Challenge One Sentence Challenge 2023

One Sentence Challenge

Welcome to the return of the One Sentence Challenge! Brevity is the soul of wit, or so the long-winded Polonius declared. The One Sentence Challenge offers all participants an opportunity to hone their brevity and thus their wit by telling an entire story in a single sentence. Though it is understood if like Polonius writers find themselves indulging in run-on sentences.



The goal as ever is to do the best we can and be creative in our ideas and execution. As inspiration, below is a classic example of a one sentence story often attributed to Ernest Hemingway:

For sale: baby shoes, never worn.

Those six words carry so much meaning and pack so much emotional punch, showing how much writers can convey in a single, seemingly simple sentence. It is this meaning and emotional punch that we'll be trying to channel into our own one sentence stories throughout the One Sentence Challenge.

The Nitty, Gritty Writing and Structural Rules for Your Stories:

1. Only one sentence per story is permitted.

2. Each story must be able to stand alone, though writers are welcome to compose a series of one sentence stories as long as each sentence can work independently of the others in the series.

3. All stories must comply with the standard Fanfic rules regarding content, but all you magnificent people guessed that already, and that is why you are the best!

4. Each writer may submit as many stories as he or she would like as long as they are submitted after the start date of October 15th, 2023 and before the deadline of November 15th, 2023.

5. Not a rule so much as a tip, but keep in mind that punctuation marks like colons, semi-colons, and dashes may be your best friends throughout this challenge, so be creative and free with using them!



The Posting Rules It’s Super Important You Read Before Posting Your Stories:

Due to the unique one-sentence format of this challenge, there have been special posting rules made for this challenge as a courtesy to the fanfiction community to avoid clutter. That is why it is very important that all participants in this challenge read this section before posting and comply with these rules when posting their entries.

1. Once this challenge starts, I will post threads in both the Star Wars and non Star Wars sections of these boards for people to post their stories. The Star Wars thread will be for Star Wars entries, and the non Star Wars thread for all non Star Wars entries.

2. I will post the links to each of those threads in this one once the challenge begins so that it is easy for all readers and writers to find those threads from this one.

3. Writers are limited to one post per day with one sentence challenge responses, so if you wrote seven one sentence stories in one day, simply compile them all in one post, and post to the appropriate thread.

4. All entries for the One Sentence Challenge should be posted in those respective threads unless you already have a multi-story thread in existence in which you can post your entries. If you have such a multi-story thread, you can link to it with the relevant post or posts containing your entries in this thread, and I will add it to the index.

5. The most important point is that no new threads apart from the Star Wars and non Star Wars ones I make may be created for this challenge.

6. If you believe your situation warrants an exception to the above rules (i.e. if you’ve made a longer story consisting of a bunch of single sentences you’d like to make its own thread), please contact me for approval prior to posting. If you receive this approval , you can create that thread, post a link to it here, and I will add your story to the index in this thread.

If after reading this section, you have any questions about the posting rules, please feel free to ask in this thread or by PM!

The Timeline for the Challenge:

The One Sentence Challenge will begin on October 15th, 2023 when I post the threads in the Star Wars and non Star Wars sections. The deadline for submitting all entries will be November 15th, 2023.

Voting for the best one sentence stories in the Star Wars and non Star Wars categories will begin on November 16th, 2023 and run for two weeks through midnight EST on November 30th, 2023. The top ten stories in both the Star Wars and the non Star Wars category will be named at the end of this two week voting period.

To vote, users may submit ranked ballots for up to ten stories in each of the Star Wars and non Star Wars categories. The best story on your ballot in each category should be ranked number one and so on through a maximum of ten in each category (you may vote for less than ten but not more than ten in each category). For each story, please list the title and author if the work is titled. If it isn’t, please list the author, post number with the story, and the first three words in the story.

You may submit your votes to me via PM. It goes without saying, but please do not submit multiple votes beyond the ten votes in each category, vote for yourself, or try to use a sock to circumvent these rules.

Once I’ve tabulated the results, I’ll try to announce them as soon as possible once the voting period is over. In the fun spirit of the challenge, the prizes will be nothing more than the the satisfaction and knowledge of doing well. In the end, the fun will all have been in the participation.

As always, if you have any questions, please feel free to ask in this thread or via PM.

