October 2012 theme and competition entries

[Ron Blanco 10]

October 2012 theme & competition: The Goose Fair

Set by Ron Blanco

 

Following the disappearance of yet another competition winner I have chosen this month’s theme.

 

Today sees the opening of the annual Goose Fair in Nottingham. It is Europe’s second largest fun fair and dates back over seven hundred years. Your challenge this month is to write a story that is set at The Goose Fair. The story can be anything you like: a family visit to the fair; a first date for a young couple; a stressful episode for a security officer or fun fair worker; or some other incident. You also have the option to set the story in any time period between 1284 and the current day.

 

TO ENTER: Your story must be 500 words or less, and should be posted on this thread.

 

JUDGING: Tallyman and myself will judge the entries, and we will decide the winner in early November.

 

** Announcement ** The monthly competitions will be drawing to a close after November, so grab the opportunity to participate while you still can.

 

Good luck!

 

Ron

Edited October 3, 2012 by Ron Blanco

[FatDave 11]

Damn, I've been away far too long.

 

Anyway, here's my effort, though I'm not sure it qualifies as you said the story could be set... "any time period between 1284 and the current day" and mine isn't.

 

Anyway...

 

The Goose Fair

 

The traditions of Goose Fair were long held.

So it was, on the rising of the Harvest Moon, bells rang in the fairground and those gathered bowed their hooded heads, while Katherine climbed the big wheel. Sly eyes watched him jump from carriage to carriage into the misty night. He shook with the effort, his grip painful on the rough red metal which crumbled in his bloody hands. Katherine was too old for a Watcher, thirty winters counted him as elder amongst The Seven Tribes, but his daughter had been chosen, so climb he must.

As a child he had marvelled at the Gooseherders, marching off towards Lincolnshire to bring back the Geese. Only when he became a father did he understand why people spoke of them as sacrifices. There were no Geese there anymore, not for thousands of winters. His mother had told him how they’d battled the dust clouds that stole the sun and made them forget they could fly. When they sat they forgot they could stand, and when they lay they forgot they could sit. Their meat became poison like the frozen earth itself, and they went off to Lincolnshire to await the rebirth of the land.

And so Jane had gone seawards as thousands had before, armed with her Mint Swords to hack the weeds of legend which would block her path, to seek out the Fat Child O’Gracious and court his blessing to battle the betrothed midgets Mite on the shore of the irradiated Sea of North, where the sand still scorched feet and the flaming nuclear winds still blew. Only then could she call the Geese back to fulfil their oath to chase off the dust and free the sun, ushering in a new age, the age of Mushy Peace.

No wonder Katherine was worried.

Below came the Bell of Calling; the Master of Voices announcing the Time of Return, 12:84pm by the old clocks. Katherine squinted into the mist, eyes watering from the cancers which filled them. Ghosts of the past swirled amongst the shadows, lamenting warnings from the world that was, before fading back into the radioactive soil.

Katherine watched the mists part, revealing the child alone on the hill. She stumbled towards The Fair, arms trembling before her, begging to be held. Katherine held his arms out to hers, almost a mile away, and felt her phantom embrace as she fell to her knees and offered her convulsing stomach to the earth.

‘She’s failed then?’ came the cries from bellow, reading Katherine’s face as he watched his daughter roll onto her back. Soon she would join her mother, and all the people of the long gone time who burned the world rather than share it. He would recover her and burn her too; her meat too poisonous now to eat.

 

The crowd began to disperse back into tribes, to part and meet again the next Harvest Moon, as Katherine walked into the mist. Above him the Geese began to cry.

Edited October 25, 2012 by FatDave

[SarahD 10]

Every month I mean to partake in this and never get round to it. Well this month I will

 

 

----

And then my soul split.

 

They stared. The comedian cried. The snob lifted its chin. The attention seeker banged against the glass, bloodying its fists. I turned to the right and saw the slut wave. To the left the virgin sobbed. I stepped forward, reaching towards myself, fingers trembling, aching to touch, waiting for the cold feel of the glass. A high-pitched shriek of laughter caused my hand to drop and something rushed past me, knee-high, I reached down to grab it when my hand was caught. My shoulders were in a vice. I kicked and screamed as I was pulled.

 

I passed them all: the sides of my soul, watching me watching me watching me watching me...

