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Hello and welcome to the The Ink Well weekly fiction prompt and prize announcement! The Ink Well is a Hive blockchain-based social media community of creative writers. If you love to write short stories, we invite you to join us. Or peruse the work of our community members.
Note: We always launch our prompt posts with important information. So be sure to check it out first! Then we invite you to read on and see what we have in store for this week's prompt.
Important FAQs about The Ink Well!
Here are answers to some Frequently Asked Questions about The Ink Well.
What Is The Ink Well All About?
The Ink Well is a short story community. This means we only accept short fiction. (Fiction means stories that came from your imagination, not from real life.)
It also means:
- No novels, chapter stories or multi-part stories
- No poems
- No introduction posts
- No essays or other non-fiction
- No memes
Just fictional short stories!
The Ink Well is all about creativity, quality, community, and engagement. As such, we ask the following:
- Please take the time to get to know the community and read other writers' work. Everyone who posts in The Ink Well is expected to read and comment on at least two other stories for each piece you post.
- See our catalog of fiction writing tips and make use of our resources. (Many of our writers are developing awesome skills, and you can too!)
- Put effort into your posts. Review and edit your content for errors before publishing.
What are the community rules?
You can find our community rules at the top of The Ink Well community (right side of the page).
Please read the rules before posting in The Ink Well, as we outline the "do's and don'ts." If you can't find them, you can read them here.
Our community rules are designed to make our community a safe, welcoming, plagiarism-free space for self-publishing original short stories. We do not allow stories depicting violence, brutality, or abuse of women, children or animals. If you have questions, please read this article explaining our stance on violence.
What does it take to get rewards in The Ink Well??
We refer you to the above description of what The Ink Well is about. If you are not getting great rewards, it is likely for one of the following reasons:
- Your story has many grammatical errors. (This is easily fixed with the tips in our post, Help for the Grammatically Challenged.)
- Your story lacks some important elements of good fiction, such as character development, dialog, scene details or a story arc. (See our catalog of fiction writing tips for information on these important aspects of short stories.)
- Your story lacks originality or does not follow our community rules.
Important tips!
- Among the factors we look at is quality of engagement with others in the community
- Please make sure your story is clearly inspired by the prompt.
- Remember to link your story to the prompt post.
Weekly Challenge and Prize Announcement
Time for the prize announcement and new challenge!
Last week's prompt was roll and the skill target was 'create an antagonist'. This community really came through with many surprising, amazing stories!
Many of our writers created original, memorable stories in response to 'roll'. Our selections of this week's winners and honorable mentions reflect how well writers dealt with this prompt and skill challenge.
Update! We are excited to share that in addition to our first place winner, we are awarding a second and third place, in addition to a few honorable mentions. For second and third place we are awarding Hive Basic Income (HBI). The third place winner receives 2 HBI and the second place winner receives 3 HBI.
Here are this week's honorable mentions, all of them written in response to the prompt and skill challenge.
Honorable Mentions
- @daveyjones7 with the story The Operation
The boss laughed. "You can drop the act now my friend. Did you honestly think I won't find out? I have my claws in every agency you can think of or how else did you think I have been able to escape their grasp this long? I got an unusual call from one of my moles in the FBI telling me she has something big for me and that's it gonna cost me. Imagine my surprise, after I had paid a few dollars, she split her guts and rolled on you."
- @ricardo993 with the story Worn Out
Strangely the captain could not hear exactly what they were saying from the radio, he just watched his ship from the bridge windows. A deck finished by the weather and the sea, with dangerous places to work and flimsy places to walk. It was a white deck with black rust stains.
- @cajiro with the story Lady Floravella and the Dream Collector
And in a few steps she came upon the beauty of that garden, which seemed to smile at her as she came closer and closer. It was a very beautiful field, lined with many flowers, trees that floated above the ground and plants that sang as they embraced each other. The ground seemed to be made of diamonds and sapphires, and everything seemed to be sprinkled with stardust, for everything sparkled, even down to the dry leaves.
- @pjpavan with the story The Pajo Ant, the Queen and the Hive
Once the hive was established, all the ants realized that now they had to work 10 times more than before, when they were imprisoned by the young Carlos. And they began to blame Pajo for everything.
One thought that came to Pajo's mind is that freedom has a price and they just have to be all perseverant and stick together and they will see that their situation will improve little by little.
- @drstrings with the story What the Gecko?
