One Perfect Sentence - October 2024

[AgentPete]

Last month’s OPS had a broad brief: I asked you to create the first sentence for a book in the Romance genre.

This month, I’m looking for you to conclude the same book… But without writing the intervening 60, 80 or even 100 thousand words.

That’s right – I’d like your best closing sentence.

It can be as long or as short as you want.

We interpret “Romance” pretty loosely.

So what do I want out of your best closing sentence?

The same as always: emotional impact.

This will not be quite as easy as before. In real life, your reader will have read the entire book, will be very familiar with your characters and the sweep of the plot. The closing sentence will come as the satisfying conclusion of these things.

In the context of this contest, your closing sentence necessarily lacks those frames of reference.

Even so.

You are writers! Write till your ink be dry, and with your tears moist it again, and frame some feeling line.

***​

The Rules are exactly the same as last month's, with this addition – please post your entries anonymously. Tick the “Posting as Anonymous?” box to do so.

 

[Anonymous]

And begin again ....

 

[Anonymous]

Reader, I divorced him.

 

[Anonymous]

We spoke our vows, we pressed our cut hands together, and we hugged each other, tears to cheeks, until he bled out.

 

[Anonymous]

And that's why she now believed in unconditional and eternal love ... not.

 

[Anonymous]

Wreathed in wisps of smoke billowing from the funeral pyre, Eric turned to me and, slowly, held out his hand.

 

[Anonymous]

““It never rains but it fucking pours!” Leah observed loudly to the empty room, as she tore off her elegant sandals and hurled them, one after the other, into a corner.

---

 

[Anonymous]

I knew what I had to do and, with both hands, I lifted the heavy spade.

 

[Anonymous]

Ben was telling the truth for once, there is always a chill wind at this height, Sophie mused, before stepping neatly off the balcony into the clouds.

 

[Anonymous]

She shook the tin of spay paint, then popped the lid off with her thumb, and wrote LOVE AND HATE ARE ONE AND THE SAME.

 

[Anonymous]

There was only one thing he could do now – admit to himself how he felt, then admit it to her and drop the bomb of his honesty.

 

[Anonymous]

The strains of him singing, “Out in the west Texas town of El Paso, I fell in love with a Mexican girl”, drifted across the bayou, followed by the equally tuneful response from her, “The wizard of Oz is one because because because because because...”

 

[Bloo]

I'm an idiot. I just realized last month's contest was specifically Romance. The damn thing was in bold and still I missed it. No wonder I did so poorly. Sheesh.

 

[Anonymous]

Last month’s OPS had a broad brief: I asked you to create the first sentence for a book in the Romance genre.

This month, I’m looking for you to conclude the same book… But without writing the intervening 60, 80 or even 100 thousand words.

That’s right – I’d like your best closing sentence.

It can be as long or as short as you want.

We interpret “Romance” pretty loosely.

So what do I want out of your best closing sentence?

The same as always: emotional impact.

This will not be quite as easy as before. In real life, your reader will have read the entire book, will be very familiar with your characters and the sweep of the plot. The closing sentence will come as the satisfying conclusion of these things.

In the context of this contest, your closing sentence necessarily lacks those frames of reference.

Even so.

You are writers! Write till your ink be dry, and with your tears moist it again, and frame some feeling line.

***​

The Rules are exactly the same as last month's, with this addition – please post your entries anonymously. Tick the “Posting as Anonymous?” box to do so.

Having had my heart broken so many times, I at last found true love at the bottom of my bottle of scotch.

 

[Anonymous]

'Look, I’m right over here, stupid, so HOW COULD I BE HOLDING YOUR HAND?’

 

[Anonymous]

Decades later, when he could no longer remember my name, I told him our story.

 

[Anonymous]

“In a manner of speaking, superintendent, the ring choked him – because someone forced him to swallow it.”

 

[Anonymous]

She added, so quietly I might almost have imagined her words: “And the Lady is waiting...”

 

[Anonymous]

They were moments into a wet and messy hug when Rudy whispered, "We can do this."

 

[Anonymous]

She clawed at her wrist with her nails, seeking to break the tight grasp of his icy fingers – but then she was falling, falling, falling... towards the fast-flowing brown water.

 

[Anonymous]

I stand on my toes so Dad and Becky can hug me, too.

 

[Anonymous]

There never was a story of such satiation than that of Keres and her Aiden’s red hot heart.

 

[Anonymous]

She kissed me on the lips and said those three little words I'd been longing to hear since I was a little girl: Mars has women.

 

[Anonymous]

His warm, strong hand inched out of hers until he was falling, falling. Lost forever.

 

[Anonymous]

As one, we looked from the apricot roses to the wedding planner and said, "those will be perfect."

 

[Anonymous]

"You're not running away anymore," he said, reaching across the table to take her hand in his, and she answered, "No, I'm not."

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[Anonymous]

"You're not running away anymore," he said, reaching across the table to take her hand in his, and she answered, "No, I'm not."

 

[Anonymous]

Last month’s OPS had a broad brief: I asked you to create the first sentence for a book in the Romance genre.

This month, I’m looking for you to conclude the same book… But without writing the intervening 60, 80 or even 100 thousand words.

That’s right – I’d like your best closing sentence.

It can be as long or as short as you want.

We interpret “Romance” pretty loosely.

So what do I want out of your best closing sentence?

The same as always: emotional impact.

This will not be quite as easy as before. In real life, your reader will have read the entire book, will be very familiar with your characters and the sweep of the plot. The closing sentence will come as the satisfying conclusion of these things.

In the context of this contest, your closing sentence necessarily lacks those frames of reference.

Even so.

You are writers! Write till your ink be dry, and with your tears moist it again, and frame some feeling line.

***​

The Rules are exactly the same as last month's, with this addition – please post your entries anonymously. Tick the “Posting as Anonymous?” box to do so.

‘Darling,,’ he said, wiping the tear below her eye. ‘I can’t let you go.’ And he locked the attic door, one last time.

 

[Anonymous]

After yet another life, past heartbreaking near misses and random pitiless intervention of fate, we once again lay in each other's arms, basking in our afterglow; the banked embers of our love aglow against the night.

 

[Anonymous]

We'll always have Blackpool.