Tune in
I took myself out for a coffee yesterday. I didn’t take a book, I didn’t check my social media accounts on my phone, I didn’t take a notebook and pen. I had no distractions, no camouflage. In the midst of a busy coffeeshop, filled with cool jazz, hot conversations, clanking crockery, and the hiss and groan of an industrial coffee machine, I was alone. And I really heard the conversations around me. I heard how people speak, where they place accents, how they modulated their voices, the words they chose, how they clipped words or trailed off mid-sentence, how the other person responded or completed a sentence, and I thought about how well-written dialogue reflects these stop-starts and incomplete utterances, the fumbles and stutters, the looseness of language and the fullness of expression. If your dialogue writing needs a boost, take yourself to a coffeeshop and listen to the way language is actually used.
~Asha
[Ed’s note: you can tell which editor doesn’t live in the US, where indoor dining of any sort is still a Very Bad Idea, and where it’s the middle of frickin winter. Still, maybe the rest of us should wrap up warmly and go sit on a park bench, or put a show on and instead of looking for plot, listen to how the dialogue advances that plot and informs us about it while still sounding like people just talking. /RBG]
Welcome to Week #506
Here’s where you’ll find everything you need to get yourself ready to put pen to paper (or fingers to keyboard)! Use our prompts—or don’t—and share links to your essays, stories, and poems in the Coffeehouse.
This Week’s Writing Prompt is:
Why are you naked?
Your job, should you choose to accept it, is to answer this question. There are no word limits. You can write fiction or nonfiction; you may interpret the prompt any way you like. Share your response in the YeahWrite Coffeehouse by linking your blog post, Google Doc, or other file. Check out your fellow YeahWriters’ responses, and don’t forget to leave them some love in the comments!
Looking for our weekly grids? After nearly ten years, they’ve been retired. Read more about the latest changes to YeahWrite in the #500 Weekly Writing Challenge Kickoff Post.
The Schedule
We will release a new prompt on our blog every Friday at 12pm Eastern.
Then it’s up to you! Write your response to the prompt on your own blog or website and share the link in the Coffeehouse. If you prefer to keep your work under wraps (and away from the eyes of potential publishers), you can still ask for beta readers in the Coffeehouse and share your work privately!
Every Monday, we’ll check in to see how you’re doing and what your writing goals are for the week.
Wednesdays are “Work-in-Progress Wednesdays.” Share a few sentences or even a paragraph or two in the Coffeehouse (no more than 250 words, please). Even if you’re not done writing, this could be the boost you need to stay motivated.
Did you publish a book? Do you have a story in a magazine? The First Friday of every month is for self-promotion, where you can share commercial links to your work for purchase. (You can always share the news that you’ve been accepted for publication, though!)
And of course, the entire community is here 24-7 to share your victories and setbacks, challenges and accomplishments. So come on in, pull up a chair, and say hello. We’re all writers here.
Upcoming and Ongoing
Sign up for our email blast so you don’t miss out on any upcoming classes, workshops, or competitions.
Ongoing: 20/20 Hindsight (Free Workshop)
For 2020 we’re looking back at stories. Didn’t get a chance to write one in January? That’s fine: jump in whenever you can.
In this, the last month of an unexpectedly long year, we’re not taking your stories apart. Instead, we’re putting them back together. No matter whether you participated in all eleven months of the workshop or for just one or two months, you know your work better than you did in January. So in December we’re teaching you to take the best parts of what you learned about your writing and yourself, and bring them together into the story you wanted to write in the first place.
Check out this month’s challenge and some suggestions for how to succeed right here.
Ongoing: Poetry Slam
In 2020 we focused on poetic techniques, rather than forms, and we hope you had as much fun exploring what you can do with language as we did. If you want to take a shot at anything you missed before, or try something new in your poetry or even your other writing, we’ve collected all of 2020’s poetry slams right here. If you do, don’t forget to tell us about it!
Super Challenge #18
Super Challenge #18 (microfiction) is officially underway! Good luck to all our participants as they anxiously await the results!
Watch this space for news about Super Challenge #19 for creative nonfiction, which will open for registration later this winter. Make sure you also sign up for our email blast so you don’t miss out on any Super Challenge announcements.
About the author:
Asha lives near the beach in Perth, Western Australia, but hates sand between her toes. She 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. Asha writes flash fiction, short stories, and creative nonfiction. She is published in a variety of places and you can find links to her work at Asha Rajan Writer.
