# Short Story Contest for Winter 2009



## ScottyDM (Oct 11, 2009)

*It's the winter quarter and time for another short story contest from Anthrofiction Network.*

The theme is Winter Magic.


> *Winter Magic*
> 
> Itâ€™s simple. Set your story in winter. Use some element of magic.
> 
> ...



Easy enough.

As always, the contest rules. I shouldn't have to say it here, but sometimes people forget. The most important rule, or at least the only rule thus far I've used to reject stories, is that your story must be anthrofiction.


*What about NaNoWriMo?*

Glad you asked. I'll be participating in NaNo this year and I assume some of you will be too. There are several possibilities:

Conceive, write, and finish the first draft of your story before November 1st. Set the story aside during November. Then between December 1st and December 7th go back and revise your story to perfect it. Enter before the deadline of December 7th.
Focus on NaNo in the next few weeks, but keep the contest in mind. You might even view the contest theme as a NaNo challenge--make some chapter of your novel about Winter Magic. Then between December 1st and 7th spin that chapter out of your novel, revise it to turn it into a complete short story (beginning, middle, end, and with a real title not something like "Chapter 14"), anthropomorphize your characters if necessary, and polish it up for the contest.
Be a NaNo pirate like me and work on your story _during_ NaNo. Count the words toward your NaNo total. Hey, if they are fresh words, and not editing, then they are in the spirit of NaNo so screw the official rules. Save your editing for December. Enter before the December 7th deadline.
Come up with a story either before November or after. Do the best you can. Planning is for pussies.
Good luck with NaNo and better luck in the contest!


Scotty


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## LadyMissie (Oct 11, 2009)

This sounds really fun. I'll try my best to get something written in time for it.


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## Shouden (Oct 11, 2009)

I think I can enter this contest. umm...would a superpower count as magic?


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## panzergulo (Oct 11, 2009)

> *Winter Magic*
> 
> Itâ€™s simple. Set your story in winter. Use some element of magic.
> 
> ...



This confused me the last time as well. Why the theme must be described so widely and with so many words? It feels restricting. I would prefer to write a story because it's fun writing a story, not force a story into a certain model or shape, just because some contest enforces it. In the end, I didn't like the story I wrote as a contest entry the last time, just because there were so many limitations. I don't care if it won me the second place, I think the story is weak compared to some other stories of mine.

That said, I might have an idea for a story that could fit this season's contest perfectly. And you have actually given enough loopholes this time, I can use some more personal elements... I might even be able to write a story I like.


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## ScottyDM (Oct 12, 2009)

panzergulo said:


> This confused me the last time as well. Why the theme must be described so widely and with so many words?


I don't quite understand. Do you find the winter theme confusing?


My thoughts for the winter theme are that I want it set in winter and I want magic. I want to see some tie between the season and the magical elements. And I want real magic, or at least the illusion of real magic. That's it.

Part of the reason for describing something widely is because in the past I've seen entries that were exactly what I was thinking of when I thought of the theme, but someone will invariably turn in a ballot and give that story a "1" for the theme score. Christmas magic? Go for it! But if you prefer to dig into Finnish prehistory and use something from that I don't want you to be penalized by a reader who lacks imagination.

The other part of the reason is because some quarters I don't think of the theme until a few weeks before the new quarter. And I don't write it out until after I've calculated the final scores for the quarter just finished. For example this quarter. That theme description is my first draft at crafting a theme description. First drafts suck.

Scotty


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## ScottyDM (Oct 12, 2009)

Shouden said:


> I think I can enter this contest. umm...would a superpower count as magic?


Wow. Ummm, maybe. Kinda depends on the superpower. To be safe you'd best tie the superpower to the winter season or to some specific winter holiday.

For example someone who has some sort of awesome power during the winter solstice. But what power? Errm, how about since the winter solstice is about "turning around", that is the days had been getting shorter and shorter but on that day the trend "turns around" and the days start getting longer. So this "turn around" power is some way to reverse the negatives happening in people's lives--but only starting during the moment of the solstice and perhaps fading with time. Or maybe have a positive power after the solstice and a negative power before. If your superguy where a hero and not a villain he might be reluctant to do anything until his "turn around" day for fear he'd accidentally cause great harm. After that day he can leap into action and help people for the next six months.

Okay, that may be a silly idea. But it fits the theme better than Mighty Mouse flying about to deliver dreidels to poor Jewish children on the first day of Chanukah.

Scotty


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## panzergulo (Oct 12, 2009)

ScottyDM said:


> I don't quite understand. Do you find the winter theme confusing?



Well... the long description confuses me. I think this would be enough:



> *Winter Magic*
> 
> Itâ€™s simple. Set your story in winter. Use some element of magic.


There. Why would there be a need of telling anything about different sort of winter festivals and stuff like that? I don't want to tell a Christmas magic story. I want to tell a winter magic story. This sort of description wouldn't disallow either of them. And still, you continue the description: "It must be this and it must be this..." I kinda understand why you want tighter theme, as people could treat the theme very loosely... but still, it restricts me. I might have a story that fits those theme limits just perfectly, but just the fact that there is a limit restricts me. It's just me, I guess.

And yeah, I will definitely use some Finnish elements in the story... We have long, cold and dark winters... there's a lot I can derive from those...


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## Atrak (Oct 12, 2009)

> Planning is for pussies.



I like this phrase  . I think I'll participate in this. It will be my first time, and the theme involves magic, which I like  .


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## Atrak (Oct 12, 2009)

Ack. A 3500 word limit. That is going to be my greatest challenge: making a story that short  .


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## Atrak (Oct 12, 2009)

> No author may enter more than two stories for any single season. That is, no more than eight entries per year.



So we get two attempts per contest? Sweetness  .


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## Shouden (Oct 13, 2009)

ScottyDM said:


> Wow. Ummm, maybe. Kinda depends on the superpower. To be safe you'd best tie the superpower to the winter season or to some specific winter holiday.
> 
> For example someone who has some sort of awesome power during the winter solstice. But what power? Errm, how about since the winter solstice is about "turning around", that is the days had been getting shorter and shorter but on that day the trend "turns around" and the days start getting longer. So this "turn around" power is some way to reverse the negatives happening in people's lives--but only starting during the moment of the solstice and perhaps fading with time. Or maybe have a positive power after the solstice and a negative power before. If your superguy where a hero and not a villain he might be reluctant to do anything until his "turn around" day for fear he'd accidentally cause great harm. After that day he can leap into action and help people for the next six months.
> 
> ...



well, one of my characters is a Snow Witch and can control/make snow and ice. It's not "tied" per-say to the winter season, but it is wintery. and perhaps, maybe they're having an excessively hot winter and she makes it snow for everyone, or something.


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## Atrak (Oct 13, 2009)

Witches are generally defined as users of magic. If she wears her underwear on the outside and wears a bright red cape and mask, there might be a problem, but that doesn't sound like a good protagonist to me, anyway. If she doesn't have the outfit, then I would not define her as a superhero. Just because she can use magic and may act heroically doesn't make her a 'superhero' per se. I'd just call her a regular hero that uses magic instead of a sword.


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## Shouden (Oct 13, 2009)

psh...you don't need a costume to be a hero...just like you don't need to drink grog to be a pirate...but she does have a costume, but, she doesn't wear her underwear on the outside of her pants...that might not be so good..seeing as she's a chick.


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## Atrak (Oct 13, 2009)

I didn't say she couldn't be a hero. In fact, I said she could, in an adverb form. I just said most people don't consider magic to be a 'superpower,' and, therefore, a witch could be a hero, but wouldn't really be considered a superhero. Heck, if you want to make her a 'super' hero, make her a legend. After all...

"Heroes are remembered. Legends never die."


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## ScottyDM (Oct 13, 2009)

panzergulo said:


> And still, you continue the description: "It must be this and it must be this..." I kinda understand why you want tighter theme, as people could treat the theme very loosely... but still, it restricts me. I might have a story that fits those theme limits just perfectly, but just the fact that there is a limit restricts me. It's just me, I guess.


