author: Nicole J. LeBoeuf

Nearly forgot to mention this! I iz published again. Sorta-kinda. A bit.

So, you know about Second Life? Virtual world where you can build stuff, program stuff, or run around in your avatar doing unspeakable X-rated things? The massively multiplayer game whose in-game currency actually has an exchange rate with US dollars? Right. So, I play that from time to time. Not with the unspeakable X-rated things, mind you; I'm more of a Tringo hall loiterer and eternally amateur object builder. My avatar's name is Kavella Maa. She looks about as much like me as I had the patience to tweak (did you know there are, like, four different slider bars just to alter the shape of the bridge of your avatar's nose?). Feel free to add me to you friends list if you're in there and wanna.

In any case, one of the socialization structures in Second Life is "groups." And one of the groups is the Writing & Performance Center. And they hold a writing contest every month.

Last month it was a short story contest. 500 words max. Must end with a twist; hence the name of the contest, "The Twist In The Tale."

So it got to be about an hour before deadline, and I thought, "Damn, I really oughtta enter this thing." So I opened a text editor and pretended it was homework for writing class. Got it done just under the wire, pasted it in all its purple-prose glory into a Notecard object in game, and dropped the Notecard into the group leader's inbox.

Well, when I got home from VP and finally started cleaning out my inbox, I came across an email such as you get when someone in Second Life sends you an instant message and you're not online to get it. It was from the group leader, Deidru Valentine, and it said, "Congratulations, you have won first prize; may we have permission to distribute your story on a Notecard?"

Well yay!

So I gave her permission, requested that my real life (or "1st life") publishing byline be used, and there was much rejoicing.

I have no idea how many people entered or what the quality of entries was (nor whether said quality can be judged by that of the winners of the previous two contests), but it amuses me that in the game, on Info Island II, in the Writing & Performance Center (view location), there is a plaque on the wall that you can click on to read my story. It's publication, of a sort. And hey! I got paid for it! Four hundred Linden dollars, baby! That's about... $1 US. Oh well. But it'll pay my ante in Tringo for a few nights, that's for sure.