Single Sentence Scribes Signups:

@devilinthedetails
@JediMaster_Jen
@WarmNyota_SweetAyesha
@Kit'
@Findswoman
@gizkaspice
@UltramassiveUbersue
@earlybird-obi-wan
@Jordan1Kenobi
@Seldes_Katne
@amidalachick
@Starith
@brodiew

 

Star Wars One Sentence Challenge Story Thread: Here

Non Star Wars One Sentence Challenge Story Thread: Here

 

Top Ten Star Wars One Sentence Stories:

1. "Pearlescent Braid" by @devilinthedetails; "Call of the Force" by @Jordan1Kenobi
2. "Temple Ashes" by @devilinthedetails;"Forbidden Love" by @Jordan1Kenobi
3. "Always" by @Kit'
4. "Kyber Cut" by @devilinthedetails
5) "The Trials of Being a Master" by @Kit' ; "Attack of the Clothes" by @Starith
6) "Clarification, of Sorts" by @Seldes_Katne
7) "Career Change" by @Seldes_Katne; "Steering Clear" by @WarmNyota_SweetAyesha
8) "A Benefactor" by @UltramassiveUbersue; "Come!" by @Findswoman
9) "Tribunal" by @Findswoman; "The Jedi Cure" by @Jordan1Kenobi
10) "Mercenaries" by @devilinthedetails; "A Sith's Fear" by @Jordan1Kenobi

Top Ten Non Star Wars One Sentence Stories:

1. "No cats were harmed in the drowning of Numenor" by @gizkaspice; "Lipstick and Nylons" by @devilinthedetails
2. "Reap" by @Mira_Jade; "like a force to be reckoned with" by @Mira_Jade; "Train" by @devilinthedetails
3. "A Standout" by @WarmNyota_SweetAyesha; "Death" by @Mira_Jade; "Lucy" by @devilinthedetails
4. "Life" by @Mira_Jade; "Yule Ball" by @devilinthedetails
5. "Offense" by @Mira_Jade; "Wet Blanket" by @devilinthedetails
6. "Oops" by @Pandora; "And They Danced" by @Pandora; "A Good Influence" by @devilinthedetails; "Veela" by @devilinthedetails
7. "Defense" by @Mira_Jade; "Dragons" by @devilinthedetails; "Wardrobe" by @devilinthedetails
8. "Law and Order" by @devilinthedetails; "Golden Age" by @devilinthedetails; "Faun" by @devilinthedetails; "Wellspring" by @Mira_Jade
9. "Wedding Tears" by @devilinthedetails; "Bruise" by @Mira_Jade; "Lovers of Toussaint" by @Jordan1Kenobi
10. "Ripple" by @Mira_Jade; "Countryside Romp" by @devilinthedetails; "Visitors in the Throne Room" by @gizkaspice

 

@JediMaster_Jen Happy to have you aboard for the One Sentence fun

@WarmNyota_SweetAyesha Oh, thank you for the kind words to make me blush

This is a very nostalgic challenge for me to host since I knocked off some dust and polished off the rough edges of the very first challenge I ever hosted on this site to make this one!

And I'm so glad that you'll be participating in the fun as well

 

@Kit' You can do it! I believe in you

 

Yay, glad to see this return; it’s becoming a real JCF fall classic! Sign me up, please—I think I have a few ideas…

 

@Findswoman Glad to have you aboard, and it's exciting to have the One Sentence Challenge return this fall, and I really can't wait to see the single sentence stories everyone comes up with this year

@gizkaspice Good question! I would say that it is fine if the single sentence story (or single sentence stories) are part of a larger story arc or a larger story as long as they can also function independently as their own smaller, very short stories. Basically, as long as your one sentence stories manage to tell their own story they are eligible for this challenge even if they also fit within a larger story or story arc. And if you have a thread where you are telling that larger story where you want to include these single sentence entries, that is acceptable and can be linked in this thread.

Also, if anyone has an "odds and ends" sort of story thread where they put miscellaneous stories and wants to include their single sentence stories in that thread, that is also acceptable and can be linked in this thread.

The main thing in terms of threads is just not to have the boards flooded with lots of new story threads that are just one single sentence.

Hopefully, that makes sense and isn't just incoherent word salad because it's been a long day at the library But definitely feel free to tell me if I made no sense and just made you more confused!

And a love of semicolons is a most excellent prerequisite for being part of this challenge

@UltramassiveUbersue Happy to have you aboard as well, and great to see another lover of semicolons! This challenge is just perfect for us lovers of semicolons

 

@earlybird-obi-wan Yay, I've got you added to the signup list now, and let the angst flow through you in honor of angstober

@Jordan1Kenobi I'm excited to have you aboard for the One Sentence Challenge! I've got you added to the signups as well

 

@Seldes_Katne Happy to have you aboard!

I've got you added to the signup list now.

As to your question, yes, you can certainly make one post in the challenge thread and edit it to add more stories throughout the challenge if would like

 

@amidalachick You most certainly can sign up, and I'm absolutely excited to have you aboard for the fun as well

And, like you, I can't wait to see what one sentence stories everyone will come up with for this challenge!

 

@Starith Wonderful to have you participating as well!

I've added you to the list of signups now

 

Ladies and gentlemen of the Fanfic community, it is my pleasure to announce that the 2023 One Sentence Challenge is officially underway and that the story threads have been posted to their respective Star Wars and Non Star Wars fanfic sections.

The Star Wars One Sentence Challenge 2023 Story Thread can be found here.

The Non Star Wars One Sentence Challenge 2023 Story Thread can be found here.

The happiest of reading and writing to you all

 

@Kit' Yes, they can be on anything and don’t have to be inspired by any particular prompts