It was the ultimate case of espionage: detective versus spy. If it weren’t for the trusty magnifying glasses and the fingerprinting technology involved, I’m not entirely sure if either would have been able to win. It’s all recorded in the Crazy Writing Week 2025 files, thankfully. And this is my case report.
What is Crazy Writing Week?
Crazy Writing Week is a free annual online program run by the Young Writers Workshop with the intention of reigniting creativity in young writers by challenging them to write as many words as possible in just seven days. No past experience is required, and there is no minimum limit to how much you contribute—you simply sign up and record your writing to help your team win points in a friendly competition.
It is an excellent event for sparking creativity in writers and building community amongst the fun and buzz of the competition. Between the daily lessons and collaboration with others cheering you on, you walk away from the event feeling uplifted and inspired (and tired, but it’s a good, satisfying feeling of knowing that you’ve worked hard alongside your teammates).
My CWW Story
Picture this: a writer’s desk littered with abandoned ideas and half-finished stories.
That was my Scrivener before Crazy Writing Week. Ideas that I began with such zeal…and never completed. Between a lack of time and an absence of motivation to keep going, those projects were just hastily stowed away in the filing cabinet for “sometime when I get the chance”—which, to be blunt, will never happen.
After the great success I had in solving the Crazy Writing Week conflict last year, I was keen to join the case if it returned. When I received the letter in my inbox a few weeks prior to the event, I did not hesitate to sign myself up again.
When the doors to Crazy Writing Week flung open, I leapt in with all guns blazing. I knew that the sooner I began my work, the better my results would be at the end. I made sure to be polite and introduce myself to the other folk who had also signed up to the case, in the bid to be on good terms with everyone. After all, if we were to spend time together on this week-long project, it would not do if there was conflict.
But alas! It seems that some of the others who were to be working on this were of a different ranking—the Spies. These people were not simply private investigators, but rather, a secret intel-gathering group employed by third parties. I stood firm alongside my fellow Detectives as we eyed our opponents. It was then that we knew that this next week would be a challenge.
The first day of the case ended with the Spies in the lead, much to my team’s dismay. We had worked long and hard that day to keep them at bay, but it did not seem to work. Why yes, we were ahead of them in the amount of words written, but the allegations held that the Spies won the majority by leading in both hours spent writing, and total achievements. Collectively though, we had all made great headway in the challenge, reaching 1.9 million words within the first 24 hours—a new record, I hear.
Day two was much the same. Unfortunately, I was in court, working on another case for most of this day, which meant I could not lend a hand to my fellow detectives. The result, unsurprisingly, was that the Spies were yet again in the lead with hours and achievements.
And so when the sun rose on the third day, I knew that something had to be done. And there was only one thing that could be done: write. Clearing my desk of the files and magnifying glasses, I started the clock. Words flew off my fingertips and onto the screen before me; letters forming words, words growing into sentences, sentences becoming paragraphs, paragraphs turning into chapters; and with every sentence a few seconds ticked by, and those seconds became minutes, which grew into hours. By the time the day was over, I was exhausted, but I felt accomplished. And to my delight, the hard work had paid off! The Detectives had reclaimed the lead.
I must say that it is a good thing to remember that, even though the Detectives and Spies were on opposing sides, we all had the same goal in mind, and that was to crack this case by writing as many words as possible in the space of one week. And by the end of it, every one of the forensic writers who participated in the Crazy Writing Week case went home with something. An accomplishment that they can be proud of. And it was that good sense of achievement that kept us alive and on good terms with one another once the case closed.
The Result
At the end of the seven days, I must report the defeat of the Detectives and victory for the Spies. It was an unfavourable outcome for me, but as a Private Investigator I must stick to the facts, and the facts only. And the fact is, in the end the Spies triumphed us by a total of 237 hours and 75 achievements. It sounds like a lot, but when each side of the conflict has around a thousand participants, that difference is very little. We did still beat the Spies with word-count, however, beating them by over 130,000 words (which is equivalent to around two novels’ length).
In total, the forensic officers of Crazy Writing Week 2025 managed to write a staggering 13.4 million words. To put that into perspective:
Conclusion
Crazy Writing Week 2025 undoubtedly met its purpose: thirteen and a half million words in just seven days? The thought of that is utterly mind-blowing. And on a personal level, it helped me to finally begin my own story. My cluttered detective’s desk is no longer strewn with forgotten stories and abandoned ideas; rather, it’s filled with notes and drafts for chapters for a writing project that I couldn’t be more thrilled about.
So, what’s the verdict after all that? I certainly made great headway, as did thousands of other enthusiastic writers. But as the espionage and crime-solving drew to a close, I had to stop and wonder: was Crazy Writing Week truly a mystery solved, or was it just another case of writerly chaos?
I guess we’ll have to find out in Crazy Writing Week 2026.
