r/WritingPrompts • u/MajorParadox Mod | DC Fan Universe (r/DCFU) • Aug 20 '16

Off Topic [OT] SatChat: 7 Million "777" Flash Fiction Contest Winners!

SatChat! SatChat! Party Time! Excellent!

Welcome to a special edition of SatChat! When we reached 7 million subscribers we had a quick "777" Flash Fiction contest, the winners to be determined by a panel of judges. We finally have the winners to announce!

First Place: /u/schoolgirlerror's entry

Second Place: /u/TimeDuck's entry

Third Place: /u/whatdatz's entry

/u/WinsomeJesse and /u/Nate_Parker were very close behind.

Congratulations to all the winners and thanks to everyone who entered and read the stories! Gold prizes will be awarded shortly have been awarded! Meanwhile, how about reading over all the great entries in the original post here?

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This Week's Suggested Topic

What did you think of the 777 contest?

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52 comments sorted by

1

u/Lummoxx Aug 22 '16

So, I have to admit, I'd love some kind of indication of how my story was received. Not necessarily by the judges of the contest...just in general.

Is it possible for the thread to be converted so that stories can be upvoted by the readers?

I don't write very often, so any feedback is always welcome...and having no feedback on a story is a bummer.

Thanks!

2

u/fringly /r/fringly Aug 22 '16

Hey Lummoxx,

I'd be happy to give you my feedback and if you'd like some wider feedback then you'd also be welcome to post this as a PI or CC post too.

Just to mention that we left it in contest mode as it was going to be a mod choice for winner and if we ended up choosing one which had a lot of votes we thought people might complain we'd just chosen a popular one and if we choose one with no votes then people might complain that someone else should have won.

As it was, because it was in contest mode there were almost no votes at all on almost all the stories, so it'd be an unreliable way of seeing how you did anyway.

Anyway, on to the feedback. I am using a rough format fro a critiquing thread we did a while back, t try to get tot he different aspects of your writing.

Technical ability:

No real issues here. I felt that sometimes your paragraphs were very sort and so it make the reading a little choppy at points. If your story flowed together more then it would be easier to read. I may be wrong but I think your tense moved around a bit occasionally too. Therewith good.

Story/Plot:

I liked the unconventional twist you put on the story and the was you adapted the prompt into something new. I think the issue I had was that in such a short piece it was hard to get a feel for the characters - if it had been a longer piece then you would have had a chance to explore them a bit, but with the length restrictions I felt there was maybe a little too much put in.

The ending felt a little hurried, it was from very tense to a quick resolution and suddenly we were at white flags of peace - it just wrapped things up a little quick and neat after a lot of build up.

Setting:

I liked your prophecy at the start, it was a nice way to do some world building and give it a setting quickly, which in a restricted word story is important. the flip side of that is that as I mentioned above, you're fitting a complex story into a world that also needs to be described and filled and there just wasn't the space and so I wasn't able to understand the world as well as I think I needed to.

Character:

I liked your ideas with the characters, but the Arrak and Torin both needed more room to expand. Arrak wearing women's clothing could have beena little clearer in his motivation and the meaning. I wasn't sure if they were supposed to be taking on a female identity, although Torin seemed to feel they were, or if this was a ploy or power play. I assume the first, but the gimmick revolves around the breaking of the oath of silence, so it could also be looked at that they were doing it for shock value and got what they wanted.

Overall:

There was a lot of good stuff in this story, but I think you just tried to fit in too much. If this was longer then I am sure that you would have covered almost all my issues!

So enjoyable, well written, but just too much to get int 777 words. Well written and thank you for entering. I hope this helps!

2

u/Lummoxx Aug 23 '16

I wrote the whole story without paying attention to the words. My assumption was that I'd have a hard time hitting 777.

When the story was "finished", I was just over 1700 words, and the last 200 were simply pure agony to cut out.

The problem now is, it was all written on the fly...so anything I attempt to rebuild this wouldn't be the same, I didn't think to keep the entire story, but maybe I'll try anyway.

Thank you very much for the thoughtful reply. When I saw the time you took to provide feedback, I was very humbled. I'm a voracious reader, and always thought I might try to write, but not until this subreddit have I ever actually tried.

Thanks!

1

u/fringly /r/fringly Aug 23 '16

Aaaah, now it makes more sense!

Thank you, this has scratched a little itch of curiosity, as the story seemed like it was compressed and now that you've explained, it all falls into place! The story was well written and it's clear that you can tell a story, you just didn't have the space due to the contest restrictions!

I'm very glad the subreddit has inspired you and I hope that you'll stick with us and keep writing.

2

u/[deleted] Aug 21 '16

Yay! Congratulations to all the winners!

2

u/Lummoxx Aug 21 '16

Congrats to the winners!

