Re: New writing contest

I'd love to see this site do a [shorter] version of the NYC Midnight writing challenge. They present a Genre, a Subject, and a Character within a given format (short story, flash fiction, screenplay etc.) and do three rounds of elimination with different criteria for each round before deciding the winner.

So for example in their short story challenge, round one is:
Genre: Open
Subject: Evesdropping
Character: A Hoarder
Of 100 entries, 10 are chosen to move on to round two.
Round two:
Genre: Crime
Subject: A Secret Hideout
Character: A Disabled FBI agent
Of 10 entries, 5 are chosen to move on to round three.
Round three:
Genre: Romance
Subject: Winter Storm
Character: A Blind Retiree
A winner, runner up and honorable mention is chosen.

I think it would be fun, different and challenging. I especially like the idea of elimination being in three rounds to really stretch and challenge the winning entrants. Plus, it would be a blast to read/review the various stages of the contest.

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27 Reply by rhiannon (edited by rhiannon 2016-10-10 18:28:55)

Re: New writing contest

Mariana Reuter wrote:

A horror short story? The title of the conteste might be: A Horror Short Story Contest: Make Us Pee in Our Pants.

Kiss,

Gacela

Heh.  I once submitted a short story to an online horror e-magazine (Yes, I know online e-magazine is redundant.  It's a holiiday in America so, tongue)  Their stated criteria?  "Make us think that this had to be written by a psychopathic serial killer who would kill us if we didn't print it."  I didn't get published.  Oh, well.

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28 Reply by Charles_F_Bell (edited by Charles_F_Bell 2016-10-12 10:04:43)

Re: New writing contest

rhiannon wrote:

Just to be insane:  write a story backwards.  You know, time's arrow is reversed.  Examples would be the Sliders Episode where they begin on death row, and proceed to the trial, the arrest, the murder.  Merlin's life might be another, as he went through time backwards.

The talented Chris Nolan made a movie Momento on that premise, but in spite of cinematic tricks to inform the audience that the story was being done backwards that a novelist cannot do, it suffered the same fundamental flaw of being weighed down by too much backstory.  I wrote a short story posted here as The Legend of Keegan Perieres that ends with the backstory four times as long as the rest to explain what just happened (sort of). I doubt there is any TNBW judge to appreciate the literary artistic merit of such effort because the formulaic process of writing commercial fiction is so violated.

(1) President dies.
(2) Shot is fired.
(3) Keegan finds a starter pistol while packing up his house.

Causality is violated both in time linearity and on how the President dies - 1 & 2&3 are actually unconnected.

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Re: New writing contest

rhiannon wrote:
Mariana Reuter wrote:

A horror short story? The title of the conteste might be: A Horror Short Story Contest: Make Us Pee in Our Pants.

Kiss,

Gacela

Heh.  I once submitted a short story to an online horror e-magazine (Yes, I know online e-magazine is redundant.  It's a holiiday in America so, tongue)  Their stated criteria?  "Make us think that this had to be written by a psychopathic serial killer who would kill us if we didn't print it."  I didn't get published.  Oh, well.


But you slaughtered the full editorial team afterwards, didn't you?

Kiss,

Gacela

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Re: New writing contest

A contest idea = the "opening line must be spoken" and it connects to the a specific theme element that has just happened or is about to immediately happen.    The idea of this was to create memorable opening lines for novels, with my students.  Everyone has the same starting line.  Thank  you,  Mike. W McCoy

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Re: New writing contest

It needs to be genre-free so that regardless of what genre a person writes in, they can fit under the umbrella of the contest. So there needs to be a contemplation of what issues cross every form of story? The first word that comes to mind is relationships. Past, present or future, Earth, Mars or an alternate universe requires two characters to interact in some manner. How about two characters who begin in opposition of each other need to cooperate to solve a problem that seriously affects their world. Their world can be as small as the apartment they live in or as large as the universe they inhabit.

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Re: New writing contest

m w mccoy wrote:

A contest idea = the "opening line must be spoken" and it connects to the a specific theme element that has just happened or is about to immediately happen.    The idea of this was to create memorable opening lines for novels, with my students.  Everyone has the same starting line.  Thank  you,  Mike. W McCoy

What a neat idea, Mike. and combined with the 'multi-genre' and 'scary', I might even be able to get on board. Giving everyone the same first few words to spring-board off from levels the playing field a bit and makes us dig deeper. Now we need a min/max word count.

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33 Reply by Dill Carver (edited by Dill Carver 2016-10-13 17:52:55)

Re: New writing contest

I think the contest should be physical. I think we should fight. For equality's sake there should no discrimination between the male, female and male poet genres, we just fight... all in. Naked except for wrestling trunks, the winner will have carved the most memorable or evocative phrase into the flesh of an opponent using claw, blade or shard of glass.   

Last time we did this it was a great success. http://orig02.deviantart.net/149d/f/200 … master.jpg

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Re: New writing contest

Dill Carver wrote:

I think the contest should be physical.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vWz9VN40nCA
Take care. Vern

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