Thursday Postcard
Pull out your wallet and prepare to enter Hell.
Hell on wheels, that is!
The International 3-Day Novel Contest approacheth. Founded by a bunch of writers in a Vancouver bar in 1978 (or something), it is a trial by fire and a total gas.
Should fire and gas be in the same sentence, even? Combustible!
This year’s contest is, as always, held over the Labour Day weekend, from 12:01 am Saturday Sept. 3 to 11:59 Monday Sept. 5. Anyone can enter. Registration is 50 USD and you can enter it here.
You don’t need to know how to write, and you don’t need to stay up late. I start on Saturday morning after coffee, because after midnight all I’m good for these days is watching the inside of my eyelids.
What’s fun about it?
I’ve entered this contest 7 times.
Every time I do it, I discover who I am.
The first time I entered, I did it alone and told nobody what I was up to.
Years later I entered again and stumbled across a beautiful, warm-hearted online community of fellow wackos who have made it tremendously fun.
Fellow traveler (creator, editor, and story tender) Pam Bustin creates the forum every year and has an excellent video with tips for 3-day novelists here.
As the weekend progresses we pop into the forum from time to time to talk about snacks and plot holes, booze and character problems. Mostly, we cheer each other on.
This forum can be found at Abebooks.com. You need to create an account and then you’ll find us at 3 Day Novel ChatZONE 2022!
Hope to see you in hell!
Cheers,
Pat
PS: If you, too, are interested in Flannery O’Connor or point of view, visit A Writer’s Roadmap for a geek-fest. See you there!