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CONTEST ENDED – Thank you for submitting your stories!

#258: Frame of Mind

What do you think of when you hear the word "photography?" In a general sense, it involves preserving memories or documenting events — and while not everyone considers it an art form, you’ve probably snapped photos of your family, friends, or even food at some point with your phone!


With that in mind, this week’s theme focuses (no pun intended!) on photography and the stories and emotions that pictures can create.

This week's prompts

A forgotten photograph tucked away somewhere is the catalyst for an unexpected journey.

Adventure – 87 stories

Center your story around two strangers who bond over their shared love of photography.

Character – 30 stories

Write a story where a photograph could change the course of history if it’s delivered to the right (or wrong!) person.

Short Story – 32 stories

Start your story with someone who has lost everything but finds solace in photography.

Dramatic – 63 stories

A photographer captures an image of something unexplainable. What happens next?

Mystery – 75 stories

Stories

“A Family Out of Focus” by Nancy Wright

Submitted to Contest #258

*Trigger warning: Familial loss, mental health. Marla wakes up today much as she does every morning: sobbing and pawing at the damp sheets, screaming for someone, anyone, to save her children. Talk to them a few minutes longer after soccer practice. Invite them to ice cream a mile in the other direction. Pull them from the car before Mac can pop in that old Steely Dan CD and pull onto the highway. Stop the driver, out of his mind on coke, from plowing into the car in the first place.  But of course no one is here to answer her cries, no...

4 comments 4
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“Blue ” by Anne Athena Dura

Submitted to Contest #258

Warning: This story contains themes and mentions of mental health, substance abuse, gore, and self-harm. Sitting on the ground, he could feel the moisture of the soil seeping through his clothes, while the throbbing pain in his mouth intensified. Dark clouds loomed overhead. With great care, he dug a tiny hole in the earth, creating a final resting place for Blue. Blue was the name of his little Dwarf Gourami Blue fish, a rather unimaginative choice. For the past 3.5 years, she had been faithfully keeping him company, starting from the momen...

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“Unseen Exposure ” by X Kaiser

Submitted to Contest #258

Max Burns is an amateur photographer. Though his profession is not photography, he does take photos as a hobby. On one of his days off, he received a call to take some photos of an abandoned house.The person who requested this of him was a friend named Violet Moss.She is a realtor who flips houses and resells them to make a profit.Max agreed and went to the address Violet had given him. Upon arrival, the house came into view. He had never seen something so unique.It was a cliff-anchored house; this type of home is not seen very often due to ...

2 comments 2
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“Exposure To Darkness ” by Lee Kendrick

Submitted to Contest #258

Exposure To DarknessBy Lee KendrickRon Goodward had been a photographer for twenty-four years, since he was age twenty. Photographing: weddings, portraits, and work for magazines.Back in his photographic studio in Swindon, Wiltshire, he was working late preparing his darkroom for processing photographs he had taken of numerous ancient sites in Wiltshire -including Stonehenge and the large Mound at Silbury Hill for an archaeology magazine.  Turning off the light, he then switched on the red light for processing the fi...

9 comments 9
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“The House on Station Road” by James Johnson

Submitted to Contest #258

Dr Mather’s husband retrieved the photographs from the attic sometime one Saturday afternoon in late summer. They came to him by chance when, stooping beneath the rafters, he spotted a tear in an insulation roll tucked into one corner of the loft floor. His curious hand had burrowed deep into the woollen pile and pulled out one of those photo wallets used for returning printed photographs. It had lost the glossiness of its heyday, but was dry and the logo of the now-defunct camera company was visible beneath a stock photo of a family pi...

2 comments 2
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“From Shame to Desire ” by Elise Marquez

Submitted to Contest #258

I’d routinely go through my old belongings like clockwork. This time it was specifically because I’d be moving to New York for college soon. Birthday card after birthday card ranging from ages 13 to now 18. Never ending piles of letters from family members in Mexico. Papers thrown around my carpet floor catching lint have created a big wall around me from my hips to the ends of my feet. As I lifted one of the letters written by my grandma I saw it there, a strip of photo booth photos with a girl. In the photo I was around 14 years old and th...

1 comment 1
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“Saint Holly” by L. Keith

Submitted to Contest #258

The sky is a lovely shade of pink, and the way it mixes with the blue makes it look like cotton candy. I can almost taste the sugar on my lips. I stare at the sky to keep my eyes busy. To keep myself from staring at a moment lost to the past. The rectangle feels heavy in my hand. I tap my thumb on one sharp corner before running it over the smooth surface. For a moment, I can pretend that I can touch the image trapped forever on paper. Pans bang together downstairs. My mother is undoubtedly working overtime, desperate to create a diner tha...

