Lucy Vickery

Sauce material

issue 06 June 2015

In Competition No. 2900 you were invited to write a short story that ends on a condiment of your choice.

The germ of this comp was the writer Richard Brautigan’s wish to end a short story with the word ‘mayonnaise’, an ambition he fulfilled in his 1967 novel Trout Fishing in America. Actually, strictly speaking, he didn’t. As an eagle-eyed friend and self-confessed pedant pointed out to me, the word that appears in most editions is the deliberately misspelt ‘mayonaise’.

The pun-merchants had a field day this week and there were several Cluedo- and Wodehouse-inspired entries. The winners take £30, D.A. Prince pockets £35.

Keith hadn’t listened properly. It was Jane’s chief complaint against him, and constituted most of their conversation these days.

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