Thank you very much to everyone who entered The Great Festival Cupcake Contest. Entrants were asked to write a 150 word Hermit Crab Story in the style of a recipe for a cupcake. This challenge was related to the theme of our last series of flash fiction festival days, The Great Festival Flash-Off. The series was partly inspired by writer, teacher and editor Nancy Stohlman’s fun definition of flash fiction as the ‘cupcake of literature’, in an interview with her at Smokelong Quarterly,and the reality TV show The Great British Bake Off. The cupcake contest was an extra mini competition open to the public, not just those who came to the festival days.

We had forty entries in all, which we thought was a good result for the challenge of writing a hermit crab micro so short on a the very exacting subject! Half the money raised from the entry cost of £5.00 goes to the winner and half to the Huntington’s Disease Association Charity. The festival has covered paypal charges to round up the funds received to £200.
and we are delighted to give the winner £100 and £100 to the charity.

The runner up receives books from Ad Hoc Fiction, a flash fiction festival tote bag and a free entry to Bath Flash Fiction Award. And the other three writers writer and co-director of Flash Fiction Festivals UK, Diane Simmons, selected for her top five have been offered publication in the festival anthology and will receive a free copy.

Our thanks to Diane for judging this competition. She read all the micros blind and said she greatly enjoyed the variety of recipe stories served up and was impressed with how people managed to use this structure. Her comments on her top five stories are below and bios of the writers are coming soon.

The winner is S.A Greene with her story ‘Eggs in Wartime’.
S.A. Greene writes micro and flash in Derbyshire. She’s had words in or forthcoming in Sledgehammer Lit., Janus Lit., Ellipsis Zine, Paragraph Planet and Retreat West (People’s Vote, monthly micro comp.)

Diane commented: “Writing a hermit crab flash in the form of a cup cake recipe is not an easy task and ‘Eggs in Wartime’ fits the brief perfectly. Full of interesting and original detail and language, this flash is engaging from the start and has a brilliant ending.”

The Runner-up is , Kim Bundy with her story ‘Rona’s Iced Cupcakes’.

Kim lives in Nashville, Tennessee where she works in an academic medical center. Her words have appeared or are forthcoming in The Louisville Review, Halfway Down the Stairs, Village Square, Heartland Society of Women Writers, and Reckoning: Tennessee Writers on 2020.

Diane commented: “Using the topical theme of the pandemic, this flash closely follows the format of a recipe to great effect. Clever and interesting, I was impressed with the level of detail the writer used.”

And the three other stories in no particular order are:

‘Recipe for a teacher’ by Tavia Allan
Tavia is a London writer and former teacher. She has work published in OPEN: Journal of Arts and Letters, Funny Pearls, the Hungry Ghost Project, the Pure Slush Friendship anthology and Virtual Zine.’

Diane commented:
“A refreshingly original subject matter with some poignant lines. I particularly enjoyed ‘… batter your teachers one at a time until pale and pliable’.”

‘When the Sprinkles Come Out’ by Kathryn Aldridge Morris.
Kathryn Aldridge-Morris writes flash fiction and CNF. Her writing appears or is forthcoming in And if that Mockingbird Don’t Sing (Alt Current Press, 2022), Sledgehammer Lit, Gastropoda, Overground Underground Mag, Ellipsis Zine, Janus Literary, Lunate Fiction, The Phare and elsewhere, and she was recently shortlisted for the Bath Flash Fiction Award.

Diane commented:
“I particularly liked the first line of this flash – it perfectly sets the reader up forthe story of family disharmony that follows. I felt I was at that dinner table.”

‘Dorian Gray’s Devil’s Food Cupcake’ by Slawka G Scarso
Half Italian, half British-Polish, Slawka (pronounced Swafka) G. Scarso works as a copywriter and translator and has published several books on wine in Italy. Her short fiction has appeared in Mslexia, Ellipsis Zine, Necessary Fiction, and Spelk among others. She lives between Rome and Geneva with her husband and her Labrador, Tessa.

Diane commented:
“A highly original flash with a title that immediately had me intrigued. I am a fan of strong last lines and this one totally delivers.”

Diane is back again to judge the first of the writing challenges for the free-to-enter cash-prize monthly contest that is part of our next series of festival days, The Great Festival Throw Down, . Read more about that contest here. There will also be an extra mini contest open to everyone, not just festival participants with a £5.00 entry fee and half the proceeds going to a charity and half to the winner. Details coming soon.