A spooky September story slam at the Haven Social Club

By Mathew White

EDMONTON — The September story slam lit up the Haven Social Club Wednesday night, and although this month once again drew a small crowd, what was lost in quantity was certainly made up for in quality.

It was almost as if the storytellers couldn’t wait another month to share their Halloween stories, as tales of ghosts, werewolves and dead bodies in pizza dumpsters filled the room.

Caleb Caswell took an early lead in the first half, but was quickly knocked out of top place by last month’s winner, Liam Shaw.  Shaw was able to hold onto his lead until the bitter end, but with one writer left, Jacki Rudko swooped in and took the prize with a true story about a hilarious email exchange with a Nigerian scam artist.

“That’s for all those people who got those obtrusive emails,” said Rudko as she accepted her $141 prize.  “I stuck it to ‘em!”

Rudko has been coming to the story slam for more than three years now.  This is her third time winning.

Although writing is not something Rudko does professionally, she said she would love to.  She recently finished her first book and is currently in the process of finding a publisher.  Like a lot of her writing, she said the book takes a serious subject and puts a funny spin on it.

“Most of my stories are making fun of things that happen to me or things that I can really build off of,” said Rudko.  “I really like to make people laugh and whenever I’m feeling down it always makes me feel good to write something that makes other people feel better.”

And Wednesday night’s story was no different.  The crowd was roaring with laughter as Rudko reviled each new email from the infamous scam artist.

“It was great to see it obviously resonated with a lot of people here,” said Rudko.

Listen to “Conversations with a Nigerian Scam Artist” here:

SeptemberStorySlam by westedmontonlocal

Edmonton Story Slam

The Edmonton Story Slam Society is an organization that gives local writers a chance to share their work with a live audience.  The rules of the competition are as follows:

• Each writer has five minutes
• For every ten seconds over the limit, 0.5 points is deducted
• Story must be original and unpublished
• Five judges each give a score out of 10 and an average is taken from the middle three scores
• Contestants must be present when their name is called or they’re disqualified
• Contestants are gonged after seven minutes
• Audience members are asked to donate towards the first-place prize

The next story slam is scheduled for October 19.