That there is a theme at all is restrictive. But this quarter, other than a minimal specification, there are few restrictions. What I wrote are suggestions (note the "...or something else," at the end of the second paragraph). Your imagination is fine, my imagination is fine, but some people--people who might read and score your story in December--may feel that if it's not about Santa Claus it's not about winter magic. The description is to help those who need a bit of a boost to expand their minds.



atrakaj said:


> Ack. A 3500 word limit. That is going to be my greatest challenge: making a story that short  .


Each of us have our own sweet spot and it can be a challenge to work outside of that. I noticed on Critique Circle that shorter stories and chapters gathered more critiques. I think that's partly to do with basic human laziness. A 700 word story is not equal to a 7,000 word story--at least not to many readers. Therefore the min/max limits.

I'm trying to level the playing field without being too restrictive. Other things I do to level the playing field are: format all the stories so they look the same (same font, page layout, etc.) and to remove author names.

BTW, some publishers' imprints have very tight limits for word count. For example 80,000 to 85,000 words for a novel. And that is not negotiable. So if you want to sell a novel to that publisher then it better fit or it gets an automatic reject.

But what is a story? A decent workable plot structure for a short story is: setup, turning point, resolution. To keep it short eliminate subplots and limit the number of characters.

Richard Thompson writes the comic strip "Cul de Sac" and a few weeks ago for his Sunday strip he managed not 1, but 2 complete stories in only 7 panels. And his outer story had a subplot as well. I thought the strip was a brilliant illustration of short story structure and so I saved it. Here's a breakdown of his strip.






Panels 1 and 2 are the setup of the outer (the larger) story.





Panels 3, 4, and 5 are the turning point to the outer story. But they are also a complete story in themselves. Panel 3 is the setup, 4 is the turning point, and 5 is the resolution of this inner story.





Panel 6 is the resolution of the outer story, but panel 7 is a part of that with the introduction and resolution of a subplot--the produce guy is a screenwriter. Panel 7 is optional. In this case it's an extra punchline. A bit of a zinger at the end.

The lesson is that you don't need a lot for a complete short story.

Now for a novel you need more. For example there will be several turning points. It's like your main character (MC) is playing Wack-a-Mole and each time he smashes a problem, two more pop up somewhere else--at least until the resolution phase when your MC obtains the mother of all Wack-a-Mole mallets and with one smash wins the game. With the typical short story you don't have to have more than one problem or one attempt to solve it.

In some circumstances you can get by with fewer than three parts. Consider the following joke.

"An Irishman walks out of a bar..."

"Hey! It could happen."

This joke consists of only a turning point and a resolution. The setup already exists within the mind of the reader: It's stereotype the reader holds about Irishmen and bars. Now for readers who are unfamiliar with the stereotype the joke fails.

I've got more I could say about how to reduce a story and get it under 3,500 words, but this will get you started.

Anyway, give it a shot.



Shouden said:


> well, one of my characters is a Snow Witch and can control/make snow and ice. It's not "tied" per-say to the winter season, but it is wintery. and perhaps, maybe they're having an excessively hot winter and she makes it snow for everyone, or something.


The White Witch of _The Lion, the Witch, and the Wardrobe_ would be a perfect sort of character because she has the perfect sort of magical power. Where ever she is, is perpetual winter. Winter _is_ her power. Although I didn't think of it when I wrote the theme page, I'd accept this as a suitable definition of winter.

I don't care if you cast your Snow Witch as a hero or a villain. Just turn her loose and let her do her stuff.

Scotty


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## Atrak (Oct 13, 2009)

Scotty, I don't mean that I can't write a story that short, I just mean that I freetype, and when I start typing, I don't think about what I'm writing or how long it is, I just write. Most cases, it turns out to be a lot longer than 3500 words  . The shortest story I've done, and I consider it a short story, is over 7200 words.

This is a good thing, however, as it will challenge me to do what I have never done before, and will make me a stronger writer.


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## ScottyDM (Oct 13, 2009)

People create the way people create. We are all a bit different. But when you're done with your first draft then what?

Although I'm closer to the "planner" end of the scale than the "pantser" (seat of the pants writer), I have a tendency to write long in my first draft. I'll often include backstory details that are irrelevant, humorous asides, characters who mater in my storyworld but not in this story, and when I first started writing fiction I included full transition scenes--the characters walking from one action location to the next while talking about some junk that, while interesting, didn't have jack squat to do with the story at hand. Even when you don't have a word limit ripping out all the irrelevancies helps.

What happens when you've finished your second draft, gotten rid of all the dross, and you're at 4,500 words? Well, perhaps it's time to change the focus of your story.

Nathan Ryan created this contest back in 2005. I entered the summer quarter and finished in the middle of the pack. For fall I pulled a chapter from my novel-in-progress where the FMC (female main character), a college-age human woman, brings her fox-morph boyfriend (the MMC in the novel) home to meet her family over Thanksgiving weekend. One reader called my short story a furry version of _Guess Who's Coming to Dinner_.

A one-sentence synopsis of my first attempt was something like: "When a genetically uplifted fox spends Thanksgiving with his human girlfriend's family, he must win their acceptance." There was the girl's mom and dad and her big brother, and I had ten scenes planned. I wrote a few of them and it was apparent they weren't going to average only 350 words each.

So I rethought my story and refocused it. A one-sentence synopsis of the refocused story is something like: "When her college-age daughter brings a genetically uplifted fox home for Thanksgiving, a mother must learn to accept her daughter's new boyfriend." Focusing on the mom cut the scene count to five and I was able to keep my story under the 3,500 word limit.

Pantsers are usually quick with their first drafts so jump in and rewrite your story from scratch if you need to. Or maybe do a tiny bit of in-head planning and think about how your story might work if told from the viewpoints of several different characters, then pick the one that seems the best.

This contest is not about the process--it's about the result.

I look forward to your story.

Scotty


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## M. LeRenard (Oct 13, 2009)

I thought about it for a while, and I've now got something in the works for this contest.  So I will participate this time!  But I'm going to have to go with your option about doing it real quick-like right now, then letting it sit until December, because I have indeed signed my soul away to NaNo this year.
This one might be tough to write, though, because the concept I've gone with is just... I don't know.  I'm still trying to think of the best kind of magic to use, and how to fit it in there.  It's about friendship between two species, and one trying to help the other get through winter.  So I'm waffling between teleportation or some kind of fire magic, I guess.  Or something more interesting, maybe, would be better.
But anyway, I'm definitely entering this time.


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## Shouden (Oct 13, 2009)

I was trying to think of a way I could use my new characters for this, but, their world is a little more bound by the laws of physics. So, there will be only one story from me this time.


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## Atrak (Oct 13, 2009)

> *Winter Magic*
> 
> Itâ€™s simple. Set your story in winter. Use some element of magic.
> 
> The magic _must_ be tied to the season.





> So I'm waffling between teleportation or some kind of fire magic, I guess.



I was under the impression that the magic must relate to winter in some way. An obvious way, not an obscure way, like that heat evaporated the water which then condensed into snow four months later. Actually, my protagonist's magic won't be cold, either, but I'm probably going to put some form of winter magic in there in order to meet the conditions.

If the magic does not have to be as related to winter as I think, please correct me, Scotty.


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## M. LeRenard (Oct 13, 2009)

I guess I read that as, the magic must have some kind of connection to the season.  Hence, if you use fire magic to deter the ill effects of winter, the fire magic is connected to the season of winter (in this case, to combat it).
See, Scotty?  Even when you specify, you still get different interpretations, I guess.  But that's the beauty of it.


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## Shouden (Oct 14, 2009)

you know, every once and a while Scotty gives some generic themes....like last year he said "write a ghost story" which wasn't specific and there were a lot of takes on the theme. I think this is one of those. "Winter magic" pretty much sums it up. All you need is to have your story focus around some sort of character or event or whatever that can be perceived as magic connected with the season.

And on that note, I will be writing two stories, as I just thought of a cool idea for another story.


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## panzergulo (Dec 9, 2009)

I suppose Scotty is going to advertise the entries again in this thread... and I have a question... so I guess this is a good place to ask it. The entries are online, if you didn't know, and the judging period has started.

