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.

You can apply to become a Squillian Journalist by submitting a sample article to SquillsBot today!

1. LAST CALL ON THE REVMO TRAIN
2. GREEN ROOM GALLERY
3. THERAPY THOUGHTS VOL 1: INTRODUCTION & INTERVIEW WITH CAPTAIN JACK
4. WORD OF THE WEEK: REVEL
5. SHAMELESS PLUGS
6. SUBSCRIBERS

LAST CALL ON THE REVMO TRAIN
written by EditorAndPerks < PM: >

Hello all! In case you've somehow missed all of the announcements , September is Review Month, or #RevMo here on YWS. The official goal? To write as many reviews as possible for an entire thirty days! Your goal? Anything you want.

Not to mention you can also participate in the Official RevMo Banner Contest hosted by @Magebird and @ShadowVyper! All you need to do is create a banner, reply to the contest thread, use the banner in a review, and then link to your review in the thread! If you have any questions, please head to the link above.

The past two years I've participated in RevMo -- 2018 I won, but 2019 I fell a little short for my 50 review goal. However, even with school coming up soon, my quarter actually starts rather late in the year, and so I am motivated to get to that gold color this September.

Feel free to post your goals on your wall with a handy #RevMo or #RevMo2020 tag, or put them in the Official Poll . If you reach certain numbers by the end of each week (10, 20, 35, and 50!) then your username will turn into wonderful vivid colors!, which is exciting.

Some goals for various users are listed below (I may have stalked a few walls just to get some fun responses):

@VioletFantasy wants to complete Team Tortoise for that awesome dark cyan as a reward and to get her third review star!

@Hkumar is hoping to do as many reviews as he can in between college classes, so hopefully he can make it to the first username color change and hit 10 reviews!

@IcyFlame wants to at least hit 20 reviews, but a very awesome goal would be an even 100!

@HarryHardy is ready to take over the world and hit 300 reviews in a month!

I don't know about you, but I know I am quite excited for RevMo. Good luck to all and have fun!

GREEN ROOM GALLERY
written by Liberty < PM: >

The Green Room is full once again! As of the twenty eighth of August, there are 26 works with 0 reviews and 50 works with 1 review. More than 75 pieces waiting to be rescued by the wonderful reviewers of YWS. Remember, if you review something from the Green Room, you get an additional 25 points and if you’re reviewing something more than a month old, you get another 25 points along with the initial 25 points.

@Anamel wrote language of flowers , a poem with this as it’s description: through the flowers and the strangeness of his love, a slight truth of his definition of love is still buried deep down under the garden.

@vilnius wrote America Gone - Chapter Nine a chapter which is a political/dramatic chapter about a Grandpa McHale destroying country over party. You can check out the related chapters Prologue , Chapter 1 , and Chapter 2 too!
Warning: This work has been rated 16+ for language.

@manilla wrote An Essay on the Boy Scouts of America , an essay which is obviously about the boys scouts in America.

@penngreen4776 wrote Shock + Awe [1.2] a teen fiction chapter. Here’s a quick teaser: After a car ride with friends, Gwen makes it home for a much needed break that seems far too content with making her wait. You can check out the first part of this chapter Chapter 1.1 .
Warning: This work has been rated 16+.

@mellifera wrote Children with Stars in their Veins (Chapter 43) a chapter, which is fantastical and also adventurous. Here’s a quick teaser: Chromium considers its options, weighing the price of alliances. You can check out the related chapters Prologue , Chapter 1.1 , and Chapter 1.2 too!

If you’re into reviewing things in the Green Room, make sure to check out the Knights of the Green Room Information ! You can do a specific amount of reviews and also earn different badges. And if you’re interested in reviewing anything and everything, make sure to stop by this thread to check out all the fun Review Month 2020 activities coming up.

THERAPY THOUGHTS VOL 1: INTRODUCTION & INTERVIEW WITH CAPTAIN JACKwritten by Bullet< PM: >


Hi! Welcome to the first volume of Therapy Thoughts. This is a collective anthology of interviews, think pieces, and advice columns that culminates to illustrate the multitulde of ways creators interact with their neurodivergencies and/or mental illness. There is no wrong or right way to be mentall ill/neurodivergent; this series is interested in taking a look as to how the variance of these Brain Bumps facillitates, impacts, and influences the content creators make.

To start us off, Squills sat down with YWS' own @CaptainJack, a lovely resource mod who I've had the pleasure of talking mental illness with multiple times. We've bonded over our Brain Bumps, and so I thought I'd take a dive into how Captain Jack writes as a neurodivergent creator!



CaptainJack: I have a lot of official diagnosis and self diagnosis but the ones I mainly talk about are depression, anxiety, autism, ADHD, and other "learning disorders". Those are the ones I'm comfortable mentioning on YWS and doing education about in public circles.




The Captain:There has never been a point where my creative endeavours have not been influenced by what was going on in my noggin. My earliest special interests were connected to music, mystery, and food. Recently, when talking about my attempts to have a blog of recipes as a disabled chef, I described my overall aesthetic as a foodie cowboy.




