New Years New Starts: 2026 - Results
A retrospective on 2025's challenge
First off Thank You everyone who participated. A round of applause for, , , , and since they helped spread the news if even a little bit, and are in this year’s hall of fame.
If you want to check out everyone’s entries they are in that round up. Go read their stuff, it’s good. For my four campions I have an idea for a spring challenge, I hope to see you there. More on that in a couple of months. When it comes to the challenge this has been the best year. Compared to NYNS:2025 everything is better. More views, more participants, and more stories.
Now for those of you with good memories, or who have dug though the archives. will realize I went back on a few things I took away from NYNS:2025. In NYNS:2025 I gathered I should have a theme, and should run Jan 1. → Feb 1. Which I did not do. My recanting on the January and pushing it back to the ‘historical’ December challenge. I did this partly out of a desire to get the challenge out there earlier, and I think philosophically it works better as a challenge in December, because of December. To quote myself last February:
After doing it, I realized there was too much going on in December. Between the run up to Christmas and then New Years, the amount of free time I had was rather limited. If I have limited time I can assume that the majority of you would have limited time as well.
I’m not wrong. Yet that adds to the challenge. What post NYNS:2025 me didn’t realize, that’s the whole point of the challenge. Yes it’s busy, yes it’s a messy month when it comes to writing yet if you do it, you get more out of it. I centrally did as I used it to test, and prove to myself that I write better with a different structure when writing. Frankly that’s valuable as I work to put out 5k/words a week. (If not more.) Likewise it adds a second philosophical argument that is championed by my writer’s circle/advising group, The Lemur Throne: get on with it. One shouldn’t need an excuse like New Years, or even a writing challenge to start writing; yet one often does. If you didn’t do NYNS:2026 in December, and want to start writing; the post is still live. Go for it. I want to read it.
I didn’t have a theme announced this year, instead I went to try and get more people in the challenge. I will have one for this year’s New Year New Starts as I think that will help add some challenge to the challenge for those who found it too easy. I’m thinking there will be a theme, maybe a line challenge for ‘bonus points’. I don’t know what these bonus points will be used for. Maybe I’ll figure out shirts or challenge coins people can order or something. That can be a “fun activity” for future me.
With the challenge as the hole finished, I’ll move on to my starts. I found Catherine the most fun to write. I will admit the depth of prose may be a bit to chew though. Off the Edge is in a world I’ve had kicking around for a while. I didn’t show much of it, it’s a start. The Last Dance, is a tie in to Noah Bannon: Space Ranger. The character is revealed a bit early, well a few of them are. I have plans to expand some of them over the course of the year.
If you participated and have any notes, or do your own post challenge post tag me. I’d love to see your thoughts either from within or looking in.
See you all soon.