So, my question is: Does the site allow a contestant to give a ballot to his or her own story? Without giving any ballot I can't really see any mechanism preventing it. I am fairly sure that a contestant is able to judge the stories of other people, as this happened to me during the last season. Just interested, I want to know what I can do and what I can't do, also, the capability of judging one's own stories is a matter of fairness... you wouldn't be a good writer if you couldn't give full marks to your own material, yes? And still, doing it would make you look like a cheater.

Sorry for any logical, grammatical or typing errors, it's early here in Finland and I am still feeling rather dizzy. Good luck for all those who were able to submit an entry before due.


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## M. LeRenard (Dec 9, 2009)

From what I could tell, Scotty encourages folks to score their own stories.  Although he expects people to be honest about it, instead of just giving it perfect everything.  I've scored my own the last couple of times, anyway, and I'll probably score this entry as well.
I say go for it.

Edit: I like that title, Monody of Wax.  I wonder whose that is.


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## panzergulo (Dec 9, 2009)

M. Le Renard said:


> From what I could tell, Scotty encourages folks to score their own stories.  Although he expects people to be honest about it, instead of just giving it perfect everything.  I've scored my own the last couple of times, anyway, and I'll probably score this entry as well.
> I say go for it.



I wouldn't be even asking regularly, because I have this idea that the contestants should be truly anonymous... but, my story is so obviously mine this time, so I didn't see a reason to hide it... you take one good read through every piece and you can tell which is mine. That is, if you have read anything of mine during the last nine months, you can tell which story is mine.

And yeah, honestly, I think my story should rank with the highest scores on all judging criteria. ;P Okay, seriously, I find it hard to judge fairly my own stuff... because I had fun writing the story... so it was a really entertaining experience for me... and the story is near to my heart, it speaks to me... maybe more than to others... and I can understand perfectly well what I meant with each sentence... it's a perfect story in many ways in my own eyes... I dunno... maybe I should read everything and then judge them as I see them compared to each other...



M. Le Renard said:


> Edit: I like that title, Monody of Wax.  I wonder whose that is.



Genuine interest, or shameless self-advertisement? Hmm... ;P Also, I had to look "monody" from a dictionary, so I fear I won't like the story much. It's nice to learn new words in English... but looking up fancy words every two seconds will take off of the reading experience. Plus, the title doesn't really give me anything.



> *monÂ·oÂ·dy* _n._ _pl._ *monÂ·oÂ·dies*
> *1. * An ode for one voice or actor, as in Greek drama.
> *2. * A poem in which the poet or speaker mourns another's death.


_
Vahan Itkuvirsi_ or _Itkuvirsi Vahalle_ it would be in Finnish... and honestly, it doesn't make a lot of sense to me... I'm too much of a utilitarian, I guess. Wax isn't worth mourning for, I can't really see wax mourning for anything, and I wouldn't coat a monody with wax either... I can't see the relation between the two. Maybe I have to read the story to understand...

Anyway, nitpicking and everything else aside, thank you for the answer and good luck for all the contestants... I presume Scotty will be here soon, so you'll hear about stories not related with monodies and wax soon enough.


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## M. LeRenard (Dec 9, 2009)

> Genuine interest, or shameless self-advertisement?


No, it's not mine.  I'm not that poetic with my titles.
Anyway, I liked it because it was just weird.  It's one of those titles that doesn't seem to really tell you anything about the story, but you still feel like a lot of thought went into coming up with it.  Granted, I haven't read the story it belongs to.  Maybe it's just a couple random words strewn together for no reason.  Either way, though, it's eye-catching.

I scored mine pretty low.  It's not exactly my best work, and the whole thing is just sappy.  Of course, whenever I think something of mine is sappy, everybody else eats it up, so we'll see what happens.  I will say, however, that I would consider it a travesty if I ended up winning this time.


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## panzergulo (Dec 9, 2009)

M. Le Renard said:


> No, it's not mine.  I'm not that poetic with my titles.



Should have known... Besides, you seem too much of a sport anyway... fair game and all that nice'n'happy stuff... ;P But yeah, you're sorta right... the title is catching... I had to even look that word from a dictionary to know what it actually means.



M. Le Renard said:


> I scored mine pretty low.  It's not exactly my best work, and the whole thing is just sappy.  Of course, whenever I think something of mine is sappy, everybody else eats it up, so we'll see what happens.  I will say, however, that I would consider it a travesty if I ended up winning this time.



You're gonna win this season, Mister LR, you're gonna win... My last season's entry was horrible sentimental crap and I nearly won... plus, you're a lot better writer than what I am.

As a thought, now that I checked the titles and lengths of each story this season... Does it take away from the story if its length is just a couple words under the upper limit? My intuition is saying that the writer is trying too hard if they have used exactly the amount of words available. There is two stories this season that are practically just at the upper limit in length. This is the reason why I don't generally like limits, they limit my creativity. I know, that they are needed in a contest or if you're aiming to publish... but still... it seems that the writer has sort of... filled the limit just to fill the limit... not to give the story more meaning or something... but just to reach that upper limit. Sort of... "look how many words I can use to tell a story that can be told with so much fewer words!"

If you feel like it, MLR, or anybody else, who's reading this, this could be a subject of a thread of its own. I just noticed this while checking the lengths.

Or I'm just lazy and want my stories short and simple.


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## M. LeRenard (Dec 9, 2009)

The only time I think about word count is if I start reading the story, notice that it's either a)terrible or b)something I don't think I'm going to like, and then look to see how much of it I'm going to have to drudge through to get to the end.  Otherwise I just don't pay that much attention.
One time, my story's length was EXACTLY the upper limit.  I think I got 2nd or 3rd place that quarter.
(I don't think this merits a whole new thread.  And it pertains to the contest anyway, so it's not really going off-topic.)

Edit: Okay.  I'm thinking your story, panzer, is the one with the wolverines that speak Finnish.  I mean, I could be wrong, but....


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## Murphy Z (Dec 10, 2009)

M. Le Renard said:


> I scored mine pretty low.  It's not exactly my best work, and the whole thing is just sappy



Since the theme is "winter magic," they all kinda fall that way. None of the stories were nearly as sappy as I feared when the contest was announced.
Nary a cocoa drinking dragon was to be found. 

If you subtracted points because of sappiness, you should add them back on or mark us all down for being that way.



> Does it take away from the story if its length is just a couple words under the upper limit? My intuition is saying that the writer is trying too hard if they have used exactly the amount of words available.



I think you'd have to read the story. Some try to stretch things out and insert too many adjectives or whatever; we've all have pulled the "very, very" trick for our third grade book reports. But "exactly" does arouse suspicions. They could have been over and had to take something out.


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## M. LeRenard (Dec 10, 2009)

Murphy Z said:
			
		

> Since the theme is "winter magic," they all kinda fall that way.


Yeah, although there was the one about the black plague, and there was yours.  Those two had happy endings, but were still pretty dark in nature up until that point.
Unless yours wasn't the one with the platypus named Murphy who wore a kilt.  I could be wrong about that.
Some of you guys are so obvious.


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## Murphy Z (Dec 10, 2009)

M. Le Renard said:


> Unless yours wasn't the one with the platypus named Murphy who wore a kilt.  I could be wrong about that.
> Some of you guys are so obvious.



The Murphy in the story is a kilt-wearing platypus who's a freelance pimp. I'm Murphy Z., a kilt wearing platypus who's a tooth fairy. How could you mix us up?


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## Xipoid (Dec 10, 2009)

I'm going to enter one of these eventually... though my story will probably be just as obvious.

I also believe I will give myself straight 1's.


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## ScottyDM (Dec 10, 2009)

I am here.

Sorry I couldn't communicate what was happening with the story entry system and the missing story through this site, but everyone is back at last. And that story is in.


Everyone gets one ballot per story and people pretty much do with it what they want. In the past some authors have scored all but their own story. Some have scored all, then given theirs a perfect score. Some have scored all, then given theirs all 3s. And some have scored all and tried to score theirs fairly. I think it would be insanely great if authors could read and score all the stories, and try to be as fair as they are able (at least with the other stories).

