Young Writers Society

Welcome to Squills, the official news bulletin of the Young Writers Society!
What will you find here? Tons of interesting news about YWS, including but not limited to: articles about writing, art, and the world of humanities; interviews with YWS members; shameless plugs; link round-ups; and opinionated columns.
And where will all of this come from? Take a look at our fantastic creative staff!




Of course, our content can’t come only from our staff. We also depend on you to help keep Squills successful. You’re all a part of a writing community, after all. If you’re interested in submitting to Squills, pop on over to the Reader’s Corner to find out how you can get involved by contributing an article or participating in other Squills activities.

Well, that’s all I have for now. So, what are you waiting for? Enjoy!

1. FEATURED MEMBER INTERVIEW: ZOOM
2. GREEN ROOM GALLERY: IN THE SHADOW OF LMS
3. NEW ARRIVALS
4. A SPECIAL ANNOUNCEMENT
5. SOME SUPER SERIOUS BUSINESS
6. SPORTS WITHOUT SCORES: THE TOUR DE FRANCE AND MY ISSUES WITH SILENCE
7. THIS MONTH IN HISTORY
8. SHAMELESS PLUGS
9. SUBSCRIBERS

FEATURED MEMBER INTERVIEW: ZOOMwritten by WritingPrincess< PM: >

Yet another Featured Member has taken the throne. This week, it's the fantastic @Zoom. We thought we would have a chat with them to see how they're getting on.


Zoom: I knew something was up the moment I signed into YWS and saw that my notifications had blown up. Somehow I doubted that one of my stories had become an overnight sensation, so I was intrigued to discover what was going on. I wasn't aware that members were featured for their contributions, so that in itself was surprising, but for me to be chosen? I'm very grateful and taken aback. After spending a lot of time in the green room, I know that there are many members who are more just as deserving.

Z: A well placed imperious curse can do wonders. Hehe jokes aside, I try to provide the unfiltered, internal monologue of a reader. Hopefully this paid off and earned me FM.

Z: I enjoy following stories and chillin’ in the green room. That's my jam.

Z: Why mess with perfection? Actually, now you mention it, something that gets my goat is when somebody joins YWS, immediately publishes their work in the green room and then never posts a review for anyone else. I get that not everyone is comfortable reviewing or sharing their opinions, but I would be tempted to increase the points necessary to post in the green room, or adjust something or other to prevent people from doing this. Although forcing people to post reviews sounds kinda harsh, so maybe this is unfixable.

Z: When I joined and people liked me. ^_^
Or when I became FM.
Thank you Zoom for your time and congratulations for earning FM.

GREEN ROOM GALLERY: IN THE SHADOW OF LMSwritten by BiscuitsLeGuin < PM: >

Good afternoon, readers, and welcome to my first Green Room Gallery article. As someone who writes primarily prose, I thought I'd take a look at the novel chapters currently awaiting their first and second reviews, particularly those who have been left behind by the wave of Last Man Standing reviews.

I spoke to @SubSubLibrarian and @FantasyWriter76 about having chapters near the beginning of the 'Oldest' tab. They have a third and fourth chapter in the Green Room respectively. If you look on the week 3 and 4 tabs for LMS submissions, you'll see that by no means are all chapters have those crucial first reviews, but the vast majority are spending very little time in there. As the weeks go on and people get more and more invested in the later chapters of novels, it is important to remember what other works still remain.

SubSubLibrarian said of reviewing old Green Room novel chapters:






The key difference between this and LMS is that with LMS there is firstly a club, in which you at least see the other novels on the thread when you go to post your work. This allows titles to catch your eye, whereas you may be unlikely to go straight to the back of the Green Room. Secondly, there was a great deal of build-up for LMS, with people sharing their planning to each other. This allowed followings to build up for novels even before they started, which prevented chapters from ever having to stay there for too long.

FantasyWriter76 then said:






I'm sure we've all experienced that at one stage or another: that chapter we spent so long planning and getting excited about... but nobody's reading it. It can be greatly disheartening.

That's why I've had an idea this week. If you come back to me after having reviewed SubSubLibrarian's To Kill A Zombie - Chapter 3 , FantasyWriter76's Fists of Fate - Chapter 4 (All Arcs) or any other non-LMS chapter from the Green Room, I will review something of yours of your choice and throw 500 points into the mix.

#nonLMS

NEW ARRIVALS
written by EternalRain < PM: >

Take a moment to welcome this week’s newest members to the site!

@Liminality has written one review so far and created a topic in the Welcome Mat forum. They like writing poetry and speculative fiction short stories.

@ToHogwartsInATARDIS, though a new account, has been on the site before. They’ve posted a topic in the research forum about How To Write A Genderfluid Character . If you have anything to add, help them out!

@TMonaa (who has a super cute turtle profile picture) has posted a short story called One Year Later that currently is still in the Green Room - which means you get extra points from reviewing it!

A SPECIAL ANNOUNCEMENT

written by BiruKun < PM: >

Hello there! I would like to announce that Squills is officially going to begin an advice column! It will be very similar to the previous Gruno/Pruno column from a while back. In order to ask a question, click this link. I can’t wait to see where this goes, and thank you for reading Squills!

SOME SUPER SERIOUS BUSINESS

Written by LadyBird < PM: >

SPORTS WITHOUT SCORES: THE TOUR DE FRANCE AND MY ISSUES WITH SILENCEwritten by BiscuitsLeGuin < PM: >

In today's article, I couldn't mention numbers even if I wanted to. I apologise to anyone who follows cycling, because this week I watched The Tour de France, and I didn't understand a word of it. Oh, I think I also make it relevant to writing, which some of you may appreciate.

