Welcome to our ool.
When I was a kid, those signs used to crack me up. You know the one? “Welcome to our ool. Notice there is no “P” in it. Please keep it that way.” It was a friendly and humorous way of stating the rules for folks who for some reason didn’t know that it’s rude to empty your bladder into something that comes into contact with other people’s eyes and mouths.
Rules have another function, too. They can tell you a lot about the place you’re visiting. For example, there’s a big difference between walking past a house with a “no soliciting, please” sign and a house with a sign that says “this property guarded by two people: Smith and Wesson.” Each of those signs tells you something about the folks who live in the house it’s attached to, and you can make a decision about whether that’s a place you want to visit or people you’d be likely to be friends with. In the same way, rules can tell you a lot about internet communities. Is there a no harassment policy? If there isn’t, do you want to be part of a community that doesn’t think it needs one? Or using a closer to home example, when you enter a competition with voting, what do you want the voting standards to be? Do you want to enter a popularity contest, where folks compete to see who can attract the most friends to click on a button, or do you want to enter the kind of contest where you create something and are judged on the quality of that something by the community and anyone else who happens upon it? Reading the rules can tell you which kind of contest you’ve entered, or if you’re passing by, it can help you decide how to vote.
Finally, nearest to my cold, shriveled, pedantic soul, rules are part of most challenges of any sort, and part of the challenge is whether you can complete the task within the framework of the rules – even the silly ones. That’s why it’s important to read the rules before entering. Don’t be like the disqualified Super Challenge writer who was insulted that they were expected to realize that there were rules as well as the FAQ (I know, I’m confused too, it says “these aren’t the rules, read the rules” in the FAQ about four times, with links). Harangue aside. I love quality writing and nothing makes me sadder or angrier than getting a piece of fantastic writing that I can’t give a prize to because it had 1500 words instead of 700. Or a well-told story that I can’t nominate for an editorial staff pick because of all the spelling errors. I want you to care about your writing as much as I do, ok?
Anyway, TL;dr that’s why we monitor the popular vote for cheating and all grids for compliance with the submission guidelines: to make sure that everyone’s in the kind of competition they thought they were entering when they read the rules. Uh. You did read the rules, right?
But it’s not all about the popular vote at YeahWrite, folks. We also have our editorial staff picks to hand out. See, while there’s a popular vote winner every week, we don’t always give out a staff pick. Our editors comb the grids to find, not just the best writing on our grid this week, but what we think is pretty darn great writing anywhere anytime. Picks are based on writing quality, how successful the author is in conveying information, and just plain style. If you got a staff pick this week, grab your badge from the sidebar and wear it with pride! The great part is that we don’t have a finite number of picks to hand out. That means that if two, three, five, or even all the works on one grid are fantastic, we can give them all kudos.
The other benefit of the editors’ pick, of course, is that unlike the popular vote we’ll tell you why we liked that post. So don’t just skip reading the blurb if it’s not about your post; you’ll pick up some handy pointers about what makes good writing great that you can apply to your own work. For more of that critical feedback, keep an eye on our Roundup for a quick rundown of trends we see each week. We try to highlight the good stuff and point out problems that more than one writer is struggling with. There’s probably a handy tip in there for you right now, so check it out!
Once you’re done reading through the Editorial Staff Picks and Roundup (and congratulating the winners in the comments), keep scrolling down to check out who won the popular vote on both 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? Both grids have the same Winner, Editorial Staff Pick, and Top Three badges. It doesn’t clutter up our sidebar, and they’ll still look pretty on yours!
YeahWrite #364 Weekly Writing Challenge Staff Picks:
Nonfiction
I love tutorials. Maybe it’s the scientist in me. I like precise steps, organization, and a goal. Really, that could be said of any good personal essay, though, which is why this tutorial works so perfectly, moving each step in both the folding blanket and the growing relationship between the sisters along at exactly the right pace for the reader. The essay could have gone on a lot longer, but it didn’t need to: it folded neatly into the space. Little details like “lingering resentment” and whipping the blanket back and forth “to get the wrinkles out” gave the reader enough to connect to, to bring their own experience to the essay, while still being personal to the author. That would have been enough, but the last couple paragraphs turned the essay into a poignant exploration of the difference between the relationship with a sister and with anyone else in your life, no matter how much you love them.
YeahWrite #364 Weekly Writing Challenge Staff Picks:
Fiction|Poetry
Shel Silverstein did it. Lewis Carrol did it. This week, Katie from Kathunk did it too in her rime royal in iambic tetrameter. They all played with the form of words, while enhancing meaning and maintaining flow. With a playfulness that belies her clever grasp of language conventions, Katie gives us kennings like “moon-sparkled,” “unpockets,” “do-darings,” “playings,” and “stepfoots” that convey a richness of meaning and vivid imagery. She drew us into a child’s world by juxtaposing these kennings against the call to grand adventures, and also through subtle references to existing children’s literature (was it only Alice that discovered a key in her pocket that unlocked the door to Wonderland?).
[ed’s note: sometimes we think that poetry always has to be The Most SRSBZNSS Thing Ever With All The Emotions before anyone will think it’s good. But that’s not the case. You can handle any subject well enough for poetry. Give it a shot! /rbg]
YeahWrite #364 Weekly Writing Challenge Staff Picks:
Microprose
Like a photographer, Katie methodically zooms in on a single individual, taking us from a global, clinical perspective to a familiar, immediate one. It’s a really effective way to make the reader care about not just the individual, but the larger tragedy. If you needed a vocabulary word this week, it’s synecdoche; Saleema standing in for all of Syria.
Rowan’s Roundup: YeahWrite Weekly Writing Challenge #364
Stopping when you’re done telling the story can be the hardest part of nonfiction. There’s always something more you could say, some way to put a bow on your story, another detail you could shove in. This week’s grid was full of writers that handled the problem masterfully, stopping at just the right point, the right number of details. As you read back through, think about ways you can employ these techniques. Examine every sentence, especially in the shorter essays, and see how the writer made the decision to include this memory that moves the story forward but not that one which is real but not productive for the reader.
When I was a wee little Rowan, I would write stories that had fifty characters by the third page, and would have to kill a lot of them off to make room for plot to happen because I couldn’t keep track of them. As a slightly larger Rowan, I would write long rambling explorations of the mind and backstory of a single character that never seemed to get around to plot. Neither of these things really contributed to a story. One of the balancing acts of fiction is figuring out how many characters you have room to develop, without doing yourself out of the amount of room they need to interact and form a plot. One is – usually – too few. Fifty is definitely too many, unless you’re writing a full-length novel. What’s your sweet spot?
Have I yelled about pronouns lately? I probably have. In microprose, it’s critical to write with precision. Every verb tense has to agree, every pronoun has to be clearly linked to its noun, or consistent (no changing which “she” you’re referring to in a story with no names, make sure that “it” is the object you intend it to be). Once your reader is thrown off, you don’t have enough words to rescue them before the story ends, so on your final readthrough make sure you didn’t accidentally edit out something you needed to keep yourself pointed the right direction.
That’s it for this week! Remember, we don’t always give out a pick on both grids; if we were impressed by several posts on one grid we’ll give them all picks, and if nothing really stood out for us we’ll hold off. If you didn’t get a pick this week, read back through the Roundup to see if you can use some of this week’s tips and tricks.
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, and don’t forget, the Weekend Writing Showcase opens tonight at 6pm Eastern US Time!
Congratulations to the Crowd Favorites at YeahWrite #364
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.
Nonfiction
Loading InLinkz ...Fiction|Poetry
Loading InLinkz ... Loading InLinkz ...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.
