Behind the Story: Paradise Found

Oh hello again. Here for another behind the story? For this one I'm pushing aside the blues of my previous two entries and basking in the glory of success because this time I'M A WINNER BABY! Well... not really, but you'll see.

While I was in the midst of receiving my results from the Heart 2025 Writing Battle (you know, the Caitlyn Clambake one), I had also enrolled in the Winter 2025 Flash fiction. This one was back to the usual format where it's all peer judged and after my fiasco with the professionally judged one (and the constant fear of being booted early) I was excited for some normalcy again. Not to mention this one had a whole new slew of fun genres up for grabs: Shipwrecked, Aliens!, Time Travel Romance, and Revenge.

I was looking forward to all of them except for Time Travel Romance, mostly because my last story was technically a romance and I didn't want to go anywhere near it again. But lucky me, when it came to handing out the the genres I got shipwrecked! Now, I've never written anything swashbuckling before but I sure as heck can get down to some Pirates of the Caribbean just as much as the next guy!

On top of my genre I was also given two prompts. One of which was furry friend, and the other was... well I can't quite remember now and that's because for the first time ever I actually redrew my prompt cards. Normally I like to stick with the one's I was given and see what kind of creative things I can come up with, but this time I didn't feel that bolt of inspiration. So after some quick mulling, I clicked redraw (you're only allowed to do this twice) and ended up with spectacles and editor.

The prompts I received along with a 1000 word limit

To be fair, this didn't exactly strike me with inspiration either. I mean editor??? How the heck is an editor supposed to play any role in a shipwreck story? Still, I already felt guilty enough after my first redraw and I was going to be damned if I pulled again. So I sat on it.

It's also worth noting that going into this battle I had a real chip on my shoulder. After not making it far in the competition the last two times I really felt like I had something to prove. I wasn't going to go silly, I was going to be serious and write something that was going to make people feel sad. And what makes people feel sad? DEATH! But what makes death even sadder? DEAD LOVERS!

My brain was already putting pieces together, and I vividly remember being in the shower and realizing that shipwrecked didn't have to mean sailboats and such, it could be a spaceship too. Coming to this realization made the flood gates really open and the story started to build itself out from there. However I didn't want to stray too far from a classic shipwreck, especially because some judges can be sticky on those sorts of things, so I still made sure to keep the setting on a beach. BUT AN ALIEN BEACH!

So I wrote the story. Originally the plot was pretty simple. Mara (the main character) hadn't tampered with the ships code, she just went about her business and her husband ultimately died from his own mistakes in the code. I'd thought that would be enough to cover my base of the "editor" character but then I realized I could take it so much further. What if Mara had tampered with the code too but didn't tell her husband? This blew the story up in such a fun way and made the impact of Theo's death at the end that much more impactful (spoiler alert, sorry).

Anyways I kept this one mostly to myself, I was still a bit soft from my last beta reader feedback and I wanted to live in my fantasy of grandeur for a little while longer. So as always, I uploaded my story and hit submit.

By the time results were supposed to come around I was seasoned warrior at losing. I believed in my story, of course, but I also didn't let myself believe that it was destined to win. This contest, along with the writing world in general is so subjective and there's no controlling who reads my story and what their preferences are. But... that being said when the emails came around to see if I qualified for the final round of judging MY STORY FRIGGEN MADE IT!!!

When I tell you my heart leapt out my chest it literally did. There was blood everywhere, it was a huge scene, I'm fine now though. I had half expected myself to cry with joy when this moment finally happened but my eyes were surprisingly dry. Funny how it happens like that. Anyways, there was no denying I was stoked. My story had won 8 out of 10 battles. A huge, huge success.

So what now? I had never made it to the final show down and I didn't really know how it worked. Basically myself and nine others were the top stories of our house and we were put in with all the other top scoring stories to create a group of 108. We were then pitted against each other one at a time, and in those duels the first to three wins moves on to the next round.

Well guess what? Paradise Found did AMAZING!! Not only did I make it to this elite group of 108, but I made it all the way to the top 32!!! This wasn't a true monetary win, but oh hot damn this was a win in my books! After two failed attempts in a row, nothing tasted sweeter than this and I wanted more. I mean come on, look at how cute that tiny little silver trophy is.

The funny thing is though, this isn't even one of my favourite stories that I've written. That being said, it was still a blast to write and oh what I wouldn't give to spend a day on that beach with its cobalt sands and effervescent waters.

Sounds like a dream day to me - minus the dead husband of course.

Anyways, that's all from me. Thanks as always for reading.

Until next time,

M.