So, it's Thursday...

[glennagirl.livejournal.com]

I'll admit to having trouble keeping up with what day it is.  My schedule has been all over the place, a 'cousin' from out of town ( wendiez ) and Vacation Bible School in the evenings.  I have to give out major kudos once again to teachers everywhere, because a couple of hours at night with kids doing crafts is incredibly challenging to me.  Thankfully I have some help, but seriously... you in the education biz do it for hours every day.  I bow in respect to you.
If you missed it, we had a grammer conversation yesterday that you can find HERE.
Last week I put out an Impromptu Challenge that centered on early days, first meetings or early partnership.  That's still something you can write and post, so if it interests you we want your story.
I've been thinking about how I used to write longer stories, something I rarely do these days.  Have our challenges stifled the desire or energy for longer, more involved storytelling?  I know we like to put up shorter entries, sometimes because of time constraints or the nature of the challenge. The ABC challenges have inspired some multi-chapter stories, but what about an intentional long story, say 5,000 and up. 
I'm wondering if we might do something like that, with a long range target date for posting.  If you're interested or have suggestions, let's talk about it in the comments.  We could choose a single prompt or a selection of them based on episodes or events.  I'm curious to know what y'all think.
And finally, I can't go too long in between my expression of gratitude to everyone who stops by to write, read or just observe.  Everyone is valuable here and I'm thankful for all that you do to make this a real community of MFU cousins.

Comments

[mrua7.livejournal.com]

I think at least for myself, writing shorter stories has become a bit of a trap. They're so much easier to do, and I think have made me lazy.

Still, I've forced myself to get back to writing some longer stories. In January I posted "The Vatican Affair" that was nearly 18.000 words. The ABC Affair was a 26 chapter WIP for me, totaling 44,224 words. That was in March, In April I posted "The Ruse" that was roughly 7600 words.

I recently posted "An American, a Soviet, a Brit and an Aussie walked into a cabin' that totaled 11,500 words. In between these I I've posted some Short Affair stories, PicFics and Once Upon a Time pieces, running anywhere from 1000 tp 4000 words.

So I've written more long stories than I thought now that I've looked back at this year alone. I'd like to finish up a couple more that I've been putzing with for a while now...

[glennagirl.livejournal.com]

You started out with epic word counts, so I know you can do it. I love our challenges, because it gets people writing. I do think we need something to spur us on to more than the 500 word minimum.

[mrua7.livejournal.com]

Well with my current situation, I don't know how much writing I'll be able to do. Are you home?

[ssclassof56.livejournal.com]

A busy schedule and the fact that I overthink every sentence tend to make me a slow writer. Heck, Breach of Promise took almost 2 years. I’m in awe of the sheer amount of great stories many writers here are able to post.

I like the shorter nature of the challenges, when I’m able to complete them, as I get the pleasure of posting and the encouragement of feedback more often.

I do have some ideas for stories to follow where Breach of Promise left off. Illya/Faustina stuff, natch. :) They are likely to be longer. If my ideas can fit the prompts, I’d be interested in a long story challenge. The deadline would be good motivation.

[glennagirl.livejournal.com]

If we were to do a challenge I'm thinking two or three months minimum to get it done. When we did the 50th anniversary mini bang we had a lot of time to construct a story. This is anniversary #55, maybe a nod to that milestone.

[alynwa.livejournal.com]

When I start a story, I have no idea how long or short it's going to be. I start to get an idea when I get to around 500 words. When I wrote "The 'After the Affair' Affair" years ago, I realized after about 500 words that the story was going to be in excess of 10K words if told correctly. I didn't want to write that long a tale at the time. What I should have done was place it on the back burner until such time that I was ready to tackle it. Instead, I wrestled it to the ground and choked it so that it was only 6800 words and the story suffered because of it. I promised myself I won't do that anymore. I'll use as many words as I need to tell the story.


So to answer your question, I don't think the challenges stifle my creativity as I am capable of writing >5K word stories. I think it would be an interesting challenge to write a story that must have a minimum count of 5K words.

[glennagirl.livejournal.com]

I agree, some stories tell you pretty quick whether or not you can do it in short form. I have one that I started at least a year ago, just waiting for time to really sit down with it.

[laurose8.livejournal.com]

With many</> thanks for givng us observers something so very worth watching.

Tentative suggestion: might the heat sap your muse's vitality?

Goood luck with the evening classes, and bravo for taking them on!

[glennagirl.livejournal.com]

Thank you on all counts :D

[jantojones.livejournal.com]

I've never been any good at longer pieces, apart from on a few occasions. However, I am working on a piece right now in which I'm stitching together, and expanding, two of my older stories which had a similar theme. It's currently sitting at 4800 words. I've almost finished the draft, whereupon I will ask duckys_lady if she is available to beta it. Hopefully I'll have it posted quite soon.

[glennagirl.livejournal.com]

I'm thinking we'll do a long story challenge, in which case you might want to save this one and post it when the date comes around. I have one that's waited for a year, and I think that's what I would work on for a challenge.

[jantojones.livejournal.com]

I'll do that (assuming it fits in with whatever prompt or theme you decide upon) :-D