Concepts for the Eighth TV Tropes Writing Contest

There was some interest recently expressed in holding another writing contest, so I decided to start the thread for ideas off, as I have one to throw out there:

The "Page 394" challenge: You take the five thickest books near you, find page 394 and take the second complete sentence on the page, and weave the five sentences into a short story. A possible variant would be to have all those interest submit one sentence from the longest book to hand, and then pick a set number that everyone had to use in the contest (either by voting, randomly, or by using the x longest books).

I think that that is a splendid idea, although I may be saying this primarily on the basis of how many very long books I own (many).

All the books I have that are thick enough are in my native language. Should I try to translate them to the best of my capabilities if I join, or should I go to a bookstore with an international section and try it there?

I say try to translate them.

My less-than-stellar idea: the OP uses the random English page button on Wiktionary to come up with a word. They then post that word and all the stories must be themed after that word. Alternatively, we could have each entrant get their own word from the randomizer.

My suggestion is an expansion of the "Write A Plot From The Title" thread: as with the variant of the first suggestion, we submit titles to the pool and then vote on which are to be used. Entrants then get to pick a title and work with that.

As a variant, instead of suggesting extant titles we come up with titles of our own to enter into the pool.

I agree with the title contest, but let's not use preexisting ones.

As a university student, all of my longest books are massive science texts :(

... and my first thing with the randomiser was "monophosphorylated" so there is definitely some amusement potential with that method.

edited 13th Mar '13 11:07:44 AM by greedling

Another possibility would be to limit it to fiction. Or to give people the option to exclude a certain number of books or something.

I am currently overseas so all of my books that are not textbooks are ebooks...

One that's been bouncing around in my head, though less for the main contest and more for a possible parallel fan fiction contest:

Double-blind fan fiction. You write a fan fiction for a work that you have no direct experience with through officially-licensed media (i.e. you haven't watched the show, read the book(s), watched the movie(s), etc.) You can use any other resources that are available (This Wiki, other wikis, other fan fiction, etc.), but you can't directly experience the media yourself until after the piece has been submitted.

In other words, you pick something you know nothing about, and write a fanfic of it before you actually watch / read / play it.

edited 13th Mar '13 1:49:30 PM by Specialist290

Adapt a myth, fairy tale or legend.

We already did that. At least the fairy tale theme, I think.

Let me throw a few ideas into the wing:

• Darkest Hour
• "Groundhog Day" Loop
• Something old, something new, something borrowed and something blue.

edited 13th Mar '13 2:33:55 PM by chihuahua0

Double-blind fanfiction is really interesting, but it seems like it would be very difficult to find unbiased judges.

Hrm, agreed. Judging would change quite a bit based on whether the judge knew of the work in question, I suppose. I know I'd read a Star Trek fanfic (a universe I know well) much differently than, say, a Bleach one (It's that animé with the characters and stuff).

I'm chiming in to say I like the "Everyone-submits-a-title" concept orginally put forth by Ars Thaumaturgis. A related, but slightly different idea: What if we were to submit sentences of a fairly malleable nature, and everyone would have to include, say, two of them in their story?

I think that I'm in agreement that the fanfiction idea doesn't seem as though it would likely work well: aside from the judging issue, I imagine that the result could change significantly depending on the degree of knowledge that the author has of the subject — someone who knows just a little might write a very different story to someone who knows nothing but the title, for whom the challenge essentially returns to "write a story from the title".

I do like the sentence idea given in the post above mine, however — I support that along with my own suggestion (specifically the "new titles" version rather than the "extant titles" version).

You get to choose a line from the Bible/any religious text and base your story around that.

Write a story based off whatever ad is showing in the sidebar.

edited 16th Mar '13 12:44:05 PM by Leradny

No way. I'd have to write about wedding rings. I don't want to write about wedding rings.

That's the point of a contest prompt. You might not like it but you have to work with what you got.

I'd have to write about business seminars if I chose the one right now.

• whine* But I always get the ad for wedding rings...
  
  And dieting advice.
  
  Jokes aside, I like the title idea.

Well the ad server frequently doesn't work on my end, so..

I think adblock prevents me from getting them, but I'm not sure. I'd totally be for that though if someone else could assign me one.

Same here. AdBlock has changed my life for the better, and I don't want to change that for the sake of a writing contest.

You'd get: "Fencing experts"!

And by fencing they mean actual wooden fences, not swordfighting.

Hm, doable.