I like to think this isn't just me being an idiot who only understands sport when there's a ball involved. Long distance racing seems not to always care about who is in the front at any given time, and apparently there are all sorts of tactics of ways you can affect the race from the back of a big pack of cyclists. All of this was explained by the commentators, but whooshed over my head like, well, like a slip stream of air over the helmet of a cyclist.

But this served to highlight a reason I so greatly enjoy having sport on in the background when I am writing - told you I'd find a link. It didn't matter to me that I couldn't understand what the commentators were talking about, it mattered that there was someone in the room talking. My parents were out at the time, and there weren't many people online, so I was trying to write in quite a lonely space.

As the proliferation of write-ins recently has shown, for some people, writing in the same space as someone while not necessarily talking to them can be greatly useful. It's just less isolated. I can't write in silence - I get distracted by thoughts racing through my mind and fragments of song that won't leave. Music I know really well isn't much better. And then having a gripping television series on that I haven't seen before, well, that's never going to lead to much productivity.

Sports commentary, however, goes on for a long time, so it doesn't matter if you miss any. And it's brand new, often live, so there's always new stimulus being fed into my brain. So, the constant chatter about packs of sprinters pushing the group around the Arc de Triomphe - without actually sprinting - or early congratulation of Geraint Thomas - who was nowhere in sight - becomes the perfect thing to slip in one ear, through my mind, then out the other side.

The Tour de France has just finished - GO GERAINT!! - but the European Championships (of many sports) has just begun. Already today I had a great time today letting the conversation of Synchronised Swimming experts wash smoothly over me. I'm not saying it will work for everyone, but I highly recommend trying out writing while listening to commentary of a sport you don't know.

Unless it's tennis. Always pay attention to tennis.

Next week in Sports Without Scores: I gush about tennis player Andy Murray and his valiant comeback from injury.

THIS MONTH IN HISTORY

written by alliyah < PM: >

Last month we started the column "This Month in History" and took a look at significant going-ons on YWS two, five, and ten years ago. This week we'll take a look a look at what August looked like in 2016, 2013, and 2008.

TWO YEARS AGO: YWS August, 2016

Featured Members
Two years ago, we had two featured members over August. You'll recognize these usernames! @RippleGylf, poet extraordinaare was one of the featured members. And @reikann the storybooker, writer, reviewer was the other member featured.

Featured Works
What were people writing about in August of 2016? Well this Squills Writer didn't have quite enough time to compile a list of all the featured works of 2016, but one that I will mention is @felistia's poem "Dragons" . It recieved over 40 likes, and is one of the neatest shape poems that I've seen! 10 points to whoever can guess what shape the poem is written in before clicking the link.

Squills Anniversary
Did you know that 2 years ago it was Squills' 3rd Anniversary? Which (if I'm doing the math right...) make this year it's 5th Anniversary! It's pretty neat that Squills has been around that long! If you want to spend some time in nostalgia, check out the Squills Anniversary Edition from back in 2016. You'll find a Scavenger Hunt written by @megsug, a History of Squills from @Lavvie, and a neat feature on Squills' Leadership written by @Morrigan (plus other neat blasts from the past).

Olympics
In August of 2016, the big event on YWS was of course the YWS Olympics! These were the first YWS Olympics that I competed in and so I can say first-hand that it was a ton of fun! There were events in poetry, storywriting, prompts and the ever-popular YWS themed Scavenger Hunt. In the end @Savvy and @Rydia shared the Gold, while @Mea came away with the bronze. You can read about those past events here: Writing Olympics 2016 .

FIVE YEARS AGO: YWS August, 2013

Featured Members
Five years ago, we had two different featured members. @SushiSashimi333 and @KnightTeen certainly made their mark on the site, especially with their reviewing. Do you remember these folks?

Featured Works
As we learned in last month's sweep through YWS history, 2013 produced some great poetry on YWS. In August of 2013 another one of YWS's most beloved poems was posted "My Body is Not Poetry" was written and posted by @vitamere. And even five years after @niteowl wrote the first review, it's still recieving comments, reviews, and likes. Today this poem has 99 likes - putting it in the Top 100 Literary Works of All Time on YWS.

Featured Storybook
Although the first movie came out in 2006, back in 2013 High School Musical was still a pretty big deal, well I mean.. I guess it still is? Who doesn't love a good Zac Efron movie? In 2013 on YWS though, there was a storybook that tried to capture some of the drama of High School along with mythical mutation elements added in. "High School Mythical" got it's start in August of 2013. It was started by @ThingRed and joined by a whole cast of characters. @Skyguy and @thelostone each ran a few characters, along with @barefootrunner, @ChocoCookie, @Gardevite, @KingLucifer, @TaylorLove, @AdventurerDaniel, and @mortimermcmirestinks (who takes the cake for most complicated username that I've ever needed to spell!). You can still check out their storybook in the storybook archives today!

TEN YEARS AGO: YWS August, 2008

Featured Member
Ten years ago @BigBadBear recieved both the distinctions of being named Featured Member and Instructor of the Month. You can read about that here: August's Instructor of the Month .

Featured Work
Back in 2008 poetry was still often posted in the forum sections rather than in the Literary Section, and people left comments on the forum for their reviews. YWS has changed it's form a little bit since then, and now most of the poetry is posted in the literary tab rather than the forum sections. The old poetry has not been lost though! Check out "The Last Word" by @Gadi. for a great example.

And that wraps up This Month in History. If there's something you remember from September of 2016, 2013, or 2008 in YWS history send me a PM and I'll be sure to include it in next month's history issue!

SHAMELESS PLUGS

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SUBSCRIBERS

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