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CONTEST ENDED – Thank you for submitting your stories!

#71: Sugar and Spice

One of my favorite parts of the holidays is baking cookies. Or, to be more honest, eating cookies — but you can’t have one without the other! From peppermint to gingerbread to iced sugar cookies, there are so many mouth-watering choices, and that’s just in my own culture. The flavors get even more varied and delectable as you head around the world.

But whether you’re a professional pastry chef in real life or someone whose cookies turn out looking more like lumps of coal, in stories our desserts can be whatever we want them to be. So get your imaginations preheating, because this week we’re going to be exploring all the different reasons and flavors that drive people to pick up the mixing bowl.

This week's prompts

Write about a group of people determined to win an award for making the biggest cookie ever.

High School – 62 stories

Write about someone investigating a break-in at a bakery. The only thing missing? A very secret ingredient.

Mystery – 106 stories

Write about two people who run rival bakeries, but fall in love during their town’s annual holiday festival.

Romance – 137 stories

Write about someone trying to recreate a grandparent’s signature baked good from memory.

Kids – 161 stories

Write about someone hosting a cookie exchange as a cover to hide the true reason for inviting one of their guests.

Dark – 141 stories

Stories

“Bakers of Busch Avenue ” by F. A.

Submitted to Contest #71

Zila Babbitt was a 30-year-old kind, caring, woman. She’s been a baker for countless years. Not that she only gave her customers a warm treat, but she also leaves them wondering how a young woman could make delicacies so grandmotherly. She always inspected anyone whose eyes caught her attention.“Hello, Ms. Babbitt! Charlotte is having a birthday party tomorrow. Is it okay if you make pepperoni pizza and some blueberry muffins for the party, please?” asked Mrs. Lily, admiring the cakes in the window freezer. Mrs. Lily was a Wayside Elementary...

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“Peppermint Bark” by The-Burrowing-Owl- Author

Submitted to Contest #71

This was not the way that Michael’s day was supposed to be going.“Mr Douglas,” He muttered. “I mean no offence... but this is really stupid.”The wizard in question only shushed him. “No it’s not,” Séan corrected him. “This is brilliant, I told you I’d bring you with me if anything peculiar happened. This is your chance to potentially learn something in the field about my… community.” He supplied.“So we’re going to Mrs Cambell’s bakery.” Michael deadpanned.“We’re investigating her bakery.”The high schooler silently complained that something l...

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“Chocolate Chips and Cyanide ” by Kate M

Submitted to Contest #71

Vicky should have been sleeping by now—it was well past midnight—but she was too busy looking at “poisoned cookie” recipes on Pinterest. Eventually, she slammed her laptop shut in defeat. Apparently, there were no good bad recipes on the Internet. None of them even called for cyanide! Mostly, it was just little kid Halloween cookies, with loads of orange, yellow, and black sprinkles. Darn. On Saturday, there was going to be a cookie exchange. At her house. Normally, she hated it when people came over and tromped around in...

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“The Other Side of the Door” by C. D.

⭐️ Shortlisted for Contest #71

The door to Diana’s room has been closed for days now. I sometimes hear tiptoeing on the wooden floors at night, the creak of the refrigerator door, the toilet’s flush. I might be lying on my bed, engrossed in a book, and hear the muted sounds of life, like a mouse rustling through the apartment. “Hold on, Mom,” I’ll say, “I think I hear something.” And I listen to the little noises while my mother pouts on the other end of the line. I pray I’ll hear the tick-tick-tick of the gas lighting on the stove, or-- please please-- the sooth...

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“The Rolodex Robbery” by Madison Smith

Submitted to Contest #71

3 names. 3 suspects. It was one of them, I know it. Last week, tragedy struck and my home was broken into. I came home exhausted from work one day to see the glass in my door shattered, cupboards ajar, papers strewn about the floor. Naturally, I sprinted back outside and immediately called the police as my heart was attempting to shatter my ribs. Thankfully, the police showed up fairly quickly and cleared the house. Whoever broke in ...

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“Final. ” by Yellow Lemon

Submitted to Contest #71

"Cherry!" Em cried, barely hiding her excitement."Coming, Em," The raven haired replied, as she switched off the television."Guess what!" Em asked, wiggling her brows."Um... You found the best cupcake recipe? "Em shook her head."You took part in baking the biggest cookie ever? "Cherry couldn't guess what Em wanted to say; she was always full of surprises and mysteries."Come on, you tell me.""Nope. Guess." Em continued."Em, you better tell me right now, or I'm going back to James Bond. "Em gave up."Okay.. Okay.. I'll tell you. ""I'm waiting.....

