IT TAKES huge talent to write a great novel, but a special kind of genius to come up with prose so appallingly purple to make you the winner of America’s most prestigious bad writing prize.

The Bulwer-Lytton Fiction Contest challenges entrants to write the worst opening line for a novel, taking their inspiration from the British Victorian author Edward Bulwer-Lytton’s oft-parodied opening to Paul Clifford: “It was a dark and stormy night . . .”

In an opening so wonderfully bad that it makes Bulwer-Lytton’s first line look positively Tolstoyan, Jim Guigli, a retired mechanical designer from California, beat off the opposition yesterday with the first line of an imaginary detective novel.

“Detective Bart Lasiter was in his office studying the light from his one small window falling on his super burrito when the door swung open to reveal a woman whose body said ‘you’ve had your last burrito for a while’, whose face said angels did exist, and whose eyes said she could make you dig your own grave and lick the shovel clean.”

Scott Rice, an English professor at San Jose State University, hit upon the idea for the contest after being asked to judge a proper writing competition which was in effect, he said, a bad writing competition with overlong submissions.

Professor Rice said that Mr Guigli’s work gained the top accolade because “the judges were impressed by his appalling powers of invention”.

Judges were only marginally less impressed with an entry by Stuart Vasepuru from Edinburgh, who won the runner-up prize for his parody of dialogue from the film Dirty Harry, the violent and tough-talking US detective played by Clint Eastwood.

“I know what you’re thinking, punk,” hissed Wordy Harry to his new editor, “you’re thinking, ‘Did he use six superfluous adjectives or only five?’ — and to tell the truth, I forgot myself in all this excitement; but being as this is English, the most powerful language in the world, whose subtle nuances will blow your head clean off, you’ve got to ask yourself one question: ‘Do I feel loquacious?’ — well do you, punk?”

Professor Rice’s favourite entry was by freelance writer Bill MacIver, whose inventive description won the “purple prose” category this year.

“A single sparkling tear fell from Little Mary’s cheek onto the sidewalk, then slid into the storm drain, there to join in its course the mighty waters of the Los Angeles River and, eventually, Long Beach Harbour, with its state-of-the-art container-freight processing facilities.”

Mr MacIver, 47, shares the secrets of his success with aspiring bad writers. “I guess it’s a matter of knowing how to strike the wrong note, exaggerating, being a little maudlin, but putting in little details like the container-freight processing facility line.”

The efforts of winners, runners-up and those gaining “dishonourable mentions” were celebrated yesterday when Professor Rice officially announced the results.

The contest was not about the money, just the fame of being a master of ghastly prose.

Mr Guigli was awarded “a pittance” and other winners “must content themselves with becoming household names”, said the organisers.

Mr Guigli said: “My motivation for entering the contest was to find a constructive outlet for my dementia.”

NOW READ ON . . .

Detective Fiction: “It was a dreary Monday in September when Constable Lightspeed came across the rotting corpse that resembled one of those zombies from Michael Jackson’s Thriller, except that it was lying down and not performing the electric slide

Derek Fisher, Ottawa, Ontario

Romance: “Despite the vast differences in their ages, ethnicity, and religious upbringing, the sexual chemistry between Roberto and Heather was the most amazing he had ever experienced; and for the entirety of the Labour Day weekend they had sex like monkeys on espresso, not those monkeys in the zoo that fling their faeces at you, but more like the monkeys in the wild that have those giant red butts, and access to an espresso machine

Dennis Barry, Dothan, Alabama

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