April Challenge Month is just around the corner, so here are all the details you need to get ready. (If you missed the announcement, see here.)

Once you have picked the challenge you wish to respond to and created your work (either fic or art), you will need to upload at least the first part between 00.00 on April 1st and 23.59 on April 30th site time, which appears under the ShoutBox on EF’s homepage. During the posting window, a tick box will appear on the upload page that, when checked, marks your work as part of the event.

After you have uploaded your work, you must link it to the challenge you’re responding to. To respond to a challenge, find the specific challenge on the Challenges page and then click “Respond to this Challenge” at the bottom of the challenge. Click the link, check the box next to the story that is the challenge response, and click submit. If your work is not linked to a challenge, you will not be eligible for awards.

Please note, the challenge you respond to must have been issued by another member. Works that respond to a challenge issued by the creator are not eligible for the event.

Event works will appear on the 2024 April Challenge Month page, be eligible for awards (designed by the wonderful bewildered), and get a little umbrella icon beside them (pictured below).

Below is the breakdown of how to qualify for each award:

• Author Award: Post a story or a work tagged as Narrative Artwork.
• Artist Award: Post a work tagged as Artwork or Narrative Artwork, contribute illustrations to an event story, or create a banner for an event story. Authors must credit their banner artists and illustrators, including themselves if they are an artist for the work.
• Beta Award: Perform a beta read or sensitivity read on an event work. Authors must credit their beta and sensitivity readers.
• Comment Award: Add 15 comments of at least 15 words each during the month of April. (see below for more details).

As always, authors must credit any beta readers, sensitivity readers, or artists who contributed to their story. Please use the new crediting fields on the Upload page to ensure everyone gets their hard-earned shinies. The Mods will not check summaries, story notes, or chapter notes for crediting, so this information must be in the crediting field. Please confirm you have the correct spelling and punctuation of usernames, as some members have very similar handles.

Commenters must leave at least 15 comments of at least 15 words each during the month of April to be eligible for the award. Comments do not need to be on event fics, though we always encourage people to read and comment on those!

Banner artists: please add a small line of text somewhere on event banners to say, Designed for Elysian Fields' 2024 April Challenge Month.

Happy creating!