[John Whitworth]

My Old Mother Merkle failed to win unsurprisingly but Chris O'carroll and Bill Greenwell kept things decent with a couple of goodies.

This week it's strictly prose (unless you imagine a verse novel).

NO. 2732: seeking closure
This is a twist on the annual Bulwer-Lytton contest, which asks entrants ‘to compose the opening sentence to the worst of all possible novels’. You are invited to submit a comically appalling final paragraph to such a novel (150 words max). Please email entries, if possible, to lucy@spectator.co.uk by midday on 25 January.

[Roger Slater]

And then he woke up in his great big bed, not naked but in thick woolen pajamas. It had all been a dream. He had not given Andrea Merkel a wedgie in the Bauhaus or smoked a joint with Barack Obama on the White House lawn as Secret Service Agents stood lookout for Sasha and Malia. He had not done shots with Putin or bet a nuclear warhead on high card or gone on television to confess his secret fear of being swallowed up by a prematurely flushing commode. But the butler delivering tea to his bedside was real. And so was Downing Street. And so were the responsibilities facing the nation. He was David Cameron, dammit, and he was in charge.

[Ann Drysdale]

Not sure about the butler - it seems to continue the fantasy a bit - what about Samantha snoring at his side? And I'm afraid you'll never creep past Lucy in woolen pajamas. Woollen pyjamas, however, would be a different matter.

I thoroughly enjoyed this. Wicked of me, but I like the idea of DC's public school image being carried to extremes of laddish prank. Wedgie indeed!

[Susan d.S.]

Go Roger! If anything it's too well-written. Enjoyed, Susan

[Gail White]

IRRELEVANT BUT URGENT MESSAGE: Jayne, I need you to send me your mailing address. Check your PMs.
-Gail

[R. S. Gwynn]

While it may be true that our story has had no middle, one may choose its beginning point and ending point with some exactitude, yet both have grown so extenuated as to preclude the existence of that part which should connect them, in the way, say, that a single strand of spaghetti may be engaged upon and nicely finished up, with only a long passage of embarrassment and social uncertainty in between, dripping sauce on one’s chin and shirt front and leaving no doubt, amongst the gathered dinner partners (who did not, mercifully, appear in the intervening chapters) that the object of their approbation was, in fact, you; thus, I must conclude this unsatisfactory narrative with the bald information the Geoffrey did successfully prevail upon Madge to relinquish the hair-clasp that was assumed to have been stolen but was, happily, only misplaced and recovered in the barest nick of time.

[John Whitworth]

Yeah, I've often found him a royal pain in the arse, I must say. Go in and win, O Master.

Once, long ago, I was serving in a Christian coffee shop in Edinburgh when a man came in with a thick Scottish accent. He told me he did a labouring job and it made him very tired, but also that he had discovered an author, new to him, who was the greatest writer of novels ever born. 'That Henry James is a f***ing genius, man,' he told me, his eyes burning with sincerity.

So there you go.

[R. S. Gwynn]

No accounting for taste . . .

[Roger Slater]

Thanks, Ann. Sorry I've been away from this thread for a bit. And thanks Susan. Here's one more:

I got in my car and headed to the church, and the same dog that had been chasing my car for the last seven years came running around the corner and started chasing me once more. I pressed on the gas, easily pulling away. But then I had a revelation! This dirty old cur had chased me as I traveled to both my prior weddings. Both marriages ended in disaster. Could it be that this pesky mongrel was a messenger God sent to warn me? Was this ungainly, flea-bitten hound actually a guardian angel I had been foolishly ignoring at my peril? It was all so clear! I pressed on the brakes and pulled to the side of the road. Huffing and puffing, the dog finally reached my car. I rolled down my window expectantly. "Yes?" I inquired. “Yes?” He lifted a leg and peed on my hubcap.

[Donna English]

You guys are cracking me up! Here's a lame one in comparison.



Her hour was up. It was then I knew why she’d remained in a slump, she was dead of a broken heart, despite being treated by me, the world’s most gifted psychologist. I'd failed her. What she'd needed all along was glasses and the cardiologist one door down.