No need to be idle while the three finalists duke it our for the rodent.  The Divine Ms M, Mari Maiko and that pirate fellow Brian Harrison have their hands full, but you can get started on our new contest right now.

Your prompt?  “A Little Secret”

Everybody’s got one.  What’s yours?  Or the one you were supposed to keep secret but couldn’t?  Or the one you thought was secret, but wasn’t?  Or the consequences when a secret was revealed?  Up to you.

But what isn’t a secret are the rules:  You must tell your story in EXACTLY a hundred words, no more, no less, as measured by microsoft word.

You can have up to three entries, and they must be sent as a separate word document (not docx).  Each entry will include the word count (excluding title and author info), and each entry must be titled and include the author’s name and email address.  Send them to thorn@awordwithyoupress.com.

By submitting an entry, you are authorizing us to publish your entry on our website.

Entries must be received no later than midnight, January 15th 2011, Californian time.

And the winner gets a buck a word!  We are pleased to announce that one of our new writers in the neighborhood, photojournalist Ron Chatham, has offered to sponsor this contest, so that the editor-in-chief can have more money to spend on the usual vices.  We will tell you more about Ron over the course of the contest, and invite you to the book-read we are holding for him at hq on January 9th.

But in the meantime, let’s see your one hundred words.  I mean, com’on.  How hard can it be?

How hard can it be?

That’s our little secret, which this exercise will undoubtedly expose.

Cheers!

those merry revelers Derek, Thorn, Diana and Monika