Hemingway Challenge: Twenty-five Influential Writers Offer Original Fiction in 6 Words, No More, No Less.

• John Updike: "Forgive me!" "What for?" "Never mind."
• Irvine Welsh: Eyeballed me, killed him. Slight exaggeration.
• Norman Maller: Satan -- Jehovah -- fifteen rounds. A draw.
• Andrea Siegel: "Welcome to Moeshe Christiansen's Bar Mitzvah."
• Rick Moody: grass, cow, calf, milk, France
• AM Homes: He remembered something that never happened.
• Robert Olen Butler: Saigon hotel. Decades later. He weeps.
• Tobias Wolff: She gave. He took. He forgot.
• Courtney Eldridge: -- I love you... -- Love ya back.
• Memoir, Jerry Stahl: You are not shit. You are!
• Jamie O'Neill: All her life: half a house.
• Edward Albee: Poison; meditation; skiing; ants -- nothing worked.
• Michael Cunningham: My nemesis is dead. Now what?
• David Lodge: I saw. I conquered. Couldn't come.
• Brian Bouldrey: "Cyanide? Bitter almonds." He knew. How?
• Mary Gateskill: Father died. Mother triumphed. I left.
• Pickney Benedict: "You? Her? No dice, fat boy."
• Bruce Benderson: Mother's Day came, doubling Oedipus' pleasure.
• JT LeRoy: Tossed remorselessly, whiffle balls sure hurt.
• Rebecca Miller: As she fell, her mind wandered.
• Ben Greenman: It's negative. Say hi to mom.
• "A Short History of Academia," by Sue Grafton: Horny professor. Failing coed. No tenure.
• AG Pasquella: Shiva destroys Earth: "Well, that's that."
• Nicholas Weinstock: Havana's no place for hockey, coach.
• As published in the Fall 2004 issue of BlackBook Magazine.