Happy endings. We all love ‘em, but they’ve been done. To death. They’ve become predictable, and sometimes a little cliched. As much as we’d like it to happen, happy endings aren’t always possible. Besides, we all know the only real happy endings happen in fairy tales anyway. So, in the spirit of shaking things up and keeping it real, we proudly present the Happily (N)ever After Contest.

This contest is open to all pairings, and pretty much any style of story you want to write from either the SVM OR True Blood verses. All human, Alternate Universe, Canon...whatever floats your boat, so long as your pairing/main character doesn’t get the much sought after HEA.

Maybe you have an inner angsty side and you want to let her out. Maybe you have never tried writing unhappy things, and you want to stretch your writing muscles a bit. This is about changing it up, going against the grain, trying something different, and it could be a lot of fun to discover what you’re capable of.

Your Hostesses:
Scribeninja
Slacker Dee
Makesmyheadspin

Your Judges:
Chanel Addict
Lubadub
Sapfirerose
Dracodew17
Musing_Mia
Mavrosal
brighteyes1131

THE RULES:
1. All entries must be beta’d (see below for more information on betas & where to find ‘em).
2. Entries must be between 2,500 - 12,000 words. NO EXCEPTIONS.
3. Collaborations are allowed.
4. No more than 2 entries per person, collaborations included.
5. Any entries with an HEA will be disqualified before going to judging. The whole point is to buck tradition here folks. Locate your angst boner, and start stroking.
6. This is a public posting contest, but judging will be anonymous. That means all pen names or other identifying information will be stripped from submissions before they are sent to the judges. Please do not post your o/s anywhere before given the go-ahead via email from contest hosts, which will happen after we send it off to our judges. Failure to comply with this rule will result in your entry being disqualified from competition.
7. Yes, yes, this is a contest for Non-HEA entries. However, please use good judgment and common sense when writing. Entries that include scenes of a graphic nature in regards to violence, incest or rape require a special disclaimer. Entries that include pedophilia will not be accepted.

We know that lots of authors have twitter and like to tweet about what they’re writing, but we ask that you please refrain from tweeting any identifying information about your entry. Our judges are smart, and they will figure it out. We are allowing you to post before the judges finish scoring so that you don’t go crazy waiting, so please do the judges the courtesy of keeping it as fair as possible.

All entries should include the following header:
Happily (N)ever After Contest
Title:
Characters:
Word Count:
Pen Name:
Beta:
Disclaimer:
Summary:

All contest entries should be emailed in a word document to happilyneveraftercontest(at)gmail(dot)com. Once your entry has been reviewed by a host, you will receive a reply email letting you know that your entry has been sent to our judges, and then you are free to post your entry. We ask that you please send us the link after it is posted so we can add it to our community.

If you wish to receive your scores and/or comments from the judges, please note that at the time of your submission. We will only send back that information if it is requested by the author, and the judges will only be writing comments if they are requested at the time of submission.

Please do not contact the judges if you have questions in regards to this contest. Please contact the hosts via PM, gmail or twitter (we lurk almost constantly).

o.O.o.O.o

Because it is hard to write for a contest without knowing what you will be judged on, we are sharing our judging criteria with you. Each entry will be judged on the following categories:

Originality of Plot
Character Development
Plot Development
Plausibility -is the plot convincing?
Tone/Voice/Style - did it flow well?
Technical Grammar
Story Structure - organized? clear?
Dialogue Quality - was it believable?
Emotional Response
Resolution

If you have any questions/concerns regarding the judging criteria, please contact the hosts.

DATES:
Black Friday- November 26th, 2010: Contest formal announcement/launch
NYE 2010: Submissions will now be accepted by hosts.
Valentine’s Day 2011: Submission deadline. No entries will be accepted after this date. No exceptions.
March 1, 2011: First round of judging will be completed & top entries will be determined for public voting to begin.
March 15, 2011: Top entry scores will be returned to hosts and public voting will be closed. Winners will be announced.

Winners will be determined by voting, judges’ top scorer and hosts’ fave. We will have a total of 5 winners: the top 2 by public vote, top 2 of the judges’ scores and one hosts’ pick.

PRIZES
Public Vote Winners: TBD
Judges’ Top Scorers: TBD
Hosts’ Pick: TBD

BETA INFO:
For those that don’t know already, a beta is essentially an editor who checks your grammar, punctuation, sentence structure, characterization and the over-all flow of your story to make sure it’s good to go for the general public.
Please keep in mind that judges & hosts will not be available to beta for this contest. Please keep that in mind when selecting your beta.
If you don’t already have one you work with on a regular basis, please check out the beta forum: http://forum.fanfiction.ws/topic/55534/12646774/1/

For more information...
You can PM the hosts, email us at our gmail address, or tweet us @HNA_Contest.
Updates will also be made available via the sookieverse_lj, the Sookieverse and Sapfirerose’s SVM Addiction Blog.

Best of luck to everyone who enters!

CONGRATULATIONS TO OUR WINNERS!!!

Popular vote 1st place winner: CrisiTM for Never Again

Popular vote 2nd place winner: SassyVampMama for Talking to the Moon

Judges 1st place winner: esquilo-negligenciadas for Thursday"

Judges 2nd place winner (we had a 3 way tie!): Drumbjo for Stop All the Clocks, Charlotte Clark for Ten Years Gone, and Evenflo78 for These Dreams.

Hostess Pick: Sarita.Alex for The Holy and the Broken

A BIG THANKS TO OUR JUDGES FOR THEIR HARD WORK AND THE TIME THEY DONATED TO THIS CONTEST. THANKS ALSO GO OUT TO ALL OF THE ENTRANTS. WE WEREN'T EXPECTING THE TURN OUT WE GOT, SO THANK YOU ALL FOR ROCKING OUR SOCKS RIGHT OFF.