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“Cookie crumbles” by June Rogers

Submitted to Contest #71

Cookie crumbles 1,675 words I wake to a hot morning—the kind we always get in July in East Texas—slip on my red and white gingham shorts, and head into the kitchen where my mother is making scrambled eggs, grits, and toast. The phone rings. It’s Granddad. My mother goes silent. “I’ll be right over,” my mother says, “and I’ll bring Diana with me. She’ll cheer her up.” My mother grabs my wrist and we run all the way to my grandparents’ white clapboard house three blocks away. The screen door bangs behind us in our hurry. Granny lie...

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“"The Sugared Love"” by Aafia Hanya

Submitted to Contest #71

The picture fell from the wall as her daughter slammed the door of the house, rushing towards her school bus. Sighing ruefully, she walked to the frame. Skipping over the glass shards, she picked up the broken portrait. She walked to the sofa and sat down, scanning the faces on the photo. The loving face of her mother, her eyes twinkling, looking up at her with a huge smile. Her father leaning on a chair, smiling at the laughing girl sitting on her grandma’s lap, who was seated on the chair. She exhaled deeply. It was her grandma...

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“Insane” by Black Raven

Submitted to Contest #71

"...there's nothing you can do," Was the last thing she said before plunging a knife inside me. And that's where she was wrong. It all had started with a break-in in Clark's bakery. The only thing stolen? A top-secret ingredient they refused to talk about. As you can imagine, you can't really find anything without knowing what it is or at least what it looks like. We tried questioning the staff, yet the only thing we got out was that the ingredient was stored in a little black box in the shop's safe. Nothing about what it actually was ...

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“Gwendolyn's Spritz Cookies” by Mandy McCool

Submitted to Contest #71

Grandma Gwendolyn took her famous spritz cookie recipe to the grave. This wasn’t the only thing she took with her, mind you, but it certainly was the one thing that anyone truly cared about. You see, this was no ordinary cookie; this was a tradition that seemed to hold the fabric of the family together. So of course it became my mission to recreate the recipe. A typical spritz cookie consisted of fairly ordinary ingredients: flour, salt, sugar, butter, vanilla extract, and a single egg. I even managed to take her original cookie press f...

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“'C' sweets” by Priyanka Choubey

Submitted to Contest #71

In the morning somebody knock on the door, a person gave a packet to Alicia and laughed and said please see the footage. It is hilarious. * ‘I am mad at her’. ‘I will run away from her’. Eddie said to Alic...

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“Breaking News” by Lily Rebecca 🐰🐾

Submitted to Contest #71

"Breaking news! Breaking news! This just in, a bakery has reported a robbery. Nothing valuable seems to have been stolen, only their secret ingredient," The reporter takes a breath and looks off into the distance. What is he looking at?"What will happen to the Colossal Croissants?" The tv screen goes black. I turn."Now, now Ambar," It's my mother, "You know not to watch the news. It's all negative stuff,""But mum didn't you hear?" She looks at me with half interested eyes, "The Colossal Croissants bakery's secret ingredient has been stolen. ...

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“Le Grand Biscuit” by David G.

Submitted to Contest #71

As it so happened, the fate of the small village situated on the bank of a forlorn and mostly dry riverbed was sealed on a dreary and otherwise quite unremarkable December afternoon. It was the Assistant Deputy Treasurer who sealed it, although, in fairness, it was not his fault. He was only doing his job. And his intentions were good.In the precise center of this particular village sat the municipal building, an ashen grey, squat, two-story structure whose marquee had recently fallen askew. The building was crumbling prematurely, the concre...

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“Baked in Sugar, Spice, And A Splash Of Villainy” by Trinity Womack

Submitted to Contest #71

Vivian, more formally known as Lady Treason stepped out on to her front entrance to greet her guests. Her name, Lady Treason had nothing to do with her power, the ability to manipulate things, objects, time, people, but rather had everything to do with the fact that her many villainous acts were considered treasonous in several countries. She smiled. But that was just the way she liked it. “Phobus!” She called to her henchman. In a second, he came trudging out of her kitchen. ...

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“Stars All the Way Through” by Aqsa Malik

Submitted to Contest #71

The stars are red today. Speckled far enough not to touch each other, but close enough to fit onto the jet black abyss of a cookie surface. “Perfect,” I mooned, admiring my own handiwork, less concerned about the taste and more so about the appearance I had been trying to perfect for ages. “Really? Looks like blood mixed in with tar to me,” his smell wafted over first, somehow even more divine than that of my masterwork. His voice registered next; oh, that horrible smooth silk spilling from his disgusting mouth like vile ribbons of...

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$50

Prize money

607

Contest entries

0

Stories

Ended on 23:59 - Dec 11, 2020 EST

Won by A.Dot Ram 🏆

Title: The Craving

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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