#EDIT also also thinking about van telling the story of the wilderness. she knows what story theyre in!!!! she knows about the narrative!!!!

[autisticbillpotts]

going insane thinking about how taissa is both the wolf that ripped van's face off and the woman who killed the wolf that ripped her face off

[goddesspharo]

weird writer questions: 3, 25, 26!

weird questions for writers asks

3. What is your writing ritual and why is it cursed?

A billion years ago when we were all still beholden to PCs, I used to write everything in Windows Notepad and then copy to Word afterwards because I found it easier to write when I didn't have the distraction of fonts/sizes/italics. Over the years, I have thankfully broken myself of this habit, but sometimes when I'm stuck in the middle of a section, I'll open up a blank Word document and start writing in that - somehow the absence of all that came before and all that will come after takes the pressure off. I mostly write in word, but then update it into the google docs file corresponding to a story so that I have it on the go if inspiration ever hits. The annoying thing is that google docs always formats a space after each line break so every time I copy it back into word, I have to manually delete the space so it won't piss me off. (Also smart quotes on my iphone/ipad vs straight quotes on my macbook - just default it to straight quotes, google docs, so I don't have to find/replace every time I edit it somewhere else!)

25. What is a weird, hyper-specific detail you know about one of your characters that is completely irrelevant to the story?

There is no story so I suppose this is irrelevant, but I've always thought that when the Yellowjackets girls get rescued from the wilderness (circa 1998?), someone in the media gets wind of how the cinematic stylings of Sandra Bullock kept them going in the Canadian Wilderness, leading Kurt Loder and the MTV crew to hold a special screening of Practical Magic in Jersey for them. Years later, Van runs into Sandy B when they're filming a movie near her hometown and tells her that she's a big fan of her work, to which Sandy jokes, "You must not have seen Speed 2 then," which, let's be real, is the ONLY good thing to come out of being stuck in the wilderness for 19 months and having to cannibalize your teammates to survive.

Another hyper-specific detail re: Top Gun Maverick is that I've always assumed that Coyote's mom used to send mini-care packages to Hangman when she sent Coyote stuff because of course he went to one (1) barbecue at Coyote's when they were on leave and charmed the hell out of Mama Machado and immediately became "one of the family." (Except to Coyote's brother who has still never forgiven Hangman for innocently hitting on his now-wife/then-girlfriend at the party.)

26. How do you get into your character’s head? How do you get out? Do you ever regret going in there in the first place?

Not to be Sophie Nélisse about this but it doesn't consume me. If I liked the character enough to want to explore the characterization more, then it's probably fun more than anything else? I also think it's less about getting in a character's head and more about getting their voice right. Once you have that, the rest falls into place.