Hello, lovebirds!

Not exactly February anymore, is it? Valentine’s day is long gone. So what’s this weird, saccharine thing about? Why all the romance? Well, it is about to be April—April 1st, to be precise—and there has been a mighty hunger among the Discord community for something… strange. A joke, which just won’t go away. That’s why…

This week’s prompt is:

The Love Story of [???] & [???]

RULES ARE MODIFIED FOR THIS WEEK!
Make sure you scroll down and read them if you haven’t! You may not be eligible if you don’t!

If you haven’t picked up in it by now, this week y’all are gonna be writing slash-fic. 

Yes. You read that right.

NOTE: this is not an excuse to write erotica. Most of the usual rules apply, but the thing we’re losing this week is the ban on fan fiction (read the new temporary rules for more on this). So go crazy. Slot whatever characters, people, deities, entities… I don’t know… objects? Sure. Objects. Slot whatever things you want into the [???] placeholders in the prompt and write that story.

I’m looking forward to the sheer discomfort you’re all about to make me feel. I’m sure you are too.

But! For those who are still aching to write something a little more serious, you can do that! Just slot two of your original characters into those spaces and tell us that story. Heck, you could even write “The Love Story of Fear & Necessity” and present us with something truly abstract and fascinating about sentient emotions, grappling with each other within a person.

There’s still room for whatever brand of creativity you want to put to work here…

But there’s also room for some of the goofy things I know y’all have been aching to write forever…

You depraved creatures. You know who you are…

—

Remember, this is part of our weekly Writing Group stream! Submit a little piece following the rules and guidelines below, and there’s a chance your entry will be read live on stream! In addition, we’ll discuss it for a minute and give you some feedback.

Tune into the stream this Friday at 7:00pm CST to see if you made the cut!

The whole purpose of this is to show off the creativity of the community, while also helping each other to become better writers. Lean into that spirit, and get ready to help each other improve their confidence in their writing, as well as their skill with their craft!

Rules and Guidelines

We read six stories during each stream, three of which come from the public post, and three of which come from the much smaller private post. Submissions are randomly selected from among the top ten most-liked of each post, so be sure to share your submissions on social media and with your friends!

• English only.
• Prose only, no poetry or lyrics.
• One submission per participant.
• Use proper spelling, grammar, and syntax.
• Submit your entry in a comment on this post.
• Submissions close at 4:00pm CST each Friday.
• Include a submission title and an author name (doesn’t have to be your real name).
• Keep submissions “safe-for-work”; be sparing with sexuality, violence, and profanity.
• Your piece must be between 250-350 words (you can use this website to see your wordcount).
• Write something brand new (no re-submitting past entries or stories written for other purposes).
• Try to focus on making your submission a single meaningful moment rather than an entire story.
• THIS IS DIFFERENT: Please format your submission as “Submission Title: The Love Story of [???] & [???]” by Author Name and be sure to separate paragraphs. Of course, replace [???] with the name of each character/person in question. (Example Submission)
• YOU MAY WRITE FAN FICTION THIS WEEK ONLY. No slander or defamation, however. You can make characters act silly, but please don’t portray Shrek as a rapist.
• PROVIDE CONTEXT. After your story, include a small blurb in parenthesis about where these characters came from. If they’re original characters, just say that. This will not contribute to your word count. (Example: (Context: This story includes Gollum, from Lord of the Rings, and The Pale Man, from Pan’s Labyrinth)).
• Original art may be included in your submission, but is not guaranteed to be shown on stream. Only .jpeg format images shared via a direct link will be accepted. (Example Submission) (Information on “Direct Links”)
• No additional formatting (such as italics or bold text) will be applied to the text of submissions. Symbols or instruction indicating such formatting may render your submission ineligible.
• You must like and leave a review on two other submissions to be eligible, and your reviews must be at least 50 words long. If you’re submitting to the private post, feel free to leave these reviews on either the private or the public post. The two submissions you like need not be the same as the submissions you review.
• Understand that by submitting here, you are giving us permission to read your submission aloud live on stream and upload public, archived recordings of said stream to our social media platforms. You will always be credited, but only by the author name you supply as per these rules. No other links or attributions are guaranteed.

