Luka's 2015 Novella and Novelette Challenge and Contest

Whether or not I actually participate--the chances are not, at least not immediately--the Nine Lives theme sounds like a good one to me. Also, speaking for myself, I'm looking forward to the prospect of reading more fiction from group members, regardless of the length it might be. If we end up with a slew of novellettes and novellas on the forum through the rest of this year and beyond, then both these new threads will have proved valuable.
 
Great idea Facing! :) Yes I would prefer to go for the shorter option. It would seem a more natural progression for me personally. Much more doable. I'm with Hoodwink, in that I shall probably aim for 17,500, so I can leave it open to be shortened or lengthened as needed. :)
 
Hoodwink said:
The forum also then covers micro, flash, short, novelette and novella forms.
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I agree with Facing and Hoodwink. It would be nice to have all of the short forms represented on the forum and if we change this one to novelette that would fit in nicely. But like Dreaming and Hookwink, I'll aim for 17.5k, too! :)
 
I'm glad people are suggesting this. .A novelette could be a great stepping stone on the way up from SS's before novellas/Novels... which was why I suggested it originally.... and if most people would rather give novelettes a try I'm all for it.

I have to admit 7500 -17500 words seems a lot more achievable to me, personally. Considering the longest other prose story I've ever completed was in the SS word-count range (<7500)
 
Where does novelette originate, btw? Is it just a publisher's/industry category? I've never really seen the difference (or need for it) though KatG's distinction is a good one.
 
It comes from the magazines and organizations that hand out awards. They had to have specific categories based on length, and so they set up a scale and basically sort of invented the novelette category to cover longer short stories. It's not just in SFF, it's pretty much fiction wide now, but SFF had the most viable genre magazine industry (still does,) and helped establish the terms.
 
I was just thinking how long it takes me to write a short story and so I was thinking if I'm writing a story that's possibly 3 times as long I might need three times as long to do it.

I also wanted to keep entering the flash and SS comps as I go along... I might struggle to finish a novelette in 6 months - let alone 3.

Although I don't know for sure - having never done it, obviously.

ALSO if we keep our deadline stories that run over length can jump up into the novella comp and novella comp entries can drop back down into ours if they fall short of their word count.

A small caveat in our contest rules could make novella non-theme writers' stories eligible for entrance. and our theme/s shouldn';t affect our entering there at all.
 
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I don't think that the length of the contest actually matters that much. As long as the reading and writing period was long enough there would be enough time for people to get in their comments.

The issue with serialization I think is that serials were often planned out and often written completely (at least in draft) before they were ever published. So that would suggest that novellas would need to be completed anyway, then released piece by piece on the site.

My suggestion, Luka, is that you just set it up the way you think best and then it can be bug fixed as it goes.
 
I have to say that at this stage, the distinction between novella and novellette seems a bit redundant and really wish there was one challenge/contest, with an optional theme, and a minimum word length. The eventual length will then dictate whether it is a qualifying novella or novellete, and what markets it is eligible for.

Would be really great if those taking part were able to share some of their planning and structuring, particularly those who've written at this length before, so that the newbies can see how its done and perhaps swap ideas, resources, links etc.
 
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I participated in a for fun short story writing contest in a group on goodreads. I believe the word count was 10,000-30,000 words? Participants had to be inspired by a list of photos, and received points by using certain words from a list of names and objects. I want to say the deadline was 2 months. Then each story was given its own sub-forum under the main forum subject of the contest. Each story took multiple comments, but it worked and was not too hard to navigate. I really enjoyed it and I'd do it again.
 
Fung Koo said:
I don't think that the length of the contest actually matters that much. As long as the reading and writing period was long enough there would be enough time for people to get in their comments.

The issue with serialization I think is that serials were often planned out and often written completely (at least in draft) before they were ever published. So that would suggest that novellas would need to be completed anyway, then released piece by piece on the site.

My suggestion, Luka, is that you just set it up the way you think best and then it can be bug fixed as it goes.
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I think the ooriginal idea for serialization came about when there was a much lower character count for story submissions. Since then the character count was increased by the site owner from 10,000 characters to (i think it's) 50,000 and I've since seen a 4500 word short story posted in it's entirety. So at worst the stories could be pasted across in 3 or maybe a few more sections rather than 15++.

We kind of don't have all the stuff together to post the contest thread yet and if some people are willing to take a stab at how the contest's invitation to writers should be worded that would be great to look at.

JonLaidlow said:
I have to say that at this stage, the distinction between novella and novellette seems a bit redundant and really wish there was one challenge/contest, with an optional theme, and a minimum word length. The eventual length will then dictate whether it is a qualifying novella or novellete, and what markets it is eligible for.

Would be really great if those taking part were able to share some of their planning and structuring, particularly those who've written at this length before, so that the newbies can see how its done and perhaps swap ideas, resources, links etc.
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We could always make the comp like the threads new title and adjust the word-count to reflect that I suppose.
Maybe make it 7500 - 40,000 instead. and make the theme entirely optional.

