But how do you do it?
I used to refer to fostering retired greyhounds as “serial pet dating” when people asked me how I could stand to just, you know, not keep them all. “I would have 50 dogs,” they laughed ruefully. But it’s not like that: while Mister, or Dioggi (say it out loud), or Radish is in your house, you know that Dafny or Audra or Spinach is in a kennel somewhere needing you. For every dog who leaves your home (and yes, those are all real names) there’s another one right behind it. That doesn’t mean that you don’t have favorites, or think some are special; but it means that you recognize the cycle of need and what you can do to nurture them. It’s almost the same with our grids: I love seeing everyone every week, and I have favorites, but I’m also excited to see what next week brings. That’s what the roundups are really about. Not looking into the past, looking forward and seeing what’s coming and how what we’ve learned together can shape that. Seeing your writing as part of a continuum, not just individual posts, will help you gain the skills and confidence you need to rise to the top of the popular vote.
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 the trends we’re seeing. 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 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 #409 Weekly Writing Challenge Staff Picks:
Fiction|Poetry
On top of just writing a good story, Maggie did a fantastic job of integrating the prompts into the plot. She worked them in by having the character interact with them and by giving them meaning. “The tiny cactus that he’d given her for Christmas” tells the reader what kind of relationship David and Celeste had found themselves in. And since the cactus was a gift from David it also could represent him, opening the door to making other gifts representations of the giver. The brother/best friend’s bomber jacket is the elephant in the room. Maggie attributes all of the emotions of the story to that one piece of clothing. The last image we’re left with is Celeste clutching the jacket and inhaling its scent, relishing her victory and grieving her losses at the same time.
Rowan’s Roundup: YeahWrite Weekly Writing Challenge #409
Sometimes I ping one of the editors and ask if I can make an example of them in the roundup. This week, heck with it, I’m calling myself out. I had no idea what I was writing about this week and it showed. Probably if I’d written this essay on Tuesday so that I could come back and look at it with some emotional distance (or better yet, on Sunday, edit on Monday and post then for optimized SEO or whatever you’re supposed to do) I could have looked at the end of the post and realized “Oh, I’m actually writing an essay about how family is a bunch of people who hold a little bit of each story.” Then I could have built this out with some parallel construction: shortened the story about Pony. Added another one. Probably used my parents clearing out their home when they built the new house and trying to figure out what all the stuff was as a framing device (that prompted some texts, for sure). But I didn’t: I wrote an essay on Wednesday in an hour and it shows, doesn’t it?
When you don’t edit thoroughly, you miss one of the finest things about personal essay: you may not know what your essay’s about until you’re done writing it. And that’s OK! That’s totally fine! But you need to build in enough time in your writing process to go back and fix the front end of the essay to give the reader some hints about where they’ll be going with you over the course of the next 750 words. Because when you don’t know, they don’t know.
Y’all, I get so excited when there’s enough poetry on the grid to make a poetry roundup. SO EXCITED. Partly because I help pick the slams, and when we get a full grid I feel like we made some right choices. So let’s talk about choices and exphrastic poetry (although this lesson can extend to your other poetry as well). An ekphrastic poem is still a poem. It’s not “a story using the picture as a prompt.” That means you need to turn on your poetry brain and be thinking about things like metaphors (does the tree mean something?) and personification (are the objects just objects, or do they have a life of their own?). Draw parallels between the artwork and a greater meaning or lesson or concept. Don’t just tell us what you see: tell us what it means.
Despite the semblance of luxury—
gilt edges, red plush,
and patterned carpet—this is no palace,
and we do not reign here, except in dreams.
This picture tells us much
about various textures of lighted air,
but at the center Hopper has placed
a slab of darkness and an empty chair.
Congratulations to the Crowd Favorites at YeahWrite #409
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 Challenge
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