Hatrack River Writers Workshop: A trigger for your thoughts

This is topic A trigger for your thoughts in forum Open Discussions About Writing at Hatrack River Writers Workshop.

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Posted by mikemunsil (Member # 2109) on :

For those of you who don't feel the need to register at Liberty Hall, but who are curious about the triggers, here's last week's trigger:
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Quicksilver.
Bonus: Sancho Panza

Quicksilver: Unpredictable; mercurial: “a
quicksilver character, cool and willful at
one moment, utterly fragile the next”
(Sven Birkerts).
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Will Briggs won Best of the Best this time, from a pool of 27 entries. His story, "Proscription Meditation", was amazing.

Posted by Elemeno (Member # 2752) on :

While we're on the subject, I have a question. How exactly do flash stories have to be related to their triggers? Thanks!

Posted by Beth (Member # 2192) on :

not exactly at all, but it may affect how your story fares in the voting.

Posted by Monolith (Member # 2034) on :

Hey Mike,

I think this post is a great idea. I'll start to participate after I get my WIP done and polished. So, keep posting the trigger and hopefully you'll recruit more and more people. Keep it up.

-Monolith-

Posted by Beth (Member # 2192) on :

Mike, are you thinking of just updating this topic with the trigger ever week? Or maybe it would be tidier if you just put the trigger in the topic announcing the week's flash challenge rules?

Posted by Pyre Dynasty (Member # 1947) on :

what is that bonus about?

Posted by mikemunsil (Member # 2109) on :

quote:
Elemeno

While we're on the subject, I have a question. How exactly do flash stories have to be related to their triggers? Thanks!

We have no hard and fast rules about how the flash stories have to be related to the triggers. In the web-based trigger system I have added a note that says:

"Please use this trigger as the basis for a central idea or theme for your story. Although you do not have to literally use the trigger word/phrase or refer to the trigger image, there should be a clear relationship to the trigger."

I haven't ever bothered to try and define what "a clear relationship to the trigger." actually means because I don't want to restrict people's imaginations. If pressed I guess I would say that after reading your story, and after looking back at the trigger, I would like to be able to recognize that there was a relationship of some sort.

quote:
Beth

Mike, are you thinking of just updating this topic with the trigger ever week? Or maybe it would be tidier if you just put the trigger in the topic announcing the week's flash challenge rules?

I like the tidier option as long as it doesn't cause confusion for people new to the challenges. The start of your 90-minute period to write is NOT the time for conusion over triggers; writing on demand is hard enough by itself. Still, I think I can make that clear. Thanks for yet another good idea, Beth.

quote:
Pyre Dynasty

what is that bonus about?

I don't really remember when we started using a bonus. (Can someone else clear this up?) The winner of Best of the Best in the voting is awarded the right to come up with a trigger and bonus if they choose to, and most do. The bonus is strictly optional, both to create and to use.

I see two general uses for a bonus: to provoke a more imaginative use of the trigger, and to provide us a means to differentiate between two otherwise equally deserving stories when it is time to vote. This happens more often than you might think.

Posted by Beth (Member # 2192) on :

Yeah, I can see how it might be confusing to have the Flash 21 trigger in the Flash 22 announcement. Maybe it's just tidiest to keep all the triggers together in this topic - so it kind of functions as a trigger archive? Sorry, I'm just kind of tidy sometimes.

Posted by HSO (Member # 2056) on :

quote:
I don't really remember when we started using a bonus. (Can someone else clear this up?)

Flash #2 had the first bonus, if I recall correctly. It was a relatively famous illustration, and there were a few sentences that an author could optionally use to start their story.

[This message has been edited by HSO (edited August 26, 2005).]

Posted by MCameron (Member # 2391) on :

Yes, that's right. The other bonus for FC2 was to use as many objects from the picture as possible. I actually went through and counted how many objects were used in each story, and used that to help determine who to vote for.

--Mel