Crunch time

Forty-eight hours is not a lot of time to write a well-crafted essay – as we all know! – but that’s part of the challenge, isn’t it? The pressure of a deadline can be a huge motivating factor, and sometimes it comes right down to the wire. Our judges get a little more time, but there’s always a flurry of activity towards the end of the judging period, when our readers are putting the finishing touches on their feedback. The best part is listening to them share what they loved about what they read.

This time around, the judges were excited to see so many writers pushing the essay form and attempting braided and layered essays. They also noted that by using a question within their essay to reflect on their own actions, many writers were able to leave space for the reader to insert themselves into the narrative, allowing the reader to approach the essay with a greater degree of empathy. (Note: this is not the same as asking the reader a question – this is about self-reflection.) These sophisticated techniques are a signature of true creative nonfiction.

As always, anything that went right this round is entirely due to our admin team’s untiring work behind the scenes, and anything you hate is probably my fault. Unless it’s your feedback—hating and loving your feedback is just kind of part of being a writer.

Before we announce who’ll be moving on, let’s take a moment to chat about the next round of the Super Challenge. Starting Friday, the advancing writers will be working with a word or a phrase. Each writer will incorporate that word or phrase into an essay about… well, about wherever it takes them for inspiration. The essay could be personal or persuasive. The catch is that the word or phrase shouldn’t stick out or sound unnatural. Words should flow, nuance should be on-point, and our judges shouldn’t be able to tell where your writing ends and our prompt begins.  This may mean that you need to adapt your writing style a bit throughout the rest of the essay so that it doesn’t stand out awkwardly. Need a little extra help? Check out our Navigating Prompts post on word or phrase prompts. You don’t have to, but we did tell you exactly how to approach the prompt, so if you struggled with centering your first-round prompt, this might be a great time to brush up on your technique.

Sound fun? Or at least not terrible? Let’s see who’ll be taking on that, er, super challenge:

Congratulations to Our Advancing Writers

Let’s have a hand for the following writers, in alphabetical order, who will be advancing to the next round of the Super Challenge:

Addy Parker
Madeleine Pelletier
KPF
Sara Stoutland
Becky Swank
Elle Symonds

Wait, wait, there’s more!

Writers, if you don’t have your feedback, please send us an email at superchallenge@yeahwrite.me, ’cause that email should have reached you about twelve hours ago.

Now that this round of the competition is over, you’re free to post your work anywhere on the Internet you like, or take our judges’ suggestions and rework your submission to send on to other venues and anthologies. If it finds a home, we’d love to hear about it in the Coffeehouse! And if you choose to post it to your personal site or blog, you can share that link in the Coffeehouse as well.

About the author:

Rowan submitted exactly one piece of microfiction to YeahWrite before being consumed by the editorial darkside. She spent some time working hard as our Submissions Editor before becoming YeahWrite’s Managing Editor in 2016. She was a BlogHer Voice of the Year in 2017 for her work on intersectional feminism, but she suggests you find and follow WOC instead. In real life she’s been at various times an attorney, aerialist, professional knitter, artist, graphic designer (yes, they’re different things), editor, secretary, tailor, and martial artist. It bothers her vaguely that the preceding list isn’t alphabetized, but the Oxford comma makes up for it. She lives in Portlandia with a menagerie which includes at least one other human. She tells lies at textwall and uncomfortable truths at CrossKnit.

rowan@yeahwrite.me