All:

We are pleased to announce the winner of our $1,000 haiku challenge -

Mariah, with the piece "Bait and Switch:"

https://www.theprose.com/post/836321/bait-and-switch

Mariah - congratulations on furthering your practice as a professional author. Please email your preferred payment method to info@theprose.com.

Until next time.

Prose.

All:

Several updates -

We deployed some changes to the platform today:

1) You will notice a new feed in https://www.theprose.com/posts - "Shuffle." To date, there are nearly a million posts on Prose., and Shuffle lets you discover 10 random posts from the whole mix at a time. This feature, in addition to the Newest feed (showing you the most recently published posts) are exclusive to Black subscribers.

2) Another exclusive benefit of subscribing to Black is participating in "Premium Challenges." Our current such challenge prompts you to write a haiku about anything, with the most-liked post receiving a $1,000 cash prize on July 1, 2025. So far, this challenge has less than 100 entrants: https://www.theprose.com/challenge/14733

3) We have decided to experiment with a new referral program to increase our Black subscriptions. If you refer a writer you know to join Prose. Black, email the proof (i.e. the email associated with the account you got to join) to info@theprose.com and we will promptly send you and the person you referred $10 in cash.

Subscribe to Black here: https://www.theprose.com/signup

Finally - to everyone who has requested a copy of their work - thank you so much for your patience. We have had to teach ourselves back-end data coding to navigate and it's taken a bit longer than anticipated. That being said, we finally have a) full access to the database and b) the specific steps and lines of code required to download copies of your work so you can have it. We appreciate your understanding and do hope you will consider subscribing to Green for $1.99 per month. Again, we had to increase revenue to keep our lights on and to keep innovating - and it was a choice between ads, or two bucks a month.

Fuck ads.

Thank you all for being here. It's a very exciting time for all of us and we are just warming up.

As always, feel free to email info@theprose.com if you ever need anything.

Much Love,

Prose.

Friends,

We remain firm on our commitment to not litter the website or mobile app experiences with advertisements. It is for this reason that we have chosen a subscription-based revenue model.

However, we are seeing an opportunity to generate additional revenue by occasionally promoting products and services within our email newsletter. If you do not wish to see these occasional promotions then feel free to unsubscribe from our newsletter by clicking the link that appears at the bottom of each email. We will continue posting the same updates via the Prose. profile itself in addition to email so you won't have to worry about missing anything.

In the spirit of transparency, we plan to use this revenue to accelerate our software engineering to eliminate bugs and drive innovation. Some features in our backlog (in no particular order) -

-a Shuffle button allowing you to see a random selection from the ~1M posts that live in Prose.

-a Fonts option allowing you to express yourself further by selecting from various font styles that will distinguish your post on the feeds

-an Audio button allowing you to record your posts and listen to others' recordings

And lots more. If you ever have a feature request, or have experienced a bug with your Prose. experience, feel free - as always - to email info@theprose.com and we will get back to you quite quickly.

We love you all and are excited for this next chapter in the story.

Best,

Prose.

Dearest Writers & Readers:

We would like to apologize once again for our accidental roll-out of the paywall requiring all registered community members to pay at least $1.99 per month for continuing to enjoy Prose.

As stated, our plan was to give everyone a head's up several weeks in advance in case anyone wanted to retrieve their work without having to pay. Sadly, our development team accidentally rolled-out the paywall before we had even made any announcement.

We asked our development team to reverse this change and we cannot afford what they quoted us at this time.

If you wish to retrieve your work and leave Prose., please email info@theprose.com and we will send you your work, or subscribe for the "Green Pill" option ($1.99 per month) and email info@theprose.com within 30 days to request and in turn receive a full refund.

We have poured our blood, sweat, tears, hearts, and souls into building Prose. for the past 11 years. Each month, the business is losing money and it has reached the point where we either had to pull the plug and let Prose. die, or start charging for usage. We don't believe advertisements have a place on Prose., so our only viable option, in the short-term, was requiring what we believe to be a very modest and reasonable minimum monthly commitment to continue enjoying this sanctuary. It comes out to about six cents per day.

