Can you believe school starts 3 weeks?! Wait…what? I have 3 weeks until the boys are in school. #headdesk
That means summer here in Michigan will begin to wind down into fall, with cold weather not far behind. It also means that I need to start planning the fifth anniversary of Black Friday.
It comes every year. The madness, the riots, the sheer insanity that is the holiday shopping season. Considering all this, I started thinking about all the “fun” the different characters might have while doing their own holiday shopping, especially during the day that is known as Black Friday. From that thought spawn the fantastical Black Friday event.
Beginning the day after Thanksgiving, when Black Friday ensues, and running through Christmas Eve, the last day to do any shopping, LE features a variety of authors who has given us stories of one their own characters and what they are doing during this shopping extravaganza season.
That’s right, Black Friday returns for it’s 5th year this November! Can you believe it’s been five years already?! I will admit, when I realized it would be BF’s fifth year, I was a little shocked. I mean, I love seeing the mini-fiction and I know others do as well. After all, every year I get at least one author who tells me they want in again months before I’m evening thinking of it. However it is still shocking to realize Black Friday has been on LE for five years.
Every year I have gotten some fabulous stories from many equally fantastic authors; and each year they keep getting longer and longer. When the feature first started in 2011, the average word count for the stories was 564; last year, the average word count was tripled that at 1,589. With all that in mind, I wanted to share some of the fabulous Black Friday stories from year’s past.
One of my favorite questions from the participating authors regarding Black Friday – My story is kind of long, is that okay? Is there a word count limit?. I’m always excited to see this question. To me it means the author has had so much fun with the story, they got carried away, and that just means more awesomeness to read. Am I right? Like I’m going to tell them no, you have to end it here, no matter what your muse has said. Pfft! I always tell them – bring it on! Here are the longest stories from each previous year:
- 2011: Christmas at the Mall with Jacob and Lyssa by Joey W. Hill (Bound by the Vampire Queen)
- 2012: Merry Christmas Mister Krampus by Andrew Mayer (Power Under Pressure)
- 2013: Gifts Fit for a Queen by RJ Blain (Storm Without End)
- 2014: Cruddy Christmas by Kenny Soward (Tinkermage)(the current record holder at 4,551 words)
It’s not always about the length of the story either. For instance, Shiloh Walker’s story in 2011, Eza and Lena, was a simple text message exchange between her characters from If You See Her, and it was just as fabulous due to it’s simplicity. Here are a few other fabulous examples:
- 2011: Darian and the Doll by Amanda Bonilla (Shaedes of Gray)
- 2011: Black Friday Memories by Jennifer Estep (Kiss of Frost)
- 2011: Shop ‘Til You Drop by James Tuck (Blood and Bullets)
- 2012: Lord Denbury Goes Shopping by Leanna Renee Hieber (The Twisted Tragedy of Miss Natalie Stewart)
- 2012: How the Beast Survived an Afternoon at the Mall by Jax Garren (How Beauty Met the Beast)
- 2012: The Black Friday Affair: Dreaming of the Future by Karina Cooper (Gilded)
- 2013: Nadia Stafford’s Black Friday by Kelley Armstrong (Wild Justice)
- 2013: The 12 Days of Christmas aka My Personal Hell by Dakota Cassidy (Something About Harry)
- 2013: O Come, All Ye Horsemen (and Angels) by Larissa Ione (Reaver)
- 2014: Last Chance Shop by Nina Croft (Temporal Shift)
- 2014: In My Mind’s Eye by Alex Hughes (Vacant)
- 2014: Clayne Goes Shopping by Paige Tyler (Her Lone Wolf)
That’s just a sampling of the 100+ stories that have been featured during LE’s Black Friday event. With all the fantastic stories that have already appeared, I can’t wait to see what 2015 will bring. If you have missed any of the fun, you can find all the stories here.