Comments on this post that aren’t submissions will be deleted, except for replies/reviews left on existing submissions.

Hello, quarantine pals!

Wouldn’t it be lovely for things to be interrupted by something pleasant? A little welcome intrusion into all the gloom and monotony? Something lovely to find and keep and hold on to during this decidedly un-fun period? I think so, and apparently the rest of our community does as well. That’s why…

This week’s prompt is:

Can We Keep It?

RULES AND GUIDELINES BELOW!
Make sure you scroll down and read them if you haven’t! You may not be eligible if you don’t!

Continue reading →

Hello shut-ins, both old and new!

Rough weather we’re having, huh? Looks like we’ll be spending an evening or two indoors. We might even miss out on some stuff. But it’s important to remember that, like every other rainy day before it, this too shall pass. That’s why…

This week’s prompt is:

Calm After the Storm

RULES AND GUIDELINES BELOW!
Make sure you scroll down and read them if you haven’t! You may not be eligible if you don’t!

No matter who you are, you’ll experience difficult, dark times. Upon us all, a little rain must fall. Just so happens that it’s falling on all of us at the moment. So this week, let’s all keep one thing in our minds as we write: reprieve.

Try to avoid sad endings and enduring difficulties that may have no end in sight this week. Turn our minds toward the eventual calm. Remind us that there have been better times, and there will be better times again.

Use your words to part the clouds.

That is your task this week.

—

Remember, this is part of our weekly Writing Group stream! Submit a little piece following the rules and guidelines below, and there’s a chance your entry will be read live on stream! In addition, we’ll discuss it for a minute and give you some feedback.

Tune into the stream this Friday at 7:00pm CST to see if you made the cut!

The whole purpose of this is to show off the creativity of the community, while also helping each other to become better writers. Lean into that spirit, and get ready to help each other improve their confidence in their writing, as well as their skill with their craft!

Rules and Guidelines

We read six stories during each stream, three of which come from the public post, and three of which come from the much smaller private post. Submissions are randomly selected from among the top ten most-liked of each post, so be sure to share your submissions on social media and with your friends!

• English only.
• Prose only, no poetry or lyrics.
• One submission per participant.
• Use proper spelling, grammar, and syntax.
• Submit your entry in a comment on this post.
• Submissions close at 4:00pm CST each Friday.
• Include a submission title and an author name (doesn’t have to be your real name).
• Keep submissions “safe-for-work”; be sparing with sexuality, violence, and profanity.
• Your piece must be between 250-350 words (you can use this website to see your wordcount).
• Write something brand new (no re-submitting past entries or stories written for other purposes).
• Try to focus on making your submission a single meaningful moment rather than an entire story.
• Please format your submission as “Submission Title” by Author Name and be sure to separate paragraphs. (Example Submission)
• No fan fiction without explicit permission from the source’s owner, and no spoilers for the source material if you are writing a fan fic.
• Original art may be included in your submission, but is not guaranteed to be shown on stream. Only .jpeg format images shared via a direct link will be accepted. (Example Submission) (Information on “Direct Links”)
• No additional formatting (such as italics or bold text) will be applied to the text of submissions. Symbols or instruction indicating such formatting may render your submission ineligible.
• You must like and leave a review on two other submissions to be eligible, and your reviews must be at least 50 words long. If you’re submitting to the private post, feel free to leave these reviews on either the private or the public post. The two submissions you like need not be the same as the submissions you review.
• Understand that by submitting here, you are giving us permission to read your submission aloud live on stream and upload public, archived recordings of said stream to our social media platforms. You will always be credited, but only by the author name you supply as per these rules. No other links or attributions are guaranteed.

Comments on this post that aren’t submissions will be deleted, except for replies/reviews left on existing submissions.

