Hi all,
For those who do not subscribe to the OTP (on the premises) newsletter, I thought I'd share the following, which I found very helpful....
I was going to enter, but my real-life deadlines interfered... so did not finish my story on time.
Congratulations to the winners (maybe some are AWers?
), and to all who made the effort to participate!
(I plan to take part in the March contest -- anyone else??)
......................................................
-----------------------------------------
"ON THE PREMISES" FEBRUARY 2007 NEWSLETTER
1) Summary of Contest Results
2) Stories That Did Not Win
3) Stories That Won
-----------------------------------------
*** SUMMARY OF CONTEST RESULTS ***
We received 68 entries for our first short story contest. All were read
"blindly," meaning the judges had no idea who wrote them. We rated them
with three adjectives in mind: creative, compelling, and well-crafted.
Entries were judged against each other, not some external standard.
The entries broke down like this:
Male author: 33
Female author: 29
We're not sure: 6
Literary or mainstream: 17
Fantasy (classic or modern): 15
Science Fiction: 14
Horror or Suspense: 9
Slipstream: 7
Other: 6
We use "Slipstream" to mean the story contains a speculative element
that is taken for granted, but never referred to as magic. Comedy is
not
a separate category, but around half the entries had comedic elements.
*** STORIES THAT DID NOT WIN ***
Sixty-three out of 68 entries did not win money. Future newsletters
will
examine common story flaws in depth, but here's an overview.
CREATIVE. After beginning a story, we often tried to guess what would
happen next, and how it would happen. Too many times, we were right.
One
very well-crafted story lost because we correctly predicted every
single
story development, from beginning to end, after reading less than 10%
of
it. Come on, folks! Surprise us! (But keep the surprises believable.
Good surprises make us say, "Wow, I never would have guessed that--but
it makes sense." Bad ones make us wonder if the author accidentally
deleted the real ending and attached one from a different story, hoping
we wouldn't notice. We noticed.)
COMPELLING. To us, "compelling" implies well-defined, believable
characters in a well-defined, believable, and *interesting* situation.
Are your characters well-defined or one-dimensional? Given your
fictional world, is your story believable or absurd? Is your story so
interesting that a *summary* of it would intrigue us?
WELL-CRAFTED. Numerous books discuss the craft of fiction writing. I'll
just say:
1) Spell-checkers won't notice if you wrote "their" when you meant
"they're," but we will.
2) Some word processors like to forcibly punctuate sentences, but they
don't know what a sentence is, and they're hopeless with dialogue.
Check
for mistakes like
"I don't know." Said Mary.
when you meant
"I don't know," said Mary. (We think "Mary said" is usually better
anyway, but that's another topic.)
3) Clutter. Figure out what really matters to your story. Throw out
everything that doesn't. Are you SURE the narrator needs a dog? Are you
SURE the narrator needs to spend four paragraphs walking the dog? Are
you SURE you need to describe in detail what your characters are having
for breakfast? The best stories say only what they must say to be
effective, and no more.
4) Read! Especially "best of" anthologies in whatever kind of writing
you aspire to. Ask yourself: Why is each anthologized story considered
"best?" What does it do well? How can I make my stories do that?
*** STORIES THAT WON ***
Congratulations to the following stories and their authors:
HONORABLE MENTION ($20): "Backseat Driver" by Cory Cramer
HONORABLE MENTION ($20): "Blood Brothers" by Michael Van Ornum
THIRD PLACE ($50): "Out There" by Mark Tullius
SECOND PLACE ($90): "Nathan's Last Lift" by Stephen Owen
FIRST PLACE ($130): "Friends Are Just Trouble" by A'Llyn Ettien
Our sincere thanks to all contestants. "On The Premises" would not
exist
without you.
Contest #2 will be launched in March, on the same day issue #1 comes
out. Look for the March newsletter, and keep writing!
For those who do not subscribe to the OTP (on the premises) newsletter, I thought I'd share the following, which I found very helpful....
I was going to enter, but my real-life deadlines interfered... so did not finish my story on time.
Congratulations to the winners (maybe some are AWers?
), and to all who made the effort to participate!(I plan to take part in the March contest -- anyone else??)
......................................................
-----------------------------------------
"ON THE PREMISES" FEBRUARY 2007 NEWSLETTER
1) Summary of Contest Results
2) Stories That Did Not Win
3) Stories That Won
-----------------------------------------
*** SUMMARY OF CONTEST RESULTS ***
We received 68 entries for our first short story contest. All were read
"blindly," meaning the judges had no idea who wrote them. We rated them
with three adjectives in mind: creative, compelling, and well-crafted.
Entries were judged against each other, not some external standard.
The entries broke down like this:
Male author: 33
Female author: 29
We're not sure: 6
Literary or mainstream: 17
Fantasy (classic or modern): 15
Science Fiction: 14
Horror or Suspense: 9
Slipstream: 7
Other: 6
We use "Slipstream" to mean the story contains a speculative element
that is taken for granted, but never referred to as magic. Comedy is
not
a separate category, but around half the entries had comedic elements.
*** STORIES THAT DID NOT WIN ***
Sixty-three out of 68 entries did not win money. Future newsletters
will
examine common story flaws in depth, but here's an overview.
CREATIVE. After beginning a story, we often tried to guess what would
happen next, and how it would happen. Too many times, we were right.
One
very well-crafted story lost because we correctly predicted every
single
story development, from beginning to end, after reading less than 10%
of
it. Come on, folks! Surprise us! (But keep the surprises believable.
Good surprises make us say, "Wow, I never would have guessed that--but
it makes sense." Bad ones make us wonder if the author accidentally
deleted the real ending and attached one from a different story, hoping
we wouldn't notice. We noticed.)
COMPELLING. To us, "compelling" implies well-defined, believable
characters in a well-defined, believable, and *interesting* situation.
Are your characters well-defined or one-dimensional? Given your
fictional world, is your story believable or absurd? Is your story so
interesting that a *summary* of it would intrigue us?
WELL-CRAFTED. Numerous books discuss the craft of fiction writing. I'll
just say:
1) Spell-checkers won't notice if you wrote "their" when you meant
"they're," but we will.
2) Some word processors like to forcibly punctuate sentences, but they
don't know what a sentence is, and they're hopeless with dialogue.
Check
for mistakes like
"I don't know." Said Mary.
when you meant
"I don't know," said Mary. (We think "Mary said" is usually better
anyway, but that's another topic.)
3) Clutter. Figure out what really matters to your story. Throw out
everything that doesn't. Are you SURE the narrator needs a dog? Are you
SURE the narrator needs to spend four paragraphs walking the dog? Are
you SURE you need to describe in detail what your characters are having
for breakfast? The best stories say only what they must say to be
effective, and no more.
4) Read! Especially "best of" anthologies in whatever kind of writing
you aspire to. Ask yourself: Why is each anthologized story considered
"best?" What does it do well? How can I make my stories do that?
*** STORIES THAT WON ***
Congratulations to the following stories and their authors:
HONORABLE MENTION ($20): "Backseat Driver" by Cory Cramer
HONORABLE MENTION ($20): "Blood Brothers" by Michael Van Ornum
THIRD PLACE ($50): "Out There" by Mark Tullius
SECOND PLACE ($90): "Nathan's Last Lift" by Stephen Owen
FIRST PLACE ($130): "Friends Are Just Trouble" by A'Llyn Ettien
Our sincere thanks to all contestants. "On The Premises" would not
exist
without you.
Contest #2 will be launched in March, on the same day issue #1 comes
out. Look for the March newsletter, and keep writing!
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