Nocturnaliss

Greetings, Writer Buds! And apologies for the delay, the weeks have been hectic for both Porsheee and I. At long last, the results are in, and we can finally proudly announce the winner of the Literature Contest: Time of Day

Drumroll please!

Aaaand congrats to Artoveli for her piece, Timeslip! We were in agreement that your piece deserved first place, and here are our reasons why:

Porsheee: 

"The dialogue is natural and light. The details are interesting and give personality. It is hard to write short sci-fi in particular (or fantasy, for that matter) that has a complicated setting without infodumping horribly. I think this story avoids that, and somehow benefits from the setting without interest-killing descriptions. The interpretation of the theme is also very interesting—a timeslip is really more like a non-time of day, which is a fun take on it! It reveals both the arbirtarity of time and yet how much meaning time gets from what we assign it (give it any other name and there is no way Rufetta would be watching so much ET!). Overall, it's a fun and memorable read that keeps you going to the last word." 

Nocturnaliss:

"From the first sentence, I felt transported into a different world. I had no idea what a timeslip was, yet the character dialogue soon enough made me understand the concept, and also built the world beyond this starship in a fun, engaging manner. Without any knowledge of the characters, I found myself just mesmerized by their exchanges, and by the little detailing actions peppering this piece that further built the greater world surrounding them. The inclusion of references to ET was not only a good way to build character, but also to make the reader understand how long a timeslip is, and its purpose. This was a very creative take on the Time of Day theme that I loved discovering."

Artoveli has won a feature in BlossomingLiterature among other things, so look out for more of her soon! 

Also, any of the entrants who would like feedback on their entry is welcome to ask us. Both Porsheee and I are quite willing to explaining our decisions and judging, as well as offering constructive feedback on the pieces themselves! Just comment on this journal or note either/both of us personally for more information.

Thank you everyone who participated! This has been a great start for the renewal of BlossomingLiterature, and we couldn't have done it without you.

For anyone who might have missed them, here are our other wonderful entries:

Hello all!

Just wanted to let everyone know Porsheee and I are still in the process of judging the five entries we got for the Time of Day contest. Apologies for the delay!

In the meantime, have a look yourselves at our entries and tell us (and the artists themselves!) what you think!

Which one is your favourite?

Nocturnaliss here, second-in-command to the lovely Porsheee. I thought I'd take a short moment to remind everyone that our contest has only one week left. Check out all of the info below:

Let us know if you intend to enter, at the very least, so we know whether to expect some surprise entries

In other news, we've seen quite a few members join the group these past few weeks. Welcome to all of you! And greetings to our watchers and long-term members.

How about we all take a moment to introduce ourselves and get to know each other?

I'll start us off by letting you know I'm a Belgian Dark Fantasy writer who loves writing character-driven stories.

And I am its Empress Lilac, second-in-command for the Sunflower Lord Porsheee, gladly inviting you to take part in our contest at BlossomingLiterature!

Read the full journal over on the group:

Deadline is July 1st, so there's still some time to come up with something fantastic :D

There's also a point raffle for everyone who helps speard the word (minus myself, obviously XD), so check out the journal for the full story ;)

With the advent of Eclipse, and the death of old!DA, many artists have (rightfully so) expressed their hate for the new!DA. And I'll admit, there's ways in which Eclipse is just not functional: the deviation process in groups is unreachable (EDIT: just found out this works now! FINALLY! EDIT2: no they haven't, it works haphazardly? Wtf.), stats haven't worked in months, and for me personally, the watch is stacked so tightly together that I get overwhelmed into literally feeling sick to my stomach, so I haven't touched it in months.

But as much as I see visual artists complaining about new!DA, I'm not seeing writers complain. And I'm one of the voices open to saying: you know, Eclipse actually works better now for writers. The 'submit literature' function I find far more pleasant and functional than the old 'n clunky sta.sh writer, I can now paste stories in from Word with preserved formatting, and literature now actually looks good when posted as literature (no more extra spacing, yay!).

And even better: it looks super legible on mobile.

Bonus points for:

* The 'submit to group' function finally working as it should

* Getting me to ditch pdfs.

Before now, I'd stuck to pdfs to preserve formatting, but also because I had to manually insert italics and bolds and whatever else formatting I needed to keep. I'd also stuck to pdfs because I wasn't sure how pieces submitted through 'literature' would appear to old!DA viewers. I now no longer have to wonder.

And with Eclipse being now the dominant layout, this may well be the right time for writers to come out of the woodworks and claim more space than before. Even the journal function is testament to how much more user-friendly writing has become on this visual-art-dominated site. And truth be told: if it weren't for the tight stacking of watch stacks (made worse on a widescreen desktop), I think visual artists got a leg-up with the new way of displaying art within a stack:

Why they couldn't implement something like this for the stacks themselves, or for literature pieces, I don't understand.

But anyway.

The advent of Eclipse marks the end of DeviantArt as a place focused on community. We've all felt it coming, for months already, with more journals about DA being dead crossing my watch.

But DeviantArt isn't the community: we are. We, the users, the creators, the viewers. We can still choose to connect with each other.

So, from now on, I'll be implementing a tag in all my literature submissions called "DAWritersCommunity" - as a bit of a throwback to the excellent WritingCommunity on Twitter. So we can connect beyond groups, and beyond the void that Eclipse might create.

Writers, the time for us is now. Let's embrace the good things Eclipse is bringing to the literary community and grow better together. Because what are writers without readers, or writers who don't read? Let's uplift one another going forward