Monday, May 27, 2019

BSSWC-3 Entry Synopses


Want to know more about the entries that have been submitted for the Third Annual Brno Short Story Writing Contest? Here they are.

Not every one of the 45 entries included a short synopsis, but most of them did. They are provided below, in order of submission. They are unedited.

The submission deadline for the contest was midnight on May 26. The four-person jury will now spend the next weeks to order their personal selections. The final winners will be determined when the judges meet in early-June. Winners will announced then.

Good luck to all of the contestants.

Information about the contest will be posted on this contest website at www.brnowritersgroup.blogspot.com. You can also go to www.facebook.com/brnowritersgroup for information. Send questions to brnowritersgroup@gmail.com.


Heart for Europe (1)
Story about sacrifice and realizing importance of responsibility over other people.


A Heart to Remember You
A person would do anything for love. There are no boundaries.

Dreams
Some say it is a real story, but what is real? What is reality?

Stalker of my Brother’s Dentist
Love can cross the borders between states and continents, but the price is sometimes too high. To which degree is our race and color of our skin the main feature which defines our place in the society?

What a Mess
My dog just died but that’s not what this short story is about and I’m not going to even mention it. Hope you’re cool with that.

Companion
This is a story about a girl who cannot imagine her life without traveling after having lived in Europe for some time. She constantly feels the soul of Europe beyond its borders and loses the feeling of reality having met a particular woman.

Trip to Nowhere
Funny short story about a young debtor running from a taxman that keeps chasing him all around a town and countryside.

Pablo and Vanessa
Pablo from Spain is travelling by coach to Sheffield to see Vanessa, the girl that he loves. But is Vanessa in love with him? Was it a case of ‘amor no correspondido’? With the support of the other people on the coach, Pablo plucks up courage to call Vanessa.

Lie Your Way Home
A young doctor from the heart of Europe and what she will have to do to see her home again.

Her Heart
A journalist meets an old lady in an art gallery to discuss an incident that happened ages ago. Right by the painting which depicts the event in question, the lady opens up about how she experienced it and how it made her feel.

Brno is for Lovers
In Brno, the city for lovers at the beating heart of Europe, love takes many complex, mysterious forms, which confound and surprise, break and rebuild, and occasionally hurt more than you can bear. But the city never stops breathing love.

Bleeding Heart
Those on the margin of the society are the only ones truly conscious. This is a tale about one of them.

A Cellar is no Place for a Heart
What happens when you lock a heart into an underground cell and forget all about it?
The citizens of Brno and, indeed, of the whole continent, are about to find out.

Just Google It
The story is about a boy that simply refuses the idea that his girlfriend would like to live in such a place as Brno.

Where the Heart Is
A weary traveler struggles to find a sense of belonging. A foreign friend helps her understand a fuller meaning and significance of connection.

A Concertina, or a City
A fugitive budgerigar forces a young boy to hunt through the streets of a city he does not love.

Sick Heart of Europe
The story describes the fight with bark beetles at Šumava, heart of Europe, which is wasting away. The scientific team headed by professor Pastrňák deciphers language of bark beetles and then develops an artificial bark beetle which is able to communicate with living beetles. This robot informs the beetles about water and floodplain forests and they run away. The scientific team is happy to see forest without bark beetles.

The Paper Boy
In the Heart of Europe, person-to-person eye contact still happens with newspaper sales, yet interaction between news vendor and 'end user' (in the USA) these days is all but passe. Back in the day, at the edge of the Pacific, a young boy takes a break from body surfing to learn that news can become more meaningful (and profitable) when it gets personal... .  

The Heart of Europe (2)
Europe was an ancient princess whose heart was full of an undying love. She later suffered betrayal, heartbreak and irrecoverable loss. Despite it all, Europe found a way to compose herself and she passed her magical legacy on to the following generations.

The Seed of an Idea
Prague, current time.
A young man with a knotty family story follows a lead of clues to enlighten his grandfather’s past. Thanks to a mysterious woman, he’ll discover the roots and the values at the basis of European Union.

Still Beating
“Still beating” describes Europe as an old friend that you keep seeking for everywhere, but you are actually bringing Her everywhere. From Venice to Brno the main character searches herself in the heart of Europe, graciously looking at and listening to the places and people she met in her journey.

The Comeback
Two friends reunite after a year apart, bringing to the table matters that have been overlooked before.

Love in the Time of Dystopia
In an alternative dystopian future, where the world has never got out of the clutches
of communism, an old man returns to his hometown to sum up his life.

A Journey to the Mother Arbor
A fictional short tale about the spirit of an old and proud continent, and the people who spent most of their lives defending it.

The Deal with the Wizard
We have absolutely no idea what might The Heart of Europe be. All we know is that the evil, powerfull wizard will destroy mankind and our world if we don’t find it and give it to him.

Opened Heart
Caitlyn meets someone on the way through the woods, making her to change some of her life attitudes.

An Instant
Two women meet and share time together, understanding through their memories what life means for each one, how to find the will to heal again, and what means the heart of Europe.

The Heart of Europe (3)
or
How to Push a Joke too Far and Let the Punchline Kill You
A futuristic look at the future in real time

Bubbles
Synopsis: What is means to have a heart of a Central European.

The Strange Man, Gideon Black
The train stopped in the Heart of Europe, but the train of thoughts of a one strange man can never be quiet. Especially if it’s beginning to be another strange day.

Up and Away
A Lighter-than-Air Afternoon in The Heart Of Europe

Petr won the Lottery
A young adult named Petr lives a simple life in suburban Brno, and one day, his dream of winning the local lottery comes true. Luckily for him, his lottery prize brings him more than just some money.

Dear Love
This is a letter to say everything I wanted to say and a combination of images and brief moments in the life of someone thousand kilometers far from home

November Winds
After a whirlwind summer romance, Fiona takes her new fiancé to meet her grandparents in the highlands of Scotland. Remote, rugged and beautiful although prone to stormy weather, a long way from the vibrant southern English city of Bristol where they met.

Games
A woman is confronted with childhood memories of an afternoon that took an unexpected turn.

Themistocles
Young student must defend his piece about democracy.

In a Heartbeat
Sometimes following your heart
can take you to the heart of the matter

The Puzzle
What have grandpa, granddaughter, history and Europe in common? Madness.

Stolen Moments with Kings
A man is invited by a strange acquaintance to drink cognac and view a famous stolen painting. Their tense conversation revolves around what to do with it.

Heartbeat
Synopsis: A brief exploration of fatherhood, fears, hopes and memories.

Close to Senselessness
“The heart of Europe” is for the author a worn-out cliché which resembles unreasonable admiration of certain places and European culture within the social construct of national states from south to north and west to east of Europe. The author in this story challenges this Eurocentric image by the crude reality of two people who face the ideology of proud European nations isolating themselves from the outer inferior world of people coming from developing countries and non-sensical debates on “the heart of Europe” are only a symbol of the timidity of wealthy European nations that do not hesitate to violate human rights of people whom they forced into the zone of illegality with dissembling justifications.

Being Human
Being Human is a short story about a journalist exploring Europe
with his naive thinking, who is getting confronted with hard reality.

Memento Mori
The bomb fell with vaporising power, but we prevailed. For five days.

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