What Is StoryADay?
A month-long short-story challenge in which writers write (finish) a short story every day In May.
(And again in September.)
StoryADay.org is the online hub for writers taking part in the challenge: part blog, part writers’ community, all designed to help you write everyday, not “some day”.
Sign Me Up For The Next Challenge!
Signing Up
Story A Day May
- What Are The Rules? | Do I Have To Create A Username Here? | Do I Have To Post My Stories Online? | Do I Have To Write 31 Stories? | Does It Have To Be Fiction? | Do I Have To Finish What I Start? | If I Miss A Day, Have I Failed?
StoryFest
Legal Stuff
How Do I Sign Up?
Just make the commitment, above, and start writing on the first of the month.
Or you can sign up and have me send you daily prompts. When you sign up you’ll get a bundle of bonuses.
Story A Day May/Sept
What Are The Rules?
- Write (finish) a story every day for a month (N.B. we do this every May, and sometimes in September too!).
The details:
- Stories may be any length (50 words? 5,000?) but they must be stories (they must take us or the characters somewhere).
- Stories may be fiction or non-fiction (but if you’re already blogging in non-fiction or keeping a journal, consider trying fiction)
- You get to decide what “every day” means. If you need to take Sundays off, go for it. You make your own rules, but you are encouraged to set them up early, and stick to them!
- Join the community here. Or don’t. But in my experience it works better if you turn up every day and join in the comments.
- You can post your story at your site and link to it here, or you can simply post an update in each day’s blog comments to let us know you wrote. or here or you can simply post an update in the Victory Dance Group saying that you completed that day’s story.
Do I Have To Create A Username Here?
No, you can participate in Story A Day on your own terms. You just have to sign up, above, so I can send you (optional) writing prompts, and so you can claim your worksheets and bonuses.
BUT if you want more accountability and support, watch out for announcements about the StoryADay Superstars group that runs each time I run a challenge.
Do I Have To Post My Stories Online?
Absolutely not. In fact, you can watch this video FAQ all about this question.
One of the motivations behind StoryADay was to take the emphasis off writing-for-publication and encourage people to pursue quantity, not quality. Too often we get caught up in whether what we are writing is any good, and it gets us stuck. StoryADayMay gives you permission to write quick and dirty prose, to get out a bunch of first drafts.
[NOTE: some publications consider a story ‘published’ even if it has appeared in a different form on a blog. If you think you might want to submit your stories to publications, you may wish to keep them under wraps for now. Password protect your blog entries, post excerpts or summaries, keep silent, whatever you need to do.]
If you’re happy enough with what you’ve written to post it online, go ahead. If the thought of an audience is slowing you down, then by all means keep your stories private. You can polish them up, rewrite them, laugh at them or abandon them just as you please, next month.
You can still use the StoryADay blog comments to chart you progress, moan, celebrate, or procrastinate. Up to you.
Do I Have To Write 31 Stories?
No. You should decide before you start if your StoryADay rules include weekends, or if you’re going to need Wednesdays off.
Me? I’m going to try to write every day, because I think that’s the challenge I need. But I encourage you to make your own rules and then try really hard to stick to them.
Does It Have To Be Fiction?
A story is a story. If you want to write autobiographical stories, or stories from your grandparents or creative non-fiction, go ahead. If you’re already posting non-fiction pieces on your own blog, or if you write a personal journal, I’d encourage you to break out and try a few fiction pieces this month. Take a story that could be autobiographical and turn it into fiction. Just for fun. Just to try something different. But no, you don’t have to.
Do I Have To Finish What I Start?
Yes. Sorry, this is where I get strict. Yes, you should finish your stories and you should finish a story every day.
I’ve read a lot of interviews with and books by successful writers (I’ve even interviewed a few myself). You would be amazed at how many of them say “Finish what you start”. It is really easy to get bogged down or lose the plot around the midpoint of a story. By forcing yourself to carry on and find the end, you are learning to craft a story. If you don’t finish the story, you’re just writing fragments, not stories. You’re capturing ideas, you’re not crafting a tale.