Some authors invite their friends to read and score the stories too. Since one of the goals of Anthrofiction Network is to promote the genre of anthrofiction this is an awesome thing. BUT please do _not_ invite your friends to sign up on the site so they can stuff the ballot box with perfect scores for you. Winning is a sweet feeling, but it's especially sweet if you win by honest merit.

Promotion is awesome. It'd be even more awesome if you stressed to your family and friends that you'd like them to be fair. I like to tell people that they don't have to read and score all the stories, but the more of them they do the more accurate the results.


In an unrelated note our dog Peanut is doing much better.

She has IMHA (immune mediated hemolitic anemia). Her immune system was trying to remove all the red blood cells from her system. One test is to centrifuge a tube of whole blood then see how much is dark red (red blood cells at the bottom of the tube) and how much is clear. Average for a dog is about 45% red cells. Peanut was down below 18% and they were clumping together inside her system because they were encrusted with antibodies. Her skin had turned bright yellow and her urine was dark red.

Currently she's on two different medications to throttle back her immune system and three more meds to support and stabilize her body chemistry.

Today she went into the specialist again and she's up to 35% red blood cells, her pee is yellow, and she has lots more energy. If we're lucky she'll be completely off meds within a year, but about 2/3 of dogs who get this are never able to go off their meds. Oh yeah, and about 1/2 never make it through the first week.


Yep. Pretty interesting mix of stories this quarter. I like them.

Scotty


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## ScottyDM (Dec 10, 2009)

I have a Finnish girl in my anthro novel. She's a minor character. She's engaged to marry the older brother of my female lead.

Her name is Mia Hakkien, although the name of Mia has a bit of "baggage" in our family and I should probably change it. She's a 23-year-old farm girl and her family has lived near Mikkeli since the time of the Vikings. Bobby (my female lead's 25-year-old brother) took a few post-grad classes at the University of Helsinki and there he met Mia. So summer rolled around and he phoned home (Salinas, California) to tell his parents he was staying in Finland for the summer and he'd be working at this farm for nothing more than room and board--and to be with Mia, of course. His parents didn't even know he was dating anyone.

At the time of the story Bobby and Mia are engaged and Mia is living with his family in Salinas. Since Bobby will inherit the farm (it's big) he and Mia will live in the USA after they wed. However, the wedding will be in Finland and Bobby and Mia will return there starting a month before the wedding.

Mia's initial reaction when she learns Bobby's sister is dating a genetically uplifted fox, is shock and anger. Her father and brother kill every fox they see back in Finland and they sell the skins. She cannot fathom why Bobby's sister wants to be romantically involved with chicken-killing vermin. But within days she is won over and by the end of the novel she is instrumental in helping Bobby's sister rescue her foxy lover from the clutches of an evil vixen.

So if not Mia, what's a good Finnish girl's name?

Scotty


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## panzergulo (Dec 11, 2009)

ScottyDM said:


> So if not Mia, what's a good Finnish girl's name?



You're derailing the thread, Scotty...

Also: http://www.behindthename.com/nmc/fin.php

Also also: In Finland, Mia is most often spelled with two i's, like this: Miia.

Also the third: Hakkien feels terribly broken to me. It's not a Finnish name at all. Are you meaning HÃ¤kkinen? There was a Finnish Formula One driver called Mika HÃ¤kkinen. Ah, you foreigners... you name all your Finn characters after racecar drivers... Finland has quite a few really good rally drivers, though... And those two dots have a meaning too. Ã„ is a totally different letter and denotes totally different phoneme than A, so you can't drop them.



Anyway, back to topic... yeah, I'm gonna do just that... read all the stories and then give the ballots... although, I still fear I have to give dangerously high grades for my own story... as I really like it and stuff... well, there's fortunately more than one or two aspects to judge... so I am able to give some variation.


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## M. LeRenard (Dec 11, 2009)

Don't try to explain accent marks to Anglophones, panzer.  We don't get it.
;-)


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## panzergulo (Dec 11, 2009)

M. Le Renard said:


> Don't try to explain accent marks to Anglophones, panzer.  We don't get it.
> ;-)



It's not an accent mark. Ã„ is really totally another letter and denotes totally another phoneme than A. Same with O and Ã–.

A in Finnish denotes the phoneme which U denotes in "bud" or A in "mark".

Ã„ in Finnish denotes the phoneme which A denotes in "hat" or "sad".

O in Finnish denotes the phoneme which A denotes in "all".

Ã– in Finnish denotes the phoneme which E denotes in "per" or O in "word".

How many times I have to say: In Finnish Ã„ and Ã– are letters of their own, the dots have nothing to do with accent. They don't denote stress, they don't denote rhythm, they don't denote syllables. They denote phonemes of their own, clearly apart from A and Ã–.

DUU JUU ANDÃ–RSTÃ„ND MII, GODDÃ„MMIT! DIFFRENT LETTÃ–RS, DIFFRENT PHOUNIIMS!

The problem is that English is written horribly unphonetically. The written and spoken language don't have clear relation. In Finnish, one letter denotes one phoneme. Finnish is easy to write and read, once you understand the system. One letter, one phoneme. In English, many letters, especially vowels, can mean any phoneme depending about in which word they are used.

"nu" in "nut" is said NA.

"nu" in "nuclear" is said NJU.

DUU JUU SII MAI POINT? ITS FAKKING KONFJUUSING...

What the hell! English language. It's just a horrible mess.


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## M. LeRenard (Dec 11, 2009)

Settle down.  I was making a joke.
By the way: 'bud' and 'mark' don't sound anything alike.  At least not in the English I speak.
Oops.  Now we're getting into dialects.  Won't that just make your head explode.

Oh, and if you think English is bad, you should try learning French.  So many unpronounced letters.  Coulaient, coulait, and coulais all sound exactly the same.  And coulÃ© sounds almost exactly like the other three, and it sounds exactly like couler.  Now tell me how that makes any sense.
Or better yet, Gaelic, or Irish, or any of the old British Isles languages.  Those are hilariously unphonetic.  So it's not just English.


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## panzergulo (Dec 11, 2009)

M. Le Renard said:


> Settle down.  I was making a joke.



Well, it wasn't funny to me. I thought you were just damn stupid. Like most of the English speakers who think they know something about languages and call those dots "accent marks" or "umlauts" and in reality they don't really know anything about what they are talking about.

And yes, "bud" and "mark" sound exactly the same. The middlemost phonemes, denoted with vowels, between the consonants... they are identical to me. I'm not talking about accent, stress, rhythm, length, or anything else, just how the phonemes sound like. And they are identical.

Meibi ai shud staat raiting laik this ool thÃ¶ taim. Juud lÃ¶Ã¶n thÃ¶ Finnish raiting sistem iventsuali. Ã„nd ai refjuus uusing thÃ¶ lettÃ¶ 'r' in moust keisiis, bikoos, in mai opinjon, Inglish dasnt hÃ¤f thÃ¤t phouniim Ã¤t ool.

Lame joke. Make a better one.


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## PheonixStar (Dec 11, 2009)

Actually, I'm with MLeR on this one. Bud and mark don't sound anything at all alike to me. Bud and fun sound alike. So I guess I admit that I still don't know what sound A denotes in Finnish.

On the bright side, I think I can better understand all the bizarre names I see in the online game I play, now.


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## panzergulo (Dec 11, 2009)

PheonixStar said:


> Actually, I'm with MLeR on this one. Bud and mark don't sound anything at all alike to me. Bud and fun sound alike. So I guess I admit that I still don't know what sound A denotes in Finnish.
> 
> On the bright side, I think I can better understand all the bizarre names I see in the online game I play, now.



Bah! Ai gif ap! HÃ¤f it joor vei, then... vii jast kÃ¤Ã¤nt Ã¤grii hau juu diinout iich phouniim, tsast bikoos vii aar neitif tu toutalli difrent lÃ¤ngvitsiis. Juu sei "bad" like bad Ã¤nd "fan" like fan and "maak" like maak Ã¤nd thei ool saund thÃ¶ seim tu mii. Meibi juu hÃ¤f sach vÃ¤rieitsÃ¶n in joor phouniims ai kÃ¤Ã¤nt kvait hier them. Laik joor meni essis... Finnish hÃ¤s ounli van es, Inglish hÃ¤s... vot? Thrii oor foor essis.

