In Today’s Journal
* Quotes of the Day
* The NEW TNDJ Challenges
* Of Interest
* The Numbers
Quotes of the Day
“Readers will return again and again to richly immersive worlds.” Kailee Pedersen (see Of Interest)
“Details can lend authenticity to the setting, but can also be used to set up plot twists, foreshadowing, or simply as imagery to additionally convey mood, tone, and characterization.” Kailee Pedersen (see Of Interest)
The NEW TNDJ Challenges
Since I’ll be reporting every Monday on both the Bradbury and Stephen King challenges, I’ll combine them under The TNDJ Challenges.
I’ve also revised and reinstituted the Run With Harvey Challenge. If there are any takers, I will include it in the report too.
These challenges are my way of encouraging you to write. The whole point of the challenges is to have fun and grow as a writer.
Participating in any of these challenges is a way to drive yourself to write more (and therefore, better) fiction. As you participate, your storytelling and craft skills will improve.
There is no cost, and you can jump in at any time. So what’s the downside?
There isn’t one.
You may enter both the Bradbury Challenge AND either of the other two.
Questions on any part of this post are welcome at harveystanbrough@gmail.com.
The Bradbury Challenge
- The only requirement is to write at least one short story, short-short story, or essay per week.
- The intention of this challenge is that you write at least one short story or essay (or mix and match) per week for 52 weeks in a row. You pick your start date.
- Each week, anytime before TNDJ goes live on Monday morning, email me at harveystanbrough@gmail.com with your story title, word count, and genre.
- Although the challenge is for a year, you may claim a prize (see below) each time you successfully complete six months without breaking your streak.
- This offer is valid for up to four prizes. And yes, for those of you who’ve been in the Bradbury Challenge for awhile, this is retroactive. Email me.
The Stephen King Challenge
- The requirement is to maintain a mean average of at least 1000 words per day (per Stephen King) as you proceed through writing a novel or novella. Again, you pick your start date.
- Each week, anytime before TNDJ goes live on Monday morning, email me at harveystanbrough@gmail.com with your novel or novella title, your word count for the week, the genre, and your total word count to date.
- If your novel or novella ends with a short day of writing, you don’t have to include that short day in your mean average.
- You may claim a prize (see below) each time you successfully complete a novel (over 25,000 words) or novella (15,000 to 24,999 words).
- This offer is valid for up to four novels/novellas and four prizes.
The Run With Harvey Challenge
Although similar to the Stephen King Challenge, this is a different animal.
- The requirement for this challenge is only to maintain a mean average of 2000 words per day of fiction for any 3-month period. You pick your start date.
- The words can go into any work of fiction—any short story, novella, or novel—or any combination of those. All that matters is that you write 2000 words per day of fiction, again, on average.
- Each week, anytime before TNDJ goes live on Monday morning, email me at harveystanbrough@gmail.com with your word count for the week and your total word count to date (from your starting date).
- You may claim a prize (see below) each time you successfully complete 3 months in a row of maintaining a mean average of 2000 words of fiction per day.
- This offer is valid for up to four prizes.
Once you establish a writing habit, this is probably the easiest of all of the TNDJ challenges.
Prizes
These prize awards are not automatic. Keep up with your writing. When the time comes to claim a prize, you have to email me and tell me what you want.
You may choose…
- Any two of my nonfiction books on writing, OR
- Audio Course 1, 6, or 7 OR any two of Courses 2, 3, 4, and 5, OR
- Any one of my omnibus fiction collections:
- Blackwell Ops: Soleada Garcia | The Subseries (7 novels under one cover),
- The Nick Spalding Saga (4 action-adventure novels under one cover)
- Stern Talbot, PI Omnibus (5 novels and 2 novellas under one cover)
- One-Off Mysteries Omnibus (6 novels and a novella under one cover)
- The Journey Home (the complete 10-volume SF saga)
- Wes Crowley | The Original 6-Volume Story (the first 3 novels I ever wrote and the 3 prequels to those under one cover. This is a period western.)
Substitutions
If you’d rather have a novel or short series (novel and sequel) instead of one of the prizes above, email to let me know the title of the novel(s) you want.
You can view covers and read descriptions of all of my books and collections at StoneThread Publishing (not a buy link).
I’ll deliver all prizes via email in PDF, .epub, and .mobi.
Happy writing!
Talk with you again soon.
Of Interest
Dark Corners: 4 Strategies for Developing Horror Settings Immersive is immersive. Chances are, you can use these in pretty much any genre.
Johnny Goes to Songwriting Camp This explains in another way that writing fiction is writing fiction regardless of literary genre.
Livestream Earth from the International Space Station Maybe get an alien’s viewpoint?
The Numbers
The Journal…………………………… 890
Writing of Blackwell Ops 47: Sam Granger | Special Duty
Day 1…… 3250 words. To date…… 3250
Day 2…… 1110 words. To date…… 4360
Day 3…… 3323 words. To date…… 7683
Day 4…… 1656 words. To date…… 9339
Day 5…… 1413 words. To date…… 10752
Day 6…… 3135 words. To date…… 13887
Day 7…… 3338 words. To date…… 17225
Day 8…… 1228 words. To date…… 18453
Fiction for September……………… 7701
Fiction for 2025………………………. 541850
Nonfiction for September.………… 7670
Nonfiction for 2025…………………… 193920
2025 consumable words…………….. 728156
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