An ONC shortlister! The long-forgotten god of chaos awakes when a small child drops a piece of candy onto his altar, unwittingly becoming the high priest of chaos. The god is beholden to his priest and his priest's people--AKA: his kindergarten classmates. The children are all-too-delighted to serve the whims of mayhe...
SHORTLISTED FOR THE ONC2023 CHALLENGE! One dark and stormy night a family went missing, they left taking absolutely nothing with them. When their disappearance was reported, nobody, including the police could figure out what happened. The mystery has gone unsolved for almost 10 years, then a call comes in from an unkn...
A mysterious garden. A forgotten prince. A forbidden romance. ------------ After losing her job at a large garden nursery, Waverly Harris travels across the Atlantic to spend a few months in England with her grandparents. The coastal village of Chepstow-on-the-Sea is as quaint a community as one can possibly find with...
Ava Kingsley is basking in her post-senior year summer- until she gets a phone call that sends her universe spinning in a completely new direction. - The disappearance of 22 year old diner waitress Jamie Clark and her son Tyler is a cold case closed 10 years ago, until a phone call dialed to the wrong number causes Av...
Reviewing restaurants is normally a safe pursuit, but Kate and Lorne face torture and death when they try to unravel organised crime's infiltration of the fine dining scene. Kate is a novelist and a dining columnist. Lorne is a lawyer, a prominent wine writer and an incognito restaurant reviewer who, since his teens...
Born in a society where an AI ran the daily lives of every human being including deciding their spouse, Ava never questioned her role. However, the day the handsome stranger who had haunted her dreams manifested into the real world, she knew she would never be content with the life that had been planned for her by the...
The mission - colonize the slopes of Olympus Mons on Mars before the Pacific Alliance lands. The challenge - something isn't quite right with the site foreseen for the colony. Explorations reveal a cave where the support struts for the home dome are supposed to go. It gets worse - not only does the cave move, but it...
For as long as anyone can remember, the kingdom of Nilemah has been overrun with rats. No one quite knows the cause, but there were rumors of someone going town to town and ridding them of the infestation. Gwen Weatherby thought they were nonsense until the day he rode into town and changed everything. A vain fae prin...
Humans have discovered a way to Mars and need a group of volunteer astronauts to be the first humans to see if it's safe for more of the population. Sil has dreamed of this her whole life so it's no surprise when she volunteers as captain, along with Eliza, Axel and her childhood best friend Tarquin. While investiga...
Everyone knows Zenith, but nobody knows how the band managed to rock Zerkovkia's youth into starting a revolution... until now. Tolya Viktov is coming of age in the 1980s to the tune of spinning records, cheap liquor, and Zerkovkia's nine year war with neighboring Blivdova. The perms and denim jackets are hip, but it'...
|𝟏𝐱 𝐅𝐄𝐀𝐓𝐔𝐑𝐄𝐃/𝐎𝐍𝐂 𝟐𝟎𝟐𝟑 𝐀𝐌𝐁𝐀𝐒𝐒𝐀𝐃𝐎𝐑 𝐏𝐈𝐂𝐊𝐒| When the apocalypse arrives 𝐊𝐀𝐍𝐄 is ready to accept death after living a cursed life. But fate has other plans for him. Whisked away by a mysterious taxi driver with a silver tongue, Kane finds himself caught up in the world of faes, vampires...
Five ordinary people. One risqué art exhibit. Many, many secrets. * * * This novella contains the stories of five individuals interweaved around a fictitious art exhibit called 'Kink: Attitudes Toward Sex, Then and Now' inspired by two ONC 2023 prompts: can we go back to the start when we were all strangers in the da...
A twisted take on Bloody Mary Mary LaRue is a crime writer for The Daily Word--a newspaper company in Nashville, TN. When her boss insists she finds a big case by the end of the month, Mary becomes desperate. Life at home has been rough with her mother on hospice. When a friend tips Mary off on a huge case developing...
University professor Cora Glass may be an expert on the topic of red/green colorblindness, but when her walking red flag of an ex shows up on campus, is she smart enough to say no to a second chance? *** Three years ago, scientist Cora Glass met a stranger over cocktails in an airport hotel lobby. His name was Jamie B...
Harley had a bright future ahead of her, but that dream died a long time ago. ***** Harley vowed she would never return to the city that broke her heart, but old wounds never stop hurting if you keep poking at them. When the phone rings, the city stops...