Thank you for assuming positive intent and continuing to believe in us. For those who packed their bags and went elsewhere...we are so sorry to see you go and hope you will find it in your hearts to forgive us and come back soon.

Thank you all for being here. Let this new chapter in our story begin. Let's get this party started once more.

Love,

Prose.

The Flash Fiction Challenge:

Write a complete story in 500 words or less, focusing on a single, powerful moment.

Our editing staff will determine the winner and finalists (judged by quality of writing and interest in content) - who will enjoy the glory of being featured on our Spotlight feed and world-famous, 200,000+ reader newsletter.

Ready...go!

A small town in Idaho, on the outskirts, lives an...artist...of sorts, and meets a reporter who gets more than he bargained for, and the end might come, or will it? MUAH HAHAHAHAHA!!!! From the mind of one of our talents, comes this irresistible Halloween romp. Here's the link to the narration of said romp on Prose. Radio, narrated by Jeff Stewart, who is whereabouts unkown in the States, in a room where he was able to send in the audio of this story by our own WilkinsonRiling.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TqIX7_Ddllg

Also, he asked us to mention this: Another talent here on the site, has a book set for release on 11/22, so go here and pre-order your copy, and give this Appalachian poet some love. He's fantastic!

https://www.finishinglinepress.com/product/in-the-throes-of-beauty-by-kevin-d-lemaster/

Piece feaured in the video:

https://www.theprose.com/post/780635/the-halloween-legend-of-jack-mccarver

To keep the tradition in closing traditional:

And.

As always...

Thank you for being here.

-The Prose, team

Four writers were approaching, and the wind began to howl...except replace wind with bloodletting of words, and ink into veins from these authors blessed and crazed with no other way to let it out, than to put it across a screen, and into our hearts with only pure aim.

Here's the link to the show:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1s3J_TYQqaM

And here are the pieces featured.

https://www.theprose.com/post/828745/king-of-california https://www.theprose.com/post/828053/the-drug-in-me-is-you https://www.theprose.com/post/828235/mile-run https://www.theprose.com/post/828263/the-only-shore

And.

As always.

Thank you for being here.

-The Prose. team

Mavia sends in another great narration from the author, Todd Beller, who just happens to be among the pantheon of talent here in the halls of Prose. Grab some coffee, lean back, or put it in drive and listen to the words while Sunday moves around you like water around a stone.

Here's the link to her beautiful read.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xdM3-ig6jBQ

And here's the featured piece.

https://www.theprose.com/post/827672/breadcrumbs-of-consciousness

And.

As always...

Thank you for being here.

-The Prose. Team

Seven writers come down with fire to make this one of our favorite episodes in the channel's history. Ranging from new blood to legends, these pieces put our 60th episode out into the world with a grip of steel and blue-lava beauty, mixes of orange, and a touch of evil to keep the thread floating upon the wind, seeable, but unreachable to remove.

Here's the link to the show.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aKWoKWK7nXY

And here are the pieces featured.

https://www.theprose.com/post/826733/i-know-why-bukowski-smiled https://www.theprose.com/post/826842/the-double-headed-scepter-of-doubt https://www.theprose.com/post/826569/tot

https://www.theprose.com/post/826584/the-art-of-love https://www.theprose.com/post/826617 https://www.theprose.com/post/826436/and-i-am-vapor

https://www.theprose.com/post/826316/black-sky https://www.theprose.com/post/827138/swallows https://www.theprose.com/post/827447/in-due-time

https://www.theprose.com/post/827090/people-ruin-everything

And.

As always.

Thank you for being here.

-The Prose. team

From an author brand new to the site, comes a chapter in our Challenge to brutalize and warm and brutalize the heart. Told from a merciless and seasoned eye in the storm of despair and destitution, to the inevitable release of death, and love, in afterthought, this is a piece of writing that brings us back to what the elements taught us. Take a drive, a walk, hell, clean the damn house, but while doing any of those, listen to the words of this new blood.

To read this entry and see more as they crop up, and, better yet, to enter your work, just click right here: https://www.theprose.com/challenge/14633

Here's the link to the episode on Prose. Radio.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=h4nJROIiB2o

And.

As always.

Thank you for being here.

-The Prose. team