Sage Advice

Last weekend I was working at the Long Beach Comic Expo (and if you’re near SoCal in September, I highly recommend its sister show, Long Beach Comic Con). My job as a panel room wrangler gives me a great opportunity to listen in on some great discussions on a variety of topics related to writing. In one such panel about making webcomics, I heard some sage advice: You need to work on your projects. It’s great if you have an idea – and everyone has one – but you have to actually work on and produce it. If you want to get noticed, your work needs to be out there. I have to admit, I took this pretty personally and any of you who are procrastinating on your work should too.

It’s not new advice, but it’s something we all need to hear now and again.

Welcome to Week 359

We’re kicking off the week in style at YeahWrite with both our competitive challenge grids in one post, plus prompts, tips, tricks and more. You asked, we answered! Keep scrolling down cause it’s all right here.

Submissions for this week’s challenges open on Monday at 12 midnight and close on Wednesday at 10pm ET. Voting will then open immediately thereafter and close on Thursday at 10pm ET. The winners, as always, will be celebrated on Friday.

Having trouble getting started? Hop on over to our quick guide. And don’t forget to doublecheck the full submission guidelines before you hit that button.

Looking For Microprose?

Our tiniest challenge with the biggest bang is open the first Wednesday of every month from midnight to 10 p.m.

Nonfiction Challenge

Burn Baby Burn

I repeated a mistake I thought I’d never make again. I got sunburned. What’s worse, is that I know better. I was on a sailboat all day. I LITERALLY GREW UP SAILING. I know that when you feel cold and wet, the wind buffeting you, yet the sun is out, you WILL burn, especially if you forget to reapply sunscreen, which you don’t even think about if you feel cold. The sort of good news is that I don’t have any more days of vacation left. I’m going back to the cold winter. The bad news is that I needlessly aged my face. Do as I say, not as I do. And I say, write some nonfiction for the grid this week. Thank you!

Technique Toolbox: Design

There’s no point in writing – at least, not in writing and posting your writing online – if nobody’s reading it. Find out some things you might be doing to accidentally make your writing harder to read in this month’s Technique Toolbox, where Rowan unpacks blog design and reader interface for everyone!

Nonfiction challenge grid:

Basic YeahWrite guidelines: 750 word limit; your entry can be dated no earlier than this past Sunday; nonfiction personal or persuasive essay, creative opinion piece or mostly true story based on actual events.

Check the submission guidelines for our full set of rules. If you’re not sure how to link up, hop over to our quick tutorial for getting started at YeahWrite! Otherwise, click that blue button when the challenge is open, and good luck! Come back to vote starting Wednesday at 10pm, and check out our winners on Friday!

Fiction|Poetry Challenge

Hearing Voices

Pulling together this poetry class has me appreciating the memories I’ve attached to words. Sort of like hearing a song can bring you back to the first time you heard it, a word or phrase can pull you back to a specific place and time in your life. “Southern Comfort” places me in my neighbor’s kitchen when I was 15. “Cobblestone” zips me to a quiet summer night in Edinburgh with a stray dog, an art museum, and a café patio. Those connotations we attach to words and phrases are what solidify our voices as writers. Those connections are ones only we can make as individuals, and writing is our way to tell others what words mean to us. Finding my voice has always seemed an intimidating task, like something bestowed upon me by some higher writing power. But it helps to think of it as something we already have; something we’ve gained just by living.

February Poetry Slam: Kyrielle

We know February is traditionally given over to sonnets, but Rowan hates sonnets. What’s a poet to do? Well, our answer is to explore a different rhyming, metered form, the kyrielle. Taken from old church songs, the kyrielle has not only a rhyme but a refrain, which saves you the trouble of writing at least one line per stanza. Get lyrical this month in about 12 lines.

Prompt Up!

Prompt Up is our weekly writing prompt for the fiction|poetry challenge! Here’s how it works:

For Fiction

• there will be two prompts each week: a prompt generated by the YeahWrite editors and a prompt generated by a previous winner of the fiction|poetry challenge. That’s right! Winners decide one of the prompts! If you’re a crowd fave winner on the fiction|poetry grid, keep an eye out for an email from us. If we don’t hear back from you by the deadline, we’ll pick our own prompt, and what fun is that? Generally, winners will decide the prompt for the challenge two after the one they won (so 349 picks 351, and so forth).
• the two prompts are MANDATORY for flash fiction submissions.
• the two prompt styles will vary month to month; they may include emotions, specific words, a specific sentence, genres, photographs, etc. There is no limit to how we can change it up.
• the prompts will be posted in the kick-off on Sunday. Submissions will be accepted through Wednesday at 10pm EST (same as before). Everyone will have a little less than 4 days to write and edit a story.
• YeahWrite editors reserve the right to alter the winner’s prompt. We’ll give you some suggestions for what makes a prompt inspiring and functional, but we’ve noticed that some work better than others, and if we think folks will struggle with yours, we might need to tweak it.

For Poetry

• You’ll need to incorporate at least one of the three possible prompts. Each fiction prompt counts as a single prompt, and the poetry slam counts as a prompt.
• This means you can write poetry about one of the two fiction prompts, in any form you like, or about anything you like, using the form given in that month’s poetry slam.
• Yes, you can use more than one of our prompts in your poem!

We’re very excited about our new challenge, and we hope you are, too!

The first prompt is:

The second prompt, from YeahWrite #357 fiction|poetry winner Christine, is: your story must contain the following three words: envelop, tide, wind.

Poets: write a poem that incorporates the photo prompt in some way, a poem that includes all three words of the prompt above, or a kyrielle poem.

Fiction|poetry challenge grid:

Basic YeahWrite guidelines: 750 word limit; your entry can be dated no earlier than this past Sunday; fiction or poetry only.

Check the submission guidelines for our full set of rules. If you’re not sure how to link up, hop over to our quick tutorial for getting started at YeahWrite! Otherwise, click that blue button when the challenge is open, and good luck! Come back to vote starting Wednesday at 10pm, and check out our winners on Friday!

YeahWrite Super Challenge

The third and final round of Super Challenge #7 is currently underway! Good luck to all our participants as they furiously finish their essays. Did you miss out on registration? Well you’re in luck! Registration for Super Challenge 8 is now open! Make sure you also sign up for our email blast so you don’t miss out on any announcements for the next Super Challenge.

Winners’ Round-Up

In case you missed them, you can find last week’s YeahWrite staff picks and crowd favorites all laid out for you on last Friday’s winners’ post. Leave the winners some love in the comments. They will love you right back, we guarantee it.

Last call: This week’s Weekend Writing Showcase is still open for business until the challenge grids start at midnight! No moderation, no voting. It’s a laid-back relaxed kind of place. Just leave your commercial or sponsored posts at home. Drop by, share your work, and while you’re there, visit your fellow yeah writers.

About the author:

Michelle submitted her first entry to YeahWrite in March 2012 and they haven’t been able to get rid of her since. After nearly 20 years in the insurance/employee benefits industry, she decided to give it all up to pursue writing full time. Her work has been featured on The Huffington Post and xoJane, as well as several local sites near her northern NJ home. She blogs at Michelle Longo.