AND Any tips or tricks any of the more experienced writers like yourself want to share will be lapped up like warm milk by we cold kittens.

andrea_luhman said:
I participated in a for fun short story writing contest in a group on goodreads. I believe the word count was 10,000-30,000 words? Participants had to be inspired by a list of photos, and received points by using certain words from a list of names and objects. I want to say the deadline was 2 months. Then each story was given its own sub-forum under the main forum subject of the contest. Each story took multiple comments, but it worked and was not too hard to navigate. I really enjoyed it and I'd do it again.
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Photos for inspiration sounds like a great idea to me. Nice one, Andrea.

ALSO sooner SEEMS TO BE THE LATEST CATCHWORD in terms of deadlines. We know four months will probably get us consistently more options for sub-calls and if this is so we will definitely be training ourselves to meet real world conditions for writers

I'm not sure but I'm getting the sense that a voting thread might be iin order to be totally certain that everyone or at least a majority is getting the contest with the structure and content they want to see in it. OR Does that sound like overkill?
 
@Luka Datas I think you should poll for:
Number of months
Length of writing
Which Theme or Optional theme or None
Likelihood of participating

edit: you might even be able to add a poll to this thread
 
Bodhi said:
@Luka Datas I think you should poll for:
Number of months
Length of writing
Which Theme or Optional theme or None
Likelihood of participating

edit: you might even be able to add a poll to this thread
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you were right @Bodhi I posted up the poll. It seems to be at the top of all the thread's pages. It'll be up for 14 days so this should be enough time for people to see it and respond.
 
If I might make some suggestions:

Obviously, minimum word count, if you want to do longer forms, would be 7,500. That's a good boundary for those who are nervous about trying a longer work. And I'd suggest you set the maximum limit at 20,000 words or 25,000, the lower end for a novella. If you were all just trying to write one, you could go longer, but since you are doing a contest and want to have a short time frame, it makes sense to keep it somewhat lower so that people have time to read the entries. If it works out, you could always do a longer range for the next one.

I would suggest that you set the deadline at December 15th, possibly even December 1st. The holiday/end of year season is hectic with many time and family demands for most people. So you want a deadline for people to get it in before all that craziness starts. Then you want to give people enough time to read the longer works (I'm not sure how you've been doing these in the past,) so you might want to have the voting be in February, maybe by end of February. Or you could do October and make it shorter, but October is seldom a good month for these things.

While I think it's a good idea to ditch the theme because people find that too restricting, you could have a motif. Just pick something, say balloons, red hats, crows or anything else, and people can have their stories about the balloons or simply have a balloon show up in one scene. That's a minimum requirement but it could be fun and you could always have a secondary vote for most creative use of the common motif.

You could have check in points during the time period where people talk about how it's going and how they are setting it up, maybe put up an excerpt?, get feedback, etc. Be aware that all of your writing processes will be different from each other and there is no wrong way to write your piece. There are no rules in written fiction, so criticism shouldn't be based on a contestant not following "the rules."

If you have a workable thing for putting up the longer works in pieces, but there are problems, let us know and we'll see what Dag can do on the tech side.

There are numerous authors and such who have written tips and suggestions on writing novellas and longer works. While none of what they suggest should be meant as gospel, you could put together a list of links of the ones that look interesting to serve as a resource.

Some well known novellas and novelettes as possible helps:

The Pearl by John Steinbeck
A Christmas Carol by Charles Dickens
The Strange Case of Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde by Robert Louis Stevenson
The Turn of the Screw by Henry James
Heart of Darkness by Joseph Conrad
The Metamorphosis by Franz Kafka
Flowers for Algernon by Daniel Keyes
The Clothes They Stood Up in by Alan Bennett
Magic for Beginners by Kelly Link
The Empire of Ice Cream by Jeffrey Ford
Reading the Bones by Sheila Finch
Solitude by Ursula Le Guin
The Martian Child by David Gerrold
Beggars in Spain by Nancy Kress
Bloodchild by Octavia Butler
Enemy Mine by Barry B. Longyear
Stardance by Spider and Jeanne Robinson
Houston, Houston, Do You Read? by James Tiptree Jr.
The Bicentennial Man by Isaac Asimov
Of Mist, and Grass and Sand by Vonda N. McIntyre
Ill Met in Lankhmar by Fritz Lieber
A Boy and His Dog by Harlan Ellison
Dragonrider by Anne McCaffrey
The Last Castle by Jack Vance
 
KatG said:
If I might make some suggestions:

Obviously, minimum word count, if you want to do longer forms, would be 7,500. That's a good boundary for those who are nervous about trying a longer work. And I'd suggest you set the maximum limit at 20,000 words or 25,000, the lower end for a novella. If you were all just trying to write one, you could go longer, but since you are doing a contest and want to have a short time frame, it makes sense to keep it somewhat lower so that people have time to read the entries. If it works out, you could always do a longer range for the next one.
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I was thinking... if people wanted an easier comp there's always short stories, flashes and micros. This isn't the easier comp though. This one is the nutcracker and the nipple crippler of comps. I wanted to adhere to industry standards here as much as possible and not prevent competitors rising to meet those benchmarks within the comp.

