Chen
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Yes, the moment you've all been waiting for is finally here - the judges have deliberated, cogitated and digested (as I believe the saying goes) and we're ready to announce the results of the May/June writing challenge competition!
First of all, I'd like to say a huge thank you to everyone who took the time to enter. We've had a stunning turnout this round, and not only have I been impressed by the quantity of entries, I'm very pleased to say that the quality has been fantastic as well! Looking at the votes that have been placed by the judges, there's been something in this round's entries to please everyone, so I'm looking forward to seeing future entries from all of the participants in future competitions!
So, without further ado, I present the reviews, and the results!
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Hi all!
Welcome to the May/June round of the Writing Challenge! Please read this post carefully for new guidelines on entering your submissions! Following in challenge traditions, the May/June round uses a single word as inspiration for entries.
Joining us on the judging panel for this round is the March/April winner, Lieutenant Alleran Tan, who has decided on the following topic for this round:
"Fire"
You're free to interpret that however you like for your entries - does the title refer to a raging inferno, or a command to shoot? Maybe it will have a more lateral connotation to your story and manifest itself through a burning hatred? Or maybe someone's about to lose their job! The choice is yours, so let your imaginations run wild!
Guidelines: To participate, create a new thread. The subject of the thread must be the title of your story, preceded by the tag [2011: MAY/JUN], which is a new requirement for entries that will be used when we archive the entries at the end of the round. If it is a Work In Progress, denote that at the top of the post itself (in the body text, not in the thread title). As with last round it will be the final draft posted in your topic that will be read and taken into consideration. Any unfinished entries marked as Work In Progress will not be considered for judging and will be moved to the "Character Cafe" forum at the end of the contest. Your work must be entirely your own. No co-authoring. You are welcome to create any character you so desire, but they must be from the Star Trek universe. No "canon" characters allowed. (i.e.- No one who has been on a show.)
Length: No more than 3000 words accepted.
Beginning Date: Tuesday, May 3rd
Ending Date: Saturday, June 25th
See Also: the Writing Challenge Website
Challenge: “Fire”
Good luck everyone!
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Well, the judges have deliberated, cogitated and digested, and the votes have been counted. As there were three entries this round, we'll be announcing a winner but no runner-up, and that winner is...
Wait for it...
"Faith" by Lieutenant Alleran Tan!
A huge congratulations to Lieutenant Tan, and a big thankyou to everyone for entering the competition! Watch this space for the launch of the May/June round!
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"Faith" by Lieutenant Alleran Tan
Reviewed by Lieutenant Commander Jesse Lawn
What an incredible piece. It had me from the very first sentence. In articulate, descriptive fashion, Radi Rais lays out a touching story of a young girl's desperation, courage, and faith. Each of the paper's three simple segments effectively told the story without wasted superfluous material.
I was also impressed how in such short order the characters were made so believable. Tami and Antani were fantastic! The story even played well with the Star Trek lineage. Nicely done!
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"Fate or Serendipity" by Commander Tal Tel-ar
Reviewed by Commander Tallis Rhul
Whenever I read an entry from Commander Tel-ar for the writing challenge, I always expect to see a creative approach to descriptive writing, and this piece certainly delivered on that front. Describing scenes and characters is often something that is difficult to successfully achieve, as too much description can prevent a reader from imagining events in their mind's eye as they read, and too little can leave a passage lifeless. In this case, I think the level of attention to detail that you employed was absolutely right, particularly through use of simile, and it certainly helped me to visualise the story as I read it.
However, there was one obstacle to the flow of the story, and that was the layout. Most paragraphs tended to consist of one or two short sentences before a break, which resulted in a disjointed piece. Combining some of those shorter paragraphs into longer ones would serve to preserve the momentum of sections such as the chase, or the sequence of events that led to the warning about taking the journey home.
I enjoyed the way that the theme was incorporated into the piece in that I didn't expect for the thieves to be children. I also appreciated the amount of thought that you had put into the creation of the world on which this story took place - as usual there were no holds barred in that respect! An entertaining action story that was very well planned - great job!
