[vc_row][vc_column width=”1/1″][vc_column_text]Lorem ipsum dolor sit… is this thing on? Hello?
It’s Friday, Friday, Friday, so welcome one and all to the great yeah write winners’ roundup, coming to you on time and on line. Literally. See, that’s how you use literally, teenage niece of mine. For things that are actually true. It was literally the first time a couple (literally, because two) of you had ever entered a yeah write challenge, and welcome! We hope you had a great time!
You might have noticed, we’re getting a little excited about Halloween around here. Our editorial staff is all dressed up and ready to hand out staff picks to the trick or treaters on all three grids this week, so if you see your name in there, run over to the sidebar, ring the doorbell, and grab your staff pick badge before you run away! The rest of you little monsters can keep scrolling down to see the voting results right there on the grids.[/vc_column_text][/vc_column][/vc_row][vc_row][vc_column][vc_column_text]
Yeah write #184 weekly writing challenge staff picks: non-fiction
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Sometimes you don’t need all that many words to make people feel what you want them to feel. Sometimes you can do it in one paragraph and such is the case with Air and Light. However short, this piece still has so much in it. We get the feel of nostalgia for the time when the narrator could actually see the changing colors of the leaves. We can picture the walk home from the library through the park and we can hear the leaves crunch. We feel the chill in the air and see the “overcast skies wrestling for dominance over sunlight.” There’s a feeling in this that’s just perfect for the time of year. The last two lines, with the last sentence only two words long, remind us once again that a simple piece done well holds so much more than initially meets the eye:
The thing about autumn – the air and light – it’s over in the blink of an eye. Like everything.
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It took me a second reading to really appreciate how Ana crafted her story. What could have devolved into a rant on people’s attachment to their electronic devices remained a very personal recollection of a life-long affair with reading. The best part? Nowhere did Ana write, “I love to read.” That came through in the details as she skillfully transitioned between childhood and present day.
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Yeah write #184 weekly writing challenge staff pick: fiction challenge
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Poetry is a tough medium to make appear effortless, but in the poem “
I held on for dear life,” Nicole Marie does just that. The pacing is deliberate and slow, emphasis falling on key moments as the speaker struggles with herself, with her partner. Words call forth a tired relationship with ease, crystallizing it in a single routine moment over the morning paper. She does this through vibrant images and active verbs, through personifying the ordinary and imbuing it with life. The house breathes, time crawls, answers appear in a napkin, and we, too, hope for the speaker’s resurrection.
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Sometimes you don’t have to know what a story’s about to get what it’s really about, as April reminded us this week. The argument, the sobbing man, the endless flow of words that the reader can’t quite catch, all of these things form a white noise backdrop to the real story. Just like the narrator, we are caught by moments and images of freedom on the “beyond side” of the repetition of our daily lives, and we can almost taste the longing to run so fast and far that “[e]ven her scarf wouldn’t be able to maintain its grip on her.”
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Yeah write #184 weekly writing challenge staff pick: microstories challenge
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J Edward Benoit’s microstory
The Last Great Beasts is both an intimate family moment – a father, confronted with his daughter’s absolute trust in him to do the right thing – and a prophetic glimpse into the not-so-distant possible future. Olive’s question at the end – “And what did you do?” – is almost a call to action, and JEB leaves us asking the same question of ourselves. All in all it’s a great example of telling a large story using a tiny snapshot.
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I really enjoyed how Kinley’s microstory blended real elephants with the “elephants in the room.” Most pieces this week picked one or the other but both resonated throughout this piece. The narrator confronting these elephants directly was a wonderful touch. I especially loved the ending, which described in a (pea)nutshell that the elephants in the room are never as strong or big as one thinks.
[/vc_column_text][/vc_column][vc_column width=”1/4″][vc_single_image image=”22393″ alignment=”center” style=”vc_box_circle” border_color=”grey” img_link_target=”_self” title=”stacie”][vc_column_text][/vc_column][/vc_row][vc_row][vc_column width=”1/1″][vc_column_text]Congratulations to this week’s winners! If you earned the highest number of votes in either challenge, you are this week’s crowd favorite. If you came in second or third, you get top row honors along with the crowd fave. Grab your winner’s badge from our sidebar!
Looking for your badge? Now that all our writers are under one roof, we’re sharing our badges as well as our drinks. That’s right: fiction|poetry, nonfiction and microstories have the same badges. It doesn’t clutter up our sidebar, and they’ll still look pretty on yours!
Everybody: before you go, please take some time to leave your favorites a little love in the comments.[/vc_column_text][vc_column_text]
Weekend moonshine grid opens today at 6 p.m. eastern time
When happy hour closes today, the moonshine grid opens. That’s right, at 6 p.m. today Natalie throws open the secret doors to the weekend bar and you’re all welcome to pull up a stool. Just don’t bring commercial posts, don’t sit with your back to the door, and if you find yourself with aces and eights in your hand for the love of Mike just fold and go have another drink of whatever that blue stuff in the pitcher is.[/vc_column_text][/vc_column][/vc_row][vc_row][vc_column width=”1/1″][vc_column_text]
Yeah write #184 challenge results
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Great submissions this week! Makes for a happy me to be getting back into the game here!
And thank you so much, Rowan!
Another week of wonderful submissions at YeahWrite.
Thanks to one and all for participating through your writing, reading, editing, hosting, et al. Congratulations to all the writers. A strong and talented bunch!
So excited about this! Thank you so much – and congrats to all of the winners!
Thanks Stacie!!
You’re very welcome! Congrats to all the picks and top row types!