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Halloween Contest 2016


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Castle Roland is excited to announce our 3rd Annual

Halloween Short Story Contest

"The Season of the Witch"

 

Contest Rules

Submissions Deadline: 10/23/16 11:59 pm Central Standard Time

Stories should be edited and polished, they will be posted exactly as you send them.

Stories must contain a Halloween theme. Think outside the box. (Stories do not need to have a witch theme)

Stories should be more than 15,000 words and less than 45,000

Author's names and story titles will be removed to ensure blind judging.

Submission must be emailed to castlerolandpr@gmail.com. Please include the following subject line: 2016 Halloween Contest

Submission sent to any other email will invalidate the blind voting and will be disqualified.

Submissions are open to the public and all are encouraged to join the fun:

Voting will be closed to the public and only forum members may vote.

Judging will begin on 10/24/16 and will conclude on 10/30/16

Members will be asked to judge the stories based on the following

Theme: Does the story embrace the Halloween season

Content: Was the story gripping and enjoyable

Character Development: Were you able to connect with the main characters

Plot: Did the author develop a strong plot withing the word count restrictions of the contest

Would you recommend this story to others.

Scores will be totaled and then averaged by the numbers of voters for each story.

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Just out of curiosity, why do you place restrictions on the length of the stories? My short stories are... short. I find that I usually end up with about 4000 to 7000 words, and it's a stretch to make 10,000,  let alone 15,000 words. I wonder if more people would submit stories if they didn't have to be so long. I have noticed that many of the writers here have no trouble finding 50,000 words or more, and that's great. I'm just not one of them.

As I said, I'm just wondering.

 

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I don't know why, Parker, but like you I tend to write 'short' short stories. I have, however, found that when I have to stretch out a story to reach a minimum word count for one of these contests I pay more attention to details and end up with a more developed set of characters. I think it improves my writing and helps me grow as a writer.

That is why I prefer to think of them as challenges rather than contests.

Hope you get an answer that is helpful.

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On September 27, 2016 at 7:20 PM, Jeikor said:

I don't know why, Parker, but like you I tend to write 'short' short stories. I have, however, found that when I have to stretch out a story to reach a minimum word count for one of these contests I pay more attention to details and end up with a more developed set of characters. I think it improves my writing and helps me grow as a writer.

That is why I prefer to think of them as challenges rather than contests.

Hope you get an answer that is helpful.

Parker,

Zach and Jeikor are right the limitations are placed to make it a challenge to get us to try to do something we normally would not. Whether it be the word count or the theme. When we started these contest in 2014 (the Halloween contest was the first of my memory serves me) the idea was to not so much make it a contest, even though that is an element but a way for the writers to try different things. We also open it up to everyone In an attempt encourage people to try writing. As Jeikor testifies that part works well too. 

We have tested different lengths and found the range we have established in this contest works the best. It's a bit more than some authors are used to writing (me included) and a bit short for some. 

I hope that explains it and I hope you give it a try. 

 

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As a matter of fact my entry in that Halloween 2014 contest is what started my story series, From Trick to Treat. I have managed to enter every contest held since then and will try to make this one also.

I'm naturally kind of lazy and have to be pushed sometimes and the word counts do that (as did writing a historical fiction story summer 2015).

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You ever get into the meat and bones of a story and expect it will only go about another 3K words and suddenly find that you've typed out twice that and still haven't finished the story you have blocked out?  Yeah, so, still gonna finish on time and have (I hope) a good story, but it is turning out to be longer than I expected.  Should still be well under 45k, but I'm just past 21k now and just hitting the BANG moments.

Such predicaments, I must forge ahead.

 

To the rest of the writers doing a Halloween story, keep going, dudes.  Lets make this the toughest competition to judge ever!

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2 hours ago, Benji said:

Well, I did it... I actually got one submitted this year.

 

1 hour ago, Jeikor said:

I made it! Just sent it in. Almost 17,000 words; which is good for me.



So happy to know I wasn't the only one who submitted at last minute. Now we can all be relieved together! Good job, guys, and I look forward to reading your stories! Whichever ones they happen to be. ;)

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