Studio8 - Uniting the Arts

Okay, my 1st challenge to the group seems to have been answered only by crickets. So let's try something else:

The Bulwer-Lytton contest is named for the Victorian writer Edward George Earl Bulwer-Lytton, whose opening line to a novel long outlived the novel itself: "It was a dark and stormy night..." The contest solicits the worst, the gaudiest, the most ludicrous opening line for a hypothetical story, and is often broken down by genre (adventure, romance, science fiction, etc). I'll go first:

"The storm's howling wind viciously buffeted the small aircraft, tossing its frightened passengers about like the beads in that little toy you're supposed to roll into the clown's nose and eyeballs."

...

"Call me Ishmael, because I hate the name Malcolm."

...

"One of these days, Elliot thought, one of these days I'll show them all, I'll show them how parallel parking is really done."

...

"DeSantos crept silently to the window of the cheap boarding room, lit only by the flickering neon sign without, and nervously fingered his .38 as he wondered where on earth that damned saxophone music was coming from."

Your turn.......

"Dark and stormy night" is hard to beat. My 10th grade creative writing teacher naturally singled it out. But I don't know if it falls into the same category as 'ludicrous' or 'gaudy,' depending on context. Mainly it's bad cliche (as opposed to good cliche) because it doesn't show you very much-- it's all "tell not show," as innumerable poetry critics have pointed out to innumerable would-be poets by now. I'll have to come back to this one..

You're overthinking this. Cliched, gaudy, whatever - irrelevant. The point is to have a little fun. Silly, undistinguished, undignified? Unworthy of "serious" writers? I suppose. So what? Take your shoes off. Unbutton your collar. Relax. Get down and have a giggle. I won't tell anyone........

Yeah but you threw me off a little. I thought #2 and 4 of your examples weren't too bad, at least for intros..

Okay okay, good challenge and I'm on it.

"The whine of the turbopumps rose in pitch and the fuselage trembled as the jumbo jet's engines gradually came up to speed, like a grimly determined Little Leaguer winding up to strike out her fat, loudmouthed cousin Lenny in this, the final game of the season."

...

"There was just something about the way Moira did her hair, Basil reflected, that always seemed to put him in a mind for fish sticks."

...

"The great starship accelerated through the black void of interstellar space towards the myriad worlds of the Detritus star system (where Dr. Pepper and Stouffer's were not yet household words) until the eerie blue Cerenkov glow from the vessel's bow shock wave informed Captain Hanson that they had reached light speed, at which point a terrifying realization elbowed into his mind - that he had forgotten, scant moments before, to jiggle the handle on the Waste Disposal Unit in the Officers' Head."

"Another hadron bomb exploded overhead, bathing the ruined land below in the sickly yellow glare of vaporized titanium, briefly revealing to Steiger the invaders from the Fornax star system slithering towards him across the battlefield, and at the sight he viciously slammed another 50 rounds into his kinetic-energy weapon and vowed that they would never get his field ration of canned pate-de-fois-gras and Marshfeld asparagus tips, never."

His git rich kwik scheme was filled with end visions of a supercharged Mopar 440 convertible suddenly landing in his driveway for doing a job well done, but would they notice that he lied to get his job? ..

"Gale force winds poured down Everest's flanks, tearing at the base camp's tent flaps and guy wires, but Franklin-Davies was bothered not, bathed as he was in the cheery glow of the Coleman lantern while contentedly warming his tea over the hissing Sterno stove, secure in the knowledge that he'd chosen this day to wear his lucky Smurf underpants."

Winter in the Colorado Rockies in an articulated vehicle on an ice slick road, even so he was cool on his stool, gripping the seat with both cheeks, no time for white knuckle driving, steering with his spinal chord. In awe of the snow clad mountain.

"You will observe," said the Inspector, "that the dirt under the deceased's fingernails is unlike any found in this region, and therefore..." but before he could dazzle the assembly by identifying the murderer with another of his brilliant deductions, the spectacle of Lady Beaumont's cleavage derailed his thought processes long enough for the guilty party to slip away unnoticed.

I wish that lady Beaumont’s cleavage were that powerful

With three MIGs in deadly pursuit, USAF Captain McIntyre pulled back on the stick, hard, sending his F15 into a nearly vertical climb, and as the rapidly mounting G-forces pressed him back into his seat, he began to doubt the wisdom to chowing down that 2nd packet of chocolate pudding before heading out on patrol.

i had no idea this (the contest, your thread) was happening! thanks