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Before the official unveiling of the reviews and winner of this round of the writing challenge, I'd like to take a moment to welcome two new permanent judges to our official panel, Lieutenant Commanders Karynn Brice and Jesse Lawn! Many thanks to both of them, as well as our long-standing permanent member Captain Toni Turner and the previous round's winner, Lieutenant (j.g.) Saveron, for preparing their reviews and votes
So, without further ado, here are the reviews, in no particular order...
"Who is Your Father?" by Lieutenant Commander Thomas Gregory
Reviewed by Lieutenant Commander Karynn Brice
I found this to be a very interesting story and a take on the topic that I hadn't expected. Throughout the story I felt like I was able to progressively get to know Braden Melborne, something I found to be a good thing, even though I liked his character less and less. Although I can't say that we got to really know him well, we did get a hint of his background that affects who he is, and it left me wanting more in a good way. His development, although minimal and probably constrained by the length requirements of the contest, reminded me of some of the great Star Trek Villains I've grown to love/hate through the years. I thought you did a really good job of this.
I do have two small complaints. The first is that, even with a second reading, I don't quite understand the relevance of the infant from the house to the rest of the story. It just didn't seem to fit, at least in my brain. I almost would have rather seen something else in its place, although I'm not entirely sure what. My other tiny complaint is that I did notice a few typos in the story that, for me, were distracting. Overall, though, these were minimal and you were free of any noticeable grammatical errors.
With those few exceptions, I really enjoyed your story. While the ending certainly didn't leave me with a happy feeling, it did leave me with a lot to think about and that is something that I appreciate. I enjoy stories that challenge me and I certainly found this challenging. I saw that you hadn't planned on entering, but I have to say that I'm very glad you did. Overall you did a very nice job.
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The deadline for this round has passed, and the judging will now begin! We hope to announce the winners as soon as possible, so watch this space!
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Yes, yes you should! Your 3x banner will never change to 4x otherwise!
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Hi all!
Once again we had a cracking amount of entries for the Writing Challenge last round - please spread the word around your crew and twist arms/bribe people to take part this time! Let's see if we can go for a record number of entries!
Joining us on the judging panel for this round is Ensign Saveron, who has decided on the following topic for this round:
"Out of the Mouths of Babes"
Once again we have a nice, open topic that allows you a degree of freedom, and the potential for a hidden meaning. How will you work this into your story?
Guidelines: To participate, create a new thread. The subject of the thread must be the title of your story. If it is a Work In Progress, denote that at the top of the post itself (in the body text, not in the thread title). As with last round it will be the final draft posted in your topic that will be read and taken into consideration. Any unfinished entries marked as Work In Progress will not be considered for judging and will be moved to the "Character Cafe" forum at the end of the contest. Your work must be entirely your own. No co-authoring. You are welcome to create any character you so desire, but they must be from the Star Trek universe. No "canon" characters allowed. (i.e.- No one who has been on a show.)
Length: No more than 3000 words accepted.
Beginning Date: Friday, March 4th
Ending Date: Saturday, April 30th
See Also: the Writing Challenge Website
Challenge: “Out of the Mouths of Babes”
Break a leg!
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With all of the reviews posted, there remains only one thing to do, which is announce the winner and runner up for this round's challenge. I can tell you (and the other judges will back me up) that this round the decision over first and second place was exceptionally difficult, and that this has been the closest-run competition we've seen for a very long time.
First the runner up...
A huge congratulations to Captain Quinn Reynolds for her entry, "The Silver Swan"!!! (For an insight into the meaning behind the title, follow this link)
And now the moment we've all been waiting for...
The winner of the Writing Challenge for January/February 2011 is...
"The Price We Pay" by Ensign Saveron!!! Congratulations!!!
Thankyou also to everyone who entered - we hope to see you again in the next round, and please get twisting the arms of your crewmates and friends in the fleet - see if you can persuade them to enter too! I'll be in touch with Ensign Saveron directly to set up the topic for the next round, and as soon as that's done we'll get kicked off for March/April!
See you soon!
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"Controversial Titles" by Lieutenant Commander Thomas Gregory
Reviewed by Chief Petty Officer Radi Rais
I'm actually familiar with 4'33, although I didn't expect its use here at all. Gregory's use of this very unique piece surprised me and I enjoy being surprised. That put me in a good mood to read the rest of his piece.
