And so it's that time again, time to vote for our favourite stories of the last two months.  Although a few of the categories are a bit thin on the ground with nominations it has been decided to keep to the schedule of a two-month cycle in order to hold the Annual Awards early next year.

And so I now hand the reins over to yourselves.  Please vote for your favourite stories.  Voting can be found here -

http://www.siye.co.uk/trinkets.php

I *think* I'm away on the 29th (calf shopping!) so voting will close and the winners will be announced on Thursday 28th September.

We at SIYE are thrilled to mark Albus Severus Potter's first ride on the Hogwarts Express this morning!  Cheers, little fellow -- it will all work out, yeah?

Challenge 2017-3 Update:

We're off to a roaring start.  Welsh Green, or Hungarian Horntail you ask?  Nay, the roaring is all the applause for two great stories already in the mill, and hopefully more to come!

A special note:  we received a question about whether it is permissible for an author to submit two stories to the same challenge?  The answer is that, to the best of our research, nobody ever said no (and indeed the Hemmingway 6 challenges actively encouraged multiple entries) so all writers with multiple beastly tales are welcome to contribute them!

By way of reminder, the topic for Challenge 2017-3 is  Somebody is going on a magical creature hunt -- tell us about it!  Categories for the challenge include 'Most Adventuresome', 'Most Unexpected' and 'Best Overall'.  Stories must be submitted by midnight, Nov. 15, in order for award announcements to be made on Dec. 1.  The strict requirement that stories focus on Harry/Ginny is relaxed for this challenge, although it's impossible to deny that HG stories are always real crowd pleasers.

Let's Begin Voting for 2018-1 Topics:

1. Years into their marriage, Ginny discovers something surprising about Harry.  Tell us about it.
2. By accident, Harry and Ginny stumble upon a hidden Portkey and are swept away.  What happens next, and how do they get back?
3. Harry has never been abroad before. His first trip is with Ginny. Where do they go, and why?
4. In the rubble of the final battle, Harry and Ginny both think that the other has perished.  What do they do?
5. Harry secretly discovers that the Mirror of Erised can be used for time travel!  Ginny secretly learns the same thing, and both begin using the mirror, without realising that the other is doing so too.  Oi, there's a recipe for trouble!
6. Harry's and Ginny's hectic lifestyles come to a screeching halt when one of them suffers a debilitating accident.  How will things change as the couple adjusts to a slow recovery?

Please let us know your preferences!  Please also feel free to make new suggestions, which will be added to the above list.

Her greatest fan just reminded me that today is Ginny's birthday.  Happy 36th!!

When Harry J's big day went off with a bang in the Cheviot Hills, I was off on travels, focusing on my road rather than his.  Perhaps he too will accept our belated cheers!

For this latest Challenge 2017-2 awards, we are pleased to announce (drumroll please) the following triumphant stories:

•     Most Humourous and Most Unexpected:  Revenge is Sweet by Gin110881
•     Best Overall and People's Choice:  Just a Talk and That's the Naked Truth by pleurocoelus

And finally, the Rory Award for Most Gratuitous Use of the Word 'Belgium' shall be shared between Revenge is Sweet by Gin110881, and Homecoming by Brennus.  

A tremendous round of virtual applause to our diligent judges:  ZA, SM, AM, KH, JG, MG and AS!

And now, here is the topic for Challenge 2017-3:  Somebody is going on a magical creature hunt -- tell us about it!

Categories for the challenge include 'Most Adventuresome', 'Most Unexpected' and 'Best Overall'.  Stories must be submitted by midnight, Nov. 15, in order for award announcements to be made on Dec. 1.

For this challenge, I am going to waive the strict requirement that stories focus on Harry/Ginny, although authors who find some way to at least weave them into tale will always earn a little extra appreciation from many SIYE devotees.

Please use this space to begin proposing topics for Challenge 2018-1.  Please Please.

The results are in for the May 2017 Dumbledore Silver Trinket Awards.  Huge thanks to everyone who voted, and congratulations to all the winners and everyone who was nominated.  Nominations are now being accepted for the July 2017 awards.

Best Comedy

• Winner: James and Me by Northumbrian
• Honourable Mention: Revenge Is Sweet by Gin110881

 

Best Drama

• Winner: Harry Potter and Love's Changes by ScubaDoc3
• Honourable Mention: The Reason Not To by potterfan2008

 

Best Romance

• Winner: James and Me by Northumbrian
• Honourable Mention: Realizations by potterfan2008

 

Best One-Shot

• Winner: Revenge Is Sweet by Gin110881
• Honourable Mention: Discovering His Roots by potterfan2008

 

Best Completed

• Winner: A Little Bit of Hope by CharmHazel
• Honourable Mention: Like Flames by DragonHeartstring

 

Best New Story

• Winner: Like Flames by DragonHeartstring
• Honourable Mention: James and Me by Northumbrian

The last two months have flown by and now it is time to vote for your favourites again.  The votiing is now open for the May 2017 trinkets.  We have a good number of stories submitted and your votes can be cast here -

http://www.siye.co.uk/trinkets.php

The results will be posted on 29th July so as to not clash with Challenge posts.

EDIT 24/7/17 - Due to work commitments on Saturday and being away on Sunday I will now close the voting and post the results on Friday 28th July.

Brill!  Happily, I have been proven wrong on both major counts of my message from this morning.  Sometime between my settling into a strange bed late last night, and my blearily hitting the road this morning, we did indeed get a second story before the deadline.  And, somewhere in all this, there may well be the mention of a flat EU country; purveyor of fine wheat beers and lagers!

