Do not want
Well, it’s not even mid-May and we’ve got our first “dangerous heat” warning. My garden, which I just! planted! last! week! is in mortal peril. The county is prepping the cooling centers for people living on the streets or without AC in their houses. Other folks are planning to take refuge in the libraries – which are becoming the last bastion of humanity, the last free place kids and adults can go to hang out for a few hours without being harassed or unsafe. Did I mention we’re well north of the 45th Parallel? When I was a kid, libraries meant safety and escape, too. Not from the same things, but in many of the same ways. A good book can take you wherever you need to be. What was your favorite book to escape into as a kid? Can you think of a few ways it has changed or informed your work since then?
~Rowan
This Week’s Writing Prompt is:
This week, your job, should you choose to accept it, is to write a story, essay, or poem incorporating the following prompt:
Trope: Die, Chair, Die!
We’re taking a cue from this year’s Scarlet Quill Society and getting some practice incorporating – or subverting – popular tropes. As I write this, it’s Release Day for Legend of Zelda: Tears of the Kingdom, and I can’t wait to get in there and smash some pots to get rupees. If you, like me, find it wildly implausible how much money is hidden in grass and under rocks in video games – not to mention in… tables? random pots in fields? you should join me in exploring this video game trope in a story. Will you choose to make it simply the way the world works and create a hilarious space between what the characters and readers understand, or will your characters be as confused as me by how kicking a tree creates gold doubloons? You can read more about Die, Chair, Die! on the TV Tropes website, and then share snippets of or links to your best story in Discord or on Facebook! I won’t read them because I’ll be playing TOTK for the next week solid, though.
Stuck? Check out last year’s — no, year before last! — series on responding to prompts!
Share your response in the Coffeehouse, located both on Facebook or Discord, 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, located both on Facebook or Discord. 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.
Scarlet Quill Society (Free Workshop w/ Optional Paid Benefits)
Welcome to the secret back room where the Scarlet Quill Society meets. In this year-long workshop, we’ll be focusing on tropes! Love ’em or hate ’em, you can’t avoid ’em. For the purpose of this year’s workshop, we’re defining a trope as a building block of storytelling. It’s a device or pattern of events that is used to solve plot or character problems or communicate meaning efficiently and effectively. Check out May’s post for a discussion of how tropes can present convenient answers when you’ve written yourself into a corner, or when you can’t get going. Then join our Managing Editor for a Zoom meeting on May 23 to talk in more depth about the topic, or even solve your personal problem story!
Scarlet Quill Society workshop posts are always free. In addition, we are offering a couple add-ons that we think you’ll find exciting and worth a few bucks a month: face-to-face (okay, virtual) monthly gatherings to delve into the topics and answer your questions, and an editorial backroom on Discord! And for a bonus, if you’re a paid SQS member and you can’t make it to a meeting, you can still send us questions beforehand and we’ll make sure to cover them.
Sign up for a membership today to join the Scarlet Quill Society and automatically receive the Zoom link and password for every meeting. One-off monthly meeting tickets can also be purchased on Kofi. At YeahWrite we believe information wants to be shared. If you can’t afford to join us for society meetings, we post the recording about a week later, and you’re welcome to leave the tip you can afford (even if that’s just a nice thank you comment). Check out our YouTube channel for more.
Super Challenge #28 (Fiction)
YeahWrite’s Super Challenge #28 (flash fiction) is officially underway! Good luck to all our participants as they anxiously await the first round results. Don’t want to miss out on all the fun? Be sure to sign up for our mailing list so you don’t miss out on any future Super Challenge updates.
WIP Write-Ins, AKA Co-Working Hours
Join Christine every Wednesday from 9:00am – 11:00am Pacific Time for regular WIP Write-ins. Other sessions will be scheduled in the future, so keep an eye on our calendar and we’ll be sure to post announcements of pop-up sessions in our Discord and Facebook groups. See you there! If you’ve been meaning to join us but can’t do Wednesdays, we’re checking our calendars now so make sure you’ve responded to the Discord poll for times! [Ed’s note: if you add that calendar to your own Google calendar, it’ll change the times to match your time zone automagically. No more searching “what time is 9am Pacific in Warsaw?” You’re welcome. /RBG]
NOTE: NO WIP WRITE-IN ON MAY 17!
Spontaneous Writing Challenges
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.