We now had about one more hour to remain on the train. It was at this last hour that I felt so uncomfortable. I wiggled about the seat I sat on with sweat dropping from my face. I looked up at Mummy who sat beside me with my squeezed face. She was too busy on her laptop to notice me. Oh no, I had to tell her. I had to tell her immediately. Or else...
Third Place: Wins 2 HBI
- @restcity with her story Granny and Her Ginger
She constantly told people to bring her ‘sushi rolls’ from the store. I had no idea why, but whenever she got them, she’d be in a happier mood and start singing, which was VERY annoying. She’d pour some of the shrimp and avocado in my bowl. I was onto her. Of course she’d try to poison me, knowing I hated her this much.
Second Place: Wins 3 HBI
- @gabmr with the story The Amazon Untangled
Meanwhile, the Amazon continued to be a space filled with all kinds of shapes, colors and sounds that Cresty was familiar with. One night, however, he heard something different in his sleeping hours. It was differently terrifying. It was a terrible mixture of snapping branches, deafening roars and screams from his family.
And the winner of the roll/create a protagonist challenge is...@mrenglish with the story A Plea for Mercy. Congratulations, @mrenglish. You will receive 5 Hive!
Papa got home and saw a surprising scene. Ajike rolled from one part of the bed to the other while a male figure was teasing her. The shock of the sight left Papa bewildered. Still stunned, he came to the bedside, knelt, and started to sob.
Okay, let's review fiction entries from last week's prompt and launch a new one.
Stories From the Previous Week
@drstrings
@gi-de-on
@wofaipeace
@restcity
@fantom22
@cool08
@mrenglish
@marynn
@fragozar01
@yuki-nee
@greatideas
@lightpen
@lordtimoty
@chincoculbert
@khairro
@agmoore
@popurri
@nelson-george
@iyimoga
@wrestlingdesires
@abigail04
@madamnaomi
@temileke
@diikaan
@farahikram
@royalty78
@buezor
@fibre1
@khaleesii
@daveyjones7
@raymondpeter
Thank you to everyone who posted a story for last week's prompt!
This Week’s Prompt
The Ink Well is fortunate to have many members who are eager to write. However, the curation team does not have infinite resources. In order to be fair to all writers, we have decided to ask our members to publish only one story per week. If members choose to publish more than that, they may. However, only one story will be curated.
It would be wise to use talent on the best story you can write so you can receive the optimal curation. Remember, Quality over Quantity. Moving forward the Ink Well Team believes this will provide a better experience for writers and curators.
At last, the prompt of the week!
This week's prompt is wishbone (wishbone, wish and bone). As is often true, the prompt is a gift to writers because of the many possible applications. There are three words in this one prompt: wishbone, wish, and bone. Derive your inspiration from any one of the three--or all three. Have fun. Surprise us.
The list of ideas for this prompt may be very long, but here are a few to help you get started:
- Marc was told the car had a wishbone suspension, which would make the vehicle easier to drive.
- The superstition about wishbones being lucky can be traced back to the Romans.
- Children often believe that wishing can change fortunes, but adults realize that change usually requires hard work.
- The well was bone dry, though Margaret had wished fervently for rain.
- Andrea was so thin that her shoulder bones showed through her blouse.
- Maria always told her children that wishful thinking would get them nothing.
- The skeletal remains revealed the small bone structure of an aged woman.
- The wishbone formation was widely used in college football for many years.
- Melissa tried to bone up on the subject before her annual exam.
- Geraldo was known in the office for one peculiar habit: he always wore a herringbone suit.
These examples for the prompt are only suggestions.
The skill challenge is something we have tried before. It is an indispensable element in your story: the hook. Give readers a great first line, one that will tempt them to read more. @jayna has written an essay, Hook Your Readers, that explains the importance of a hook. Here is an excerpt from the essay:
The fishing metaphor for fiction writing is an important one. Hooking the reader is about writing a compelling opening so the reader becomes “hooked” and wants to keep reading.
Read the rest of @jayna's essay to get a better handle on the concept of a hook.
A week from now, we will select a winning story that demonstrates this skill and utilizes the prompt. Of course we will also be looking for overall quality in the winning story. Good luck!
Note: As always, please avoid violent, gory, bloody, brutal, sexist or racist themes and language, erotica and other NSFW (not safe for work) content, and stories featuring abuse of women, children or animals. (We have a complete article about The Ink Well stance on violence and brutality for more information.)