Breaking the piece into acts and scenes was an interesting, if slightly distracting, choice of style but I got used to it almost immediately. I liked the idea that a piece that was both Song AND Silence was the focus of the piece, and in that regard I felt it held to the premise of the topic faithfully.
I felt that this story had an interesting plot, was clearly about the topic and held itself together cleanly. However, I felt that it needed an editor. There were a few silly mistakes that could have been fixed by a careful proof-read, and I felt that some sections were either all descriptive text or all dialogue. Adding more descriptive text along with the dialogue and paragraphing out the descriptive text would have helped this story reach its full potential.
Controversial Titles also hit a couple of my personal formatting and grammar berserk buttons, but I know that each person's writing style is different; a writer cannot be the Borg, seeking to make everything like themselves, so I won't dwell on them. The issues were not so serious that they substantially coloured my reading of the piece.
But in some ways, a writer must be the Borg... must dismantle any piece, any s[...], of another's writing that impresses them and see what they can learn from it, to see what can be used to add to their own perfection writing style. I've said before that my favourite part of Writing Challenges is when I lose, because it's in seeing how others do it that I improve my own writing.
Anyway, Controversial Titles was a solid story told in three acts, and it's clear that Gregory knows how to draw together the elements needed to make a great story... all the piece really needed was to be sharpened, clarified and bought into focus. As I wrote earlier, it needed the hand of a skilled editor, but take heart- a writer and an editor are two different skills, that's why they are called two different things. It is, however, a good skill for a writer to have.
All said, a good work. I enjoyed reading it. Well done!
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"The Price We Pay" by Ensign Saveron
Reviewed by Chief Petty Officer Radi Rais
The moment I saw the opening sentence I knew this would be a cracking story.
The Price We Pay had a very strong opening and it immediately conjured grim, visceral imagery in the mind of the reader. For me, that immediately drew me in. I wanted to read more...
As the last competition's winner I had the honour of picking the topic... I selected "Song and Silence". The topic I picked was one of contrast, and I was very pleasantly surprised to find that Saveron had embraced the concept of contrast as the overall message of her piece and used it liberally throughout her writing, while still keeping auditory contrast the overall focus of the piece. The implicit comparison of music as life and silence as death was brilliant.
Saveron's grammar structure and vocabulary (the tools of any good writer) are superb, and her ability to conjure mental images both beautiful and sad was amazing... her writing wasn't just telling a story, it was painting a picture in the mind. It was art.
However, it was her ability to employ contrast as an artistic tool that really sold me with this piece. A fertile field as the site of a battle, delicate slippers stepping over bloodshed, the fountain in a desert, the warrior that was both fierce and gentle...
A good writer plucks at the heartstrings like a harpist at play, and the revelations that Lohraedhys wouldn't seek vengeance and that she was pregnant were master strokes. Further, I loved the fact that Saveron described non-visual elements in her story. The smell of the blood, the sound of the music, the feel of the foliage underfoot...
I felt that this story is one that never forgot where it was going, where it had been, or where it was set. Rather than just reading about a bunch of humans with pointy ears, I got the very clear feeling that this story was distinctly alien. Distinctly Vulcan.
However, the role of a critic is to be critical. This is difficult for me because I just loved this piece to bits, but here goes...
The only thing I could think of that would have improved this piece was to reduce the focus on the "present day" segment of the piece, to shorten or reformat it somehow. I felt it was a little distracting and although it served as an interesting framing device, unlike the imagery-loaded "pre-battle" and "post-battle" scenes it didn't contribute a huge amount to the meaning of the story. Jumping back and forth between three timelines is difficult to follow.
I also felt that the story needed to use more white space in the "present day" segment, just to space it out some of the lines a little bit.
However, those are tiny issues. I loved reading The Price We Pay and I encourage Saveron to enter more writing challenges, for no other reason that I want to read more of her writing. Can't really give it more praise than that.
In fact, this piece presents me with a very interesting problem. I am a huge, huge, "Sign my chest!" squealing fanboy when it comes to Quinn Reynolds's Writing Challenge entries- the only writing challenge I've ever won was where she didn't enter, and when she does enter I spend my nights crying into a bowl of icecream shakily trying to convince myself that "next time I'll beat her!".
