[vc_row][vc_column width=”1/1″][vc_column_text]”It’s a fine essay, but you buried the lede,” I told my mentee earlier this week.

What does that mean, buried the lede? It means the heart of your story or essay is so far removed from the places a reader looks for meaning that it may be missed entirely. While you don’t want to begin your essay “How I spent my summer vacation was like this…” neither do you want to wait for somewhere on page five to mention that all of the events you describe took place in the summer. How do you balance these two directives?

The easiest way to keep a story or essay fresh and avoid burying the lede is to make sure your first few paragraphs have only essential details. They don’t have to contain your thesis sentence or your plot twist, but readers should need to carry the information they get from these paragraphs with them throughout the rest of your post. Think about including main character names, the object that’s at the heart of your story, or the feeling you’re trying to convey. Microstory writers, you only have 42 words, so you know how to make every one count. Bring that sensibility to your first few paragraphs in a longer piece and see what happens!

Speaking of burying the lede, the actual point of this post is to give you the results on all three of our grids – nonfiction, fiction|poetry, and microfiction – so I’m going to do that now!

editorial staff picks

We know, everyone loves being popular. But here at yeah write we do more than just give you the crowd favorites every week. We also have our editorial staff picks to hand out. Our editors comb through your submissions looking for the best of the best. Picks are based on writing quality, how successful the author is in conveying information, and just plain style.

“Nothing breaks my heart more,” says our microstories editor Christine, “than when there’s a couple stories on the grid that I want to pick because they have beautiful imagery or great ideas, but the authors just didn’t bother with grammar and proofreading. Every one of those 42 words counts. If I’m faced with the choice of giving a staff pick to a great story with poor grammar or a mediocre story that at least is made of words and sentences, I can’t in good conscience pick either one.”

When we give you our staff picks, we really are looking at your whole post, and we have to be impressed with the concept and execution. That’s why we don’t give them out on every grid every week. So if you got a staff pick this week, grab your badge from the sidebar and wear it with pride!

Once you’re done reading through the staff picks (and congratulating the winners in the comments), keep scrolling down to check out who won the popular vote on all three grids. If you earned the highest number of votes in any challenge, you are this week’s crowd favorite! If you came in first, second or third, you get “top three” honors. Grab your badge from our sidebar!

Looking for your badge? The fiction|poetry, nonfiction and microstories challenges all have the same winner, staff pick, and top three badges. It doesn’t clutter up our sidebar, and they’ll still look pretty on yours![/vc_column_text][/vc_column][/vc_row][vc_row][vc_column][vc_column_text]

Yeah write #221 weekly writing challenge staff picks: nonfiction

[/vc_column_text][vc_separator color=”grey” align=”align_center”][/vc_column][/vc_row][vc_row][vc_column width=”3/4″][vc_column_text]

don’t know love by megan

[/vc_column_text][vc_column_text]What is love, anyway, and how do you know it? Megan addresses this question brutally and unsentimentally this week through the lens of her brother’s insistence that only parenthood is love. But it’s not only love that’s under fire in her post but society, the expectation that fulfillment means checking a set of boxes: career, marriage, parenthood; and that those who do not check those boxes in that order are somehow lesser, unfulfilled, no matter what they do with their lives. Even the act of judging itself is examined, judged, discarded… and collected tidily in the last sentence. This one’s worth a re-read.[/vc_column_text][vc_column_text][/vc_column_text][/vc_column][vc_column width=”1/4″][vc_single_image image=”22649″ style=”vc_box_circle” border_color=”grey” img_link_target=”_self” title=”rowan” img_link_large=””][/vc_column][/vc_row][vc_row][vc_column width=”1/1″][vc_separator color=”grey” align=”align_center”][vc_column_text]

That’s it for our staff picks this week! Remember, we don’t always give out a pick on every grid; if we were impressed by several posts on one grid, we’ll give them all picks, and if nothing really stood out for us on another grid, we’ll hold off.

If you’re lost in the middle of the grid and wondering how you can get a little more feedback on your posts, check out our membership perks!

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

Cast off your mooring-lines and steer your zeppelin our way to tie up at the moonshine grid. Port call is at 6:00 US Eastern Time tonight, and airmen and passengers alike are welcome. Leave your commercial posts stowed, though. They weigh us down.[/vc_column_text][/vc_column][/vc_row][vc_row][vc_column width=”1/1″][vc_column_text]

Congratulations to the crowd favorites at yeah write #221

The thumbnails are now sorted in order of most votes to fewest. Ties in the overall number of votes are broken by number of editor votes.

Congratulations if you’re at or near the top! Writing well is hard work, and we’re honored you’ve chosen us this week to showcase your entry.

If you’re at or near the bottom, don’t be discouraged. You’re in the right community for learning and growing as a writer, and we are always available with resources for those who ask nicely.

To our readers and voters: thank you! See you next week.[/vc_column_text][vc_column_text]

[/vc_column_text][/vc_column][/vc_row]