This is a mobile proxy. It is intended to visit the IOMfAtS Story Shelf on devices that would otherwise not correctly display the site. Please direct all your feedback to the friendly guy over at IOMfAtS!

Inspired by a Picture: What? - A Writing Challenge

This challenge is to write a story based on both the pictures below.

2018 Inspired by a Picture Challenge - What?

This challenge is coterminus with submissions for Halloween. We recognise that authors may find it a logistics nightmare to produce two tales, so the pictures have been chosen with care to hint at their possible joint use. That is also why this preview stage has been released very early. We are also going to publish a set of Halloween tales.

Now look, this is not confusing at all. The same tale may be in the challenge and also be a Halloween tale. But there is no compulsion for it to be a Halloween tale! Got it?


The stories have been uploaded, and are here for you to read and enjoy. When you have enjoyed them please come back here before the closing date for voting and mark up to three stories in the overall survey.

Runners and riders

The stories are as follows. The order changes each time the page is refreshed, to try to get folk to read and rate all the tales:

Until polls open this is just a list. Once they open the titles link to the tales.

Cast your vote

There are two ways. Each story has a survey at the foot which relates to how well you judge that it met your needs as a reader. That's probably the most useful for the authors. After that, once you have read them all, please come here and rate them all.

What?

Click all the stories that you enjoyed

The Eye of the Storm
At the Edge of Forever
The Challenge that is Tony - Not Carrot Cake
The Monsters Are Due on Maple Street


Current Results

Voting period

Voting lasts for three weeks only. Polls open on 31 October 2018 at noon, and close at noon on 21 November 2018. Poll opening and closing is programmatic

Rules

The basic rules are simple:

The story may be a new story, an existing story published in this site or elsewhere, or current work in progress (ie part of a serial that you also enter in the challenge). Absolutely no stories with adult/youth themes or heavy BDSM content will be allowed, and no exceptions will be made. Scatology, coprophagy, or faeces play will not be accepted. Diaper fetish is, likewise, deprecated.

Stories do not need to contain or avoid sexual encounters, nor need they be gay male stories, though authors' attention is drawn to the fact that this is primarily a gay site, with a gay male majority in the audience.

All stories that are accepted for the challenge will remain the copyright of the authors, and the authors and submitters give an absolute assurance that the stories may be published here. Authors' attention is drawn to the copyright statement at the foot of every page on this site. Stories accepted into the challenge and published on the site may not subsequently be withdrawn.

By submitting a story into the challenge the submitter gives an absolute assurance that he or she has the right to submit the story, that it is their own original work (or that they have the author's permission to submit it), and that it does not break any other person's copyright. Should the submitter be in breach of any undertaking in law, the submitter agrees that the webmaster be held harmless and that any such breach is the total personal responsibility of the submitter. Anyone recognising a work as their own and submitted without their consent, or having any issues with it should register this by clicking here and emailing the webmaster, explaining their reasons in detail.

Results

An overall results page shows all the results gathered in one place. Obviously polls have to be open for the results to show! Until polls are open it is pretty obviously a work in progress.