San Diego CityBeat has put together an anthology containing some of the best entries from its annual Fiction 101 contest. The resulting eBook, Fiction 101: The Anthology, is available for $3.99 on Kindle, or $2.99 on either the Nook or iPad/iPhone:

Here’s how this worked. Every year for almost the last decade, CityBeat asked writers to craft humorous, sad, tragic, scary, heart-warming, silly and abstract stories in just 101 words. It had to be fiction. Poems, diatribes, how-to manuals and ransom notes were all disqualified. Then a top notch, grade-AAA, blue ribbon (“good for nothin'” in the words of CityBeat editor Dave Rolland) panel of judges hand-selected winners to appear in that year’s fiction issue.

Fiction 101: The Anthology, is the best of those stories for the last eight years, covering everything from animals to sex, and sometimes animals and sex? We’re not sure, we were too afraid to read it all so you’ll have to let us know.

“It will cost you a few bucks,” explains staff writer Dave Maass. “But it’s a great way to support your local free weekly as we enter the slowest months of our business year.”