Disney Writing Comp

[sandie]

To all you budding writers (Yes you Lisa!)

Mice Age is running a competition:

How about a contest? You write and submit stories to me by email, and the best one will win a prize (I'll cobble together a few books and collectibles). Best of all, I'll run the winning story in a future MiceAge column. Who knows? If we get several good ones, I may just make it a running feature every so often.

There are some ground rules:

Length: between 5 and 15 pages double-spaced is preferred, but as short as one page or as long as 25 is acceptable.
Deadline: all submissions are due by September 1, 2008.
Setting: all stories must involve Disneyland in Anaheim. Or, at least part of the action must be there.
Genre: all genres are open. You can send in drama, superheroes, action-adventure, horror, ghost stories, mystery, romance, thrillers, crime drama, political drama, and even science-fiction, time travel, or anything else that occurs to you.
Time frame: open. It can be set in the past, present, or the future.
Restrictions: no Disney characters can be mentioned at all, and do not use real Cast Members. Also, even the fictional CMs cannot be portrayed nefariously. If in doubt, do not include anything questionable, because it won't win.
Required component: every story must mention a happy person, a happy coincidence, and a happy ending.
The final requirement above is to see how creative you can be in slipping in the references! I got this idea from The Plot Thickens, a collection of mystery short stories with the requirement that every story had to mention a thick fog, a thick book, and a thick steak. Everything else was up to the writers. The diversity of stories was great, and the reader experience included a kind of fun hunt for the required components (some of which were central, and some of which were mentioned only very briefly). Sure, it was a gimmick, but it was fun and it worked.

Your mention of a happy person, a happy coincidence, and a happy ending don't have to come in that order, and most authors will spread them out over the story rather than mention them all at once. Note that you don't have to actually *have* a happy ending, just that you must mention the words "happy ending." The rest of the sentence is up to you, and could in fact turn out to be a dark and pessimistic sentence if worded the right way! A few authors might be able to get away with paraphrasing or just leaving the required terms implied, but most will use the required phrases verbatim.

Before you jump to your keyboards, let's talk about what makes for good fiction. If you're new at this, you might be thinking first about an interesting plot. While a great plot can help, truly great fiction writing comes from well thought-out drama and characterization. Consider the possibilities of a bereaving family visiting Disneyland, or perhaps a romance slowly blossoming through a day of standing in lines. How about the friction of a long-simmering jealousy and competition between two people finally coming to a head during a day at the park, which was supposed to be so carefree? If you're just dying to do a "Die-Hard at Disneyland" type of scenario, just make sure the characters are not an afterthought. Characters are what make readers care about the story! Make the characters interesting, and everything else will fall into place.

Excited yet? Me too! Time to get cracking and start those fingers typing! We have the opportunity to finally start a fanfic community for Disney park fans. I can't wait to see your submissions and ideas. I really hope this flies.

[mushu mama]

Wooo hooo.... -/ -/

I didn't even get to the end of the post before my mind went into overdrive....

I'm in.... -/ -/

Lisa

[KeithS]

Let's just send them our Never Ending Story thread hehe