Audio: This American Ice Cream Truck

Nick Faber — Mon, 26 Apr 2010 12:19:28 +0000

Photo by flickr user a_isacson

In 2007, New York City made it illegal for parked ice cream trucks to play their jingles in residential areas. I spoke to one man in Queens who still hears the Mister Softee jingle every day.

Co-produced with Jason L. Curtis.

I Did Not Win

Nick Faber — Thu, 01 Oct 2009 19:54:07 +0000

We were driving from Maine to Brooklyn, playing a game called “Find the NPR Station.” It was a Saturday, after all, and even the smaller markets have Weekend Edition. Somewhere in Massachusetts or Connecticut, we found This American Life and stayed tuned in for as long as we could. New York Times book critic James Wood came on Weekend All Things Considered to announce a fiction writing contest and my ears perked up. I know who this guy is, I thought, I’m reading his book (more on that in a second)! It turned out that this was Round 2 of NPR’s Three-Minute Fiction contest, to which they invite listeners to submit their own works of flash fiction.

Wood talked about the power of specifics in a first sentence. You know, the hook. He gave some example that he also references in his book about a marquis eating lunch, but I’ve already forgotten. And, oh yeah, I only ended up reading half of the book, so…

So the rule for Round 2 was that all stories should begin with the bland, generic sentence, “The nurse left work at five o’clock.” The trick would be to write a killer second line.

I wrote a little story in the next week or so and sent it off a day early. I’d been checking back at the site every few days to see if I was a contender or not, but alas, today I saw that a winner was chosen, and it was not I.

Here is my entry: “A Fern in the Rose Garden.” Please to enjoy.
A Fern in the Rose Garden by Nick Faber

I'll Be Here All the Week! » npr

Audio: This American Ice Cream Truck

I Did Not Win