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Friday, June 3, 2011

The Most Beautiful Fight Scene EVER!! (Plus a yummy contest reminder)

I'm not a huge fan of confrontation in general, but fight scenes certainly have their place in books and life.

During my recent trip to Iowa, I was lucky enough to witness a beautiful altercation--I'm not usually emotional, but I got a little misty-eyed watching this particular conflict. It had all the elements of a real zinger:

-It was boy versus girl.

-There was pent-up agression.

-There were some serious glares.

-There was a treasured possession being fought over.

-Subtle threats, whining, bared teeth (check, check, check).

-Open threats were made as the fight progressed.


-It climaxed in a magnificent shoving scene!



Where, you ask, did this brawl take place?

The local library, of course. A brother/sister pair were fighting over the only copy of Catching Fire (2nd book in The Hunger Games trilogy). They were fighting over a book.
The mother declared the boy to be victor of the day, and ordered him to finish it in a week and NOT spill the plot to his sister or there would be punishment.

Now that's my kind of family conflict.




CONTEST LINK:
In other news, Cheerios is holding their annual Spoonful of Stories contest for unpublished writers. It's a picture book contest and it's free to enter! Deadline is July 15, 2011. The prize is having your book inside Cheerios boxes (the winner will also be considered for publication by Simon & Schuster)!

Click the picture to see the official rules and registration information.

26 comments:

  1. Jess, I love that description of the fight, and what they were fighting over! My daughters have been known to argue about who gets to read a book first too. Come to think of it, sometimes I want to be the first one, too!

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  2. I love that they were fighting over a book. My kids have fought over books before, but never in the library. Fighting in a public place means we immediately get in the car and go home.

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  3. I fight with my oldest over books...she always wins, thought, since she can usually tear through them faster than I can.

    Shelley

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  4. Now that is the best fight ever. Glad to hear, though, that there will be consequences if he ruins the plot for her. :)

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  5. It goes to show that good writing will always be read. So glad to hear that it will be fought over, too!

    ~Debbie

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  6. That's awesome! I love conflict in stories, but any kind of real-life confrontation makes me dizzy. I know. I'm such a soldier.

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  7. Fighting over a book -- as much as I'm a pacifist, that would make my heart sing!

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  8. I loved your story, too--warms the heart that the fight was over a book and not some video game or something! And thanks for the Cheerios link. Off to check out the details :-)

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  9. Oh, I love that! My mom totally had to do that with me and my siblings when we all wanted to read the Harry Potter books.

    Thanks for the links too.

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  10. HAHA, what a story! I love it. That should be a new reality show: BOOK FIGHTS.

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  11. Oh, I would have fought over that book too! AWESOME! Fighting over a book, that is soooooo cooool.

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  12. LOL. Awesome. Sounds like my son and...ahem, me.

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  13. Hey Jess, I wanted to let you know that I awarded you the Irresistibly Sweet Blog Award. You can find out about it here: http://findingthewriteway.blogspot.com/2011/06/irresistibly-sweet-blog-award.html
    Congrats! :D

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  14. Thanks for the shout-out, Jess! And if that brother and sister had to fight, at least it was for a worthy cause:)

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  15. I like a fight scene over a book too! Though I have to say the first one if the book most worth fighting over in the series.

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  16. Now that's a scene I would have loved witnessing! How cool that they were trying to decide who'd read it first. Just shows how much of a hold Suzanne Collins has over us. This made me smile!

    You went to Iowa?! I get to go back home and visit my friends and in-law this Christmas and can't wait!

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  17. OMG! That is freaking awesome!! :D I love that! And how the mother handled it. I had to reprimand someone in our own carpool for almost giving away things in that very book to my daughter who hasn't read it yet. Her words? "You know I'd like to read that book too when I grow up." How cute is that?

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  18. That's great! I agree - love the way the mother handled it.

    I wish my daughter would fight over books with me! :) I keep egging her on...

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  19. Great story :) Your introduction brings to mind the Friends episode with Alec Baldwin - "Wasn't that the best fight you ever had?" :) Fighting over a book - awesome!

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  20. Very good description. I could feel my expectation of a conflict rise as I read the post, and then I couldn't help the smile that spread across my face when I found out about the cause of the fight. :)

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  21. Hahahaha! Awesome!

    My siblings and I always bought our own copies of popular books as to avoid these types of scuffles... (we were a bit greedy... couldn't share, you see). I'm pretty sure at one point there were 5 or 6 copies of EACH book in the HP series floating around our house!

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