More About the Author
I'm a retired English teacher who currently writes children's literature. My Appalachian version of the Rumpelstiltskin tale, FERRADIDDLEDUMDAY, was published in 2010 by Cedar Creek Publishing and my middle-grade paranormal novel, STUCK, was published in 2011 by Cedar Creek.
To learn more about me, visit my website, http://www.beckymushko.com.
For 10 years, I wrote a humor column, "Peevish Advice," first for Blue Ridge Traditions and later for the Smith Mountain Eagle. My previously published columns have been collected into two books: PEEVISH ADVICE and MORE PEEVISH ADVICE.
I'm a 5-time winner of the Lonesome Pine Short Story Contest and a 3-time winner of the Sherwood Anderson Short Story Contest. My short stories have appeared in some regional magazines, and one was nominated for a Pushcart Prize. Collections of my winning stories are THE GIRL WHO RACED MULES and WHERE THERE'S A WILL.
My story, "Out of the Fog," appears in A CUP OF COMFORT FOR WRITERS (Adams, 2008) and several of my dreadful sentences appear in the Bulwer-Lytton anthology, IT WAS A DARK AND STORMY NIGHT (Friday Publishing, 2008).
I'm best known for being a Bulwer-Lytton Bad Fiction Contest category winner--twice. In 1996, I won the "Worst Western" category with this:
Following the unfortunate bucking of his horse when it was startled by the posse's shots, Tex--who now lay in a disheveled heap in the sagebrush--pushed back his sweat-stained Stetson from one deep-set eye, spat a stream of tobacco juice at the nearest cactus, and reflected momentarily that the men approaching him with ropes probably weren't just out for a skip, and--if they were--his freshly broken ankle would have to cause him to decline any entreaties to join them.
In 2008, I won the Bulwer-Lytton "Vile Pun" category with this:
Vowing to get revenge on his English teacher for making him memorize Wordsworth's "Intimations of Immortality," Warren decided to pour sugar in her gas tank, but he inadvertently grabbed a sugar substitute so it was actually Splenda in the gas.