Like an online friend of mine said: "I am an American. Thus, I am always right and all others are always wrong." ;P


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## PheonixStar (Dec 11, 2009)

panzergulo said:


> Bah! Ai gif ap! HÃ¤f it joor vei, then... vii jast kÃ¤Ã¤nt Ã¤grii hau juu diinout iich phouniim, jast bikoos vii aar neitif tu toutalli difrent lÃ¤ngvitsiis.Juu sei "bad" like bad Ã¤nd "fan" like fan and "maak" like maak Ã¤nd thei ool saund thÃ¶ seim tu mii. Meibi juu hÃ¤f sach vÃ¤rieitsÃ¶n in joor phouniims ai kÃ¤Ã¤nt kvait hier them. Laik joor meni essis... Finnish hÃ¤s ounli van es, Inglish hÃ¤s... vot? Thrii oor foor essis.
> 
> Like an online friend of mine said: "I am an American. Thus, I am always right and all others are always wrong." ;P



But then again, it's okay, if you're Finnish, to speak with authority on your native tongue... but if an American does so, they're just "always right" and trying to make everyone else "always wrong"?

Perhaps this will make it less offensive: "I've never heard a native American speaking person pronounce mark or bud in such a way that they sound anything alike"?

Although, on the other hand, it seems to me that you'll be offended, regardless. Perhaps you believe that you're an expert on both languages and anyone who doesn't agree with you is wrong. 

Don't worry, I won't try to argue that the A in your language is the same as the A with the droopy colon over it. Perhaps if you'll loan me some of your Finnish perfection, I might even be able to restrain myself from the obvious "droopy colon" jokes.


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## panzergulo (Dec 11, 2009)

I'm not offended. I just have quirky humor. Plus, to my ear, "bud" and "mark" sound exactly the same. Not the consonant parts, but the phonemes that are denoted with U and A. Not my fault if you have so slight vowel variation I can't handle it, or if you can't understand what I'm talking about. U in "bud", "fun", "smut", "cut", "hut", "just", "run", "up", "hung" etc. and A in "mark", "hard", "part", "smart", "tart", "fart", "start" etc., they sound exactly the same to me. The length of the phoneme varies between the words, but the sound of the phoneme is just the same to me.

Bah. MLR should've known me better not to bring it up at all... If you joke with me the wrong way, you receive nothing but these weird and long conversations about things nobody can do anything about and jokes being misunderstood by everybody. Better just to ignore me and continue with your lives. Saves you from a lot of grief. ;P

Really... I listened all those words in an audio dictionary and they all sound the same... "a" sounds with consonants around them. When you say they don't sound anything alike, I can't understand what you mean.


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## PheonixStar (Dec 11, 2009)

I gotta tell ya, I don't think I've had a stranger conversation in a very long time. They sound different to me.

Don't misunderstand, that's not synonymous with me saying that the American language makes sense. The fact that our vowels can make two different sounds is silly. Same letter, different sounds, which require other letters to know which sound it makes. And at the same time, we have two stupidly redundant letters that have zero sound of their own. C and Y are utterly and absurdly useless. They shouldn't exist.

But even though I recognize the inherent absurdity of our language (written, I mean), doesn't mean I can hear what you're hearing. They sound totally different to me. Perhaps it's part of my cultural bias that tells me they ARE different, and thus I hear them so, I don't know.

But just as you don't understand how I can't hear it... I don't understand at all how you can.

It's okay to disagree. But I think that it would help Americans understand the sound of the letter if you left off the a-words on that specific sound explanation.


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## panzergulo (Dec 11, 2009)

To mess more with American readers, the O in "sound", "mound", "pound", "hound", "down", "frown", "drown" etc. sounds exactly like the phoneme we denote with A in Finnish.

Mark the Hound was bathing in mud.
Maak thÃ¶ Haund vos baathing in mad.

You looked down and you heard a really nutty sound.
Juu lukt daun Ã¤nd juu hÃ¶Ã¶d Ã¶ rili natti saund.

Also, more confusion: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Vowel

No wonder it's so damn complicated... I can't understand all those different kind of vowels... Maybe the thing is with that... open central/front/rear vowels... the sound is basically the same, but in a language where they make a difference, you can actually here it differently, depending from where the sound comes...

Also also, Y in Finnish is a vowel of its own, it denotes, if I'm correct this time, the phoneme they denote with E in "new", "ew" and "threw", or UE in "queue" and "revue". In my opinion, the letters Q, W, Z, X and C are totally useless. Although, there is something magical in your double-U... W denotes sometimes a phoneme I seem to be unable to pronounce.


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## M. LeRenard (Dec 11, 2009)

I now know an easy way to make panzergulo start ranting!
This is all off-topic, but whatever... Scotty started it, and he started the thread.  Anyway, for me, the 'u' sound in 'but' or 'run' or what have you is "Uh" or "Ugh".  Like a caveman sound, or a disgusted (same 'u' sound in "dis-guh-sted") sound, tongue flat on the bottom of the mouth, coming ("cuh-ming") from the back.  It's the same sound as the 'a' at the end of 'umbrella', as in, "Uhm-brel-uh."  
Whereas the 'a' in 'hard', 'part', etc. is "Ah," wider mouth, back of the tongue slightly raised, coming more from the top-back of the mouth.  With the 'r' being wholly separate ("sep-ah-ret") from the 'a' (though from your choice of words I'm getting the feeling that you're putting them together?).  Open your mouth and say "Ah," as the dentists here always ask.  Incidentally, the 'a' at the beginning of 'always' has the same sound.  "Ahl-wÃ©js."
Maybe you just can't hear it because you don't have one or the other of those sounds in Finnish.  And I'm guessing we don't exactly have the Finnish sound A in English.
But at least now we all have the basic idea of how to pronounce A, Ã„, O, and Ã–.  The more you know. 

Edit:


> To mess more with American readers, the O in "sound", "mound", "pound", "hound", "down", "frown", "drown" etc. sounds exactly like the phoneme we denote with A in Finnish.


God, no.  That's just... you're obviously doing something wrong.  That's 'ow'.  It requires the w sound you can't seem to make.  It's a diphthong.


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## panzergulo (Dec 11, 2009)

Also, there is the phoneme I would denote with A in "night", "sight", "plight", "hight", "kite", etc... I is like AI... or with Y sometimes, like in "my".

I like you.
Ai laik juu.

Can you hold my hand tonight?
KÃ¤n juu hould mai hÃ¤nd tunait?

I am farely sure now it's just so drastic difference in our writing systems (also in our vowels) that we can't quite see or hear the language the same way...
Ai Ã¤m feorli shuor nau its tsust sou drastik difrens in auor raiting sistems (olsou in auor vauvols) thÃ¤t vii kÃ¤nt kvait sii oor hiÃ¶r thÃ¶ lÃ¤ngvits thÃ¶ seim vei...

I'm gonna write like this always!
Aim gonna rait laik this oolveis!



> It's a diphthong.


As in my _really_ professional examples I show, I would actually denote the diphthong with two letters, OW or OU becomes AU. I don't recognize the sound as a diphthong, but two vowels next to each other, I guess. It's in the beginning of the word, like in "wikipedia", where I replace the W with a V sound.

From here: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Finnish_phonology#Diphthongs

"They are usually, phonologically speaking, analyzed not as phonemes of their own but as sequences of two monophthong phonemes. This is in contrast to languages like English, where the diphthongs are best analyzed as independent phonemes (see International Phonetic Alphabet for English). However, in speech (ie. phonetically speaking) they do not sound like sequences of two different vowels; instead, the sound of the first vowel gradually glides into the sound of the second one with full vocalization lasting through the whole sound. That is to say, they are not broken by a pause or stress pattern."

I read it that this is the reason why they don't talk about "diftongs" in Finnish classes... We are again talking about same things but from a viewpoint of totally different languages.