Now if you both enter I'm going to bring it up another notch... and I'm going to need a whole lot more icecream.
Masterfully done, Saveron.
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"The Silver Swan" by Captain Quinn Reynolds
Reviewed by Captain Toni Turner
Once again Captain Reynolds has guided her readers through a delightful trip through a maze of pleasingly discriptive words to tell a bleak tale of what could be a dying species, although some would argue Neitee was the last of her kind to be assimulated by the Borg. Thinking about it, the latter could probably be right with her references to "emerald and silver cubes,"and the "cold song" of those chasing her. But I like to think it was a story more timeless than that... perhaps a story woven from life itself, and prefer to think of it as spending a lifetime searching for a song that Neitee had with her all along, and her victory in the face of death, she found a way to sing it.
Whatever her intent, it was a mighty fine read. Excellent story, Quinn.
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“The Music in Silence” by Commander Tal Tel-ar
Reviewed by Lieutenant Commander Tallis Rhul
A lot of effort went into creating the environment and background in which the story took place in this unusual entry. The scene where Tony fell asleep in particular created a vivid picture in my mind as I read.
At times, however, as good as the descriptive writing tended to be, I felt it got in the way of the actual story itself. There were seeds sown early on about the mystery of the phantom melody, and that was certainly interesting, as was the story’s resolution, which I certainly didn’t see coming. The main bulk of the story, however, seemed to take place in the final paragraph, and it ended quite abruptly. While that seemed to be the intention, I felt as a reader that I would have liked to know more about the effect that this melody had on its listener, and how Tony felt once he had made his discovery.
Notably, Tegik’s character came over particularly strongly, mainly through the attitudes of the other members of the team of colonists. As a supporting character, he fulfilled a background role, and I felt that the use of the other characters to fill in what we didn’t have a chance to see for ourselves was particularly well done.
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Ladies and Gentlemen (and gender nonspecific androids, androgynous and dual gender species, or members of third and fourth genders from races that use terms that don't translate easily into Federation Standard...), the judges have cogitated, deliberated and digested, and so without further ado I'd like to present the reviews for this round's writing challenge entries in no particular order, followed by the announcement of our winner and runner up for Jan/Feb 2011!
“Song and Silence” by Ensign Traven Stark
Reviewed by Lieutenant Commander Tallis Rhul
The opening passage of this submission did a fantastic job of making me feel sentimental for my school days. In particular, the moments where Travis’s eyes caught the sun brought back actual real life memories, and that in turn had me identifying with your main character from the beginning of the story. It can be difficult sometimes to win a reader over and warm them to your protagonist, but as the story continued you used other tricks such as informal speech and allusions to your character’s memories that kept me on board with him until the end of the piece.
There were times where I felt the story moved too quickly. It can be difficult when writing flash fiction (or snapshots of a longer story) to resist the urge to try to cram everything into a short space. For me, the pirate attack, which was clearly designed to come out of nowhere, seemed to come a little too much out of nowhere. I found myself asking why a transport ship would travel through some kind of phenomenon where pirate attacks were known to occur, especially as the trip was Starfleet funded. Nevertheless, the attack did occur, and led to the death of the professor, which seemed to be the entry’s only link to the title, a parallel between song and life, and silence and death.
There were moments of Travis’s reaction to the incident that were quite human, and caught my attention as I watched events unfold. You referred to the triumph of him being able to move one of his arms, which caused the gravity of the situation to hit home. The death itself was like a scene from a movie – the victim is being watched like a hawk, and it’s during the one moment where someone looks away or lets their mind wander that they lose the person they were trying to hold onto. I found that exceptionally poignant.
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Well, the time has rolled around again for us to gather up your challenge entries, spirit them away to a conceptual room somewhere in the internet, and sit down and discuss them over much coffee and hopefully some chocolate biscuits!
A huge thankyou to everyone involved - it's good to see another sizeable set of entries, and it's fantastic to see that we have some new participants!
As the deadline has now passed, no more entries will be considered for the time being, but the announcement of this round's winner, along with the launch of the next round, will take place within the next few days!
See you then!
