Dear John Rogue Challenge Update

There’s nothing like a Dear John letter, especially when it’s from Juliet to Romeo, Renfield to Dracula, Lady Macbeth to her husband, or Jill to Jack. You get the idea.

What would Mrs. DeWinter say in a Dear John letter to Mr. DeWinter? Would it be the same letter before Manderly burned as it would be afterwards? What if Shakespeare’s mistress has another lover who says her hair is too like the sun? What if it’s Christopher Marlowe? Does Hester have words for Dimmesdale? Maybe Helen left a note for Menelaus when she departed for Troy.

April showers seem to be on hold this year; nevertheless, spring fever abounds. Maybe that’s why there were so few breakups last month. Or maybe I’ve been dumped. I’ve been so lost in the throes of that rapturous malady myself that I doubt I would have noticed. Alas, the Flower Moon wanes.

Let’s dump some characters!

Okay, here’s the skinny:

Rule 1: You’re not getting any money from me. If this is a problem, extract blood from a stone until you understand why. You’ll be too tired to do much else, but you’ll learn something.

Rule 2: You write a Dear John letter breaking up with a literary character, anyone from Little Bo Peep to King Lear, and you put a link to this challenge in your entry. You post a link to your entry in the comments here.

Rule 3: Enter as many letters as you want, as long as they’re not the same addressee and letter author. Feel free to respond to any of the letters you see in the existing submissions. You know, have fun.

Rule 4: That’s it. Three rules is excessive for me.

I’m keeping this challenge open all year. Ideally, God willin’ and the creek don’t rise, and all that, the winning entries will be included in an anthology I edit. Yep, that best of all prizes, braggin’ rights about having your words in print, will be yours.

I fully intend to update once a month, but if May is as slow on submissions as April, I will skip June. Thank you, Kendall, for the lone entry this month.

Rather than exploit digital space with links to all of the entries, I give you one link to the previous update. Links to all submissions thus far are linked in it.

Let’s have some fun!