 

Glass. People. Faces. Steps. Voices.

 

"What happened?" someone asked.

 

"I think she had a nervous breakdown in the Hall of Mirrors."

 

Laughter. "Not again."

[greg2 10]

Apologies for lack of contribution recently - a wedding intervened!

 

LIKE BUILDING AN ORANGE

 

This was one of the best bits he thought, as the first light oozed out from behind the eastern horizon and you could see the road stretching ahead through the greens and yellows and reds of autumn and you were very alone but on the way. It would not have been like this in an office job. It would not have been like this, regularly, even if he’d been able to stay in the army.

Another one of the best bits was that the Goose Fair was a big fair, big enough for Slim Al to be taking all his concessions. That meant Margot would be there too, probably running one of the game stalls. He liked seeing Margot. The prize goldfish liked seeing Margot.

It was about 6.30 when he pulled the tractor unit on to the lot and felt the bump as he eased the trailer down off the tarmac on to the grass. There would be a plan, Al would have told Greasy Jim the Mechanic how the lot should be laid out, and then gone to bed. He lowered a window and Greasy Jim appeared as if by magic.

‘Hallo Army boy. Get this tiddler out of the way. You can go down left next to the kids’ roundabout.’

It was true this was the smaller model of ferris wheel. But that made it easier to put up with a plate in your leg, and kids were a better class of customer. He drove slowly to his place and spent time with chocks and his spirit level getting the trailer absolutely level. Then he turned the engine back on, and operated the side controls to begin lifting the tower. He loved how, as the tower rose, it dragged the radial arms up from the floor of the trailer.

A police car pulled up on the perimeter of the lot, keeping an eye on things. Army Boy climbed the tower so that at the top he could turn the small but vital control which locked the tower upright. As he reached the top he saw Greasy Jim on the field, exercising by walking backwards.

He turned the control, and checked it. Then, looking out again across the field, he saw that Jim had walked backwards into a hole opened up by heavy rain. But Jim seemed to be OK. He seemed to be pulling some sort of package from the hole. The police car was bumping across the grass towards Greasy Jim, with the passenger officer hastily phoning HQ for guidance on the law on treasure trove.

Army Boy climbed down the tower and pulled the first pair of radials towards the back of the trailer, bolting the first set of circumference sections in between the first and second pair of radials. It was like building an orange by adding one segment at a time. He would smarten up before the concessions started arriving. He had a story he could tell Margot.

[Ron Blanco 10]

Well done FatDave, Sarah and Greg. I'll consult with Tallyman and get back to you with our comments.

[Ron Blanco 10]

Thanks to all who took part this month. I've consulted Tallyman, and here are our thoughts:

 

Fat Dave got us off to an atmospheric start, with his dark, post-apocalyptic piece. The story succeeds in creating a nice sense of tradition, in keeping with the theme. And the doleful, dystopian aspect was offset by the odd bit of silliness. I read it several times and chuckled at Mushy Peace every time. The man called Katherine had us a little stumped. It may be reflecting the fact that name usage changes over time, or is there greater significance intended here? I particularly liked the line: “When they sat they forgot they could stand, and when they lay they forgot they could sit.” Not sure why, I just liked it. On the down side, at times the story possibly lacks a sense of the ‘positions’ of its participants, which I suppose makes it a bit harder to visualise. An imaginative interpretation of the theme, though, and the step forward in time is certainly not a cause for disqualification. In fact it just highlights a lack of imagination on my part when I set the theme. Incidentally, was any inspiration taken from Will Self’s ‘The Book of Dave’?

 

SarahD followed this up with a witty and cheeky little piece. Well within the allowed word count, bordering on mean, but because the words were so well-chosen we don’t feel short-changed. It has a tidy conclusion but, rather cleverly, leaves much to be speculated on. The ending, for example, suggests this is a regular occurrence, perhaps after a few port and lemons?

 

Greg2 ensured that it wasn’t a two-horse race by submitting his story just in the nick of time. There is a nice hint of back story to explain the Army Boy's circumstances, and some good character names that paint instant pictures. Sometimes it is necessary to do some research when writing a story, and we have a sense that Greg has studied Ferris wheel erection in some depth! It has a good description of the process, just enough detail to be authentic and interesting. Just a small point but we wondered if in this story told from Army Boy’s perspective he could know about the police conversation with HQ? Margot adds a nice human aspect to contrast with the precision of other elements of the story.