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“Worth More Than A Thousand Words” by Raven West

Submitted to Contest #258

Worth More Than A Thousand WordsByRaven West           Hannah Levy rushed through the front door of her family’s home. The official notice to report to the IDF on her eighteenth birthday the following week clutched tightly in her hand. She didn’t know if she was more excited to join the Israeli army, or to finally be free from under the scrutiny of her overly protective parents. As far back as she could remember, Hannah never went anywhere without one or both of them tagging along. Hanna...

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“The Man In The Portrait” by Anna Emm

Submitted to Contest #258

Ronald Davis started out as a humble carpenter back in Glasgow. He worked hard, got one or two lucky breaks along the way, and within a few short years he ran a successful furniture business. He spent his time making bespoke pieces for the rich, as well as fitting out shops for every important retailer in the city. But with the increase of wealth and success one often sees a good man turn into an arrogant fool. And that was exactly what happened to Ronald Davis. As his riches grew and grew, so did his selfishness. He was cruel to his workers...

6 comments 6
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“Things are Not as they Seem” by Kyle Kaye

Submitted to Contest #258

“Hon, you hoarding the spray in there?” I call from our client’s living room.   “Yeah, babe hold on,” he says as he leaves the kitchen with the ant spray in hand. “What do you need the spray for? You’re vacuuming.”  “I saw a bunch of ants crawling around behind the couch. Look there’s some on the floor.” John passes the ant spray and I coat the bottom of the windowsill as he wipes up the few on the floor. “Mind helping me undress the couch so I can vacuum it?”  “Yeah, no problem. What time are the Chiperskis getting home ...

2 comments 2
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“The Tablet of Souls” by Michael Robinson

Submitted to Contest #258

“Where did this come from,” I asked, looking up from the grainy pict displayed on the hololith to Anna, my Intelligence officer. Light from the overhead lumens glittered off the lenses of her augmented eyes. “I found it in an old data packet I was about to delete. It appears to be from Lysander.” That caught my attention. Anna and I had been part of his entourage before I was made a full Inquisitor. Six years ago, he had been declared rogue by the Inquisitor Silas Ventus, who accused him of Chaos corruption. I didn't believe it, Lysander was...

2 comments 2
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“Monochrome Monarch” by C.T. Billups

Submitted to Contest #258

Dear Reader,This story contains: Mental health, Substance abuse,Gore, and Suicide.- C.T.As I sprint through midtown the star-filled skies fill the back alley with interstellar light. The smell of airborne dust and rotten garbage fills my nostrils.I pass a large trash receptacle pushed against the cement block wall.A fire in my chest signals the finish line is near. My legs grow heavy. I inhale a lungful of air through my nose and turn to face my pursuer.Out of the corner of my eye, I see the shadow fade into the night. I watch its hot breath...

5 comments 5
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“God's Gift” by Alex McColm

Submitted to Contest #258

As he lifted the last bulging cardboard box on to the kitchen table with a sigh , Sean lamented his late wife's knack for hoarding memories like a squirrels acorns. 'Once they're gone , they're gone' she would always say. That was certainly the case now as , after a lifetime planning for retirement and what they would do together , cancer decided to intervene. Jean had been buried three months but the world around Sean was a haze since then. Three months , and he got to the last of the photos now. He sat at the kitchen table clutching the ne...

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“Alfonso’s Portrait” by Al Griffin

Submitted to Contest #258

Alfonso’s Portrait                                                     Al GriffinAt 4:00AM Tom parked the car in the pre-dawn glow of mercury vapor streetlights and gaudy neon signs.“Early-morning sidewalks are always cold and empty,” he thought as he listened to his shoe heels thu...

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“Two Abes, Wrong Adress” by Joseph Hare

Submitted to Contest #258

February 12, 2024…This day of the year had always been the busiest, a time when every resident of this small town gathered to celebrate one extraordinary day: Abraham Lincoln’s birthday. The whole city was abuzz with shoppers and excited chatter, for a barbeque would be held to commemorate everything Lincoln had done for his country, and as the slogan was “No one goes hungry on Lincoln’s Birthday!” everyone was a tad more than excited.Ian Holston, a nineteen-year-old boy, strolled down the street, his cerulean jacket keeping out the early mo...

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$250

Prize money

287

Contest entries

88

Stories

Ended on 23:59 - Jul 12, 2024 EST

Won by Rozmarin Ideas 🏆

Title: She Owed Nothing to Ghosts.

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!

Prompts | Big Blue Hand | 2024-11

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Prompts | Big Blue Hand | 2024-11

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