Hello dreamers and night owls!

Forget everything you knew about sleep , dream, the night, the waking. Let go of the downward spiral into delirium, the steady fall into the arms of rest. Tonight, all of that goes away. Instead of a descent, for this one evening, it will be a climb. Because…

This week’s prompt is:

Stairway to Midnight

RULES AND GUIDELINES BELOW!
Make sure you scroll down and read them if you haven’t! You may not be eligible if you don’t!

This is exciting for a variety of reasons, the least of which is that this prompt goes back. It was in some our earliest polls, but until now never had enough support to make the cut. And that’s sad, because it’s a supremely cool concept.

I alluded to this in that moody, sonorous intro above, but I see this prompt as a really fun subversion. Wakefulness is effort, exertion. The daytime is for work and struggle. Sleep, though? We get there by letting go. We fall into it. It’s gravity and sinking and languid descent.

So what does it mean to take that symbol and put it instead at the top of a staircase? Well, that’s the riddle you storytellers get to solve. We’re all eager to see what you come up with.

But there’s more here, because after all this is Stairway to Midnight, not Stairway to Sleep. That was only one possible interpretation. If, for instance, you take “midnight” to mean “hour of change” or “end of a day”, suddenly this takes on a whole new meaning. Now you aren’t climbing a paradoxical path toward the veil of slumber, but the necessary hill that precedes all change.

This prompt is teeming with metaphorical goodness, so go wild. This text is only here to provide a springboard for your big, beautiful, creative mind. If you don’t find what you need in my rambling, I’m sure you’ll find it elsewhere.

I’m sure some of you will even find ways to lose the metaphor altogether and spin something extremely concrete and literal from this abstract thing.

I can’t wait to see what the the twelfth hour becomes in all of your hands.

Enchant us.

—

Remember, this is part of our weekly Writing Group stream! Submit a little piece following the rules and guidelines below, and there’s a chance your entry will be read live on stream! In addition, we’ll discuss it for a minute and give you some feedback.

Tune into the stream this Friday at 7:00pm CST to see if you made the cut!

The whole purpose of this is to show off the creativity of the community, while also helping each other to become better writers. Lean into that spirit, and get ready to help each other improve their confidence in their writing, as well as their skill with their craft!

Rules and Guidelines

We read six stories during each stream, three of which come from the public post, and three of which come from the much smaller private post. Submissions are randomly selected from among the top ten most-liked of each post, so be sure to share your submissions on social media and with your friends!

• English only.
• Prose only, no poetry or lyrics.
• One submission per participant.
• Use proper spelling, grammar, and syntax.
• Submit your entry in a comment on this post.
• Submissions close at 4:00pm CST each Friday.
• Include a submission title and an author name (doesn’t have to be your real name).
• Keep submissions “safe-for-work”; be sparing with sexuality, violence, and profanity.
• Your piece must be between 250-350 words (you can use this website to see your wordcount).
• Write something brand new (no re-submitting past entries or stories written for other purposes).
• Try to focus on making your submission a single meaningful moment rather than an entire story.
• Please format your submission as “Submission Title” by Author Name and be sure to separate paragraphs. (Example Submission)
• No fan fiction without explicit permission from the source’s owner, and no spoilers for the source material if you are writing a fan fic.
• Original art may be included in your submission, but is not guaranteed to be shown on stream. Only .jpeg format images shared via a direct link will be accepted. (Example Submission) (Information on “Direct Links”)
• No additional formatting (such as italics or bold text) will be applied to the text of submissions. Symbols or instruction indicating such formatting may render your submission ineligible.
• You must like and leave a review on two other submissions to be eligible, and your reviews must be at least 50 words long. If you’re submitting to the private post, feel free to leave these reviews on either the private or the public post. The two submissions you like need not be the same as the submissions you review.
• Understand that by submitting here, you are giving us permission to read your submission aloud live on stream and upload public, archived recordings of said stream to our social media platforms. You will always be credited, but only by the author name you supply as per these rules. No other links or attributions are guaranteed.