Accomplished writer Ríone Embers' life takes a turn when she learns from the solicitor that her dead mother has left her their childhood home in Loutham. It unearths memories buried deep in her past, threatening to unravel the life she has made since leaving that place. Seeking the advice of her therapist, she decides...
An amateur medium races against the brink of her own sanity to track down a serial killer who is already in possession of his next victim. And she only has 23 days to solve the case or else. *** Devyn Brooks has only ever had one fear: don't become like Aunt Atheena. But after helping her boyfriend, Ace Jones, solve...
Florence Eisley is dead, according to her death certificate and her loved ones. Gone. Buried. Already rotting away into nothingness in her little grave. Ethan hasn't seen her in over a year, after a falling out that left both of them too awkward to reach out and mend things. Not only that but for some strange reason...
🤎 'Three women. Three secrets. Three tangled lives.' 🤎 All that supermodel Amy Wonderson ever wanted was a few breathes of relief in a new home, after an early retirement from the industry, with her long-term partner and fiance. But leave the breathes, even her want to stay for a minute fades away when a not-so-secr...
| 𝟏𝟐𝐱 𝐅𝐞𝐚𝐭𝐮𝐫𝐞𝐝 | An ex-gamer enters a virtual reality ruled by a rebel AI in order to rescue her younger sister and shut down the death game. * * * Eight years ago, Mori Fukutomi held the rank of number two player in the tactical hero sho...
The Sentinels are finished. Everyone knows that. Once crucial to the defence of the galaxy, now neglected and labelled as irrelevant, the legendary warriors are a shadow of their former selves. No longer a bastion of the best and brightest, in this time of drones and AIs, when contracts have taken the place of conflic...
{ ᴏɴᴄ ʜᴏɴᴏʀᴀʙʟᴇ ᴍᴇɴᴛɪᴏɴ & ᴀᴍʙᴀꜱꜱᴀᴅᴏʀꜱ' ᴘɪᴄᴋ } Tate has been the bartender at The Imp's Bottle for years. The dive bar attracts a trickling array of unusual patrons, but due to his social anxiety, Tate avoids conversation and interaction. ...Until a random encounter with a beautiful girl causes Tate to open up in a way...
He's an introverted romance-loving writer. She's a heartbroken girl who no longer believes in love. What if you were caught up with your polar opposite in the most tragic love story of all time? What if you had to help Romeo and Juliet fall in love again? What if Cupid and Aphrodite entrusted you with the mission of g...
Copying is a common occurence, but not to the extent of copying someone else's image and likeness. Carina a.k.a. The Copycat was the harbinger to usher in an era of usurping on a galactic scale by stealing the encrypted data of a bioweapon which can copy and splice the genetic composition much faster than any plastic...
One woman's deep dive into a cold case will reveal shocking answers to a mystery that has captivated an entire town for decades, answers someone will do anything - even kill - to keep from coming to light. * * * One year after the incident that completely disgraced her, private investigator Mysti Coleman...
SHORTLISTED. Paul Finn wakes to discover that not only is he feeling horribly sick but, more worryingly, the naked stranger in his bed isn't moving. If only he could remember what happened... My story for the ONC 2023, a thriller scifi adventure, with a touch of romance. (SciFi /Adventure / LGBT)
Liha wants to avenge his family. If he has to become one of the king's men to do this, he will. But in the capital Penira, the golden city, he learns fast a man has to prove his worth. Sword in hand, if needs be. Dánirah hates the city, and people of her tribe are not welcome there. But she must deliver a message to o...
[2x Featured] The moment you meet your soulmate, you feel it like the wind brushing against your skin when time stops. »»--♥--«« Finally ready to make an attempt at moving on from a loss that shattered her entire life, Eyilore Boss goes touring in search of something that can fill the ragin...
[ONC 2023 SECOND PLACE WINNER | AMBASSADORS PICK 2023] An unwilling but gifted geneticist must find a way to safeguard humanity against the deadly pathogen she's forced to design or die trying. *** The planet's population is pushing past 11 billion and counting. With resources spread thin, widespread famine, and heal...
Three women. Three tangled lives orbiting Mars aboard the Phobos Transit Space Station. Val loses her station operation engineer job under false pretenses, Exo-biologist Cassy is blackballed for doing the right thing, and ex-marine Kate suffers a broken heart. Fortunately, Mavis, the owner of the Starlight Tavern and...