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CONTEST ENDED – Thank you for submitting your stories!

#231: A New Leaf

The year is almost over, and a new one begins in just a few days. With that comes the traditional time of reflection, and of projection. As well as looking back over the year that's just passed, we're looking ahead to a next — and even the most cynical among us have to admit there's something pretty exciting about that.

A new year is an opportunity for self-improvement, exploration, and even complete reinvention. This week's prompts are all in that vein; characters who are all looking for a fresh start, in one way or another.

This week's prompts

Write a story in the form of a list of New Year's resolutions.

Adults – 54 stories

Write about a character who has reinvented themselves, but realizes it's not always easy to outrun your past.

Character – 62 stories

Write a story about hope.

Short Story – 78 stories

Write about someone trying something completely new.

Character – 34 stories

Set your story on New Year's Day.

Holiday – 50 stories

Stories

“Be Bold, Be Brave” by Bracy Ratcliff

Submitted to Contest #231

It would be disrespectful to say it's my favorite holiday, but I enjoy and appreciate the significance of a New Year's Day celebration. It represents HOPE, a new opportunity, a start-over day and time for things that are important to us. When you share the day, and those leading up to 1/1, with family it gives you some valuable insight into what's going on with them. When I was a boy, my family followed some rules about New Year's Resolutions, and I've maintained them throughout my life. We ‘hope’ our dreams come tr...

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“I am a new leaf” by Cheryl Ann Zlomke

Submitted to Contest #231

Change. Out with the old and in with the new they say. I question this philosophy. What is wrong with the old if it is not broken? If it is broken, can you fix it to make it something new? How did it break in the first place? Did you break it or did someone break it for you? New from old. Old from new. Change. So, the old saying, “turn over a new leaf” is a new saying for me this year. Something old, something new…and no! I will not be get...

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“The Blackberry Do-Over” by Am Rey

Submitted to Contest #231

The Blackberry Do Over Sixta the gardener came today. She is Quechua but doesn’t wear the native clothing that many still do here in the Sacred Valley of Peru. The Quechua are descendants of the Incas. The older generation, the parents and grandparents of adult children, often speak only Quechua. Sixta is first the generation that learned Spanish in order to better integrate into the rapidly approaching Western world. Her children are now learning English and the Quechua language and culture are being slowly forgotten. These people are sm...

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“a letter to you” by Hope Shema

Submitted to Contest #231

dear person, Please. Hear me out. I know it's been a couple of years since I reached out and said ‘hello’. I bet you're wondering where I went, and why I obsess and stress over the little things. The reality is, I want you to be prepared. So, please. Just hear me out. I promise I won’t keep you long. Have you heard of this funny thing? It’s called loneliness. You ought to have met it at some point. Have you shaken hands with it? It’s very abstract, mind you. From isolation, rejection, abandonment…so many puzzle pieces that scatter ac...

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“Derelict Dignity” by Phil Manders

Submitted to Contest #231

31-12-202311.30 pmThe old theatre's ornate stone pillars stood guard, clinging on defiantly to the grandeur they once owned, barely maintaining their dignity in a town that had long since given up on hers. Stained white steps lay frozen, spilling down to the black pavement like bones in a tarmac graveyard. Drifts of hard snow tucked themselves away in icy corners, out of reach of the steely wind that patrolled the narrow Victorian streets. The sickly flash of a neon-lit kebab shop opposite made the boarded-up entrance come alive, then die. A...

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“Fading Echoes of Us” by Alexandra Noir

Submitted to Contest #231

*** "..I want you to be eternal... not like the sun or the moon, but like the chaos that was born with us and will never end... but if you become chaos, then who will I be?.." *** Every day you fight demons, and even if you don't want to acknowledge it, you lose... You cannot win... but you don't give up. You, who have lost count of time in the calendar of ages, often interweaving pages from your youth with those of the present. And you can do nothing else but cry silently, in your moments of solitude. Cut a carrot, and forget your glorious ...

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“Signifying Everything ” by Ben LeBlanc

Submitted to Contest #231

The scared camo-clad woman shuddered in her foxhole as enemy lasers screamed overhead.Even as she closed her eyes behind her thick military-issue goggles, the reflected glare of the lasers burned through her eyelids in a bright red haze. She thought: so this is what Moses saw when God hid him in the rock.Except, this time, she would not come down the mountain with her face blazing with reflected glory. Any blaze in connection with her face would result in horrible disfigurement, if not death. The pictures of soldiers who’d been “fried” flash...

