Valley of Lilies
A sensation of relief came to Kevin’s panicked mind as he wrapped the blanket around him and the rifle.
Who would discover remnants of his hollow bones hidden in the valley of lilies?
This weekend the folks at Trifecta came up with a rather interesting challenge. We had to use 33 words from the 33rd page of Elizabeth Stout‘s book Olive Kitteridge to come up something. Anything. I hope you enjoyed it. Please feel free to share your thoughts with me.
Posted on February 23, 2013, in Fiction, Flash Fiction, Prompts, Short Stories, Trifecta, Writing, Writing Challenge and tagged Elizabeth Strout, Entertainment, Fiction, Olive Kitteridge, Short Stories, Trifecta, Writing, Writing Challenge. Bookmark the permalink. 16 Comments.
I love “valley of the lilies” – sad story well done.
Thanks Barbara for stopping by and I’m glad you enjoyed it even though it’s a sad and tragic story. I hope you’ll stop back by soon.
A sad story beautifully told. Well done.
Thanks for stopping by and I’m glad you enjoyed it. I really enjoyed this challenge. It’s amazing how what you start off with is practically never what you end up with. But this is what moved me the most.
Loved the title & this beautifully chilling piece:-)
Thanks for stopping by and I’m glad you enjoyed it. Hmmm, I didn’t think of it as chilling. Sad, yes; but now that you mention it it definitely is. I hope you’ll stop by again soon.
Oops!Am sorry -must be my twisted mind,lol!But I did enjoy it.Sometimes it’s so different from how we writers think & project & how the reader goes off at a tangent-guess we all get effected by our world views & perceptions.Looking forward to reading more from you.
I look forward to reading other comments you have about my work and I hope you enjoy them just as much. You’re absolutely right how we creatives perceive things. I’ve read many responses to the challenge and have often come away with something completely different than what other readers got out of it.
True:-)Will definitely try to read some of your pieces-I always find myself overwhelmed by the huge backlog I have on reading. I have a tendency to get sucked in & have caught myself spending hours on reading & commenting-so I tend to run away,lol!
Oooh a little creepy and a bit sad. Great job!
Thanks!
That means a lot coming from a veteran Trifectan.
Almost makes me want to join him. Almost! Nice piece.
Wow! I definitely did not expect this to illicit anyone to almost join him.
Thanks for stopping by and I’m glad you enjoyed it.
Given the restrictions of the challenge, I think you did a lovely job. I get a clear sense of Kevin’s struggle, you create imagery in a few words, and there is foreshadowing of what’s to come. I wonder how your fellow writers who didn’t have a copy of Olive Kitteridge handled it.
Thank you very much Eliz. I truly appreciate that compliment. This was by far the most difficult challenge for me as I have never written anything so short. Usually, I take a lot of words to build up to what I accomplished in 33 words. Now that I know I can do something like this I’m sure I’ll try it again.
Great. I also left you a comment on the community page.