{"id":3641,"date":"2010-02-12T22:59:55","date_gmt":"2010-02-13T06:59:55","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.candlelightstories.com\/?p=3641"},"modified":"2010-02-12T23:16:04","modified_gmt":"2010-02-13T07:16:04","slug":"three-minute-fiction-contest-on-npr","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/candlelightstories.com\/Blog\/2010\/02\/12\/three-minute-fiction-contest-on-npr\/","title":{"rendered":"Three-Minute Fiction Contest on NPR"},"content":{"rendered":"
\"\"<\/a>

Write a short story inspired by this photograph.<\/p><\/div>\n

National Public Radio’s web site is hosting a three-minute fiction contest<\/a>. NPR book critic Alan Cheuse will choose a winning story to be read on-air and the best entries get posted on the site. The rules are simple. You just write something that can be read in under three minutes.<\/p>\n

My camera is a digital one.\u00a0 Not the old kind with rolls of film in it.\u00a0 I took this photo to show you something about the street where I work.\u00a0 Lots of people there do things the old way.\u00a0 They read newspapers and get on buses to go across town.\u00a0 Things like that.\u00a0 I always think of lists and smeared fingers when I see a newspaper.\u00a0 And I think about people looking for jobs or fast horses.\u00a0 They’re always folding the pages and scanning them while they wait for something else, like a sandwich or a cup of coffee.\u00a0 So that’s why I took the photo of the paper as I passed.\u00a0 No one was using it.\u00a0 They’d left.\u00a0 The place was empty.\u00a0 Not even a person behind the counter, though the door was open.\u00a0 People sometimes leave papers for the next person.\u00a0 Happens all the time on the subway or a plane.\u00a0 ‘Well I’ll just leave it right here in the seat so the next person can have something nice to read.’\u00a0 Really they’re just littering like a Christian.<\/p>\n

I went home and bought a Kindle.\u00a0 Now I can read my news each morning in electronic ink without any smears.\u00a0 It’s under my control and I can have it all delivered before I wake up.\u00a0 When I canceled my paper delivery the representative of the Times spent forty-five minutes on the phone with me trying to find an argument that would keep my driveway on their delivery route.\u00a0 I asked why I should pay for something I can get for free online.\u00a0 He told me that all the people who work at a newspaper need my money so they can keep gathering important news.\u00a0 I told him if someone’s willing to do it for free then it’s free.\u00a0 He said he certainly hoped I would return soon and have a nice day.<\/p>\n

I felt like I had started a war.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

National Public Radio’s web site is hosting a three-minute fiction contest. NPR book critic Alan Cheuse will choose a winning story to be read on-air and the best entries get posted on the site. The rules are simple. You just write something that can be read in under three minutes. My camera is a digital […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[119],"tags":[68,941,472,942],"class_list":["post-3641","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-writing","tag-contest","tag-national-public-radio","tag-short-story","tag-three-minute-fiction"],"aioseo_notices":[],"aioseo_head":"\n\t\t\n\t\n\t\n\t\n\t\n\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t