Finish your stories.
If I Miss A Day, Have I Failed?
No.
If you miss a day or don’t finish a story, move on. You still have every other day of the month (of your life) which is a new day, on which a new story can be told.
Don’t go back and try to finish yesterday’s story. Leave it. Wash your hands of it. Move on.
As long as you keep writing, you’re not failing.
How Do I Sign Up?
Sign up here and I’ll send you reminders during the next StoryADay challenge.
You don’t have to use the StoryADay.org site to write a story a day, of course. Feel free to do your individual challenge at your own site.
I’ve Signed Up, Now What?
Showing Your Team Spirit
To show off your bold participation in StoryADay, grab a participant badge for your blog (other online home). Post it with pride.
Some People Seem To Have StoryADay.org/username Blogs. Can I Get A Blog?
It was a perk for people who took part in the first three challenges. This has been replaced by the StoryADay Superstars group.
StoryFest
What Is StoryFest?
StoryFest is a celebration of StoryADay May and all our hard work. It generally happens during the second weekend in June (more details to follow). It’s also my ‘thank you’ to you for coming along.
StoryFest is a chance for us to promote each other’s stories to the wider world by linking to them from Twitter, Facebook, blogs and anywhere else we can post. It takes place over one weekend only, in order to create some urgency, for people to come by and visit now, and not put it off. (The blogs, however, will be on StoryADay forever, as much as ‘forever’ exists)
How Can I Help Promote StoryFest?
Social Media Starters
Whether you’re posting in a blog, on Twitter, on Facebook or any of those other sharing sites out there, feel free to take any of these starter suggestions or make up your own. Customize them to link to your stories, other people’s stories or just the front of the storyaday.org site. Go wild!
#StoryFest: a celebration of the short story. This weekend, [DATES]. No admission fee: https://storyaday.org
[customize this next one for the genre and link to a specific story]
Need a little romance/mystery/time-travel/humor/suspense/sci-fi in your life? Try a short story today: [URL] #StoryFest
Short Stories: bit-sized brain food. Fine one that’s to your taste during #StoryFest: https://storyaday.org
Broaden your horizons with a day trip into someone-else’s world. Read a start story during #StoryFest: https://storyaday.org
Travel the world for free: Read a short story set in [insert location]: [link to specific story] #StoryFest
Ever wanted to time travel? Read a short story [link to a story set not in present day] #StoryFest
Personals Ads
I had what I hope is a cute idea: how about posting links to your story as if it were a Personals Ad?
For my story “Broken Toys”, about an adulterous husband, I could use:
“Married man seeks discreet female friends for casual fun” Will he get away with it? http://bit.ly/a4qdGs #storyfest #PlotAsPersonalAd
Other stories might read like this:
“Warrior Princess seeks fortune and glory.” Will she find them? http://bit.ly/a8KI3x #storyfest #PlotAsPersonalAd
What could you come up with for your stories?
Legal Stuff
Privacy Policy
If you have provided personal details such as your name and email, admins of StoryADay may use them to contact you. They will not be shared with anyone else (unless there is a legal imperative).
Site-wide notices will reach you when you log in to StoryADay.org, and are routed through your StoryADay username and account.
You may unsubscribe from the mailing list (powered by Mailchimp) by clicking on the unsubscribe links at the bottom of every mailing.
If you have subscribed to feeds (such as the Daily Prompt) you will find unsubscribe links in those mailings.
If you wish to password protect your entries on a StoryADay blog for which you have author privileges, the site admins (currently just me) may still be able to access them. It is StoryADay.org policy to access your site only to help you with a technical issue, if requested to do so. I will NOT be poking around on the back end of your site uninvited.
StoryADay.org will never sell, rent or give your personal details to any organization — beyond storing them on a third-party database such as that of the webhost (WPEngine, mailing list company (Convertkit), and Feedburner (e.g. if you sign up for prompts by email).