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## M. LeRenard (Dec 11, 2009)

So you're saying you read it more like "a-uu"?  I think I can get behind that.


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## ScottyDM (Dec 11, 2009)

panzergulo said:


> You're derailing the thread, Scotty...


Yep, I did. And judging by what follows, quite effectively. I suppose I should have PMed you.

And thanks for that link. I'll have to see what search functions they have.

I'm not sure where I got Hakkien... Well, I probably was sure at one time, but I've _forgotten_ where I got Hakkien. It really doesn't matter. I think I use her last name only once in the novel. So if HÃ¤kkinen is a real family name and Hakkien is just some sort of mistake, then HÃ¤kkinen it is! :-D I eat up details like this.

Shortly after I finished junior college and moved out to California to make my fortune, my parents got on an exchange student kick. My sister was in high school at the time. So this Finnish girl named Mia (or Miia) came to live with them for a period of time. She got my old room. :-? 

I had a serious girlfriend who stayed behind in Nebraska to finish her 4-year degree while I worked in California, so I was back home whenever practical, and I met Mia/Miia. She was nothing less than a goddess. All the boys in high school were after her (much to the annoyance of my little sister). And she'd do stuff like schedule two dates for one night: Finish the first early, then have that boy drop her off at her next date. I'm sure the boys didn't care much for that.

Anyway, my parents saw an early version of one of my chapters where my character Bobby mentions that his Finnish fiancÃ©e Mia went back to Finland to attend the funeral of her grandfather. They commented on my choice of names. They were reading all kinds of stuff into my story such as my female lead was my daughter, the male lead was her much older boyfriend, etc. Now that my character Mia/Miia is taking on an expanded role I thought maybe I'd change her name. It'll keep my mother happy. But maybe the second "i" is enough.




panzergulo said:


> Anyway, back to topic... yeah, I'm gonna do just that... read all the stories and then give the ballots... although, I still fear I have to give dangerously high grades for my own story... as I really like it and stuff... well, there's fortunately more than one or two aspects to judge... so I am able to give some variation.


If all the authors gave their own story dangerously high grades, then it'd be fair. 	;-)

*It's kinda fun seeing the scores readers give to a story.* One quarter an author wrote a story with a "wolfess" as a character and one reader left a private comment, "There is no such thing as a 'wolfess'. The word doesn't exist." The next quarter that author entered two stories: A new one, and a sequel to the "wolfess" story. That same reader came back and verbally blasted the author because, "I told you there's no such word as 'wolfess'!" and gave that story a total score of 1.25. The sequel story was good, but it wasn't close to the new story. The same reader loved the new story.

Anyway, *I do not change or censor scores or comments unless I feel someone is cheating.* I have a mechanism in the site code where I can split the scoring between a panel of judges and the public, but these past couple of years I've not done that. So my ballots count exactly the same as everyone else's ballots (I know several have speculated about this).

When I read and score the stories (I print out the PDFs and scribble on them) I will often rank the stories as I score them. I feel this one should be the winner, that one should come in second, etc. *Most quarters my rank matches the overall rank once the scores are tallied, and I've never seen an outright upset of the scores yet.* Maybe 3rd and 4th places might swap, but nothing crazy. So *I feel pretty good about the public's ability to recognize a good story and reward it with a good score.*

Poetigress and I have had several conversations about fairness in the scoring system. While I care about fairness that's not my only goal. *My goals are (no particular order): To promote anthrofiction as a genre. To help authors improve by providing a place they can get feedback on their stories. To provide a place where lovers of anthrofiction can find fresh quality content. To provide a venue where everyone can have fun. And yes, to have a fair contest where the winners really deserve to win.*

*I feel that a huge contribution to fairness is the system of using scores rather than popular vote.* I've mentioned the summer 2007 contest in an earlier post. The top three finishers all had handsome scores over 4.0 and it seems all had done at least some promotion of the contest as all had several "single ballot readers" (let's call them SBRs). Because Michelle and Teric had done such a tremendous job of self promotion, and some SBRs gave perfect scores, I was concerned that the outcome of the contest might be tainted. So I ran all the numbers twice: Once with all the ballots and once when I threw out all the SBR ballots. Essentially Poetigress and Teric's scores didn't change substantially and Michelle's score dropped so that she was nearly tied with Teric for 2nd. Poetigress got 16 ballots, Michelle got 37, and Teric got 21. Without SBR ballots each would have gotten 11 or 12 ballots. Had this been a popularity contest the rankings would have been substantially different.

*The point is, feel free to promote the contest and your story. But please, please, please ask the readers you invite to be fair when they score.* I suspect some SBRs give a perfect score because they have no reference by which to judge. That is, they read only your story, think it's great plus you're their friend, so they give all 5s. *Maybe mention there are some awesome-cool stories this quarter and suggest they read two or three before they score yours. Or better yet, say you have a story in this contest and that there are some awesome-cool stories they might like, but don't mention which story is yours.* There are only 5 stories so it's not like they need to make a career out of reading them.

It's just an idea.

*Also, the Anthrofiction Network website doesn't look like a hard-core furry site.* So feel free to invite your mom and dad, or your friends. I've deliberately tried to keep it "family friendly". Finally, when someone signs up there's an option for a temporary reader's account. I'm not always thrilled when faced with yet another thing I must join.

Scotty


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## panzergulo (Dec 12, 2009)

I haven't done any real promotion, plus, during the last season I told some friends of mine that I was taking part to a contest and they said "cool" and never really even thought that they are able to sign in and read and give ballots... and anyway, those of them who would be most potential readers/judges read some sort of anthro fiction already, whether here in FA or someplace else... I wrote a journal about the contest this season, didn't tell my watchers which story is mine (because they are able to tell it apart from others anyway), but I don't know if I managed to get any more readers/judges for the contest... but yeah, we'll see.

So yeah, you have very high ideals behind this whole contest thing. I am happy you have some sort of system to make the contest relatively fair... if I remember correctly, I, or anybody else, didn't receive so many ballots during the last season... if I'm not completely mistaken, a total of three or four individuals had read and judged my story.

@MLR. Yup. I don't really get that whole "diftong" thingy... I hear only a collection of "monoftongs" or whatever you call the vowel phonemes when they are on their own. I have lost all my steam now, so I don't write anything more about how I read, write and hear language... If anybody is THAT interested, there is Vikipedia... ;P ...or, you can listen how I speak both Finnish and English on my FA gallery, as I have my own made audio recordings of one story and several poems of mine.

Probably nobody is interested anymore, but what the heck...

And in my opinion, "always" doesn't have A sound at all. In Finnish system, I would write it "oolveis". I presume this AY turned into EI is again one of these "diftong" thingies... Gotcha... I had some (little) steam after all...


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## M. LeRenard (Dec 12, 2009)

ScottyDM said:
			
		

> "I told you there's no such word as 'wolfess'!" and gave that story a total score of 1.25.


Does that imply that the reader scored the story based on one word?  I swear, some people just judge stories to make trouble.  There's no such word as 'dwarves' either, but that certainly didn't ruin Tolkien's books for me.
I guess I just try to be more fair in my scores.  Even if I hate a story, if I think it's creative and well-written, I'll give it a high score (though I mark 'enjoyability' down).  But I guess some people just want to trash every piece they don't like, for whatever reason.  And probably there are some that give pieces high scores just because they happen to like them, which is equally as silly.  Maybe those two even each other out.


			
				panzergulo said:
			
		

> And in my opinion, "always" doesn't have A sound at all.


Well, now you know that it, in fact, does have an A sound.  Not 'oolveis', but 'alveis'.  If you said it like the latter, I'm thinking it would sound better.
By the way... I was just listening to a Finnish pronunciation guide on YouTube, so now I have a little better idea what you're talking about.  Plus, the guy doing it kept saying 'wovels' instead of 'vowels', which I found hilarious.


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## panzergulo (Dec 12, 2009)

M. Le Renard said:


> By the way... I was just listening to a Finnish pronunciation guide on YouTube [...]



You are one weird critter, MLR...

What I have found is usually problematic for English-speakers in Finnish are three things:

1) Our strong R. Example: It's written "kanerva". It's said "kanerva". But Americans say it "kanÃ¶Ã¶va".