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“The Death of Kuvé Hwanuk” by René Pinet

Submitted to Contest #231

Accustomed as we are to cell phones, CNN, video games, it is difficult for us to conceive that, in one of the most remote regions, in the 18th century, José Hwanuk considered himself a relatively fortunate and modern person. Educated as a neophyte at the Nuestra Señora de Los Dolores Mission in the Northern Territory, he had surpassed the expectations of the friars. He had become a skilled worker. To such a degree that, overcoming the reluctance of his advisors, Father Granados himself had taught him to read and write. All reluctance quickly...

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“Khao Yai” by James Maxwell

Submitted to Contest #231

I’ve decided that I’m going back to Khao Yai. My father is against the idea, naturally. On the phone he kept trying to talk me out of it. “You know that we worry about you.” “I know.” “And we just want to know that you’re safe. Last time you went there we were very concerned. We couldn’t contact you for days.” He doesn’t seem to understand that that’s the point. The lack of contact. The ability to disconnect from society, to sever the cord that feels so permanent and so real for most of our lives. You always have to reconnect but it feels ni...

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“Nereid's Tale” by Len Rely

Submitted to Contest #231

A small, red sun rose over a snow-covered planet of the Nereid system, the lights of a semicircular hangar carved into the side of a mountain overlooking a narrow green belt that followed the equator. Hundreds of unclothed, pale-skinned humanoids with artificial bodies toiled at their stations; a community that acted as one mind with no concept of citizenship, laws, disobedience, individual expression. Unconformity leads to selfishness and unpredictability and therefore ex...

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“The Grief Maker” by Liam Xavier

Submitted to Contest #231

Roger had just killed a man last month - not for the first time - and sitting opposite him now was the man’s sister. Again, not for the first time. Though it was true that it was uncommon for therapists to kill in the pursuit of clients, Roger liked to call this his unique selling point. Albeit, a USP that was never advertised to the general public. He was not exactly subtle but he had managed to avoid suspicion so far, a fact that sometimes even baffled his own mind. Roger was so confused and thrilled that he often tried becoming mor...

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“Oh, The Irony...” by Carly Mart

Submitted to Contest #231

No. That’s the first thing I say whenever I think of trying something new, or when someone asks me to try something new. I mean, why bother if it’s not necessary, right? Like the greatest saying of all time goes: if it ain’t broke, don’t fix it. I’ve always wondered who was the scholar to come up with that brilliance (but I never managed to find out, bummer). Yet, here I am: I find myself in the midst of breaking this rule I have always proudly lived by. Please, allow me tell you all about it. I always thought this was something I would ...

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“Claire” by Cody Martin

Submitted to Contest #231

I was coming off a string of bad luck and just kind of wondering what in the hell is the point of all this? I mean, we’re here in this banal existence. Crappy Job. Crappy Life. The same things day in and day out. The only thing that seems to give it any meaning is agony or some form of suffering. Is that why we’re here? To give life a spark by bleeding all over it? To seek cheap thrills until we die? Another hit. Another puff. Rain comes down on me softly, like little kisses on my cheek. I actually like the rain. I don’t despise or mi...

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“First Ride of the Midnight Rider” by Zack Herman

Submitted to Contest #231

I’m not exactly sure how Marty Reavis and I ever became friends. We had exactly one thing in common: We both attended Briar Bend baptist Church. Daddy was a deacon there and Marty’s grandparents were members. Marty’s grandparents, Whit and Maudie, were raising Marty. His parents had been killed in an auto accident up in Detroit. Marty and I were as different as two guys could be. We were both sixteen yeas old and that pretty much sums up our similarities. Marty was from Michigan and he talked like it. He had the swagger of a city kid. He w...

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“"New Year's Day"” by Domika Stewart

Submitted to Contest #231

"Happy New Years Day"! Its a great day for the new year. There are a lot of sales today. This is what people enjoy the most after the New Years Eve. The weather has started out a little cloudy. Overall, it looks pretty much like another holiday. We always set resolutions for the new year. Some of us may set goals and actually proceed with them.I have set only two resolutions for the beginning of the day. I vowed to start eating healthier and doing more cardio. In my mind, I said I would no longer eat heavy meals. I clean out my closet throwi...

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$250

Prize money

278

Contest entries

109

Stories

Ended on 23:59 - Jan 05, 2024 EST

Won by Mary Lynne Schuster 🏆

Title: No Junior League

Submissions must be between 1,000 - 3,000 words and will be approved and published on Reedsy Prompts within 7 days of the contest closing.

Read the full terms & conditions or check out the FAQ if you have any questions!

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