I think the average reading speed for adults is 300 words per minute. Which should mean a reader should be able to read a 40,000 word story in just over 2 hours and a 7500 word story shouldn't take a reader more than half an hour. I'd anticipate that most stories would fall in the mid to low range anyway so why limit people who have gotten on a real roll...?

KatG said:
I would suggest that you set the deadline at December 15th, possibly even December 1st. The holiday/end of year season is hectic with many time and family demands for most people. So you want a deadline for people to get it in before all that craziness starts. Then you want to give people enough time to read the longer works (I'm not sure how you've been doing these in the past,) so you might want to have the voting be in February, maybe by end of February. Or you could do October and make it shorter, but October is seldom a good month for these things.
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Typically in the contests I've entered, writers submit their stories when they finish them and not all at once on deadline day. I read them as they come in. and give my feedback right away but obviously other people have different lives and prioritise differently. The main reason for a fast turnaround in this comp in particular is so that the writers can submit their proofread and possibly slightly tweaked stories in time to meet the deadlines for the subcalls that will be linked(example only) to our contest.

KatG said:
While I think it's a good idea to ditch the theme because people find that too restricting, you could have a motif. Just pick something, say balloons, red hats, crows or anything else, and people can have their stories about the balloons or simply have a balloon show up in one scene. That's a minimum requirement but it could be fun and you could always have a secondary vote for most creative use of the common motif.
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The arguments for and against themes has caused some people to have kinipshun fits but to me it's a small thing, which was why I selected theme - optional in the voting thread at the top of this page. I think those who choose to write to a theme, will do so in their usual creative way.

Not every novelist writes to a theme but that doesn't mean they all don't. Or that it can't be done well. For instance - I've been reading SLAUGHTERHOUSE 5 recently and the anti-war theme in that is fairly clearly apparent, and it's even marketed on its theme.

KatG said:
You could have check in points during the time period where people talk about how it's going and how they are setting it up, maybe put up an excerpt?, get feedback, etc. Be aware that all of your writing processes will be different from each other and there is no wrong way to write your piece. There are no rules in written fiction, so criticism shouldn't be based on a contestant not following "the rules.".
Click to expand...

Yep that sounds like a good writer friendly approach. A few of the more experienced long form writers would be great resources for those of us who are less so.

KatG said:
If you have a workable thing for putting up the longer works in pieces, but there are problems, let us know and we'll see what Dag can do on the tech side.
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Will do.

KatG said:
There are numerous authors and such who have written tips and suggestions on writing novellas and longer works. While none of what they suggest should be meant as gospel, you could put together a list of links of the ones that look interesting to serve as a resource.
Click to expand...

Yep every little helps.

KatG said:
Some well known novellas and novelettes as possible helps:

The Pearl by John Steinbeck
A Christmas Carol by Charles Dickens
The Strange Case of Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde by Robert Louis Stevenson
The Turn of the Screw by Henry James
Heart of Darkness by Joseph Conrad
The Metamorphosis by Franz Kafka
Flowers for Algernon by Daniel Keyes
The Clothes They Stood Up in by Alan Bennett
Magic for Beginners by Kelly Link
The Empire of Ice Cream by Jeffrey Ford
Reading the Bones by Sheila Finch
Solitude by Ursula Le Guin
The Martian Child by David Gerrold
Beggars in Spain by Nancy Kress
Bloodchild by Octavia Butler
Enemy Mine by Barry B. Longyear
Stardance by Spider and Jeanne Robinson
Houston, Houston, Do You Read? by James Tiptree Jr.
The Bicentennial Man by Isaac Asimov
Of Mist, and Grass and Sand by Vonda N. McIntyre
Ill Met in Lankhmar by Fritz Lieber
A Boy and His Dog by Harlan Ellison
Dragonrider by Anne McCaffrey
The Last Castle by Jack Vance
Click to expand...

cool list. I'm gonna try reading them all.
 
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Okay - I voted. I'm ready to start. Can we start?

I'm gonna try to write a novelette in July. It will be a follow up to the novelette I just completed. I'll try to work in the 9 lives theme, but I might not be able to. :)
 
Of course you can start New, Anyone can start any time they like. I'm still waiting to hear back from Facing with subcalls (although I imagine she's waiting to see what the comp's duration will be, before posting them - seems a bit close to call in the poll right now.) and we were going to post the comp on the 15th.

People seemed OK with the 9 lives theme and a few seem to have started writing to it so it may as well be that.

Also we were planning to end the comp on the 31st of the month and it should work OK but only as long as the other comps stayed where they were... but If you've worked out some sort of roster that could be useful too.

:eek: this is really starting to feel like politics - but politics is the showbiz for ugly people - and I'm much too pretty to be a politician - at least,- under the skin of my face.
 
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