Anyway, our two illustrious stories are:

• Revenge is Sweet by Gin110881
• Just a Talk and That's the Naked Truth by pleurocoelus

Community involvement is greatly encouraged, courtesy of the People's Choice award voting:

http://siye.co.uk/trinkets.php?peopleschoice=Y

Sometime, shortly after expelling the host of gnomes that broke into my home in my absence, I will try to write to esteemed judges with revised instructions.

Hmmm...  Well, unless someone has dreamed up a rather novel gag, I believe that the April Fool's Challenge has produced only one story.  It is, however, a fine one:

Revenge is Sweet by Gin110881

There will be no People's Challenge, obviously, so over the next two weeks judges will ponder the pranksome nature of a titilating tale of knickers, chess pieces, and misplaced attribution, to determine which of the following categories is a suitable award:

• Most Humourous
• Most Unexpected
• Best Overall

There is, to my knowledge, no gratuitous use of the word Belgium to evaluate, hence there is no need to compromise anyone's beer loyalties.

Dear judges:  I am currently on travel and am limited in my laptop time, so I will send you a note with instructions within the next 24 hours.

HG4evr!

             - GHL

"Er..."  Wide eyed, Harry scratched his head.  "Now that was unexpected."

Watching huge gobs of greenish clotted cream oozing from Marcus Flint's armpits, Ginny sputtered into her hand.  "Oops!"  She took Harry's arm and steered him away from the spectacle that had exploded the Great Hall into hysterics.  "I may have dribbled too much doxy egg-yoke into the potion by accident.  Oh well."

"Accident?"  Leaving the raucous hall, Harry glanced back in time to see Flint skid in the cream and land tail first in the mess.  He smirked and pulled his new-found conspirator a bit closer.   "Say, Gin'.  I wouldn't mind having another accident like the one we had yesterday in the, uh, broom closet."  His eyes couldn't resist a quick glance at his conspirator's lips.

"Nuh uh, Potter."  Ginny shook her head firmly.

"No?"  Harry blinked, a bit crestfallen.

"Of course not."  Ginny tugged Harry to the side, sending them both stumbling into a tiny alcove, rattling an old mop and some pails.  "This time it's no accident!"

*******************

So April Fool's Day may be months past, but who's not looking forward to reliving some great pranks??  The next challenge is due in less than twelve days now -- we have one great story in already, and at least one more in the works, but here's hoping there are loads more tricks and gags waiting to be sprung on poor hapless Hogwarts villains!

Please get your entries in by midnight SIYE time on July 15th.  Some of you should also be on the lookout for judging requests.  Also, we need to pin down our topic for Challenge 2017-3.  Please either suggest a topic, or vote for one of our the top prior candidates:

• Someone is going on a magical creature hunt. Why they are hunting the creature?  Do they find it?  Tell us about the journey.
• Years into their marriage, Ginny discovers something surprising about Harry.  Tell us about it.
• By accident, Harry and Ginny stumble upon a hidden Portkey and are swept away.  What happens next, and how do they get back?

WHAMM!!!

As the shock wave receded from the Gryffindor Table, Colin Creevey timidly wiped a spatter of stew from his nose, Ginny slowly emerged from her blast crouch, and several seventh years looked down their sharp seventh-year noses at... Harry Potter.

On her way over from the Ravenclaw table, Luna smiled genially.  "Good evening, Harry Potter.  You're looking quite tetchy tonight."

Harry took a breath, low and raspy like a 'quite tetchy' lethifold. His white knuckles unclenched the seat back that he had just slammed, and he scanned the Great Hall, seething, "I'm going to rearrange someone's bloody face."

"Oh dear no."  Luna blinked.  "It need not be bloody.  Magical healers can do excellent, non-intrusive cosmetic surgery these days."

Ignoring her, Ginny stared at Harry.  "Oi Potter.  Does that mean they got you too?"

"Got me too?"  Harry looked in askance.  "Do you mean, someone else was cursed with a singing cauldron in Potions?"

"Yes.  Me."  Ginny nodded stiffly, banishing from her mind the strains of a daft love song (something about her fancying the Boy Who Lived).  "They pranked me this morning."  

"Bugger."  Harry gritted his teeth for a moment.  "Do you have any idea who did it?"

Ginny's shoulders slumped.  "No.  Snape took all the evidence and locked it in his office.  How are we going to find out?"

"Simple!"  Luna beamed a ray of sunshine at her friends.  "Just ask that lot over at SIYE.  They know everything that happens to us."

"Hey!"  Harry grinned.  "That's a great idea.  You know, I'm still chuckling about that Hugo Granger-Weasley piece.  That poor lad is so clueless..."

"True."  Ginny smiled.  "But I think my favourite was the story about two weddings.  Who would have thought, you know, that old Mrs. Figg would have let that happen?"

"Uh, I may have missed that one..."  Harry scratched his chin.  "What was that about two wedd-?"

"Shush!"  Luna rapped the table.  "Be quiet and hear what the authors say.  Meanwhile, I'll find you a book on cosmetic surgery."

*********************

Somebody has just wronged Harry and Ginny, and they're going to get even in the most fitting and funny way possible.  There are roughly six weeks left for you to tell us about it and compete for fame and (nonmonetary) fortune in the 2017-2 April Fools Challenge!

Challenge award categories are:

• Most Humourous
• Most Unexpected
• Best Overall
• People's Choice Award

Standard advisories:  all challenge entries must be marked as 'Complete' by the due date (midnight, July 15, 2017).  Stories longer than 20,000 words or with a Restricted rating are discouraged.  Judges need not read Restricted stories, and are not asked to read beyond the 20,000th word of any story.

Everyone, please feel free to suggest new challenge ideas whenever they occur to you!