In Today’s Journal
* My Quote of the Day
* Another Quote of the Day
* The Bradbury Challenge Report
* A New Challenge
* A New Short Story
* My “Top Mistakes” Book is a Go
* Of Interest
My Quote of the Day
“I never consider the opinions of writers who rigidly stick to any set of rules about writing. I suspect they would die of suffocation if breathing weren’t an automatic reflex.”
Another Quote of the Day
“I figured I might not have an input this week, until I saw the title of a YouTube video: Carnival of Rust. This is the highest daily word count I’ve hit all month. It got me thinking, and now 153 minutes later I have my story for the week.” Dave Taylor, in the email accompanying his story of the week (below)
Heh. As you can see, the Challenge really does push you to the keyboard.
The Bradbury Challenge Report
Participating in any challenge is a great way to have fun and grow as a writer.
The requirement is to write at least one short story per week, then let me know the title, word count, and genre per the format below. During the past week, the following writers wrote these new stories:
- Erin Donoho “Lillia’s Christmas Homecoming” 2500 historical.
- Vanessa V. Kilmer “Pastels” 3099 Romance
- Christopher Ridge “The Davey Jones Locker” (A Nate Cutter story) 3245 fantasy
- KC Riggs “Farcebook Revolt” 1009 Humor
- Dave Taylor “The Carnival of Rust ” 2,153 Paranormal
Congratulations to all of these writers.
A New Challenge
Christopher Ridge is starting a “Story a Day in May” challenge beginning on May 1. He asked me to pass that along in case anyone else wants to join him in the challenge.
This is a great idea! If you want to join in the fun, email me at harveystanbrough@gmail.com and I’ll put you in touch with Chris.
A New Short Story
“One Early Evening in Mexico” went live on Saturday at 10 a.m. on my Stanbrough Writes Substack.
I first heard a version of this story from my friend, Kenneth Flowers (IM). I jumped in among the characters and the next thing I knew, I had a new fiction on my hands.
I wrote the story years ago. Kenneth enjoyed both the similarities and the differences and gave me his considerable blessing to publish it. Go check it out. It’s free.
That’s it for the freebies from Stanbrough Writes, at least for now. Thanks for being along on the journey. You can read some 200 stories here, all free.
My “Top Mistakes” Book is a Go
After careful consideration, and anticipating that the book promo service I recently engaged will make a difference in discoverability for Writing Better Fiction, I’ve decided to go ahead with my next nonfiction book.
The current working title is horrendous: The Top Seven Mistakes Fiction Writers Make and Several Other Mistakes That Still Matter.
I’m not kidding. Told you it was horrendous. (grin)
Maybe I’ll just call it Mistakes Fiction Writers Make or The Top Twenty Mistakes Fiction Writers Make. Or Hey, If You’re a Fiction Writer and You’re Doing This Crap, Knock It the Hell Off. (grin)
Yeah, I know. Those aren’t any good either. I’ll figure something out. I’m pretty good with titles. Maybe I’ll call it A Shi*load of Writerly Sins. Or maybe not.
Anyway, I’ve also decided to post the book here one chapter or partial chapter at a time. I figure I owe you guys that much.
Of course, those posts will comprise only the unedited, not quite ready for primetime book, but feel free to copy/paste the posts for your own use if you want.
Or just print off the emails as they come in from Substack and slip ’em into a file folder. Or hit ’em with a three-hole punch and slap ’em into a binder. Shrug. Up to you.
I’m writing and compiling this as I go, so there will probably be a delay of one or more days between posts, but if I have to split a chapter over more than one post, I might occasionally post on consecutive days.
I hope to post three or four times per week (plus, of course, on Mondays for the Bradbury Challenge) but I’m taking my careful time on this one to be sure I cover each of the included topics as thoroughly as possible. When I’m finished, this thing will be a goldmine of information.
As for how long it will take to post the whole thing, your guess is as good as mine. I currently have only around 20 topics for chapters, but in my world topics often lead to subtopics and subtopics sometimes move up in the hierarchy to head their own chapters. Which is my long-winded way of saying (shrug) “I dunno.”
At any rate, this might be a great time to let your friends, writer’s groups, and critique groups know about TNDJ. It would be a great time for some new subscribers to jump in.
I’ll be back with the Introduction in a day or two. Talk with you again then.
Of Interest
Dr. Mardy’s Quotes of the Week: The Life of the Mind” A great post that’s chock full of quotable passages from Dr. Mardy himself. Plus, who lives more in their mind than those who write and study fiction?