Hey, Aspiring Fiction Writers! Your Short Story Could Win Publication and a Prize!

German Federal Archive

Got an itch to write but don't know how to start? Never fear—Libertarian Fiction Authors and Students for Liberty have teamed up to sponsor a short story contest with cash (yes, cold, hard, wet lucre) and publication as the prizes. Stories can span the universe, tickly the funny bone, or focus on a few characters and serious situations. Fifty-page philosophical monologues at your own risk.

What are LFA and SFL looking for in these stories, you ask? And well you should ask.

Write a short story that illustrates the positive role of freedom in human life. 

Whether it's a galaxy-spanning space epic or an introspective contemporary character piece, we want to see stories that paint the benefits and possibilities of human freedom in sharply compelling brush-strokes.

The deadline for Submissions is March 4, 2014. Stories should be 1,000 words to 10,000 words. Winning entries will be announced on March 19th.

The top prize is $300, free supporting membership for a year in LFA, and publication in SFL's Ama-Gi magazine, and an anthology.

Find out more here.

Comments

[RBS]

Paging SugarFree...

[Episiarch]

Write a short story that illustrates the positive role of freedom in human life.

Uh, I think NutraSweet is screwed. He only knows how to write ball, and good, and rape.

[Clich? Bandit]

Warty Hugeman Time Traveler...I can't wait.

[waffles]

How does Warty Hugeman illustrate the positive role of freedom in human life?

I'm stumped. Are there clifnotes?

[Clich? Bandit]

It's ironic, like wearing a Def Leppard t-shirt to high tea.

[SugarFree]

Warty Hugeman is freedom. 320 pounds of rock hard, flexing, veiny freedom. He will fill you with freedom, drown you in liberty and break the chains that bind you to this life.

[WTF]

Of course "freedom" is Warty's nickname for his mighty Futurecock of doom.

[Notorious G.K.C.]

Ytraw the Barbarian adjusted his fur hat as, astride his horse, he stood on a hill overlooking the remains of the village of Nutra.

The evil Prog army had arrived in the village only one month ago, promising free mead and picked beef for all. But soon the whole thing went sour. As taxes rose through the roof and innkeepers were forced to lay off their wench staff to avoid burdensome mandates, the Progs began running out of money to finance their benevolence, and the dwarf moneylenders stopped providing gold and silver. So the progs summoned the wizard Yelenus, who distributed magic scrip backed by fairy dust in a desperate effort to keep the economy afloat.

When the villagers finally resisted thes tyranny, the Progs sent in their centaur horsemen to raze the village to the ground.

[Notorious G.K.C.]

Now it was payback time. Ytraw pressed his heels into his horse's flanks and charged down the hill.

The Prog centaurs looked up from their raping and pillaging to see the avenger approach. They drew their broadswords and put on their spiked horseshoes.

But it was to no avail. After a few minutes of fighting, the Prog army was nothing but horsemeat and severed heads.

"How can we ever thank you," the wenches cried after getting their jobs back. They ripped open their bodices in eager anticipation.

"Sorry, ladies," Ytraw declared, "but I will stay faithful to my horse."

[Brian D]

+300 dollars or +1 travesty!

[Fist of Etiquette]

I have a story about how a man of vision, constantly and consistently striving to provide the blog reading community a quick and timely comment on one or more of the day's links. However, he does so not to the accolades of a grateful readership as one would expect but to the naked envy of those of lesser achievement. One day that man decides to no longer provide that first comment to internet leeches for them latch onto, no longer giving the undeserving a platform to post unrelated messages at the top of the thread. No, he takes his wit and his humor and his fast tagging and typing skills and he goes offline. And the takers of the internet are left to fend for themselves, without order, without coat tails upon which to ride the top.

And then a big meteor comes and he has to work with NASA to make 800 feet and save the Earth. The end.

[Clich? Bandit]

cool story bro.

[Episiarch]

You forgot the Aerosmith song, dude.

[Jordan]

Atlas Unplugged?

