Minerva Fest

The Minerva Fest is an annual Harry Potter prompt-based fest for fanfiction & fanart focusing on Minerva McGonagall, founded in 2010 by vane_nt & others. The community's tagline is For Minerva McGonagall Fans. The fest was originally organised via sister livejournal & insanejournal communities, but is now just on livejournal.
==History==
The community was founded in March 2010 by vane_nt & others, who ran the 2010 round of the fest. No 2011 round occurred. kellychambliss took over as moderator from the 2012 round.
==Rules and Timetable==
Prompts are posted in the first half of May or June, and claimed in the second half. Posting starts on 4 October, Minerva's birthday.minerva_fest: Profile (accessed 17 February 2014)
The fest allows all types, genres & ratings of Minerva-centric fiction & art, including gen, het & femslash, in all pairings. Posting is anonymous and exclusive until reveals, which occur early in November. Fanfiction must be complete, standalone (not a sequel), and at least 1500 words. British English is preferred.minerva_fest: Minerva Fest Rules (accessed 17 February 2014) The first round of the fest also included graphics, with a minimum of eight icons or three different wallpapers being required; graphics were not included from 2012.minerva_fest: Minerva Fest 2010 - Here are the rules! (accessed 17 February 2014)
==2010==
Four artworks & 22 stories were created by 24 participants: bottleofsmoke19, chantefable, cranky__crocus, curia_regis, kellychambliss, keppiehed, ldymusyc, mindabbles, minervas_eule, miss_morland, pale_moonlite, prayer_at_night, pretty_panther, queen_of_snapes, selmak, shadowycat, strav/rebism, tartansocks, tetleythesecond, thamy, therealsnape, the_winterwitch, vane_nt and zephre.
There was a close to even balance of gen, het & femslash. The most common pairings were Minerva/Snape and femslash with Wilhelmina Grubbly-Plank and Amelia Bones.
* 2010 Masterlist
==2012==
Five artworks & 19 stories were created by 22 participants: albalark, chantefable, cranky__crocus, deepforestowl, dueltastic, imera, kellychambliss, kit466, lash_larue, lazy_neutrino, lullabymoon, miss_morland, pretty_panther, primeideal, queen_of_snapes, realmer06, selmak, shadowycat, spin_84, squibstress, tea_for_lupin and therealsnape.
Gen predominated over het & femslash, with pairings with Severus Snape and Alastor Moody being the most common.
* 2012 Masterlist
==2013==
Four artworks & 18 stories were created by 21 participants: akatnamedeaster, chantefable, delphipsmith, errandofmercy, flaminia_x, lash_larue, lazy_neutrino, liliths_requiem, lyras, magnetic_pole, notearchiver, Peg Minerva, primeideal, realmer06, selmak, shadowycat, sara_lakali, squibstress, swallow_b, therealsnape and writcraft.
Gen predominated over het, followed by femslash, with pairings with Snape and Elphinstone Urquart being the most common.
* 2013 Masterlist
==2014==
The fest is ongoing in 2014, with works due in September.
==Example Fanworks==
Widely recommended works include:
* I'll Be There Before You by mindabbles. Minerva/Amelia Bones (2010)
* The Case of the Living Portrait by therealsnape. Agatha Christie-esque investigation (2013)
==Community==
Outside the fest, the community is open for year-round posting of all types of Minerva-centric fanworks, including fiction, art, graphics, vids, recs & meta as well as fic searches. All material must focus on Minerva, and bashing of the character is not permitted.minerva_fest: Things you can post to this community (accessed 17 February 2014)
The community has also run "Minerva McGonagall's Theme Blackboards", personal challenges based on theme tables, as well as maintaining a list of prompts, "Minerva McGonagall's Prompt Library".minerva_fest: Minerva McGonagall's Theme Blackboards - Rules and Instructions (accessed 17 February 2014)minerva_fest: Minerva McGonagall's Prompt Library - Book 1 (accessed 17 February 2014)
==References==
Category:Harry Potter Journal Communities
Category:2010 Challenges
Category:2012 Challenges
Category:2013 Challenges
Category:2014 Challenges
Category:2015 Challenges