If you don't feel inspired by this prompt or the featured image, feel free to peruse any of our past prompts or our collection of idea-generators:
Weekly Prompt Rules:
- Deadline: You have a week to write for the prompt, until the next one is posted. (Note: You can write for any of the prompts anytime. This is just a guideline to be included in the weekly round-up in the next prompt post.)
- Story link: Post your story in The Ink Well community, and post a link to your story in a comment on this post.
- Hashtags: Please use these hashtags: #fiction #writing #inkwellprompt #theinkwell and #dreemport, if you are also posting your story to the DreemPort site.
- COMMUNITY SUPPORT: Visit the work of at least two other community members and comment on their work.
- Title: The title is up to you. You can come up with any title you wish. You do not need to name it after the prompt or include the prompt word.
- Images: Please only use images from license free and creative commons sites, like Pixabay, Unsplash and Pexels. Images you find on the Internet are copyright protected and cannot be used. Be sure to provide the source link.
- Length: We request that story word counts are a maximum of 1,500 words maximum length (preferably 750-1000 words). This is just a guideline. Longer stories are okay too, but they tend to get fewer readers. Additionally, The Ink Well admins appreciate keeping to that maximum story length for our time management. Thank you!
Reminder: Be sure to also read our community rules. The reason for the repeat reminder is that we see many stories describing brutality of women, children, or animals, or that have excessive gore or violence, and we must mute them. Please do not post these stories in The Ink Well. We want our community to be a safe and comfortable place for all readers.
Here are the past prompts if you would like to use them or refer back to them:
- #1: Heart and Soul
- #2: The moment when...
- #3: Beauty with a twist
- #4: The Way Home
- #5: A Matter of Time
- #6 50 Story Ideas
- #7 The Library
- #8 All the way to tomorrow
- #9 Legend
- #10 Three Words
- #11 World Building
- #12 Childhood Summers
- #13 50 Imagination Ticklers
- #14 Railroad
- #15 Cats - 750 words
- #16 Your Birthday
- #17 Action, Dialog and Narrative
- #18 Change
- #19 Tea Time or Tee Time?
- #20 Summer Camp
- #21 Main Street
- #22 Fireworks
- #23 Picnic
- #24 Run
- #25 A word of advice
- #26 Winding road
- #27 Mirror
- #28 Shipwreck
- #29 School Notes
- #30 Three Words: Scooter, River, Midnight
- #31 Flash Fiction Contest
- #32 A Fork in the Road
- #33 Shadows
- #34 Three Words: Island, Witch, Cake
- #35 Full Moon
- #36 Graveyard
- #37 Jack-o-Lantern
- #38 Family Ties
- #39 Longing
- #40 Feast
- #41 Gift
- #42 Season of Light
- #43 Believe
- #44 Elf
- #45 Holiday
- #46 New Year
- #47 Unlikely Hero
- #48 Inheritance
- #49 Under the Light of the Moon
- #50 Three Words: Shoes, Mood, Adventure
- #51 They're Here
- #52 Artist
- #53 Headlights
- #54 Tomorrow
- #55 Lense
- #56 Perfection
- #57 Making and Breaking Rules
- #58 A Reckoning
- #59 Blossom
- #60 Temptation
- #61 Happiness
- #62 Footprint
- #63 Frequency
- #64 Sailing
- #65 Fortune
- #66 Worry
- #67 Adventure
- #68 Shadow
- #69 Motor
- #70 Embarrass
- #71 Proud
- #72 Guide
- #73 Impression
- #74 Lost
- #75 Wonder
- #76 Tear
- #77 Splash
- #78 Brilliant
- #79 Sinkhole
- #80 Exhaust
- #81 Roll
Thank you for being a part of The Ink Well!
@jayna, @agmoore, @gracielaacevedo, @yaziris and @itsostylish
Interested in joining our community? Start by joining Hive!
We invite lovers of creative writing to visit The Ink Well, a Hive community started by @raj808 and @stormlight24 and run by @jayna, @agmoore, @gracielaacevedo, @yaziris and @itsostylish.
You can follow our curation trail by going to our hive.vote curation trail page and clicking the follow button.
We welcome delegations! These support our community in many ways, including helping us to provide support to quality content creators through curation and contests.
@jayna, @zeurich, @felt.buzz, @marcybetancourt, @marlyncabrera, @stormcharmer, @generikat, @agmoore, @iamraincrystal, @preparedwombat, @gracielaacevedo, @chocolatescorpi, @kirlos, @josemalavem, @morey-lezama, @sayury, @evagavilan2 and @popurri.
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