[Grand Moff Serious Man]

"Many years later, as he faced the firing squad, Colonel J. D. Tuccille was to remember that distant day when his father had given him a copy of 'Free To Choose'."

[Killaz]

'Why, pa! Why!'

He gazed enviously at the smirks of those unexposed to freedom as they waited for the count to end.

[NoVAHockey]

My working title is

"And then something else happened"

[WTF]

"For sale, freedom, never used."

[SugarFree]

10,000 word?

And you call yourself a published author...

[Almanian!]

"Shooting Puppires: A Peace Officer's Memoir"

[WTF]

Tell me, friend, where can one get one of these mystical "puppires"?

[Scarecrow Repair]

It's the standard abreivation for "puppy, expired".

[Grand Moff Serious Man]

Actually looking back at yesterday's The Independents thread, I had a great idea for a Mirror Universe show featuring the evil counterparts of Kennedy, Matt Welch, and Kmele Foster.

I'm sure I can expand that to encompass all sorts of libertarian and statist pundits and run that into a story.

Nick Gillespie: wears a fur coat like Joe Namath, a bleeding heart-type who supports statist policies because of the feelz.

Paul Krugman: an intelligent, yet humble economist writing for Mirror Universe New York Times, which is a bastion of freedom and capitalism.

Thomas Friedman: Poet Laureate of the United States.

Amanda Marcotte: Pulitzer prize winning journalist and the best known female libertarian in America

Robert Reich: the "He-Man of Liberty", the imposing 7'2 pundit crushes the skulls of the silly and marginalized progressives with his powerful arguments for liberty.

[Episiarch]

Remember that a mirror universe doesn't have to be the polar opposite; just very different. There's no mirror universe that could make Reich not a midget and not a fascist.

[Notorious G.K.C.]

You know who else was a fascist?

[WTF]

FDR?

[Tonio]

Vidkun Quisling?

[waffles]

But there must be goatees!

[Grand Moff Serious Man]

In Trek the traits of the characters are either consistent but skewed evil (Mirror Kirk is still a tactical genius and a womanizer, just malevolent), or reversed completely (Mirror Quark on DS9 is a polite and considerate Ferengi).

So there's room to mix things up.

[Notorious G.K.C.]

Speaking of prizes for fiction...

NYT journalist Linda Greenhouse is shocked that the people assaulting the government's boot with their faces are somehow portraying *the government* as the aggressor.

Isn't it suspicious that all these groups are simultaneously challenging the HHS mandate which threatens them with crippling fines for violating their consciences? And isn't it just a bit sinister that a gentle old prolife lady, threatened with imprisonment if she peacefully counsels women at abortion clinics, has become the public face of an anti-abortion agenda?

And Greenhouse is "baffled" that the Supreme Court gave the Little Sisters of the Poor a temporary exemption from the HHS mandate provided that they certify their religious objections. I mean, all the government wants is for them to certify their religious objections...oops, they did that, but the point is they didn't use the right *form,* and so of course they should be subject to crippling fines.

"The dozens of pending challenges to the contraception mandate are not popping up randomly or by accident. This is a deadly serious and sophisticated campaign, a claim by religion for primacy in the public square. The Rehnquist court for years appeared receptive, but ultimately blinked. The church plays a long game."

http://www.nytimes.com/2014/02.....pe=article

[PM]

The church plays a long game.

Coming from these people, that is just fucking precious.

"We will go through the gate. If the gate is closed, we will go over the fence. If the fence is too high, we will pole vault in. If that doesn't work, we will parachute in.

- William Rehnquist Nancy Pelosi

[CE]

Did any of the Supremes attend Ohio State? They play the Little Sisters of the Poor every September, so maybe they were grateful.

[SusanM]

I'm in. woohoo!

[CE]

No one needs to "win" publication for their short story. Just post it on your blog. Voila! It's published, and more people will read it.

[Tonio]

I am disturbed by the recent uptick in manboob photos published here. Granted, this one isn't as bad as the photo of Comrade Brezhnev, but still...