2) Double consonants. Example: It's written "puukko". It's said "puukko". But Americans say it "puuko" or even "pukou".

3) H before a consonant. Example: It's written "sahti". It's said "sahti". But Americans say it "saati".



M. Le Renard said:


> Well, now you know that it, in fact, does have an A sound.  Not 'oolveis', but 'alveis'.



I listened the word many times in an audio dictionary, and no, in our writing system it would have an O sound, not an A sound. "oolveis". OO isn't a "diftong". It's two Os next to each other -> a long O. "alveis" would sound like Swedish.


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## M. LeRenard (Dec 12, 2009)

panzergulo said:


> You are one weird critter, MLR...


I figured if we were going to have this discussion, I ought to listen to it instead of just trying to imagine what it might sound like.
Anyway, maybe it sounds slightly more like an O in British English, and that's where you're getting that.  The way I say it, it's got a definite A.  And a W.  Let's not ignore the W.

Be happy: I'm the mod who not only allows off-topic discussion, but promotes it.  Unless I don't think it's interesting, of course.  We now return to your regularly scheduled conversation about Anthrofiction.net.


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## ScottyDM (Dec 12, 2009)

panzergulo said:


> if I remember correctly, I, or anybody else, didn't receive so many ballots during the last season... if I'm not completely mistaken, a total of three or four individuals had read and judged my story.


Yea, last quarter reader turnout kinda sucked. Only three to five ballots per story.


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## PheonixStar (Dec 12, 2009)

panzergulo said:


> You are one weird critter, MLR...
> 
> What I have found is usually problematic for English-speakers in Finnish are three things:
> 
> 1) Our strong R. Example: It's written "kanerva". It's said "kanerva". But Americans say it "kanÃ¶Ã¶va".



I think that a part of the problem is that the way we write our translation of sound into writing is vastly different, too. 

I would say kan-er-vuh (wherein the a makes an uh sound rather than its hard sound, ay)

it seems strange to me that you would consider that the e and the r sound exactly alike. This is more where I simply cannot understand how that can be. To me, the E and R sound so vastly different that it's as if you are saying that an ass is the same thing as a hand. 



> 2) Double consonants. Example: It's written "puukko". It's said "puukko". But Americans say it "puuko" or even "pukou".



Probably because in most cases, if there's a double consonant in English, it's often a single sound. We also don't really have words (that I can think of) that have a double vowel sound in them side by side. Almost all of our vowel sounds are separated by a consonant. So it would be unusual for us to understand the concept of having a poo-ook-ko word. Mainly because the transition to two K sounds together is very odd. 

Two hard consonant sounds together is extremely unusual in our language. I can think of no examples of hard consonants together, and not too many with soft consonants together. Most of those, don't originate in our language, at that. (The ones I can think of: seppuku, for example.)



> 3) H before a consonant. Example: It's written "sahti". It's said "sahti". But Americans say it "saati".



Because in such a case in English, the H would be silent. I think that, because of the only sound attributed to our H, we would say it suh-huh-tie, or suh-huh-tee.

Remember again, though, that we're trying to translate sounds into writing, so in the above example of suh-huh-tee, none of the H's actually make a sound, they just modify the sound of the vowel they're beside...

Then again, I think a part of the problem may be that, like all humans, I would likely attribute your H sound to be the same as our H sound. If this is the case, the word would sound quite strange to my ears. 

As far as the example you gave of how most Americans would pronounce it, it makes no sense to me. I would expect most Americans to pronounce it Sah-tee, not sah-ah-tee/tie. And I can't tell whether you're giving those double-a's as hard A or soft A, and the I as a soft I (ih), or a hard I (eye), or as whatever the last weirdness I is called, (ee). 

Our vowels all have at minimum, two sounds. Several have more. Another idiocy of our written language, IMO. And an I at the end of a word, would most often be expressed as the ee sound of the I. So that word wouldn't have a double A in most people's manner of speaking, but would be a single ah or aw sound.

Given the way that you've written most Americans say it, I would translate that into sound thus: sa-at-ee, assuming that the a there uses the a as in at (or as). Because I can't think of a sound in American that aa might represent all by itself... except if you drew out the a sound in at and drawled it: aaaaat.

So the way that you've translated sound into writing doesn't follow rules that I understand.



> I listened the word many times in an audio dictionary, and no, in our writing system it would have an O sound, not an A sound. "oolveis". OO isn't a "diftong". It's two Os next to each other -> a long O. "alveis" would sound like Swedish.



I have to ask here... are you really saying that it would sound like "ohl-vees," or are you saying that it would sound like, ool-vees, or is it ool-veye-ees?

We would say it sounds like "ahl-vees," or "awl-vees." Are you using our oo sound, or your oo sound when you translate it into sounds? Because perhaps your oo sound makes an aw or ah sound... but to us, it's a totally different sound from one another.

Ooooo versus AAAAAH... to us, they're nothing alike. At all. When the mouth makes the first sound, it puckers forwards and draws together. When the mouth makes the second sound, it draws backward, the jaw drops slightly, and the tongue falls lower into the mouth.

Imagine you're trying to scare someone with American ghost noises: wooo-ooo-ooo! That's one noise. You pucker up and have only a small gap between your teeth.

Now you're at the American dentist, and he says, "say ah!" and you open up your mouth, drop your tongue, and say, "aaaaaaah!"

I can only hope that some of our problem may be the way we write various sounds. Except that I just can't be very convinced of that, given the fact that, let's face it... bud and mark? Wut?


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## Fere (Dec 13, 2009)

I've always found that American-English is very phonetic, and on a spelling level, almost what can be described as a simpler form of British-English. 

Welsh is very similar in that it seems to stimulate an almost parrot-fashion phoneticism in its indigenously English-speaking learners - on the whole that is. I mean, my brother started his education in Wales in a fully welsh-medium school, becoming quickly fluent by the age of 10/11 (just like yours truly). But I had the "advantage" of having had the first 6 or 7 years in an English school before we moved. So when my brother tried to write in English, it was quite distinct in that, what was supposed to be his mother tongue, the words were spelt phonetically by a huge majority.

And yet, what with being educated in wales since the age of 4 (myself from the age of 7), my brother retains his distinctly East Midlands English accent.

I find linguistics fascinating, and having grown up in die-hard, conservative rural wales (where one needs half a pint of phlegm in the throat to pronounce the place names ;-) ), it's intriguing to hear of the different speech forms and pronunications of other European and world cultures.

Always been a big believer in that if one knows a smattering of the language of the country one is in, people will respect you a lot more for trying it out (in shops and hotels and stuff), rather than speaking in English really really slowly. Regardless of how you wrap your tongue around the various umlauts and weirdly cobbled letters, indigenous citizens will always appreciate it.


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## Shouden (Dec 29, 2009)

Any hints as to what the next theme will be? may I suggest Furry Fairy Tales. Like furry versions of fairy tales. I think it can make everyone get a little creative.


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## ScottyDM (Jan 7, 2010)

*As of now, there's a bit more than 12 hours left to finish reading and scoring the stories.

Thanks!

S~*


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## ScottyDM (Jan 7, 2010)

Shouden said:


> Any hints as to what the next theme will be? may I suggest Furry Fairy Tales. Like furry versions of fairy tales. I think it can make everyone get a little creative.


First, I never pre-announce or hint at future themes. But I can tell you the website's color scheme will be spring-like. ;-)


Feel free to write or rewrite a fairy tale for any quarter, as long as it fits the theme. To stay out of legal trouble rewrite a fairy tale that's at least 100 years old (copyright expired). To avoid accusations of plagiarism and avoid a low creativity score, change something. E.g. change the plot or change the point of view. Changing your human characters to anthros is probably not enough since that's pretty much the whole point of the website anyway.

For example what if Little Red Ridinghood was a wolf and the wolf was a human? To do something beyond a mere gender swap: Why would a human guy be interested in a young female wolf? (no snickering!) How would he menace her? What did he do to her grandmother? Why would she fear him? And what is the woodsman and how would he fit in?

