Fiction | Challenge Responses

Anyone for Mash?

My Monday Mashup Responses — ranked

Hello! Have you heard of the Monday Mashups, run by our friends over at The Kraken Lore?

It’s a really fun fortnightly writing event, where authors work the prompts and challenges set mostly by Jonathon Sawyer and Bradan Writes Stories into pieces of flash fiction (or the occasional drabble, chapter, or series).

If you enjoy writing fiction, you must give this a try. You can find the most recent one here.

Below are my own responses… at least the ones I could find! To date it seems that I’ve submitted 25 entries (including three for one of the weely challenges! 😅). Here they are, not chronological, but ranked by claps —an imperfect way of going from best to worst, but perhaps giving some insights all the same…

1) Hallowe’ening on an Alternate World (Mash-Up #7)

My very best mash-up? Certainly, it was fun for me to re-read this short story of pumpkins and goblins just as spooky season returns. The line “The sacred cows have really come home to roost with a vengeance” still makes me smile. It responded to multiple challenges at once, which might have boosted interest! A 6-min read.

2) Relentless (Mash-Up #4)

This is a fantasy flash fiction story featuring a bloody ghost and a fantasy-medieval ‘Karen’; a 2-min read.

3) In the Mountain Snow (Mash-Up #2)

This fantasy short story takes place in my Shadow Kingdoms world, the same as my Sorcerer web-novel. A 5-min read.

4) The Knights and the Kobolds (Mash-Up #21)

A fantasy flash-fiction tale with a heavy isekai element. It wasn’t easy to work in that washing machine! 4-minute read.

5) Fire-Breathing Foes in the Tombs of Terror (Mash-Up #23)

One of my favorite titles, best images, and shortest stories! This ‘dragon heist’ fantasy fiction is just 50 words long — a ‘dribble’.

6) The Journey’s End (Mash-Up #19)

This was a bit of a departure from all the high fantasy... A ‘vampire MacGuffin’ in a setting inspired by Victoria-era scientific societies, it got great feedback and was fun to craft. A 5-min read.

7) Elves, Dwarves, and Love Letters (Mash-Up #1)

You can decide whether my first outing at a Mash-up response was a good effort or not. They say you never forget your first, but I certainly feel that I’ve moved on! A fantasy short story that has some connections with the world from ‘You Are Dead’; a 6-min read.

8) Humans (Mash-Up #13)

More contemporary story, but still fantasy of a sort, with the challenge being to present a character who wakes as an anthropomorphized version of their Spirit Animal. A speculative fiction short story; 3-min read.

9) Giant Strength (Mash-Up #30)

A more recent one, and very enjoyable to craft. This stand-alone fantasy tale is a 3-min read. Is it the same Zaxon as appears in this series, and in Sorcerer? Perhaps.

10) The Ancient Hunting Bow of Ma’rvesta (Mash-Up #31)

Rounding out my top-ten of best-received mash-ups, another more recent entry. This is again a stand-alone fantasy short story. I loved the image and the character, and it’s tempting to expand the tale! A 6-min read.

11) Burned (Mash-Up #6)

Quite a few of the mash-ups turn to humor, and this fantasy flash-fiction made me laugh like an idiot as I wrote it. A 3-min read, it is again set in the Shadow Kingdoms world, and the lead character pops up in another story, ‘Rebels’.

12) Trapped (Mash-Up #34)

The most recent of these stories, this was published just last week, so perhaps 257 claps (to date) is not bad. A fantasy/dystopian short story which ends on a cliffhanger… more to come?

13) A Diversionary Documentary (Mash-Up #12)

Time for something a bit different! Occasionally I respond to a mash-up with a chapter from an ongoing ‘choose your own’ story. This is part of You are Alive, a (mainly) high fantasy tale written in drabble-length chapters. It gets weird.

14) Pet Shop Longing (Mash-Up #23)

A ‘slice of life’ dribble; cute and sad…?

15) A Mysterious Meal of Mushrooms (Mash-Up #29)

I almost missed this one, and found it via one of Jonathon’s round-ups. It’s a stand-alone story, but is inspired in part by what I’d read by other talented fictioneers.

16) Top Team — Woof! (Mash-Up #10)

As the strapline says, Can three mutated wannabe heroes find common cause? This superhero tale turned into the first of a 5-part series, and responded to a Mash-up call that got us all started on pigeons and pomeranians. A 4-min read.

17) Sunset Seawater (Mash-Up #23)

A speculative fiction drabble, this was my second attempt at a seedling challenge response as well as being a mash-up. Sadly, it didn’t grow.

18) Double Trouble (Mash-Up #15)

Another drabble-length chapter of a ‘choose your own’ story, and the only mash-up connected to the sprawling The Burned Village story. Somewhat weirdly, I wrote it prior to writing the chapters that led in to it.

19) A Farmer… A Hero? (Mash-Up #5)

Yet another chapter of a ‘choose your own’ story (possibly the first mashup/CYOA chapter combo of all time?), this one links to Jonathon Sawyer’s ‘Hero of Pendown’ tale. I hope my take on Eshami didn’t spoil the atmosphere of the overall adventure.

20) No Superheroes (Mash-Up #32)

Rounding out the top twenty, this was a chunky 10-min read, and is also the final part of the 5-part superhero story mentioned above. It was a tough but rewarding piece to tie up all the strands, and got a better response than sections 3 and 4! (See below).

21) “Yo-Ho-Ho, and Anchors Down.” (Mash-Up #33)

One of my most recent… this was a 5-min read, a stand-alone pirate-themed short story. I greatly enjoyed writing it. It might deserve a higher place than this — you can decide. Arrrr!! 🏴‍☠️

22) A Mortal Meeting (Mash-Up #24)

This is a ‘choose your own’ story epilogue, again connecting in to You Are Dead. The overall story is written in drabbles, but this was a 6-min read which (I believe) works a story in its own right. And it has a Scottish goblin.

23) Smiling at the Chaos Army (Mash-Up #25)

A stand-alone fantasy short story; 6 min read. This is definitely one of my overall favorites in terms of how I worked in the prompts, but it was submitted late to the challenge, alas.

24) Gremlins and the Pizza Hideout (Mash-Up #11)

This chapter follows up from ‘Top Team — Woof!’ and is the third of a 5-part superhero story, by way of part 2 which responded to a different writing challenge. A 5-min read.

25) Explosive Action (Mash-Up #26)

Part 4 of the same 5-part superhero story as the section above. This is the least clapped of my mash-ups, with a nice round zero. Sad! Even the comments have more claps. An unfulfilling 6-min read.

Edited to add... Missed one! This should have been #12 by rights, with everything else bumped down. My response to Mashup #3, and another CYOA chapter (if I find any more, I’ll add them below!).

Another!! This should have been a lowly #23 in the list… but it’s a bit of fun. CYOA again. My response to Mashup #8:

And another! I really lost track 🙃 Mashup #9:

Many of the stories above had already been curated in my list of poetry and fiction (below), but others were on their way to being forgotten. It was fun to rediscover them.

And over two dozen entries — not bad. Thanks to everyone who read, clapped and commented, and to the wonderful Kraken team 🐙 for the prompts and for publishing most of the stories above: Jonathon Sawyer, Bradan Writes Stories, Jay C Wells, Rayne Sanning, FJCMontenegro, H.R. Parker and Andrew Crocker. I hope and expect you kept a running total of my points? 😂

Next up, getting back to all the great challenges I missed. Perhaps that should be my NaNoWriMo target!