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I'm extremely pleased to say that we had a great turnout for the last round of the Writing Challenge, so let's see if we can beat our total this time! Those of you that entered, it would be fantastic to see you enter again, and pass the word around the your crew to see if you can persuade them as well!
Joining us on the judging panel for this round is Chief Petty Officer Radi Rais, who has decided on the following topic for this round:
"Song and Silence"
The topic is nice and broad, and leaves plenty of room for you to be creative! How will you represent the song? Could it be a symbol within your story, an integral part of the plot, or will it somehow influence the structure of your piece?
Guidelines: To participate, create a new thread. The subject of the thread must be the title of your story. If it is a Work In Progress, denote that at the top of the post itself (in the body text, not in the thread title). As with last round it will be the final draft posted in your topic that will be read and taken into consideration. Any unfinished entries marked as Work In Progress will not be considered for judging and will be moved to the "Character Cafe" forum at the end of the contest. Your work must be entirely your own. No co-authoring. You are welcome to create any character you so desire, but they must be from the Star Trek universe. No "canon" characters allowed. (i.e.- No one who has been on a show.)
Length: No more than 3000 words accepted.
Beginning Date: Wednesday, January 5th
Ending Date: Friday, February 25th
See Also: the Writing Challenge Website
Challenge: “Song and Silence”
Good luck all!
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Before announcing the results, I'd like to take a second to say how much I enjoyed reading all of the entries - it was great to see so many people entering the competition this time, and the final decisions on the winner and second place were very close run indeed!
In second place for November/December 2010 is...
Best Left Unsaid by Lieutenant Kevin Breeman!!
Congratulations to our runner up for an excellent entry! Which leaves just one more announcement...
This round's winner is...
The Iron Sky of the Federation by Chief Petty Officer Radi Rais!!!
Many congratulations to our winner - I'll be in touch within the next few days to grill you about what you'd like the topic for the next Challenge to be!
Thanks again to everyone who entered - I hope you've had fun, and I hope to see you enter next round
Keep your eyes on this forum for the new challenge, which will be launched very soon! -
What We Should Do...
By Lt. Commander Marcus Dickens
Reviewed by Commander Toni Turner
Taking the viewpoint of a species caught between the superpowers, Lt. Commander Dickens' submission was quite interesting. The quandary of whether to remain standing with the faction they had already chosen or taking sides with one that could be stronger is not uncommon, but little has been said or done to delve into the reasoning behind it.
While Dickens touches on fear, he leaves the question unanswered, letting the reader decide whether it was just plain survival that made them entertain a choice. And which did they choose?... well, that answer remained the option of the reader - an old ploy, but one still extremely effective.
Well done, Marcus!
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"The Death of a Dream" by Commander Tal Tel-ar
Review by Cpt Quinn Reynolds
My major problem with this entry is that it isn't so much a story, as it is a scene from one. There is no real progression of plot; we have a beginning, but no middle or end. The story could have been fleshed out in several ways; as an example, we could have still ended in the same place, but preceded it with more insight into how Nagato had managed to assemble her multi-racial fleet, instead of simply being told that she did. Or the scene as it stands could have led into the rest of the plot, showing us if her daring gambit paid off.
I think the author would benefit from finding a beta reader; there were several grammatical errors very early on which rapidly distracted from the story being told. The prose itself was quite difficult to read, because I found the rhythm choppy and abrupt, resulting in sentences that lacked a good flow.
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"The Iron Sky of the Federation" by Chief Petty Officer Radi Rais
Reviewed by Lieutenant Commander Tallis Rhul
By the time I got halfway down this story I felt thoroughly uneasy. The opening speech jarred with the Star Trek ideal of an altruistic and conscientious human race, and the idea that Starfleet was marauding through the galaxy, eradicating race after race was disturbing...
In other words, the story did exactly what it was supposed to do, and I liked it for that reason; from the construction of the initial speech through to the cathartic twist as a new adversary was revealed, and into Starfleet's response at the end, everything had been planned to shock the reader, and had maximum impact.
Your choice of characters was interesting. It was nice to see that your First Officer, Lau, showed some redeeming qualities. His disdain for the Captain's 'reproduction order' was one of the things that helped to draw me into the story, and helped to add a touch of realism, which in the midst of a "What If?" scenario isn't always easily done.
