There are always new mysteries to solve, so what're you waiting for? Challenge yourself with our latest contests and prompts. Winners will have a chance to be featured in Chills & Thrills!
here comes your next contest. The last one was very modern, so we decided to return to the classics.
You all know Sherlock Holmes, right? The guy who looks at your shoe and tells you that your cat has been locked in your wardrobe by the gardener who nicked all your chocolate beforehand. That sort of stuff.
He's using CLUES to suss things out. In classical mysteries, clues are really, really important. Clues - and red herrings. Because readers of classical mysteries want to play Sherlock Holmes and work things out for themselves. Clues (and red herrings) are in fact so important, we have written a chapter in our Writing Tips to give you some ideas what we mean by this and how to use it in your own stories. We suggest you scoot right over and have a look.
Because - tadaah - we want you to write a classical mystery. A murder mystery, a burglary, somebody is receiving poison pen letters - whatever you fancy. But
- you must plant at least two clues and two red herrings in your story;
- your reader must have a chance of solving the murder mystery (no act of god solutions at the end, all elements of your mystery are on the table even if you hide them well)
You need a bit more space to work this out so you have 3 K words for this short story.
Deadline is Friday 19, May. The Winner will get our awesome Mystery Contest sticker
Good luck!
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