CS Open - round one

CS Open is underway. I like this whole weekend thing. I may end up writing the thing in the car on the way to Montana. I think the people we're staying with have electricity and rumor has it they even have internet. Who knew?

I have a difficult time following directions. Two years ago I missed the first round because I didn't really follow the prompt. Last year I barely met the criteria of the prompt. The reader spent the first three pages commenting on how I didn't properly address the prompt, then crossed all that out and went "Oh" when they got to the last two pages where I finally did what I was supposed to do.

I almost made the same mistake on this one. I read the prompt:

"Your PROTAGONIST is in a jam. He (or she) had been relying on deception in order to further his objective, but his ENEMY has figured out the ruse. Write the scene in which your protagonist’s LOVE INTEREST confronts him with this information acquired from the enemy – while in staging it in a tricky or dangerous situation."

And started working on a story about a character who had already used the deception years ago but wasn't at the moment and was being confronted by the enemy, not the love interest. Typical me. I skim the instructions and then ignore them.

But because we have extra time I didn't screw up. I think I can use the same story and change a few elements to comply with the prompt.

One thing that surprised me was how this ended up being more difficult than I first thought. That prompt lends itself to an action plot so at first I thought - AWESOME! An action story will be easy! But it actually ended up making it more difficult to be creative. It's so action-oriented that the first five or six ideas I thought of have already been done to death.

The idea I ended up going with isn't the most creative story idea, but I think the execution is pretty clever so I hope that will get me past round one. I'm playing on my strengths - strong female protagonists with major insecurities, fight scenes, and really depressing confrontations.

I just hope typing in the car doesn't make me sick the way reading does.

In the comments, please refrain from posting your own story ideas if they're action stories. If they're comedy or romantic that's okay, but I don't want to be influenced by anybody else's take on this prompt. Until Monday, anyway. I'm sending my scene in Sunday night so Monday morning, post whatever you want.