challenge:Incorporate a White Russian and the words “over the line” into your next passage, which should be no more than 500 words.
Catherine felt her blood start to boil as the meaning of those words crashed upon her purring semi-consciousness. She shoved Arthur off her ravaged body and bolted up, her prodigious breasts spilling about.
“Wait a long minute. What did you say? The man in that photo? Your lover?!”
Arthur leapt up as nimbly as a panther, wincing as his half-swollen salivating maleness swung out and slapped against his defined Adonis-like pubic bone. He clutched Catherine by her velvety shoulders. “But darling, I told you! When I asked if you understood you cried out, ‘Yes, yes, yes!’”
“Fool!” Catherine cried, tearing herself from his grip. “Are you nothing but a perfectly sculpted torso? I wasn’t in my right senses!” Catherine began weeping into her hands, her oversized breasts bouncing rhythmically with the sobs. “I never expected it would come to such an obscene end! Oh, Arthur! What indecent desire drove you into… oh I can’t bear saying it… into the muscular arms of another man?” Continue reading
Read Olaf 5 here (see “Similar Posts” at the bottom of this post for any earlier entries)
Round 6 Challenge:Incorporate a White Russian and the words “over the line” into your next passage, which should be no more than 500 words.
The title of Olga’s message to him was “coming to hagan harbor on thursday.” Had it been a TV show, Ron would have spluttered up his drink. Instead he just sat in stupefied silence and read on:
“dear Ronnie!…
i was so surprised and so happy to get friended from you on facebook – i have to tell you that at first i was nervous to write to you because of… well you know of course. it’s been so long. thats why i waited to write you this news… my husband and my two children have always wanted to visit america so we decided at long last to come so I can show them the places from my history…
i never would imagined you were still living in hagan’s harbor… i always guessed you went back to your family’s town. but i should have known you wouldnt by how stubborn you are…Continue reading
Read Tess 5 here (see “Similar Posts” at the bottom of this post for any earlier entries)
Round 6 Challenge:Incorporate a White Russian and the words “over the line” into your next passage, which should be no more than 500 words.
My god was he hot in a dark-and-dangerous way (even being white). His cell phone went off, one of those bottom-of-the-line ones without Internet. It was so 90s technology, on him a total turn-on because it showed he had deeper things on his mind.
He answered, “Hi Trish.” Talk about finding something to start chatting him up on! Not that I ended up needing it.
By his businesslike tone I could tell my namesake wasn’t a girlfriend or anything. She was blabbing on. Finally he said, “It’s not your fault. Let me talk to her.” After a pause, his deep voice softened. “Anna, love, it’s daddy, what’s wrong…”
Oh. My. God. My heart melted right there. Literally. Nothing is sexier than a grown man talking sweetly to a child. Continue reading
Read Utah 5 here (see “Similar Posts” at the bottom of this post for any earlier entries)
Round 6 Challenge:Incorporate a White Russian and the words “over the line” into your next passage, which should be no more than 500 words.
* * *
The expanse of Lake Champlain opened before them as the black station wagon pulled in to the cabin. Junked cars and trucks lay abandoned about the yard. A black Presa Canario that was chained by its spiked collar to the shed rose to its feet and began growling as they stepped out of the vehicle.
“Don’t worry about Herb,” Jacob told Corey, who was glancing over at the dog nervously. “He’s all bark and no bite.”
The cabin was shrouded in the shade of weeping willows, whose tendrils overhung the lake. Jacob motioned out over the state line of Lake Champlain towards the far shoreline. “Have you ever been to New York, Corey?” She shook her head. “I’ve got a rowboat. Want to row across sometime?”
Corey looked out blankly at the lake and nodded mechanically. He unlocked the door. “Home sweet home,” he said, with a sweep of his arm. “After you.” Her fingers knotted by her waist, Corey looked back at the dirt road and then walked in. Continue reading
Round 6 Challenge:Incorporate a White Russian and the words “over the line” into your next passage, which should be no more than 500 words.
Tuck has been eliminated and Tess has received immunity from the next round of elimination voting. For details, watch the video, shot at the Lebowski Fest in Brooklyn, NY:
Readers, even though the Joyce Carol Oates novel has been given away, please feel free to continue offering recommendations for the literary challenges. I may use one of the suggestions for a future round. If I do, I will offer a prize of some kind.
*STEPHEN GEE of Nicosia, Cyprus receives the signed copy of the Joyce Carol Oates novel for proposing that the next challenge involve including a line from a book or play. The Round 6 challenge is to incorporate a White Russian and the words “Over the Line” in the next passage, which should be no more than 500 words. Both are taken from “The Big Lebowski” (see the Round 6 video, shot at the Lebowski Fest, for details). It’s not a book or play, but it’s close enough.
This round I’m taking suggestions for the Round 6 literary challenge. The person whose challenge I select will receive a signed copy of an uncorrected proof of Joyce Carol Oates’ novel Little Bird of Heaven and will receive mention in the next video. Continue reading
"In defense of privacy-20th century's most reclusive authors" http://bit.ly/cTQi0E Good piece despite the title's hypocrisy 3 weeks ago
@yasminepeacock Ha, and you also found your cousin's Twitter page! ("Just found my uncle's wikipedia page lol! Search Kyriacos C. Markides") 3 weeks ago
99 degrees. If I were bald, I'd fry an egg on my head. #nyc3 weeks ago
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