CJacobo's Before The Holidays AW Contest

MacAllister · Sep 9, 2012

GUIDELINES

Entries must primarily consist of: Dialogue
Entries must represent substantial interpersonal conflict
Entries must be titled
Entries must be 3000 words or less (not including the title)
Poetry that otherwise fits the guidelines is totally admissible
All genres are welcome.

SUBMISSIONS OPEN OCTOBER 1ST and CLOSE OCTOBER 31st

Prizes to Be Announced - But they'll be damn good!
Including, but not limited to:
$150 for First Prize, donated by CJacobo
$65 for Second Prize, donated by swachski
$35 for Third Prize, donated by swachski

Rules

Entrants must be members of AW in good standing since at least September 30, 2012 (members who join later than September 30th will not be eligible for this contest). Limit ONE entry per member.
Entries will be posted exactly as submitted. Please make sure your spelling and formatting are exactly as you want them before you submit your entry. We will not proofread or edit the entries.
All AW members in good standing since at least October 1, 2012, are eligible to vote.

Entrants must vote to be eligible to win.

How to Enter
Send your entry to submissions (AT) absolutewrite.com AFTER midnight, October 1, 2012 and BEFORE October 31st at 11:59 PM US PACIFIC

Do NOT post entries in this thread. They will be deleted and disqualified.

VOTING PROTOCOL TO BE ANNOUNCED

You retain all rights to your entry, save the temporary non-exclusive digital rights you're granting us to post it for voting. The winning three stories will be posted on AbsoluteWrite.com, but only with the authors' express permission, should they so desire.

(With a nod to Smish, whose contest template I've blatantly ripped off.)

More details coming - but in the meantime, feel free to ask questions here!

Bufty · Sep 10, 2012

Does 'interpersonal' exclude non-humans?

MacAllister · Sep 10, 2012

Nope. If it's capable of carrying on part of a conversation, then it counts as a person, for our purposes.

Calliopenjo · Sep 10, 2012

Stupid question but, is this the short fiction contest that CJacobo originally posted or is this different?

Are we sending these as attachments or copied and pasted into the body of the email?

BunnyMaz · Sep 10, 2012

Oooh interesting! Dialogue is one of my weak areas, so this could be a fun challenge.

MacAllister · Sep 10, 2012

Calliopenjo said:
Stupid question but, is this the short fiction contest that CJacobo originally posted or is this different?

Are we sending these as attachments or copied and pasted into the body of the email?

Yes, this is the contest CJacobo was proposing - and send the story as an attachment, standard manuscript format.

Manuel Royal · Sep 12, 2012

Mac, just to be clear -- it doesn't have to be dialogue between a man and woman? (I think that was in CJacobo's original post.)

Looking forward to entering. Been meaning to write more short stories.

MacAllister · Sep 12, 2012

Right - we're going to open it up a bit further than that, for the sake of including more genres/conventions/situations.

Prog · Sep 13, 2012

Can I ask, does the title "Before the Holidays" have to figure into the story? Or does the story have to be set before holidays?

HarryHoskins · Sep 13, 2012

Great to see the contest off the ground. Good show Cjacobo for getting things started and offering a grand prize and nice work AW for making the TBA prizes so tantalising.

Here's my questions.

*Will the voting protocol be announced before the submission period opens.

*Is there a percentage or rough guide for the amount of dialogue required in relation to non-dialogue.

*Am I correct in saying there is no minimum word count.

*Does it have to be a new or previously unpublished work.

*When published for voting, will indentions in the text be maintained or will you use flat paragraphs with a line break.

*Will entries be posted for the vote in order that they are received.

That's about all I got for questions. Thanks in advance for the answers and double thanks to everyone involved on the organisation and donation fronts for setting up such an exciting contest.

MacAllister · Sep 14, 2012

Prog said:
Can I ask, does the title "Before the Holidays" have to figure into the story? Or does the story have to be set before holidays?

Nope. That's just when the contest will be running.

Sorry I wasn't more clear.

HarryHoskins said:
Here's my questions.

*Will the voting protocol be announced before the submission period opens.

Yep. The entries will be posted here on AW (In a passworded subforum off of this room) for a community vote. One vote per member. Participants MAY vote, and MAY vote for themselves. You'll PM your votes to a volunteer, still to be ~~shanghaied~~ determined.

HarryHoskins said:
*Is there a percentage or rough guide for the amount of dialogue required in relation to non-dialogue.

