Bradbury, and Contest Results

by

In Today’s Journal

* The Bradbury Challenge
* Echoes of Chandler Contest Results
* Of Interest
* The Numbers

The Bradbury Challenge

The whole point of the Challenge is to have fun and grow as a writer. There is no cost. The only requirement is to write at least one short story per week. Feel free to jump in at any time.

During the past week, in addition to whatever other fiction they’re writing, the following writers reported these new stories:

  • Erin Donoho “Knowing Is Enough” 2000 literary
  • Vanessa V. Kilmer “What Roosevelt Felt” 3003 Speculative
  • Christopher Ridge “The Roach Whisperer” absurd fantasy 1839
  • Dave Taylor “The Abandoned Hospital Challenge” 2,372 Horror

Congratulations to these writers.

Echoes of Chandler Contest Results

This is a difficult result to report.

As I mentioned yesterday, there will be no anthology as a result of this contest.

But for this contest, there will also be no cash prizes.

I created three folders to hold the results of this contest: Accepted, Honorable Mention, and Rejected.

Yesterday I read every story from beginning to end. Each one had one or more serious glitches.

As I read and finished a story, when the story almost worked but didn’t, I put it into the Honorable Mention folder.

Usually that was because the writer either led up to something that obviously happened in the story but then omitted it, or because s/he inserted something that made no difference to the story.

When a story didn’t work for multiple reasons (often those glitches were stacked one atop the other), I put it into the Rejected folder.

At the end of the day I hadn’t moved any of the stories into the Accepted folder. As a result, none of them vied for the cash prizes.

Here, by story title in alphabetical order, are the results:

Honorable Mention

  • A Sky Gambling Den (Disqualified, no entry fee)
  • Cockers
  • First Kill
  • One Percent
  • The Gardener
  • The Top of the Seventh
  • The Woman in the Fog
  • Valerie

Rejected

  • Barn Stories (Disqualified, memoir)
  • Forged from Tragedy
  • For Sale: Used Spaceship, Seats Six
  • Raindrops (Disqualified, memoir)
  • The Brooch and the Broom Closet
  • The Island Game
  • The Long Way Home
  • The Mop in the Closet
  • The Secret of the Silver Brooch

I should emphasize that almost all of these were good stories in one way or another, but each had glitches (usually omissions or excesses) that rendered them WIPs rather than complete stories.

Intense Mentorship Offer

You all know there are two parts to every story:

  • the story itself (the content) as lived by the characters and recorded by the writer, and
  • the presentation of the story (how the writer presents the story on the page to readers).

As a way of teaching one-on-one and providing focused learning, I’ve decided to offer a mentorship to those who entered this contest and/or the Echoes of Hemingway contest.

For a flat fee of $75, I’ll use one story you submitted to either contest as the focus of the mentorship. If you entered more than one story, you may choose which story we focus on during the mentorship.

I’ll begin the process with a finely detailed, intensive line edit of your story. A line edit is far more detailed than a copy edit.

I’ll go word by word, sentence by sentence, and paragraph by paragraph through your story, pointing out places where the presentation of the story could be more appealing and how to make that presentation stronger.

I won’t change any of the content, but I might recommend

  • adding content that would be nice to have for the reader, and/or
  • deleting any content that’s unnecessary, convoluted, or distracting.

The line edit will focus on sequence, paragraphing, wording, phrasing, and even punctuation. What works and what doesn’t and why in all of those areas. I’ll tell you what’s lacking and what can (and should be) omitted or condensed to make your story a depth-ridded page-turner.

The line edit will include explanatory comments where necessary. But after you’ve studied the edit and my comments, I’ll also answer any specific questions you might have.

To take advantage of this offer, email me at harveystanbrough@gmail.com and please put Line Edit Request in the subject line. In the body of the email, be sure to include the title of the story (or stories) you want me to line edit for you.

You can make payment through PayPal with either your own PayPal account or with your credit card.

Any ‘pre-sale’ questions about this, feel free to ask. I suspect this will be a one-time offer.

I don’t expect a lot of takers, and doing this isn’t something I relish, but it’s something I feel you deserve as loyal TNDJ subscribers.

Talk with you again soon.

Of Interest

On Creating Secondary Characters Not vetted.

4 Days Left In Pulphouse Kickstarter

The Numbers

The Journal…………………………… 790

Writing of Blackwell Ops 47: Sam Granger | Special Duty

Day 1…… 3250 words. To date…… 3250
Day 2…… 1110 words. To date…… 4360

Fiction for August..………………….. 1110
Fiction for 2025………………………. 527757
Nonfiction for August………………… 7360
Nonfiction for 2025…………………… 175760
2025 consumable words…………….. 695903

2025 Novels to Date…………………….. 13
2025 Novellas to Date…………………… 0
2025 Short Stories to Date……………… 31
Novels (since Oct 19, 2014)…………….. 117
Novellas (since Nov 1, 2015)…………… 10
Short stories (since Apr 15, 2014)……… 301
Short story collections……………………. 29