Updates on "Locked"
In the last new episode of Spookier Times, I shared my short story “Locked.” This was inspired by my car actually being broken into in my driveway. Nothing was taken from either car that was parked there, but the doors were left open. I wrote “Locked” because of a contest held by AutoCrit.
AutoCrit is a website offering a variety of editing services, from this mind-blowing AI-driven editing software that compares your writing to other published work (like, I can compare my Gothic stories to Shirley Jackson to see how it compares in pacing, sentence variety, repetition, etc.) to critiques from professional writers and editors to classes like Nightmare Fuel.
They held a challenge where you had two weeks to write and edit a story for submission to a winner’s anthology. The goal was a story ready to be published, so the actual editing was as important as the content and style. I wrote “Locked”—actually, four separate versions of “Locked—in less than a week. I sent them off to various people I trusted to see which version got the best response, then hit submit on the day it was due.
I also immediately spotted a typo after submitting because of course I did. Happens every time.
Yesterday, 29 June, I watched the livestream reveal of the winners. I fully did not expect to win. Even though AutoCrit offers a lot of support for genre writers, this was an open call contest. I’ve never won a a general story contest with a weird fiction submission. The best I’ve ever done is an honorable mention, which can be really hard to celebrate in the moment when you see the final publication and there is no genre fiction included.
That wasn’t the case yesterday. The stories were announced in no particular order and the hosts (who helped judge the contest) just kept mentioning that a lot of entries were darker stories. Then the second winner’s entry was a brilliant sounding horror story that the hosts loved. I didn’t have time to become more optimistic as my name came up onscreen. I kind of blacked out for a minute.
Naturally, I called and thanked all my beta readers for their feedback. They correctly pointed out that I used none of it, but I wouldn’t have chosen the right length, tone, or perspective without their reactions. The judges loved the use of the security cameras to break up (or build?) the tension, which was not in the original version of the story at all. It only appeared in one version of the story and those readers gave me the reaction I was looking for. The other versions were shorter, longer, and the same length without the cameras as a separate perspective or character.
Yes, this is how I approach all my fiction writing. I don’t do rough drafts; I do alternate drafts. No, I do not share the alternate versions once I decide which one is the correct one.
I took the liberty of cutting together a bit of context for the contest and the judges’ reaction to the story.
You can watch the full video here (and subscribe to AutoCrit for excellent live writing workshops and advice).
Their feedback is what I hoped for but didn’t expect. I will quietly point out that their positive response to me writing a character who lives with my worst OCD symptoms (down to memory gaps and scribbling down indecipherable maps of what I was doing before losing focus) makes me feel confident about the work I’ve been doing to better represent my own lived experience in my genre writing.
I’m allowed to be proud of things like this. The only downside is actually a net positive from the experience. The prize is publication in the anthology, but the anthology is only being printed for the winners. I will get a copy of this collection, but you won’t be able to pick it up for yourself. This is to make sure that any winner can still offer first publication rights for the story to paying markets if they so choose. Like I said, a net positive.
“Locked” is going to be in my next short story collection, which I’m aiming to put out early next year. If you’re impatient, you can always listen to me read the story while the car break-in was fresh in my memory.