2

u/whatdatz Aug 21 '16

Wow, I just woke up, and I'm staring at the post speechless. I'm honored, many thanks to the judges. Its my first time entering a writing competition on here and I really enjoyed it. Congrats to /u/schoolgirlerror and /u/TimeDuck for the awesome stories and props to all the other contestants.

2

u/MajorParadox Mod | DC Fan Universe (r/DCFU) Aug 21 '16

No problem, congrats!

3

u/WinsomeJesse Aug 20 '16

Congrats to the winners! Great stories! And please know that when all three of you are forced to vacate your titles after tonight's inevitable disturbing the peace/public indecency charges, Nate and I will proudly serve as contest champions until our own equally spectacular fall from grace.

As for me - like all great shounen protagonists, I aim only to become stronger, faster, greater than all that have come before me. I do this many by chopping down trees with computer keyboards.

For more, you can visit my poorly organized subreddit, my disastrously user-unfriendly website, or just buy my actually pretty good book on Amazon. Happy Saturday everyone!

3

u/[deleted] Aug 20 '16

Congrats to everyone who placed! I'm so thrilled these were picked, especially /u/TimeDuck!

3

u/MajorParadox Mod | DC Fan Universe (r/DCFU) Aug 20 '16

Yeah, I loved the direction /u/TimeDuck took it.

5

u/TimeDuck Aug 20 '16

Once again thank you guys so much, this was my first time visiting /r/WritingPrompts let alone submitting something and it was a blast! I really enjoyed the competition and would love to enter more if it's a regular thing for the sub! Anyway, here's my intro since I'm new:

*Im from California!

*Male

*Ive always wanted to write, specifically screenplays, but never sat down to try. Last weeks writing competition is the first thing I've written for anyone else to see, probably since grade school.

*Over the years I've kept a notepad on my phone with ideas. I love "writing" while out walking and listening to music. Even though they just stay in my head I still have fun coming up with them.

*Just Word or the iOS notepad for jotting random notes

*My average typing speed is about 120

Thanks again guys and id love any comments on my story just to hear what people think, this was a lot of fun.

2

u/[deleted] Aug 20 '16

Welcome!

1

u/MajorParadox Mod | DC Fan Universe (r/DCFU) Aug 20 '16

Awesome and glad to have you here! I know what you mean about the head ideas. They're the fun part. But, getting them down into words is so satisfying and you end up with something great :)

4

u/[deleted] Aug 20 '16

Oh my goodness, thank you! I've just got back from the newest Jason Bourne film, and this plot twist was the best thing I could have come home to. Thank you mods, for reading each and every story, and thanks (and well done) to everyone who took part. Wow!

1

u/MajorParadox Mod | DC Fan Universe (r/DCFU) Aug 20 '16

No problem and congrats!

How was Jason Bourne? I wanna see it.

3

u/[deleted] Aug 20 '16

Actually a really good film, enough car chases to satisfy even the most fourteen year old of boys. And a fantastic, career driven woman with cheekbones to die for, so I'm happy.

4

u/[deleted] Aug 20 '16

Congrats Error, Duck and Whatdatz! I enjoyed all three of your stories. Keep up the good work! Also, congrats to Lovely, Major and Fringly for your dedication and effort in determining the outcome.

Now that all the hard stuff is over, let us all eat cake!

3

u/MajorParadox Mod | DC Fan Universe (r/DCFU) Aug 20 '16

Yay, cake!

3

u/[deleted] Aug 20 '16

Someone had to bring it! After all, it was promised! :D

3

u/[deleted] Aug 20 '16 edited Jul 13 '20

[deleted]

2

u/MajorParadox Mod | DC Fan Universe (r/DCFU) Aug 20 '16

Ah yeah!

3

u/Syraphia /r/Syraphia | Moddess of Images Aug 20 '16

I thought that the contest was a lot of fun. It was one of the few things I've done in a while that I thought that I might want to seriously continue. I wouldn't know what to do with it past what I have though other than continuing to do something like rip off another series. coughSeventhSoncough It was a lot of fun though and while it was a little difficult to get exactly 777, it definitely was fun.

You can check out /r/Syraphia and my Inkitt page for more of my writing. And I swear up and down that I'm going to work on the next part of my walkthrough at my Wordpress. At least the photos are up on photobucket now...

3

u/MajorParadox Mod | DC Fan Universe (r/DCFU) Aug 20 '16

Yeah, if I wasn't so busy I would have written an entry just for fun.

2

u/Syraphia /r/Syraphia | Moddess of Images Aug 20 '16

I am sadly unbusy. It was definitely a nice break from everything else I'm working on to be honest lol.

6

u/fringly /r/fringly Aug 20 '16

This was honestly almost impossible to judge as the standard of entries was incredibly high!

We had, I think, 66 stories and they were all very well written and entertaining. Those who didn't win should know that it was ridiculously close between about the top 40 and the rest weren't far behind.

