Is this your first time here? Welcome!

Read, click through, lurk a little. Take your time, then decide if this feels like a good place for you. If you’re a good writer or a good reader who loves a supportive community, we sure hope it is. Email us or ask any questions of us in Twitter. We’re glad you’re here.

Fiction and poetry are over at the speakeasy

Grab the first line provided in Sunday’s speakeasy post, incorporate into your story the photo prompt then submit your newest piece of flash fiction to the speakeasy grid. It’s that easy. Unless you have no idea how flash fiction or poetry is constructed. In that case, it won’t be easy, but Flood is a wonderful teacher. You’ll get the hang of her writing challenge in no time.

Personal anecdotes, personal essays and creative nonfiction are here on the challenge grid

Quick primer: for yeah write purposes, the personal anecdote is the well-told blog story we love to read, the personal essay centers around the person writing the essay and should reveal a new perspective on the original topic before the essay concludes. Creative nonfiction, though it may contain a personal story, has more of a global focus with a subject matter requiring research.

These three writing styles should cover each blogging genre historically submitted to the yeah write challenge grid. No one should feel left out, not the graphic storytellers, not the social activists, not the personal bloggers with a well-told story. Once you’ve met all the elements of a yeah write submission, don’t bore us to death, and we will love you forever.

Editors’ picks are back! The moderated queue is back!

A similar version of the following section ran a few weeks back and, although, we haven’t gotten as much recent pushback as we used to, I’m reprinting it for those of you who missed it the first time around.

You guys, not every post you write is a yeah write submission. You may be a published author and a very good writer. But, let’s say, you submit your article on the history of aviation to a botany publication. You may receive a letter from the publications editor saying something like: this was awesome, but we only accept submissions focusing on botany. Here are some of your responses to that letter:

[bullet_list]

• I knew this was a botany publication, but I had this aviation article lying around, and I thought you could use it
• You must not know who I am. This is a perfectly good aviation article and your botany publication isn’t worthy
• I don’t write about either aviation or botany, but this is a pretty good article on the fast food industry. I don’t get your problem with it

[/bullet_list]

The moderation queue will clear much faster if our submissions editor isn’t writing her infamous love letters to those not writing to the publication guidelines.

As a reminder, these types of posts are no-nos:

[alert_list]

• stream-of-consciousness; I love writing those. They are not accepted on the grid.
• ruminations without telling an actual, interesting story; we’re all getting older—why is your birthday post any more special than ours would be?
• anything at all containing the phrase “but I digress” or any variation of it. It’s written right here: “Honor your audience with proper transitions instead of hopping from place to place, abruptly interrupting yourself with “but I digress”.  If you are digressing, refocus, then start over.”

[/alert_list]

Wondering why it’s been four hours and your post still hasn’t appeared on the grid? Flood is busy trying to politely word 10 custom letters that are basically asking you guys the same question: why do you hate us? Then, baby Jesus bless her heart, she’s gotta respond to the responses to her original letter. We’re not doing that anymore. If your initial submission is unacceptable, you’ll get one letter in which you’ll be invited to try again next week. Thanks for understanding how our off-blog lives can no longer support the back-and-forth. 

Here’s the spreadsheet each editor uses as a guide when selecting our weekly picks. If you’re having trouble making the grid or you’re swinging for the jury prize, you can use it to structure your pieces as you draft them. It contains exactly what we’re looking for as we read each entry.

Yeah write #86 is open for submissions. Bring us your best stuff.

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