100 Theme Challenge Conclusion and Thoughts - A Ramble

I did it. I wrote a hundred stories in more or less a hundred days. I began on April 19th and finished on July 11st, so it's not that bad, right? At first, I was writing two themes in advance, meaning that I was publishing #1 but already working on #3. It worked well until I went to Montreal for my birthday, at the end of May. I wasn't able to keep up and was even late some days. I hate to be late, and my procrastination skills don't help in the matter. I had to focus and force myself to write each day, and it was worse when I reached a thousand words per day. I often finished around 3 or 4 AM a story, so of course most of my stories aren't polished or sometimes not even double-checked. I'm that lazy, what can I say. It's a bit of a wonder how I managed to do it, but like I said, sleep was optional at some point. My inspiration comes a lot more easily at night, so when I was working early in the morning, it sucked. Self-motivation is really important when trying to complete this kind of challenges, because few people will encourage you and even fewer will read your stories along the way. It's just how things are, I guess. Do this for yourself, not for the others. That's what I learned a while ago, and if people congratulates you for your devotion, then gently pat your shoulder and have a drink while writing. Don't get yourself drunk though, because you might not like the results of your story (true story).

Anyway, there was a lot of work involved in that challenge, let me tell you, and I'm glad it's over to be quite honest. I feel a bit empty-handed, with no more obligation to write, but I have my list of future projects. I already published a new chapter of one of my fanfictions, I have to polish Teardrops Burn and finish the sequel of The Veredas Contract, among other things. I'm also building up a new project from scratch, but this one will be extended on a whole year. Crazy, you say? Wait 'til you read what I have in mind, but I'll take a break before starting it, don't worry.

So, I wrote around 60 000 words for that challenge. It's kind of a lot, for me at least, considering I've been working on something for six months and it's only 10 000 words. The genres of these 100 themes were also quite diverse, even though I'm not the best to classify a story, I think I wrote non-fiction, suspense, horror, science-fiction, fantasy and drama. I must forget some genres, but I'm satisfied with that list. I liked to touch as many genres as possible, it was refreshing and kept me on my toes, if I can say, because I kept experiencing. I wrote on witches, zombies, werewolves, pirates, detectives, vampires, princess warriors, mythical creatures, desperate people, lonely ones and lots of gay men, to name only these ones. I am satisfied of myself.

Last thing I wanted to mention is how much research I put into many of these stories. I don't know how many times I found myself on weird sites because I was looking up something. The FBI site is really informative (and intimidating, I mean, it's the FBI). I now know too much about Chicago's gambling situation of 1959 and read all about the differences of false and real opium. I'm not sure if that'll ever come in handy in my life, but at least I know a pirate translator exists out there and I'm aware of what kinds of sorcery is practiced today...  Yeh scurvy rats!

Sorry for the ramble. I haven't even talked of the most important thing: my improvement with dealing with plots. The whole point of starting this was for me to be able to rapidly establish a start, a main action and a conclusion to any kind of story. Of course, with 1000 words, the main action was longer and more detailed, and the ending cut short, but I'm happy with what I did. The first stories were glimpses of a situation, really to tease the reader and to rapidly create an environment and a situation or to build up a feeling, and that's why I sometimes used them to write sequels for the longer stories, to expand its universe and write something a bit more satisfying; to put meat around the bones.

I also enjoyed connecting some of the stories together, I love putting references a bit everywhere. For example, when I wrote #25, Broken Pieces, I used the term 'Underworld' without realizing that #85's theme was that, so from there I had the genius idea that I could link universes together. Some of the stories are really cool and personal achievements for me, some less, but for the amount of time I had for each of them, I feel awesome.

The complete list is available here!

Shall I tell you my TOP 10? Hell yeah! The list is in no particular order, mind you.

1. #99. Ocean : Of course it's in my top 10, simply for my genius idea to add pirate slangs to the story. You can't imagine the fun I had with that, even though I'm not sure if my story is believable. I read that potatoes don't have enough vitamin C so they couldn't heal the scurvy, but Jacob was in an early stage, so why not? The pirate was never sick because he kept drinking his potato wine (if you didn't already understand).

2. #65. Princess : I knew I wouldn't write something traditional when I saw that theme. My princess would kick ass à la Xena, and she did. The sequel took another direction, but I loved the fact she goes in and kills a dragon by herself.

3. The Dive Under multiple stories: I wasn't satisfied with the ending of it, but I loved the concept, especially #23. Magic Imagine working and a beast just crashes in and someone throws fireballs at it, how quick you'd probably faint. I don't know what I would do, to be honest. I saw the concept of #25. Broken Pieces more like a version of the BBC Sherlock, with his assistant having a crush on him and not pretending not being gay (or whatever is supposed to be true in that serie). I wish their relationship was a bit more like in the manga Do you know my detective? in which both of the detectives are badass and in a twisted relationship, but oh well, I can't satisfy all my fantasies in one story.

4. 57. Bones: An evil necromancer! Do I need to add anything?

5. 49. Alcohol:  I love mythology, and I always wanted to try to write a modern version of one. One of my favorite Greek gods is Hades, because I love broody bad men, so it was the perfect opportunity.

6. 45. Need: I love reversing stereotypes, and I asked myself what it would be if heterosexuals were persecuted and killed instead of the LGBT community.

7. 27. Words: A man loved his wife dearly and her writing keeps him alive, so of course he wants her heritage to be shared to everyone. Perhaps she wasn't interested in being published, but he loved her so much he wants everyone to know how much of a beautiful person she was. It's a beautiful love story, I adore it.

8. 34. Solitude: I wrote this in one go, in about ten minutes, and I was crying at the end. I love that story, the sentences are so simple yet exhales of solitude, loneliness and melancholy. It's meant to be read between the lines.

9. 12. Tears: I was inspired by a conversation I overheard on the bus. Sometimes the real meaning of a conversation is not in the words themselves, but in the way they are pronounced, the breath's rhythm, the silence, the double meanings, the struggle of the voice. Sometimes people prefer not to listen to these signs, they pretend everything is fine.

10. Teardrops Burn, of course. You can't imagine the amount of work I put in that story. I was working on the plot months before I started writing it. It was my first time writing a Film Noir story, so I wanted to be sure where I was going with this before attempting anything. I love Jack, and if you hadn't notice before, Kenneth is the Homme Fatal. ;) I'll still need some more time to finish it completely, and then I'll publish it on Wattpad. It's 11k words on its own, after all.

It was a bit hard to narrow down 100 stories to only 10, since I put so much time and effort in each of them, but I think those ones are the ones I'm most proud of. I probably have some other things to add, but I'll stop here, otherwise I won't ever go to sleep... it's 4 AM. Old habits die hard.