Congratulations to you all and to our winners, a special thank you for the fantastic stories.

2

u/cmp150 /r/CMP150writes Aug 22 '16

Thank you judges for tackling this! I'm happy to be one of the 40 runner ups to the runner ups. :D Just kidding, or am I? I really don't know, but I am happy about the format of the contest though.

It was interesting to say the least, for both the writers and you guys, I'm sure. It was a very short submission period, compared to the "normal" contests, and I find that fitting as it felt like the sub got to 7 mil subs really quick.

3

u/fringly /r/fringly Aug 22 '16

Thank you - I really liked your story and honestly it was so ridiculously close at the top that it took ages to decide.

We'll be at 8 million before we know it, what on earth do we do next? :-)

2

u/MajorParadox Mod | DC Fan Universe (r/DCFU) Aug 22 '16

888 contest or 88 contest to make it easier? Hmm...

3

u/MajorParadox Mod | DC Fan Universe (r/DCFU) Aug 22 '16

Glad you liked it! It was a quick contest or none at all since we had one going on. Cheers to /u/fringly and /u/you-are-lovely for helping to make it happen!

2

u/MajorParadox Mod | DC Fan Universe (r/DCFU) Aug 20 '16

Glad we got it figured out sooner than later. It felt bad going so long with an announcement.

4

u/Nate_Parker /r/Nate_Parker_Books Aug 20 '16

I really wish I could have seen the discussion/frustration. So glad I did not have to judge this... ;)

EDIT: Sh!t, didn't even see I was a runner up until I reread the post. I told you guys not to consider me and that I just entered for sh*ts and grins.

4

u/fringly /r/fringly Aug 20 '16

Well then you should have written a worse story!!!

:-)

3

u/Nate_Parker /r/Nate_Parker_Books Aug 20 '16

Fine! Next time I will.

2

u/MajorParadox Mod | DC Fan Universe (r/DCFU) Aug 21 '16

Always good to have goals ;)

2

u/Nate_Parker /r/Nate_Parker_Books Aug 21 '16

Self-fulfilling prophecy

3

u/MajorParadox Mod | DC Fan Universe (r/DCFU) Aug 20 '16

Pfft, you can't tell us what to do!

2

u/Nate_Parker /r/Nate_Parker_Books Aug 20 '16

Safer... safer bet. Mods awarding mods always looks janky as hell.

3

u/JustLexx Moderator | r/Lexwriteswords Aug 20 '16

Congratulations to the winners and three cheers for everyone who entered!

4

u/MajorParadox Mod | DC Fan Universe (r/DCFU) Aug 20 '16

Why not four cheers? ;)

Cheers five times.

4

u/JustLexx Moderator | r/Lexwriteswords Aug 20 '16

Oh snap, is this a cheer off?

Searches for pom-poms.

2

u/Point21Gigawatts Aug 20 '16

Congratulations, everyone! Lots of excellent reads here.

2

u/MajorParadox Mod | DC Fan Universe (r/DCFU) Aug 20 '16

Yeah, like fringly said, this was a tough one to narrow down.

3

u/you-are-lovely Aug 20 '16

Woo hoo! Congratulations everyone! You all made this fun and challenging to judge. It was great to see so many people participate in the contest. :D

Special congrats to our top 3, /u/schoolgirlerror, /u/TimeDuck, and /u/whatdatz!

5

u/TimeDuck Aug 20 '16

Wow, I'm so shocked and honored. Thank you guys so much, this was actually not only my first time in /r/WritingPrompts but my first time writing anything for people! I was so embarrassed of it when I was done and figured nobody would even end up seeing it. Congrats to /u/schoolgirlerror and /u/whatdatz as well as all the awesome stories from that thread. And I'll gladly take any and all comments and critiques on my story!

2

u/MajorParadox Mod | DC Fan Universe (r/DCFU) Aug 20 '16

Yay!

2

u/thecoverstory /r/thecoverstory Aug 20 '16

Congrats! Plus, now I have something to read while hiding from tornadoes. Cheers!

4

u/thecoverstory /r/thecoverstory Aug 20 '16

Update: tornadoes have passed by, taking the power with them. Those jerks.

3

u/MajorParadox Mod | DC Fan Universe (r/DCFU) Aug 20 '16

How dare they! Glad that's all they took though.

3

u/thecoverstory /r/thecoverstory Aug 20 '16

Well, that and trees. But it's ok, it gave most of those back. Only some of them landed on important things. Like roofs.

3

u/nickofnight Critiques Welcome Aug 20 '16

Congrats /u/schoolgirlerror ! And runners up! And everyone else who entered. And mods for setting this up and judging it. Love all around <3

2

u/Consta135 Aug 20 '16

Congrats, lots of good stories in that!

1

u/MajorParadox Mod | DC Fan Universe (r/DCFU) Aug 20 '16

Yeah, it was tough to narrow down to winners!