Comments on this post that aren’t submissions will be deleted, except for replies/reviews left on existing submissions.

Hello everyone!

This is a call to anyone whose got a rabbit’s paw dangling from their rear-view mirror, a mutated clover pressed between the pages of a book, or a penny in their pocket they found staring at the sky. Keep all your lucky trinkets and baubles near, because…

This week’s prompt is:

A Roll of the Dice

RULES AND GUIDELINES BELOW!
Make sure you scroll down and read them if you haven’t! You may not be eligible if you don’t!

Bring on the gambling stories. I wanna see all your gunslingers with a bone to pick and your irreverent rogues with bones in need of pickin’. If someone doesn’t got with a card up their sleeve or a weighted pair of dice somewhere in the mix… well that just wouldn’t be right, would it?

Actually, it would.

This is a lot broader than that, because instead of explicitly writing something about gambling, take this prompt more broadly to be about chance. Chance, but also stakes. Because for that roll of the dice to mean anything, first you gotta ante up. Whether than means looking embarrassment in the face to ask that cute person out, or putting your life into a stranger’s hands—that’s up to you! Just make us feel that moment of tension before the dice settle.

It’s all in that roll, that top card of the deck, that falling coin. Take us into that anxious limbo where the laws of physics and probability melt away into pure emotion at what could be.

—

Remember, this is part of our weekly Writing Group stream! Submit a little piece following the rules and guidelines below, and there’s a chance your entry will be read live on stream! In addition, we’ll discuss it for a minute and give you some feedback.

Tune into the stream this Friday at 7:00pm CST to see if you made the cut!

The whole purpose of this is to show off the creativity of the community, while also helping each other to become better writers. Lean into that spirit, and get ready to help each other improve their confidence in their writing, as well as their skill with their craft!

Rules and Guidelines

We read six stories during each stream, three of which come from the public post, and three of which come from the much smaller private post. Submissions are randomly selected from among the top ten most-liked of each post, so be sure to share your submissions on social media and with your friends!

• English only.
• Prose only, no poetry or lyrics.
• One submission per participant.
• Use proper spelling, grammar, and syntax.
• Submit your entry in a comment on this post.
• Submissions close at 4:00pm CST each Friday.
• Include a submission title and an author name (doesn’t have to be your real name).
• Keep submissions “safe-for-work”; be sparing with sexuality, violence, and profanity.
• Your piece must be between 250-350 words (you can use this website to see your wordcount).
• Write something brand new (no re-submitting past entries or stories written for other purposes).
• Try to focus on making your submission a single meaningful moment rather than an entire story.
• Please format your submission as “Submission Title” by Author Name and be sure to separate paragraphs. (Example Submission)
• No fan fiction without explicit permission from the source’s owner, and no spoilers for the source material if you are writing a fan fic.
• Original art may be included in your submission, but is not guaranteed to be shown on stream. Only .jpeg format images shared via a direct link will be accepted. (Example Submission) (Information on “Direct Links”)
• No additional formatting (such as italics or bold text) will be applied to the text of submissions. Symbols or instruction indicating such formatting may render your submission ineligible.
• You must like and leave a review on two other submissions to be eligible, and your reviews must be at least 50 words long. If you’re submitting to the private post, feel free to leave these reviews on either the private or the public post. The two submissions you like need not be the same as the submissions you review.
• Understand that by submitting here, you are giving us permission to read your submission aloud live on stream and upload public, archived recordings of said stream to our social media platforms. You will always be credited, but only by the author name you supply as per these rules. No other links or attributions are guaranteed.

Comments on this post that aren’t submissions will be deleted, except for replies/reviews left on existing submissions.

Hello everyone!

It’s time to bolt down your eternal soul, trap your faith in a bottle, criss your heart, cross it, and regurgitate whatever prayers may have been sitting like stones in your belly. Do anything in your meager power to shield yourself from the celestial ire you’re about to draw, because…

This week’s prompt is:

Even Gods Bleed

RULES AND GUIDELINES HAVE CHANGED!
Make sure you scroll down and read them if you haven’t! You may not be eligible if you don’t!

