Are you uninspired? Are your muses lifeless lately and lacking enthusiam? Try a challenge!
We bring a new challenge to you at least once a month, to inspire new thoughts and take your writing in new and interesting directions. Below is a chronological listing of all of our challenges.
Have an idea for a challenge? For more information on our challenges, see our challenges FAQ.
Current Challenge
Canon with a Twist!
Have you ever wondered, what if just one thing had been done differently in the canon? Maedhros had decided to hold off on meeting Morgoth? What if Orom� had taken a different road and hadn't discovered the Elves for another five centuries? What if Haleth had taken Caranthir's offer to stay in Thargelion? What would have changed?
This challenge asks you to think about just that. Choose a single moment in Tolkien's canon and have the character make a different choice. How does history change? Or how does fate fulfill itself?
Complete Challenge Listing
Great Journeys
The Silmarillion is filled with characters going places, from the great and important journeys to the daily travels that must have occurred but live only in our imaginations. For this challenge, we join our favorite characters on the road, to discover the actual and symbolic importance of journeys. Follow a character as s/he journeys from one geographical place to another. What does the character learn? How does s/he grow or change? What adventures are faced and challenges overcome? From tension-filled adventures with plots as surprising and winding as the road beneath the character's feet to character-driven wanderings through daily life and into the depths of the psyche, all journeys great and small are worth taking on this challenge.
One True Love
(For Adult Authors) Many of us are guilty of it: that one pairing that captures our fantasies, the love story that Tolkien never wrote...but we just know it should have been. It torments our thoughts, expresses itself in awkward behavior in our otherwise well-behaved characters, and many times, goes unwritten for shame. It is wholly unjustified by the canon or is just too weird. Maybe the characters lived too far apart in time or geography to be brought together; maybe their differences were insurmountable to friendship much less romance. The characters might be different races, different species, or the same gender.
But for this challenge, forget all of your qualms, cast aside your inhibitions, and write your one true pairing.
No matter how odd, no matter how wrong it feels, your challenge is to share in a story why this pairing captivates you. Whether it is an AU (alternate universe) pairing as common as Maedhros and Fingon or as strange as Galadriel and Aul� (or even stranger!), your goal for this challenge is to build a story around the premise of love between two characters never seen in Tolkien's canon. Het or slash is acceptable, but both characters in the pairing must be canon characters (although only one needs to be from The Silmarillion) and the story should be more than just a raucous love scene. Create characters and build a story that convinces your readers that these characters belong together, and use romance and sex to advance your plot and characterization.
Love Conquers All
...or does it?
So the old saying goes: "Love conquers all?" Does it? Can love overcome the death of a loved one? The trauma of war? The pain of exile?
In this challenge, show how one character helps another to overcome a difficulty in his or her life through love and romance. At least one of the characters must be a canon character, but the pairing may also involve an original character or may be AU (alternate universe). It may be slash or het, and any rating is acceptable. The difficulty faced may be from the canon, implied by the canon, or may be AU.
Many Meetings
This month's challenge asks you to consider nonviolent conflict. Can you create tension and conflict without drawing swords? Many of the key turning points of The Silmarillion take place off of the battlefield, in meetings and councils, between individuals and groups, but few are the instances where we are allowed to see and hear what actually transpired. So let us wander there: to the soaring halls of Valinor or the hovels of the Edain, where decisions that would change the history of Middle-earth were made. Entries may be any length and involve any characters; the goal is to create tension and conflict without resorting to overt action.
Trinkets and Treasures
The Silmarillion is full of stories pertaining to or involving items that are magical or valuable in some way to their owners. Write a piece in any form--short story, drabble, poem--about how one of these items influenced history or its possesor, how the item was acquired or created, or how the item was lost.
The Silmarillion canon is full of items that could be used for this challenge, but also, there are items that must have existed by receive no special mention and items that exist only in the imaginations of fanfic writers. From the infamous Silmarils to the sword of a traitorous Man, many are the items that hold a special importance or helped shape the history of Arda.
What's your treasure?
First Meetings
How might a character originating from and living in Valinor react to his or her first meeting with a character just arriving from Middle-earth?
The possibilities for this challenge are vast and encompass all of the ages and Tolkien's works. Through the ages, the mystique of that which lies over the sea has drawn and influenced many characters. Some get their wish to go to the Undying Lands and must have encountered canon characters from Aman. How might this character have responded to the newcomer? What might they have learned from each other?
Differing Perspectives
Tolkien's works are written from a historical persective and assume that the "author" of the stories was a person living in those days, recording events for historical purposes. As such, careful readers must assume that the author has some degree of bias...and this inevitably means that each beloved tale has another side.
For this challenge, you will work in conjunction with another writer to show how history looks different from different perspectives. Choose a drabble or another work by an author that illustrates a single character's perspective. After seeking the original author's permission, write the same event--using all of the author's original conventions--from a different character's perspective. How do things change? What biases or misconceptions of the original speaker look different through your character's eyes?
Strangers in Strange Lands
Your character arrives for the first time in a new place. Maybe he journeyed there with a purpose, or maybe she ended up there by mistake. What does she perceive? What new experiences and conflicts will he have? This challenge asks you to bring a character to a new, strange place for the first time and to develop a story around his or her experiences there.
Part of the challenge involves painting a realistic picture of a place or civilization for your readers. How well can you make your readers see the stolid bleakness of Himring? Or feel the enchantment of Doriath? Fear the shadows of Angband or be overwhelmed with the grand halls of Nogrod?
And within each of these places are strange new cultures, possibly contrary or hostile to what your character is accustomed. From here, your conflict may arise, as characters try to barter, entreat, and win love in foreign lands, facing the same barriers of language and custom that plague the modern world. Or, possibly, the conflict is more of a physical nature: an Easterling battles the cold of northern Beleriand or a new captive in Angband learns to navigate the complex prison society of her new home.
The character you choose for this challenge may be original or canon. The conflicts the character faces may be profound or petty. Your challenge is to take readers somewhere new, to experience the hope, fear, or awkwardness of a strange land.
Strong Women of Arda
Tolkien is often criticized for the lack of strong female characters in his work, but many believe that The Silmarillion not only incorporates more female characters than Tolkien's other works but that they more often serve in strong or influential roles than the women of The Lord of the Rings. The stories of Middle-earth would be vastly different without characters like Varda, Galadriel, Haleth, and L�thien Tin�viel.
This challenge allows both for the development of strict canon characters within the confines of Tolkien's world or for those more AU-inclined to create wholly new characters from those women whose canon role extends little beyond being the wife or mother of someone more important. Choose a female character from The Silmarillion or related texts. She could be someone like Galadriel, one of the Valar, or someone barely mentioned, such as Nerdanel or Elenw�. Write a story--any length--about this character, developing a strong personality for her. Her strengths could lie in many different areas: Perhaps the woman would be a good mother, perform an act of heroism, or be a healer or a teacher, but she must contribute something of value.