In April 2015, B.K. Stevens debuted the blog series “The First Two Pages,” hosting craft essays by short story writers and novelists analyzing the openings of their own work. The series continued until just after her death in August 2017, and the full archive of those essays can be found at Bonnie’s website. In November 2017, the blog series relocated to my website, and the archive of this second stage of the series can be found here.
We’re continued to celebrate ShortCon this week—and to celebrate the Slee sisters as well, moving from an essay by Jessica, on her story “Woodpeckers,” to an essay by Jennifer, writing about “Stranger,” which originally appeared in Writer’s Digest. I really love the set-up for the story, focused on a character with prosopagnosia, more commonly known as face blindness—a situation which compromises her ability to be an accurate witness for a crime but which also leaves her potentially vulerable in other ways. Complications! Suspense! It’s a winning story—literally, since it took top prize in the genre category of Writer’s Digest‘s annual competition.
(I have to add a personal aside here. As you’ll learn in the first lines of Jennifer’s essay, she’s originally submitted it to the Bouchercon anthology California Schemin’, which I edited… So how did I miss selecting a story that went on to win a major prize? I looked back myself to see, and it turns out that her story didn’t make the long-list of stories sent to me by the first round of readers. This isn’t to blame someone else for missing a good story but only to speak to the complicated layering of readers, rounds, and tastes that go into such an anthology. For those of you who may have been rejected elsewhere, take heart! It doesn’t mean your story isn’t good—or that it doesn’t have a strong future elsewhere.)
Jennifer and her sister share a website—sleesquared.com—and Jennifer’s bio shares some details with Jessica’s, since they’re also co-authors (and I loved hearing about their current book-in-progress when we talked at ShortCon). But each of them also writes independently too. Together, the sisters are Claymore Award Winners and were longlisted for the CWA Debut Dagger and the First Pages Prize. In addition to the Writer’s Digest award, Jennifer herself has also won an award in the Great American Fiction Contest, and you can find her work in Mystery Most Devious, Starlite Pulp Review, Black Cat Weekly, and The Saturday Evening Post. (In an interview with Cold Caller, Jessica said she would be “the evil twin,” so it’s nice to be hosting the good one this time around.)
I’m planing to welcome other ShortCon attendees to the First Two Pages in upcoming weeks, so do check back. And registration is now open for ShortCon 2027, with featured presenters including Reed Farrel Coleman, Linda Landrigan, Libby Cudmore, and Tom Milani—not to be missed!
Please use the arrows and controls at the bottom of the embedded PDF to navigate through the essay. You can also download the essay to read off-line.
