THE 2024 BULWER-LYTTON AWARDS

The Bulwer-Lytton Fiction Contest announced a winner for 2024. The contest challenges participants to write an atrocious opening sentence to the worst novel never written. The contest honors the novelist Sir Edward George Bulwer-Lytton, the man who started a novel with “It was a dark and stormy night.” Here are some of the entries;
– First prize went to Lawrence Person of Austin, Texas, who wrote: She had a body that reached out and slapped my face like a five-pound ham-hock tossed from a speeding truck.”
– Winner, Detective Story Division: “She was poured into the red latex dress like Jello poured into a balloon.” (Jack Harnly, Sarasota, Florida)
– Special Mention: “Mrs. Higgins’ body was found in the pantry, bludgeoned with a potato ricer and lying atop a fifty-pound sack of Yukon golds, her favorite for making gnocchi.” (Joel Phillips, West Trenton, New Jersey)
– “It was a dark and stormy night, or more specifically, a Tuesday afternoon in Ireland.” (Owen Roherty, Colborne, Canada)
– “Sir Arthur Pendragon, High King of the Britons, son of King Uther Pendragon, nephew of King Aurelius Ambrosius, only slept with his sister once, but boy did it come back to bite him in the ass.” (Diana Murtaugh, Baltimore, Maryland)
* That there is plenty bad writin’.