h2g2 The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy: Earth Edition

Entry: Stranger on the Shore - A52415354
Author: Tibley Bobley - U170471

A nautical tale for the stretcher. I make it 1499 words. You'll have to hunt for the 'sophistication'. It's well hidden

Interesting. It reminded me of dmitri's cannibalism entry.
What puzzles me is: if the couple had brought him there ten years before, leaving him to what they thought was a certain fate (ie death), why did they go to the trouble of rescuing him now?

Ms GB

Do you know, I've got no idea what this 'stretcher' business is, I must of missed the announcement. I've seen the stretchers about the place but not what it's all about.
So as a result I've read none of them because I'm not sure what the guidelines are

Introduction of the Stretcher: A44319404

Stretcher Archive: A45104906

This is macabre and disturbing.

I can see what B'Elana means. If you knew you'd left someone on an island where he's almost certain to get eaten, would you ever visit that place again?

I'm not sure about the end - that last paragraph seems to weaken the impact. Why not leave us with the ex-missionary ranting about Hell?

Oh, it is explained that they went there again by accident and din't recognise the place. But I don't understand why they didn't just turn around and leave again on finding out.

Ho hum. It was 3am when I submitted this. I can see I'll have to give it another read through and see why it's so unclear. The reason they went to that island was they were on holiday, on a yacht - like the Nirvana. They didn't get to say where it was going - like the guests on the Nirvana, I dare say. It was just sailing around the islands between Borneo and Irian Jaya for the fun of it. And they had no idea they were going to stop at that island or even that it was the same island, because the yacht didn't stop in the same place where the husband was left. They had no intention of rescuing him. They thought he'd be dead because the crew on that previous trip were under the impression that the natives were cannibals - but they weren't cannibals. They were just fed up with having foreign idiots dumped on their shores to bully and rant at them and tell them what to believe. So they kept him drugged on a local product (made from orchid I think) that immobilised him and put him into a trance. He'd heard about zombies and thought they'd turned him into a zombie. And the poor natives hoped to get rid of him just as soon as another boat load of these foreigners turned up. It took them 10 years. The details aren't really important though, are they? As long as you get the right impression - which you didn't if anyone thought they deliberately went there to rescue him or that they realized it was the same island or that it was up to them (they were just passengers) to navigate the yacht away from there. Ah well. I'll have to do it later.

I wanted it to have a light ending mVp. They asked for something sophisticated. Not sure how to do sophisticated, but I'm pretty sure my usual horror isn't.

To me, a 'sailing holiday' means messing about in small boats, getting wet and getting stuck on the mud. Perhaps I should tell a true story about getting stuck on the mud.

Perhaps you should describe this holiday as a 'cruise', or 'a package holiday on a sailing ship' if, indeed, your ship has sails. If your characters are clearly just passengers, rather than proprietors, that does solve the problem that B'Elana and I both raised.

I don't know what the judges meant when they said 'it must be sophisticated'. Do they mean that the story should be set among the sophisticated elite who have money to burn? Of course, such people don't necessarily behave any better than anyone else .
Or did they mean a sophisticated narrative, which might mean twist endings, playing about with time, an unreliable narrator, etc?

I'm quite glad I'm not in this competition any longer!

I don't think it's you. It was very early in the morning when I read this, and I clearly wasn't fully awake then.

I'm afraid I have to echo the reader confusion. (And I was wide awake when I read this.)

The word 'zombie' grated, due to the story's being set in Borneo. Your explanation - that the missionary was confused - is reasonable, but does not register at the speed at which these almost-flash-fiction stories are needing to go.

Does it matter if the reader is left to sort out all that tedious detail for himself, if the impression is right?

I think it does. I think the faster it needs to go, and the more the impressions of the story are lightning flashes, the more subtly the preparation needs to be done, so that the setup is clear.

I love that image of the man on the beach. It's compelling, it's a novella moment (don't know the English for this, ).

I think you need a tweak - phrasing here and there, alteration in setup - to make that flash image stand out clearly.

In other words - the story's a good one. Don't undersell it.

And Keith......we've been writing our hearts out over here...hoping you'd read us...

Most helpful, as always! Thank you. I'll try to sort out the problems with this between now and Wednesday night. You might find this hard to believe dmitri (I know I do) but in the early hours of this morning, when I could hardly keep my eyes open, I came over to submit this but ran my eyes over your story and Bel's poem () first. And saw something about Madagascar - where my story was originally set so I grabbed the map and found a new location.

Still at work. Better crack on

PS mVp, do do a stuck in the mud sailing story That sounds like fun!

No, no, no, no......tinfoil hat time again...

(Great minds think alike, )

You're much more attentive than I am, Tibley. I chose the wrong island at first.

It's been one of those weeks. No time. Sophistication continues to elude me, but I've tried to make the story clearer. Hope it's a bit better anyway

D'know about more attentive Bel - just trying not to broadcast my thoughts or pick up on dmitri's

I read this before but forgot to comment...

It's an intriguing story, and I think the rewrites have helped

I wasn't quite sure about the very last sentence, though:

"a zombie-like trance in nuisances neighbours - and other enemies."

Something about that isn't quite right. Should there be a comma between nuisances and neighbours?

Or is it meant to be 'nuisance neighbours'? Good work, anyway

Thank you Danny and Alex. Yes it was supposed to be 'nuisance neighbours'. I've removed that sneaky stray 's' now.

I think the plot is much clearer now.

Yes, and the explanation about the orchid seeds powder helped a lot.
I really thought at first you were implying some voodoo magic.