by Zena Shapter
(originally written for the NSW Writers’ Centre Genre-Mash – where I had to mash together fairytales & social media)
Once upon a time, there was an author called Jack, who lived with his wife. Like most writers, he was very poor. All he had was a kick-arse manuscript and a dream of it becoming an international bestseller.
One day, Jack’s wife told him it was time to start approaching publishers. On his way, Jack met a literary agent. The agent loved Jack’s manuscript, so he gave him a contract.
Excited, Jack took the contract and went back home. When Jack’s wife saw the contract, however, she was very angry. “There’s no money here!” she screamed. “In fact, you’ve given away some of your future earnings!” She threw the contract out of the window.
The next morning, Jack looked outside. Overnight, a huge interstalk had grown so high it reached the sky. His contract was attached to its base as a promise-delineation-flower, or pdf. After re-reading it, he realised he was contractually obliged to use the interstalk to promote his writing. Becoming an international bestseller was, it seemed, going to involve slightly more climbing than he’d originally thought.
Jack stared up at the interstalk and its network of interwoven connections. There were so many ways to climb this thing, the options were overwhelming, and Jack realised it was going to take a long time to learn how to climb it effectively. Really, he just wanted to go back inside and start writing another kick-arse manuscript. But he took a deep breath and started to climb.
He climbed up and up the interstalk, carefully toeing each foothold he could find in the interstalk’s tips and tricks sections. He chiselled a few comments into its blog posts along the way, though it made him feel silly. No one ever commented back. Still, he climbed up and up into the clouds.
There, Jack saw a massive castle festooned with photos of people’s dinner creations and funny baby videos. He went inside, where it was just as beautiful. Many hours did he spend trawling through news feeds, playing scrabble and live-tweeting trends to his now quickly-connected circles of friends. They kept sending him lots of love. It was both confusing and friendly, almost like being at a party.
Then Jack heard a voice. “Fee, Fi, Fo, Fum! I smell procrastination!”
There was no time for Jack to poll his followers for options! So he ran into a cupboard and lurked there. An enormous troll came into the room and sat down. He brought with him a cat and an elf.
“Smile!” said the troll. The cat stared at him and did nothing. The troll laughed out loud.
How magical is that cat, thought Jack, that it makes the troll laugh so.
“Elf yourself!” said the troll to the elf. The elf began to dance, repeatedly changing the background of his mini-theatre as he did so. Soon the troll was so exhausted from hitting the like and +1 buttons on the elf’s theatre stage that he fell asleep.
How magical is that elf, thought Jack, that it sends the troll to sleep.
Jack jumped out of the cupboard. He would share the LOL cat and the Elf Yourself with his world, and thereby become the most popular author on the planet. It was pure gold. So he took them both and left only a comment behind: ‘Once it’s out there, it’s out there forever, he he! #FridayFreebie.’
Suddenly the cat meowed. “Help, master!”
The troll woke up and shouted, “Fee, Fi, Fo, Fum!”, which was really off-topic, though made for dramatic alliteration.
Jack didn’t waste any time responding, so the troll started swearing, calling Jack vile names and saying he couldn’t write to save his life. Jack yelled back: “Be polite, and keep your manners!” Then he ran to the interstalk and started climbing back down. But Jack had forgotten to set his privacy settings, so the troll knew exactly where to find him.
“The troll has followed you,” boomed a voice. “Do you wish to follow him back?”
“No!” Jack screamed.
The weight of the troll on Jack’s interstalk threatened to send it crashing.
“Wife!” Jack shouted. “Help!”
Quickly, his wife grabbed a captcha axe, hacked down the interstalk and severed the troll’s access to Jack’s site. The troll fell to the ground in a hail of spam.
“You’ve been gone for days,” Jack’s wife said.
“Sorry,” Jack said, “I ended up on the dark side. It can be addictive there! But please don’t retweet that.”
Not knowing what he meant, she didn’t. But she did like the LOL cat and the Elf Yourself. So did everybody else – so much so they started rolling on the floor laughing. That immediately raised Jack’s profile as an author, and soon everyone who was anyone knew who he was. A publisher took notice of this, and sent his agent a contract for a three-book deal.
“Now this is the type of contract that pays,” said Jack’s wife. “Say,” she added, following Jack back into the garden, “since you’re about to become an international bestselling author, shouldn’t you be busy writing? Why are you trying to reconnect that interstalk thingy?
Already on his hands and knees in the dirt, Jack didn’t even hear her.
The End
If you would like to ‘elf yourself’ this festive season, please just click here.
If you’d like to read a round-up of my year, then please just click here. Season’s greetings!
