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Welcome to YeahWrite’s Weekly Writing Challenge #419

by | Apr 20, 2019 | Fiction|Poetry, Kickoff, Nonfiction, YeahWrite

New Year, new age, old me

This week has been a big one for me. It started with Vishu–the celebration of the New Year in Kerala–on Monday. Vishu signals the end of the spring equinox in Kerala and the transition into the first solar month in the Malayalam calendar. The day begins by viewing specific items; particular flowers, unhusked rice, gold or silver coins, a lit oil lamp, and a mirror are among the most important. The best part is receiving the Vishu kaineetam. Just as on Chinese New Year people gift little red hongbao packets filled with money, on Vishu we’re gifted money from our elders. Who doesn’t love an ancient tradition of receiving money on New Year?

If starting a whole new year this week wasn’t enough excitement, today (Saturday) is my birthday. And it’s a big one. Today marks half my century on the planet. I’ve never been a fan of birthdays–not because I worry about getting older, or because age is meaningful to me, but because I really hate the attention. So, to mark my 50th birthday, I’m escaping all possibilities of celebration and parties, and travelling to Singapore with my family. As a bonus I’m meeting up with YeahWriter Hema while I’m there. All in all, this feels like a pretty great way to spend my half-century.

~ Asha

Welcome to Week 419

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 Saturday 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.

Technique Toolbox: Year of Fearless Writing – Critique Groups

Ready to take yourself seriously as a writer? Not sure how, or not convinced you’re ready? We think you can, and are, and will be. This year is our Year of Fearless Writing, where we’re going to focus on the craft of writing, not the art, to take you from “I write” to “I’m a writer.”

In April we’re going to tell you all about critique groups. How can you tell if your idea is good? Are you stuck on a plot point? A critique group can help you sort out in-progress writing that isn’t ready for an edit, or figure out what’s missing in a piece that’s racking up rejections.

Nonfiction: Optional Prompt

The nonfiction grid has no mandatory prompts. However, each week, we will give you an optional prompt in case that helps your mostly-true story juices flow. This week’s prompt is to write about a time you saw something unexpected. Have fun!

Fiction|Poetry Mandatory Prompt

Prompt Up is our mandatory weekly writing prompt for the fiction|poetry challenge! Here's How It Works!

After two months of some pretty challenging prompts, we’re steering this ship back to familiar waters. Two prompts! Woo hoo! The first prompt, selected by the winner of the Fiction|Poetry challenge two weeks ago, will be an occupation. The second prompt, selected by the YeahWrite editors, will be a line of dialogue that must be included somewhere in the story.

The occupation prompt, chosen by our YeahWrite #417 fiction|poetry winner, Jen, is: School bus driver. One of your characters must have this as their primary occupation. The character doesn’t have to be your main or point-of-view character, but they shouldn’t be a throwaway character that’s only in your story for one line. They should matter to the story.

The dialogue prompt, which must not be changed in any way, is: “Okay then, humor me. Why should I?” 

Poets: It’s National Poetry Month! This month we’re focusing on reading and writing more poetry. Work at least one of our prompts into a poem in any style or form! If the prompts aren’t speaking to you this week, remember that our nonfiction grid also accepts poetry that speaks your truth, and doesn’t require you to write to a prompt. And for this month only, we’re waiving our linkup rules for poetry. It’s fine to also link to your NaPoWriMo, Poem of the Day, or whatever other challenge you may be taking part of, as long as it’s not a competition and not a commercial link!

Poetry Slam - National Poetry Month

It’s National Poetry Month and all we want is… poetry! This month’s “slam” focuses on poetry itself, what makes us love it, and why we want to write it. Discover a new poem that you’ll love, and write one that we’ll love. It’s as simple as that! 

Since there’s no official form requirement, poetry for the fiction|poetry grid will need to incorporate one of the grid prompts. But never fear, our nonfiction grid also accepts poetry that speaks to your understanding of the truth, whether that’s your inner truth or the world around you.

For April, we’re waiving our linkup rules for poetry. It’s fine to also link to your NaPoWriMo, Poem of the Day, or whatever other challenge you may be taking part of, as long as it’s not a separate competition (i.e. with voting, etc.) and not a commercial link.

A QUICK NOTE REGARDING OUR GRIDS: Inlinkz, which supports our grid format, is currently upgrading its offerings and may not be able to support image-based grids for a brief period of time. Don’t be worried if your link and other links appear as text over the coming weeks (or perhaps even months) during this transition. Thank you for your patience!

NONFICTION

CHALLENGE

Basic YeahWrite Guidelines

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Fiction|Poetry

Challenge

Basic YeahWrite Guidelines

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Looking For Microprose?

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

YeahWrite Super Challenge

Super Challenge #12 (fiction!) is now open for registration! Registration is open until April 24, so sign up today to take part in this awesome writing contest. Make sure you also sign up for our email blast so you don’t miss any Super Challenge announcements.

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.

About the author:

Asha keeps moving from one side of the world to the other. Her most recent move has taken her back to Perth, Western Australia where she grew up. She lives near the beach but hates sand between her toes. It’s a real conundrum. Asha began blogging at YeahWrite in October 2014 with this post, and YeahWrite was lucky to pull her on board as a Contributing Editor in December 2016. She is currently working on a novelette that grew from a series of flash fiction pieces. Asha is published in a variety of places including Modern Loss, PANK, Dead Housekeeping, and SheKnows. You can find her inconsistent blogging at Parenting In The Wilderness, or at her fiction blog, FlAsha Tales.

asha@yeahwrite.me

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!

750 word limit; your entry can be dated no earlier than this past Saturday; 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!

750 word limit; your entry can be dated no earlier than this past Saturday; 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!

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