"It was a dark and stormy night..." *no no, crumples paper and tosses it*

"Once upon a time..." *what? no... toss*

"I watched as the dark, humped figure slowly made it's way across the dark, narrow lane, stopping directly in front of a dark, opaque window, out from which a dark, shadowy figure looked..." *bah! I give up!*

If you're better at writing fiction than I seem to be, now is your chance to prove your wordsmith worth. Broken Pencil recently announced their first short story contest, the Indie Writer's Deathmatch. You've got just over three weeks to come up with your edgiest 1000-3000 word story. The deadline is December 31st; after that, the best eight submissions will be hung out to dry on the Broken Pencil website.

Each week, two stories will face off. The authors will have the opportunity to play up their stories in a blog created especially for their entry. They'll also be encouraged to trash the other stories, while readers can lend support to their favourite piece, or bash to pieces what needs to be bashed. It'll be a commenting free-for-all (which we all love).

The winner will have their story published in Broken Pencil's Spring 2008 Fiction issue. They'll also get an "indie lit library", containing examples from some of Canada's groundbreaking small presses (a $500 value), as well as $250 in cash and a Broken Pencil prize pack! Worth playing for? Stylos in hand, and GO!

For full contest rules, check out Broken Pencil's site.