A couple of years ago someone entered a rewritten Russian fairy tale in the contest. The original had a prince who was helped by this magical wolf. But there was no motivation for the wolf in the original, he was little more than a good luck charm. The author rewrote the fairy tale to the wolf's POV and gave him motivation. Why was he helping the prince? The author came up with a good reason that was believable.


I'm not against fairy tales. I thought of my own rewrite for a famous old French fairy tale originally published in the mid 1700s. It would start the same, but about halfway through a twist would result in a different ending. I've never really done anything with it.

On a different project I've done some research and preliminary planning for a novel-length original fairy tale based on Scottish mythology. I have an evil daughter (perhaps she should be a stepdaughter). An old crone who's a witch. A whole troop of faeries. A shape-shifting heroine who doesn't look her age (when she's in a form where you might guess at her age). A bard, or at least this English fellow who fancies himself a bard. And my hero who's a widower in his 60s, but still spry. One idea I had was to construct the plot as a quest by the evil daughter, who is ultimately unsuccessful (but she comes really, really close). I also considered letting the bard be the narrator, swapping between 3rd person for scenes where he's not present, and 1st for scenes where he is. As a bard he's studied Scottish mythology and so can interpret for the reader (should it become necessary).


Fairy tales are fun.

S~


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## M. LeRenard (Jan 7, 2010)

Good luck, everyone.  I have another prediction for the winner, and it's not me.


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## M. LeRenard (Jan 9, 2010)

My prediction was wrong.  Anyway, congrats to Cerih, who won this season's contest!  And to panzergulo, who got a really close second.
...and to myself, who got an even closer third, I guess.  The scores were really close in this one, if you couldn't tell. S[sub]1[/sub]-S[sub]3[/sub] was only 0.05, which is astounding.
I wonder why so few people left comments, though.


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## Shouden (Jan 10, 2010)

so the Spring contest is up, but I have to ask: didn't we do this theme before? Like for the Spring 2009 contest?


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## M. LeRenard (Jan 10, 2010)

I think it's a glitch of some kind.
Anyway, I wouldn't bug Scotty about it right away, considering the news item on the main page.  Might need some time to himself.  If it were me, I would.


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## Shouden (Jan 10, 2010)

right. just figured I'd ask. If it's not, I have a good idea.


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## ScottyDM (Jan 12, 2010)

Shouden said:


> so the Spring contest is up, but I have to ask: didn't we do this theme before? Like for the Spring 2009 contest?


Oh crop! You're right.

Okay, here are the themes for past contests.
*Spring 2005: "Butterflys"* -- The contest was started by Nathan Ryan as the Watching Stone Anthro Story Contest.
*Summer 2005: "Oceans or Beaches"*
*Fall 2005: "Apples"*
*Winter 2006* was skipped -- The story entry deadline for fall collided with NaNoWriMo, which delayed Fall by several weeks. Rather than hold winter late Nathan skipped it.
*Spring 2006: "Foreigners"* -- When Nathan announced he was dropping the contest I took over and renamed it the Anthrofiction Short Story Contest, but kept his theme and rules. Designing the new site took longer than expected and spring was about a month late.
*Summer 2006: "My Sister"* -- Over the next few quarters I was able to get the schedule back on track.
*Fall 2006: "The Harvest"*
*Winter 2007: "Transformation"*
*Spring 2007: "Blue Sky"*
*Summer 2007: "A Sense of Wonder"*
*Fall 2007: "Pumpkins"*
*Winter 2008: "Unique Relationships"* -- I decided to sit out winter and Vaperfox sprang into action and held a contest he called: the Tale Weaver Anthro Fiction Contest. He chose the theme.
*Spring 2008: "Green"* -- And the Anthrofiction Short Story Contest was back.
*Summer 2008: "More than Skin Deep"* -- The start of this quarter was delayed by about 5 weeks as I slaved over my essay on how to write anthrofiction while avoiding the "humans in fur coats" syndrome.
*Fall 2008: "Ghost Story"* -- I decided to keep the new schedule with the 5-week "slippage".
*Spring 2009: "A New Beginning"* -- I changed the names of the quarters. No quarter was skipped.
*Summer 2009: "Road Trip"*
*Fall 2009: "The Bittersweet Goodbye"*
*Winter 2009: "Winter Magic"*
*Spring 2010: "?!?"* -- Would you look at that! I'm so flustered I'm using comic strip punctuation. :roll:

There is sort of a seasonal theme to picking a theme -- at least for most of them. I guess I got too caught up in the season and "A New Beginning" popped into my head, but without that sense of dÃ©jÃ  vu it should have triggered. I didn't even look to see if I'd used it before.

*I'll think of something else.*

Well poop. I was so pleased with myself because once I'd thought of that theme I realized I could use it as an excuse to write an ending for a novella that sits unfinished -- and post my ending as a sample story. The novella is about a young fellow who needs a fresh start. In my old end he resolves to make that fresh start. Only 2 weeks ago I realized my ending was limp, at best, and the fix would be to have him _take action_ and _make_ that fresh start.

I swear, I didn't dream up that theme because I could use it to motivate myself.

*I've got an inkling of an idea for a replacement theme.* It won't fit anything I'm working on at the moment so don't expect a sample story in a few weeks.

S~


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## Shouden (Jan 12, 2010)

yeah, it was that deju feeling that popped in my head that made me think we had done it once. and, if I remember correctly, it was the first time I entered...or it was my best entry. Anyways, I plan on actually entering this time.


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## ScottyDM (Jan 12, 2010)

*Update: I changed the theme to "TBD" (to be decided) while I'm deciding.*


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## Shouden (Jan 12, 2010)

ScottyDM said:


> *Update: I changed the theme to "TBD" (to be decided) while I'm deciding.*



Some ideas:

"Spring Rain"
"Picnic"
"Open Season" (a lot of hunting and fishing seasons start in the spring)
"Valentine's Day"

I have more, but I'm a little tired at the moment.


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## Fere (Jan 12, 2010)

Congrats to Cerih on winning this quarter.

Intrigued to see what's next for Spring


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## ScottyDM (Jan 12, 2010)

Shouden said:


> "Spring Rain"
> "Picnic"
> "Open Season" (a lot of hunting and fishing seasons start in the spring)
> "Valentine's Day"


Interesting ideas there, but I'm working on one of my own. Maybe I'll tap one of these for summer.

I'm at Flickr looking for an illustration with a CC license, although the idea doesn't _need_ an illustration.

S~


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## PheonixStar (Jan 13, 2010)

*crickets*

hmmm


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## Deosil Fox (Jan 13, 2010)

This looks like fun ^^


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## Murphy Z (Jan 13, 2010)

Oopsie, I thought of something for "A New Beginning." Oh well, if it doesn't match, at least I have a story idea.

Or maybe the new contest could be made to fit my idea. How about the theme be one of the following: Platypus, orthodontist, Chupacabra, bizarre love triangle, or seasonal allergies (j/k that isn't what my new story is about ... or is it?)



> *Spring 2010: "?!?"*



I'd make a story about that.


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## M. LeRenard (Jan 13, 2010)

Attack of the Killer Interrobang.


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## Murphy Z (Jan 18, 2010)

There will probably be a more official announcement soon, but the Spring 2010 is up, and the theme is "Wildflowers"  see http://www.anthrofiction.net/ for details.

*has an idea and guards it closely*


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## Shouden (Jan 18, 2010)

yes, I have an idea, as well.  Well, I know what the title will be. I just need to figure out what I want to do with it.


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## Fere (Jan 19, 2010)

A most intriguing theme this quarter. A few ideas floating around in this old fox's head. Go all medieval and Welsh on everybody again perhaps ;-)


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## M. LeRenard (Jan 19, 2010)

Fere said:
			
		

> A most intriguing theme this quarter. A few ideas floating around in this old fox's head. Go all medieval and Welsh on everybody again perhaps


Yeah, please do.  Your stories are always awesome.


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## Fere (Jan 29, 2010)

M. Le Renard said:


> Yeah, please do.  Your stories are always awesome.



Awww *blushes* thank you. that's very sweet of you.

One tries one's best


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