You know, let me talk to Caleb about that, and get back to you on it.

HarryHoskins said:
*Am I correct in saying there is no minimum word count.

Yep. But a 200 word flash piece is going to have to be pretty seriously incredible to stand up against the amount of development and characterization possible in a 3000 word piece -- not that it can't be done.

HarryHoskins said:
*Does it have to be a new or previously unpublished work.

Yes, new or previously unpublished.

HarryHoskins said:
*When published for voting, will indentions in the text be maintained or will you use flat paragraphs with a line break.

Flat paragraphs with a line break.

HarryHoskins said:
*Will entries be posted for the vote in order that they are received.

Not necessarily - but I'll post them in batches of three to five submissions, as they come in, so no one is trying to first-read all however-many at once.

In other great news, swachski has also donated $65 for 2nd and $35 for 3rd place prizes.

Prog · Sep 15, 2012

Thanks!

HarryHoskins · Sep 15, 2012

Thank you for the answers and ...

MacAllister said:
In other great news, swachski has also donated $65 for 2nd and $35 for 3rd place prizes.

Way to go swachski!

captain_ryan · Sep 17, 2012

MacAllister said:
Yep. But a 200 word flash piece is going to have to be pretty seriously incredible to stand up against the amount of development and characterization possible in a 3000 word piece -- not that it can't be done.

I just counted the piece I wrote last week for this, and I'm at 205. :gaah

Seriously though, I want to thank you guys for putting on this contest. I've been really struggling with finding time to write over the last year. I work three jobs, and writing for myself hasn't exactly been on the front burner. I was going stir crazy when I read about this, and I thought, "A competition? Now that's a reason to make time!" So to everybody involved, THANK YOU.

And, although I know the odds are against me, I'm eager to see how my 205 David fares against the 3000-word Goliaths. :e2sling:

Good luck, all. This should be fun.

Chasing the Horizon · Sep 17, 2012

This sounds really interesting.

HarryHoskins said:
*Is there a percentage or rough guide for the amount of dialogue required in relation to non-dialogue.

I'd need an answer to this too.

captain_ryan · Sep 18, 2012

Wow, that's a creepy avatar.

Calliopenjo · Sep 18, 2012

Any word on the percentage of dialogue rule?

Chasing the Horizon · Sep 18, 2012

captain_ryan said:
Wow, that's a crepy avatar.

Lol, thanks. And I don't even write horror.

MacAllister · Sep 18, 2012

Figure at least 75% dialogue - but with a little bit of wiggle room for really well-written pieces.

HarryHoskins · Sep 19, 2012

MacAllister said:
Figure at least 75% dialogue - but with a little bit of wiggle room for really well-written pieces.

Excellent. Thanks for the clarification.

Manuel Royal · Sep 19, 2012

Here's another fun question (relevant to the story idea I'm playing with): does it have to be spoken (as in, uttered aloud) dialogue, or can it be all or partially typed? (Within the story, by the characters, that is; obviously the whole thing'll be typed by me.)

CJacobo · Sep 20, 2012

Hey all, I just wanted to pop on and say thank you for your enthusiasm about the contest.

MacAllister and her team have done a wonderful job getting the details worked out and addressing your questions on this thread, so a big thank you to them!

I hope this gets y'all writing, and best of all, strengthening your craft. Happy writing. I'm excited to see your entries!

Manuel Royal · Sep 21, 2012

Manuel Royal said:
Here's another fun question (relevant to the story idea I'm playing with): does it have to be spoken (as in, uttered aloud) dialogue, or can it be all or partially typed? (Within the story, by the characters, that is; obviously the whole thing'll be typed by me.)

Would still like an answer, as I'm about to start on that story. If not told otherwise, I'll assume the in-story medium of dialogue doesn't matter.

ETA: Thanks again, Jacobo! Kind of excited about this; haven't done a short story in too long, and have a good idea, if I can make it work.

victoriakmartin · Sep 21, 2012

I think I've nailed down an idea for mine that would work, I'm definitely excited to see how it turns out!

MacAllister · Sep 21, 2012

Manuel Royal said:
Would still like an answer, as I'm about to start on that story. If not told otherwise, I'll assume the in-story medium of dialogue doesn't matter.

ETA: Thanks again, Jacobo! Kind of excited about this; haven't done a short story in too long, and have a good idea, if I can make it work.

As long as it's dialogue, then the format or medium isn't an issue.

CJacobo's Before The Holidays AW Contest

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