Blasphemy is the well-trodden path, here.

There are stories upon stories of deities suffering some unexpected or unprecedented fate. Heroes outsmart them, apocalyptic monsters gobble them up, mortals rebel and revoke their godhood. Most of us will have heard some permutation of this idea, and for good reason. Like any trope, this is recycled because it has a power. It stirs us to thought in a variety of ways: Why put my faith in something ultimately ephemeral? If the divine can perish, what hope is there for a creature like me? If a mere mortal can wound a god, why are we looking to them instead of to ourselves? etc., etc.

A world of ideas. Granted, the majority of them pessimistic, but fascinating to think about all the same.

Alternatively, you might start to think about what “god” even means to you. And when you stray into this territory, that world of ideas opens out into a cosmos. Now you aren’t thinking of the divine; you’re thinking of all the ideals, hopes, philosophies, and forces they embody. Now the story seed in your head might not be about an actual celestial being spilling golden ichor from its first ever pricked fingertip; you may instead be thinking about a hole pricked in reality. A problem with the science which informs our basic perception. A figure in one’s life—a parent or role model—always perceived to be without weakness, showing the signs of their quiet suffering for the first time. A new writing recognizing for the first time the fatal flaws in their first manuscript (the one which was supposed to be a golden, prodigious, career-launching best-seller).

Whatever path you choose to take, heresy lies at the end. So come bold and impenitent, and show us all what it takes to wound a god.

—

Remember, this is part of our weekly Writing Group stream! Submit a little piece following the rules and guidelines below, and there’s a chance your entry will be read live on stream! In addition, we’ll discuss it for a minute and give you some feedback.

Tune into the stream this Friday at 7:00pm CST to see if you made the cut!

The whole purpose of this is to show off the creativity of the community, while also helping each other to become better writers. Lean into that spirit, and get ready to help each other improve their confidence in their writing, as well as their skill with their craft!

Rules and Guidelines

We read six stories during each stream, three of which come from the public post, and three of which come from the much smaller private post. Submissions are randomly selected from among the top ten most-liked of each post, so be sure to share your submissions on social media and with your friends!

• English only.
• Prose only, no poetry or lyrics.
• One submission per participant.
• Use proper spelling, grammar, and syntax.
• Submit your entry in a comment on this post.
• Submissions close at 4:00pm CST each Friday.
• Include a submission title and an author name (doesn’t have to be your real name).
• Keep submissions “safe-for-work”; be sparing with sexuality, violence, and profanity.
• Your piece must be between 250-350 words (you can use this website to see your wordcount).
• Write something brand new (no re-submitting past entries or stories written for other purposes).
• Try to focus on making your submission a single meaningful moment rather than an entire story.
• Please format your submission as “Submission Title” by Author Name and be sure to separate paragraphs. (Example Submission)
• No fan fiction without explicit permission from the source’s owner, and no spoilers for the source material if you are writing a fan fic.
• Original art may be included in your submission, but is not guaranteed to be shown on stream. Only .jpeg format images shared via a direct link will be accepted. (Example Submission) (Information on “Direct Links”)
• No additional formatting (such as italics or bold text) will be applied to the text of submissions. Symbols or instruction indicating such formatting may render your submission ineligible.
• You must like and leave a review on two other submissions to be eligible, and your reviews must be at least 50 words long. If you’re submitting to the private post, feel free to leave these reviews on either the private or the public post. The two submissions you like need not be the same as the submissions you review.
• Understand that by submitting here, you are giving us permission to read your submission aloud live on stream and upload public, archived recordings of said stream to our social media platforms. You will always be credited, but only by the author name you supply as per these rules. No other links or attributions are guaranteed.

Comments on this post that aren’t submissions will be deleted, except for replies/reviews left on existing submissions.