“I’d stumbled onto solving my first murder case, having found myself the only eyewitness, yet no matter how frantically I pleaded with John Law that the perp was right in front of them and the very dame they’d been grilling – the sultry but devious Miss Kitwinkle, who played the grieving patsy the way a concert pianist player plays a piano – the cops just kept smiling and stuffing crackers in my beak.” Chris Esco, recipient of a “Dishonorable Mention” —Bulwer-Lytton Fiction Contest 2003  (San Jose State University)

Bulwer-Lytton was, of course, the Victorian novelist infamous for the opening line, “It was a dark and stormy night.” Esco’s was really the first on the list that made me laugh. Nicholas Eaton‘s Romance entry was also pretty good.

The winner in the Science Fiction entry is Mark Silcox, formerly the editor of an interactive fiction website on Suite 101.

Incidentally, IF author Adam Cadre has pretty much pegged the formula that the winners usually follow — see Cadre’s “Lyttle Lytton” contest for an alternative.