The Captain:Aside from being physically disabled, I also have a little thing referred to as executive dysfunction. These are obvious limitations to my creative process but there's other situations that people might not immediately consider as roadblocks. With autism, I have many special interests. When the intersection of ADHD is brought in, then I'm constantly cycling through many interests and a variety of different projects.
For me, it's 50/50 for nearly all of my disorders and conditions. Sometimes they help me do outrageous things (like completely NaNo) and other times they severly hurt my progess (like not being able to complete NaPo).




The Captain:Many of my characters do have mental illnesses and/or neurodivergences. There's some of my characters, such as Harry Bivens and Emily Robertson, who could essentially be described as self insert. These are two characters of mine that mimic two parts of my life - Emily is from when I was still hiding under the cover of being cis and Harry was after my gender realization. Those chracters get treated for their issues, mental and physical, in ways that I hope one day achieve myself.
Now, there's an entirely different branch of characters that are still reflections of me or having MI/ND's, but there's not the same level of connection. Those would be characters like my current Winslow Smith and Bethany Hoffman. These are two characters from very different projects who are both queer, both struggling with mental issues, and both make their way to a happy ending despite the initial diagnosis they were given.
All of my characters carry the idea that our MI/ND's don't make us bad people and we all have different connections to our Brain Bumps.




The Captain:For me, it's the intersection of being a very creative person who is trapped in their head with all of their ideas and they're unable to put all of these thoughts down into a medium. That's the classic struggle of MI/ND creators. The two lines involved in this system of equations are polynomials with many points of intersection. Another example is how my trauma makes it so I can write very realistic scenes but a day later my own work might trigger an attack.
It requires a lot of strength to be a MI/ND writer but there's many of us out there and we all find ways to bring our creativity to the light of day.




The Captain:For neurotypical readers who want to include MI/ND characters in their stories, they should of course do research but also consult with people in the proper communities. As a resources moderator, I come across a lot of insensitive responses on how to write [blank] character that include what people think of us. For example: most people who fall under the clinical "psychopath" are not serial killers.
If anyone has questions about writing with this subject or anything else just remember me as the friendly(ish) resources mod who is here to have creative conversations.


Thanks again to Captain Jack for the first interview of Therapy Thoughts! As this series progresses, we'll continue to see different answers on how neurodivergencies and mental illnesses - Brain Bumps - affect writers of all kinds. Stay tuned for more!

WORD OF THE WEEK: REVEL
written by EternalRain < PM: >

Pronunciation: reh-vull

Part of Speech: verb, noun

Definition: v. enjoy oneself in a lively and noisy way, especially with drinking and dancing; get great pleasure from (a situation or experience).

n. lively and noisy enjoyment, especially with drinking and dancing.

Synonyms: celebrate, party, enjoy; celebration, festivity

Origin: From Latin “rebellare” (to rebel), Old French “reveler” (rise up in rebellion)

Used in a Sentence: The YWSers cheered with their pens in the air, reveling in the news of RevMo soon approaching!



Because #RevMo starts tomorrow, if you use the word “revel” (in any conjugation or used as either part of speech; such as “revel”, “reveling”, “reveled”) in a proper sentence in one of your reviews, I’ll give you a bonus prize of **50 points!!**! Just PM me (EternalRain) with a link to your review that contains the word “revel”! It must be written from the dates September 1 - September 7. 1 review per person. Additionally, if you’d like your sentence to be featured in next week’s Word of the Week, let me know in your PM!

SHAMELESS PLUGS

written by SquillsBot < PM: >

We love to run articles and questions, but we also love to advertise for you. Let people know about your new blog, a poem or story you’re looking for reviews on, or a forum thread you’d like more traffic on through Squills’ Shameless Plugs. PM @SquillsBot with the exact formatting of your advertisement, contained in the following code.

Code: Select all

Place advertisement here. Make sure you include a title!

Poetry Discussion

Do you want to discuss poetry?

Join our discussion at the Poetry Readers Club .

Our current poem is "Do Not Go Gentle into That Good Night" by Dylan Thomas. Hope you check it out!

For questions please PM @alliyah.








Have you heard the news? September is Review Month! Help us reach our site-wide goal of 1,250 Reviews and become eligible for our nifty temporary username colors!

10 Reviews - Deep Pink
20 Reviews - Medium Slate Blue
35 Reviews - Maroon
50 Reviews - Gold
Team Tortoise - Dark Cyan

Each week is a chance to advance to the next review level! Find out more in the Information Thread and don't forget to join the RevMo Club.


*click the image above for more information*



Up for a challenge? Do you enjoy amazing prizes, fame, and badges?
Put yourself to the test and try out this year's Ultimate Checklist Challenge during Review Month! Details will be in the Contest Thread: information coming soon.

50+ Challenges: 1000 points, 35+ Challenges: 500 points, 20+ Challenges: 250 points, 10+ Challenges: Limited Edition Checklist Challenge RevMo Badge


That's all folks~ Now send us yours.

SUBSCRIBERS

written by SquillsBot < PM: >

Find an enspoiler-ed a list of our subscribers!

Do you, too, want to be enspoiler-ed and receive a personal weekly notification when the Squills newsletter is posted? Shoot a PM over to SquillsBot to let him know, and you'll be pinged along with the next issue!