In Today’s Journal
* The TNDJ Challenges Report
* As I Recently Told a Writer Friend
* No Writing Yesterday
* Of Interest
* The Numbers
The TNDJ Challenges Report
The whole point of these challenges is to have fun and grow as a writer.
There is no cost. Feel free to jump in at any time.
Participating in any challenge is a way to drive yourself to the computer or legal pad and write fiction. It’s also a great way to build and maintain a streak.
As if writing more and better fiction isn’t enough, I even offer prizes. To see those, please visit The NEW TNDJ Challengeshttps://hestanbrough.com/the-new-tndj-challenges/.
Bradbury Challenge
The only requirement is to write at least one short story, short-short story, or essay per week. During the past week, the following writers wrote these new stories:
- Loyd Jenkins “Memories of the Mountains” 5810 Weird Western
- Vanessa V. Kilmer “Radiance and Radioactivity” 3317 Fantasy
- Christopher Ridge “Serial Killers H.O. A.” 1422 Dark comedy Horror
- KC Riggs “Sixteen Steps” gen’l fiction 2018
- Dave Taylor “A Reunion of Sorts ” 4,313 Dark Fantasy
- Dave Taylor “Cabbel’s Dreams ” 2,925 Dark Fantasy
- Mattie Fern Worrix “Will The Real Oliver Please Sit Stay” 4090 Time Travel Romance
The Stephen King Challenge
Maybe I’ll run this one later again. The only participant has stopped reporting, so I assume his novel wrapped.
Anyway, the requirement is to strive to average of at least 1000 words per day as you proceed through writing a novel or novella. Any takers, let me know before next Monday.
The Run With Harvey Challenge
The requirement is to strive to average at least 1000 words per day. The words can go into any short or long fiction or both.
- Erin Donoho 3800 words this week
- Balázs Jámbor 10,000 words this week
- Christopher Ridge 10,011 words this week.
Congratulations to all of these writers.
As I Recently Told a Writer Friend
Re that whole WITD thing I’m always blabbing about, as I recently told a writer friend who also happens to be a man of god,
It occurs to me that you and I have different jobs, and mine, by all accounts, should be by far the easier. But it isn’t:
You try to guide people to believe in things they will never be able to see, at least while they’re still drawing breath. Yet you regularly speak to believers, giving them further guidance, and convert former non-believers with much greater frequency than I do.
I, on the other hand, try to guide people to believe in themselves: the person who’s actually staring back at them from the mirror.
That’s something they can actually see and touch, a person for whom they can directly access memories of actual experiences, both good and bad.
Yet in my job, even those who already believe backslide with alarming regularity, and new converts are all but impossible to come by.
For my friend’s sake, and for the sake of his flock, I hope it remains so.
But as I told my friend, it would be nice to know I’ve convinced at least a few people to buy into believing in themselves too.
No Writing Yesterday
For the past few days I’ve been waffling back and forth with an appealing offer from a book promotion outfit based in London. The offer was initiated by a new writer friend.
I tend to be a trusting guy, but I also learned early on that if something seems too good to be true, it almost always is.
That ‘almost’ is what threw me, but after a lot of research and a lot of thought, I decided to decline the offer. Still, my fretting over it cost me a couple of days’ worth of writing. Maybe more on this later.
In the meantime, be careful out there.
Talk with you again soon.
Of Interest
Don’t Lose December… Challenge Yourself! Of course, you can also just do this on your own.
The Numbers
The Journal………………….. 640
Mentorship Words…………….. 0
Total Nonfiction…………………. 640
Writing of
Day 1…… XXXX words. To date………… XXXXX
Fiction for December……………………… XXXXX
Fiction for 2025…………………………… 754647
Nonfiction for December.………………… 640
Nonfiction for 2025………………..……… 265770
2025 consumable words………………… 1012848
2025 Novels to Date…………………….. 18
2025 Novellas to Date…………………… 0
2025 Short Stories to Date……………… 36
Novels (since Oct 19, 2014)…………….. 122
Novellas (since Nov 1, 2015)…………… 10
Short stories (since Apr 15, 2014)……… 310
Short story collections……………………. 29