This was a thoroughly enjoyable read.
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Best Left Unsaid
By Lt. Kevin Breeman
Reviewed by Commander Toni Turner
Lieutenant Breeman contrived an interesting piece chronicling a reporter's stay on the derogated remains of the Klingon moon, Praxis. From the descriptions of the surface, and the depths where the reporter was quartered under the guise of writing a book or interviewing a book writer (unsure of which), to the reporter's short choppy, sometimes, incoherent dialog with her host, I found the story well-written, and in places, a spellbinding tale.
Very nice job, Kevin.
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My Last Words by LtCmdr Thomas Gregory
Review by Cpt Quinn Reynolds
There's an interesting idea at the centre of this piece: 'What if the klingons lied about Praxis?' I do feel, however, that the execution could have been improved.
There seemed to be a lot of of 'because it is so' in the story, where the reader was told something with no explanation or description (or even hints) as to why it was the case. A prime example was when Ryan mentioned that if the peace convoy was destroyed, the klingons would then strike into the heart of the Federation. The importance of the convoy's survival, the circumstances surrounding its formation, why it was so lightly armed when paying a visit to one of the most aggressive and militaristic species known to the Federation... none of these things were explained. Rather than enjoying the tale that was being woven, my immersion was broken as I found myself thinking 'but why?'
I also felt that Ryan's condition took centre stage for much of the story, yet added very little to it. There was no explanation as to why a captain who seems seriously ill – to the point where he can be rendered comatose for days with little to no warning – was allowed to remain in command. This sub-plot needed either further development so that its importance and relevance to the main story could be fully realised, or removed entirely, as it was distracting in its current state.
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The results and reviews are in! In the time-honoured reality TV style, I'll post up the reviews first, followed by the results! Without further ado, here they are...
"Praxis" by Ensign Roland Weston
Reviewed by Lieutenant Commander Tallis Rhul
One of the things I particularly liked about this submission was that there was enough time taken to allow the reader to identify with the main characters. In flash fiction writing, it can often be difficult to have time to make your characters matter, but the first section of the story provided us with the opportunity to empathise with the situation the group of humans found themselves in. It also raised some interesting questions as to what exactly was going on.
As the story progressed, those questions were answered through discovering the motivation of 'the Section'. It turns out that in a timeline where Praxis didn't explode, the Klingons ran rampant, and the consequences were dire. This serves to draw the reader in even further as the action sequence begins. Johnny's reaction after killing his Klingon reminds us that these people are not soldiers, further amplifying the heroic feel.
Many authors are reluctant to kill off their main characters, even in short works, but the ending to this piece is bold, and I felt a genuine impact as I read the final sections. The fact that the plan succeeded, but at a terrible cost, rings true with the fact that the operation was not conducted by the military.
This was an engaging and well-written piece, and I enjoyed reading it!
Lieutenant Commander Tallis Rhul
Keep your eyes on this forum for the new challenge, which will be launched very soon!
May/June 2011 Writing Challenge
in 2011
Posted
Mazu's Flame by Captain Della Vetri
Reviwed by Lieutenant Alleran Tan
Della's piece, Mazu's Flame, starts strong and keeps it going. Speaking personally, I think starting a short story with an interesting snippit of dialog is a great way to get people to just jump right in- and Della's was an excellent example of doing it right. The scene where the mere act of *eating* becomes an almost sardonic, defiant spit at the universe made me smile.
The piece's pacing was solid and the story was very interesting. I did find the ending a little predictable, but as TV Tropes will tell you, Tropes are Good. I'd rather read a slightly predictable, well crafted piece like this that really flexes Della's creative writing skills. The characters were believable and real, the situation was very plausible and interesting, and I want to read more- this was a finely crafted, snappy piece that I found engaging. I tend to be very easily distracted and take stories like this in quick bursts of alt-tabbing frenzy, but it was a testament to her skill that I stayed for the whole duration. In short, I thought it was brilliant.
Incidently, regarding the title, my first thought was that Mazu's Flame was a reference to the ancient chinese god of the sea, who protected sailors, the pink fire being some kind of her metaphorical manifestation. If I'm right, woo. If not, well, I missed it.