If you think this policy is missing something or if you are worried, please contact editor at storyaday dot org.
Rights
You retain all rights to your work.
What happens at StoryADay.org, stays at StoryADay.org. Except for the fact that any comments you post on the blog are public. So, there’s that.
If I want to quote you for any reason, I’ll ask.
Spam Policy
If you are a nasty spambot, using your StoryADay username and/or site for anything other than writing-related goodness, your site may be deleted without notice. Sorry. This judgement is made by the admins of StoryADay.
If you are a real person who is concerned that you’re writing something that might get you deleted: you’re not. Any hint of humanity/that you’re using the site properly most of the time, and I’ll contact you before taking any action.
Harassment Policy
Tl;Dr: don’t.
The Last Word
Please, please, please, back up your work. I do attempt to back up the StoryADay site, but you should keep copies of all your work somewhere else. Do not rely on me. (I’m serious about this.)
Where do I get an activation code? I’ve signed up, but I need this to log in.
You should have received an email with a link to click. Have you checked your spam folder?
If your story appears on twitter, face book, etc. Will it be considered published to outside markets?
Catgirl
Hi Catgirl, the answer depends on the market (see my answer above) but it’s probably best to err on the side of caution and publish excerpts or early drafts only.
I have joined just now. Can I start now?
Yes! Yes! Start now and write 29 stories –or go until June 2. Or never stop! You decide!
Hi Julie,
I read through the FAQs but didn’t come across anything as regards to posted stories being considered as “published” or not. I’ve read that, if a piece of writing is published on a blog or on a website, then it is considered a published piece and may or may not be used for submission to, say a contest. Can you verify this? Thanks.
Thanks for the reminder. I should put something up here about that.
Attitudes in the publishing world are changing, and more and more publications are willing to accept work that has been published on a personal blog – especially if it has been substantially reworked before submission.
HOWEVER, some have not.
If you have any qualms, you probably shouldn’t post your work in full on any blog.
One of our writers here has password-protected their StoryADay stories and put a note on their site saying ‘if you want to read, just ask and I’ll send you the password’. This is one way to share without publicly posting.
You could also share excerpts of the work, or only post them in a private group at the StoryADay site (or elsewhere).
It’s probably best to err on the side of caution unless you know that you are likely to submit a story to a specific market and that its editors don’t care too much about where it has been posted before. (You can usually find this information in the writers’ guidelines for each publication).
I wish I had a simpler, more complete answer, but that’s the best I’ve got for now.
Thanks for asking. I will update the FAQ.
Hi, julie!
I love this challenge.
my core question: can I write in spanish? Is it possible?
Absolutely! You could start a Spanish-language group at the site if you like.
(Sadly my Spanish is very poor, so I won’t be able to comment much…)
Do scripts count as stories, or is it short story type prose only?
Yes! Yes! I think so, don’t you? Anyway the rules are fairly loose around here and you pretty much get to set them yourself. Write, finish. Every day. (Or as many days a week as seems slightly-unreasonable to you…)
Hi Julie,
I keep trying to register, but each time I click on the link, I get a message that says “User registration is currently not allowed.” Am I doing something wrong, or is registration closed?
I moderate a writers group, and at last night’s meeting one of the members told us all about StoryaDay. I’ve challenged my group members to check into the site and consider taking the challenge. If we can’t sign up, we can still do the challange on our own, but I want to let the members know.
Can you help?
Hi! Sorry about the sign up thing. I don’t open registration until a few days before the challenge (in part to cut down on the spam-bots).
Signing up for the Advance Notice mailing list is the way to go for now. (If you’re on the mailing list you’ll get a notice a few days before everyone else that registrations are open.)
I would love to have you and your group here. Once I open up the site you can set up a group and a forum of your own, if you like. That’ll happen in a few days. Thanks for getting in touch!