 

So, good stories all round, but a competition needs a winner. As usual, different aspects appeal to different people, but in our minds there’s hardly a hair’s breadth between them. However, I'm pleased to declare Sarah's classy glassy snapshot as the winner of this month’s cuddly toy.

[SarahD 10]

Woohooo! Yay! It was a bit short, sorry about that. But then Hemingway apparently wrote a short story in 6 words, so maybe short and sweet is the way forward.

 

I liked all the stories. I thought Fat Dave and Greg both brought something atmospheric, which is what you need for an October theme

[sci fi 10]

Fat Dave, brilliant, yours won in my opinion

[FatDave 11]

Lol, thanks for the comment sci fi, but the right person won. I've always found this flash fiction competition tough as the 500 word limit is so very restrictive; the difficulty of the task is no doubt why I enjoy entering so much. I've always been envious of people skilled in brevity, it's something I'm struggling to master, and I find my stories running away with themselves, at times I feel like I'm just there to keep them from going off the rails as they write themselves.

 

When I finished writing this it was about 800 words, and I thought I was being consise. The hard part after that is recrafting what I've written whilst trying not to lose anything of the story, which I often fail at. So when I see a story like SarahD's, which is complete, and fat with content and light enough on the descriptions that adds to the story, I'm left enviously wondering how the hell they managed it. Looking back on my past entries, I believe every single one was bang on 500 words, lol.

 

As for the naming of the main character as Katherine, I wanted to put accross that things of the past were still in use in this post apocalyptic world, but their true uses and meanings were lost. I intended to make a few references, perhaps a helter skelter used for sacrifices, or a merry-go-round as some alter to the horse-gods, but I was defeated by the word count.

[SarahD 10]

See I have the opposite problem. I usually have to go out and flesh out my word count. Unless I'm writing dialogue, that seems to just go on and on.

 

Thanks Dave. You should put up your longer version of the story, it sounds interesting.

[CraigDaley 10]

I know the competition is over but this is sort of in support of Dave’s comment on the Graphic Novel thread, he’s right, we are not all pants outside your trousers types...

 

I usually write and draw graphic novels that are set in Sheffield. You can find out more about them at http://cdgraphicnovels.blogspot.co.uk if you are interested,

 

This is my attempt at the set short story challenge… ‘Nottingham Goose Fair’

 

The Beggar Tramp

 

For the last seven hundred years he has stood in the centre of the crowd and watched the people going about their business. On just this one day every year he has returned to watch and always the beggar tramp goes unnoticed.

 

He has seen houses around the castle turn from wood to stone, taller and taller buildings springing up with each return visit as Nottingham has slowly transformed from a medieval town into the city it is today. His eyes open as the stalls are laid out and the trader set out their wares and he sees the first eager customers arrive clutching their well earned wealth, whether to barter or now to buy.

 

The traders shouting out their prices and offering their bargain deals as they look to make a profit on the day and try to shift their stock. Groups of girls giggling as they share a joke no one else has heard, the even louder boys arguing over the some choice that has been made or the price a trader is asking. The children have always run and played, the Mother’s weighed down with goods struggling to catch up, while Father pays for another purchase. The clergyman moving slowly through the crowd, his pace slow and steady, his interest in the goods only fleeting as he shows us all, he is somehow above all of this. The singer with the guitar plays another song and sitting next to his hat that has only a few coins inside is his tired old dog, looking up with sad eyes for sympathy.

 

The bartering is no more and even the sound of coins being shuffled has lessened as the swipe of plastic and an electronic beep takes centre stage. The sellers of alabaster statues have long since gone, the traders of lace, fine cloth and textiles no longer flourish, replaced by plastics and token gifts to mark the day, but there is still the smell of cheese and there is always the Goose.

 

Another year comes and goes, the daylight fades and the crowds thin, many leaving with bags full and wallets empty. Then as the Nottingham Goose Fair closes, the traders pack away and shut up their stalls and the beggar tramp simply disappears for another year.

 

He is a marker of the passage of time, the unchanging unnoticed sight in a not so changing world, the beggar tramp we all ignore as we go about our business.