The TNDJ Challenges Revisited

by

In Today’s Journal

* Quote of the Day
* Sometimes to Start Again
* The TNDJ Challenges Revisited
* Of Interest
* The Numbers

Quote of the Day

“[T]his kind of challenge really gets a writer producing stories, novels, and other stuff. Just a regular amount really, really adds up.” Dean Wesley Smith

Sometimes to Start Again

With every story or novel I start writing, when I finish writing for the day, the act of closing my laptop seems to erect around the story a minor barrier: a parapet or a low wall.

Sometimes to start writing again the next day, I only have to shove aside the game or the Facebook feed or the internet, open the story or novel and read what I wrote before.

Sometimes that’s all I have to do.

Sometimes when I do only that, I realize my fingers are flashing over the keys again without me willing them to, the characters are happy I’m back, and the story is telling itself to me again.

The TNDJ Challenges Revisited

Dean’s post (see Of Interest) started me thinking about this again.

Today is April 1. The first day of a new month and the first day of a new quarter. It’s a great time for a challenge restart.

So here are the challenges I’m currently sponsoring and in which I’m inviting you to participate.

You can enroll in any of them by simply emailing me to let me know you want to. This isn’t a lifetime commitment. It’s an opportunity to test yourself for one month.

For some of you, today is when you will go from being a would-be writer to being a writer.

Please save this post to a Word document (to retain the links) for future reference.

The Bradbury Challenge

This is open to everyone.

The whole point of this 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.

The Stephen King Challenge

Imagine how competing with yourself in this challenge will help your self-confidence going forward. Not to mention how much IP you will have added to your inventory.

The objective is to write at least 1000 words of publishable fiction per day.

It doesn’t matter whether the words go into one or more short stories or a novella or novel. What matters is that you write 1000 words of publishable fiction on the day.

To help you reach 1000 wpd, I recommend setting a daily word count goal of 1100 wpd or higher, but that’s up to you.

The Rules Are Simple

  1. Email me at harveystanbrough@gmail.com to register for the challenge and qualify for the prizes.
  2. Email me once a week during the challenge with your word count for the week and to claim your prize.
  3. Email me at the end of the month with your word count for the month and to claim your prize.

Prizes for The Stephen King Challenge

Weekly Prizes—

If you’ve written at least 7,000 words of publishable fiction in any week (even if you fell short on some of the days), you may claim

Monthly Prizes—

If you’ve written at least 30,000 words during the month (again, even if you fell short on some of the days or weeks), you get your choice of the following:

By the way, Stephen King

This week’s FREE 1440 Society & Culture newsletter takes a look at the six-decade career of the master of horror. Sign up here to join!

The Run With Harvey Challenge

In honor of the first post in Of Interest below, I’m simplifying and reopening the Run With Harvey challenge for the next three months (April through June).

Despite the name of the challenge, you don’t have to match my numbers.

You only have to write an AVERAGE of 2025 words per day for the month or the quarter, from April 1 through June 30, 2025.

Hint: I recommend setting your daily goal at 2050 words per day. If you reach for that every day, you will succeed.

Caution: I’ll mention required totals below, but don’t think you have to eat an elephant all at once. Just focus on writing 2025 (or 2050) words per day.

Monthly and Quarterly Prizes

Monthly: If your word count equals or exceeds 61500 words in any single month (April through June) you may claim any prize from among

  • ANY OF my omnibus novel collectionshttps://stonethreadpublishing.com/omnibus-fiction-collections/,
  • ALL OF the Paul Stone, Jack Temple, or John Quick (your choice) Blackwell Ops novels (all are action-adventure/romance),
  • ANY OF my nonfiction books (including the omnibus)https://stonethreadpublishing.com/writing-books/,
  • ANY TWO of my audio courses (view the list at Audio Courseshttps://hestanbrough.com/audio-courses/), or
  • ANY TWO of my video DVDs (view the list at Video DVDshttps://hestanbrough.com/paper-books-and-video-dvds/, while they last).

Quarterly: If your word count equals or exceeds 182,260 words for the quarter, you may claim ALL of the above prizes.

All prizes will be awarded as follows:

  • All book prizes will be awarded via email as ebooks in your choice of epub, mobi, or PDF files.
  • All audio course prizes will be awarded via email as MP3 attachments.
  • All audio DVD prizes will be mailed to your PO box or physical mailing address. (So let me know that.)

The Rules

  • There is NO COST to enter, but
  • You must be on the list in order to claim the prizes.
  • To enter and be placed on the list, simply email me at harveystanbrough@gmail.com.

If you want, you may email me once a week with your weekly totals. If not, that’s fine. Simply email me at the end of each month with your totals and/or to claim your prizes.

Questions are welcome.

Of Interest

The Great Restart Coming

The Numbers

The Journal…………………………… 1040

Writing of “What Mothers Do”

Day 1…… 1699 words. To date…… 1699 done (not counted below)

Writing of Blackwell Ops 41: León Garras

Day 1…… 1847 words. To date…… 1847
Day 1…… 3410 words. To date…… 5257

Fiction for March…………………….. 81119
Fiction for 2025………………………. 266950
Nonfiction for April………………….. 1040
Nonfiction for 2025…………………… 82570
2025 consumable words…………….. 343010

Average Fiction WPD (March)……… 2617

2025 Novels to Date…………………….. 7
2025 Novellas to Date…………………… 0
2025 Short Stories to Date……………… 11
Novels (since Oct 19, 2014)…………….. 111
Novellas (since Nov 1, 2015)…………… 10
Short stories (since Apr 15, 2014)……… 281
Short story collections……………………. 29

Disclaimer: Whatever you believe, unreasoning fear and the myths that outlining, revising, and rewriting will make your work better are lies. They will always slow your progress as a writer or stop you cold. I will never teach the myths on this blog.

Writing fiction should never be something that stresses you out. It should be fun. On this blog I teach Writing Into the Dark and adherence to Heinlein’s Rules. Because of WITD and because I endeavor to follow those Rules I am a prolific professional fiction writer. You can be too.

If you are able, please support TNDJ with a paid subscription. Thank you!

If you’re new to TNDJ, you might want to check out these links:

Questions are always welcome at harveystanbrough@gmail.com. But please limit yourself to the topics of writing and publishing.

Leave a Comment

This site uses Akismet to reduce spam. Learn how your comment data is processed.