!LP 2022 May Choose Your Challenge

Anyone who wishes they were writing more.

Whether you take part in the Fun-Size (one-story) version or decide to go all-in and write many stories, you’ll be spending a month acting like a writer: gathering ideas, taking steps to get to your desk, engaging with the writing community, and of course, writing!

You might want to write memoir or business stories and realize that brushing up on your storytelling skills is a fun way to do that.

You might be a novelist who just wants a break from their big main story (or who wants to explore other stories within their world)

Or you might be like me, a lover of the short story, who never seems to write enough of them, without a deadline.

Or maybe you’re just a sucker for a challenge and have no idea if you can even write stories. 

All are welcome!

Easy!

Sign up for one of the ‘tracks’ of the challenge, and wait for your daily emails to start on the 1st of the month.

Each day, do your best to complete the task sent to you.

In the classic challenge you write and finish a short story every day; in the fun-size challenge the tasks are much, much less demanding, but still keep you focused on your writing.

Then, click on the link in your email to come to the blog and leave an update on that day’s post, sharing how you got on. While you’re there, cheer on some of your fellow writers by replying to their comments.

I do not generally encourage writers to make their stories public during the challenge.

(As Gandalf said: keep it secret, keep it safe)

The challenge month is a time to play in your creative sandbox. Make a mess. Experiment! 

That’s harder to do if it feels like someone is looking over your shoulder.

I do, however, encourage engaging with your fellow writers in the blog comments, and sharing stories about how it’s going, and what you might try tomorrow!

Most people are too busy writing during challenge months to read other people’s stories.

In 2022, however, there will be an opportunity to submit one very short story to a ‘review lottery’. Towards the end of the month, I’ll pick a few representative stories and give feedback on them, on a live session. Your story might be picked!

Then, later in the year, you may have an opportunity to join one of our “Critique Weeks” (more details to follow)

If you’re taking the Fun-Size Challenge, then no. You’ll spend a little time everyday BEING a writer, but you won’t have to write every day.

Many people taking part in the Classic StoryADay Challenge since 2010 have indeed written a story a day all month.

But I also  encourage people to set their own rules. Want to write 3 days a week? Fine! Want to write one story every week? Fine!

Just make your own rules (that push you to do more than you’re doing on an average month) and stick to them!

I mean, if you like…but it’s going to be a lot of ‘me’ in your inbox!

I’d encourage you to pick one version…and don’t worry I’ll be sharing links to the other version of the challenge throughout the month, so you’ll always be able to see what you’re missing!

Sign up anyway! 

You can jump in right where you are, and go forward from there.

For the Classic Challenge, there’s no need to try to catch up, just start writing!

For the Fun-Size Challenge, some of the earlier materials may be useful to you, so you can skim through them. They are all tiny tasks, so you can easily try a few of them before jumping right in.

Don’t let another year go by until you find a way to free your inner-writer. Join us today!

Humans are born creative, but somewhere along the way we start to believe the people who tell us it isn’t sensible or respectable to play.

StoryADay is all about reclaiming that sense of play.

That’s why the classic challenge is so extreme in scale: there is a lot of discouragement to counter, so we plunge into a whole month of extreme creativity–balancing the scales, a bit.

• For some people that’s it. They have some fun, feel creative, get happy.
• Some people use the challenge to limber up before writing their next contracted book. 
• Some people use it to write stories for their memoir or for characters in their novel-in-progress.
• Other people have used the challenge to create a stack of short stories they used to get their first or fiftieth publication. 

Use the challenge to let your creative kid out to play, and don’t forget to share that playfulness with us in the comments.

I encourage you to be serious about your creativity, but never somber.