#but some of my wip outlines are over 200k words long

[wolveria]

Hey there, I hope you don't mind me asking but do you have a general outline for writing multi chapter stories? Like "horny hours around 40 chapters in" or do the ideas just jump into your head?

For book-length fics I definitely have an outline. Sometimes it gets so specific and long that it's more of a zero draft or manuscript. It's like writing a fic quick and dirty with bullet points, and then writing the "real" draft later.

I get a better idea of what happens in each chapter as I go along. Funnily enough, creating a song list helps since I can assign a song to each chapter matching its vibe.

That's what I did with TRH, I have a song/chapter list, an outline, and the actual story lol My writing method isn't sane

[radioactive-earthshine]

Writing tips for long fics that helped me that no one asked for.

1.) Don't actually delete content from your WIP unless it is minor editing - instead cut it and put it in a secondary document. If you're omitting paragraphs of content, dialog, a whole scene you might find a better place for it later and having it readily available can really save time. Sometimes your idea was fantastic, but it just wasn't in the right spot.

2.) Stuck with wording the action? Just write the dialog then revisit it later.

3.) Stuck on the whole scene? Skip it and write the next one.

4.) Write on literally any other color than a white background. It just works. (I use black)

5.) If you have a beta, while they are beta-ing have them read your fic out loud. Yes, I know a lot of betas/writers do not have the luxury of face-timing or have the opportunity to do this due to time constraints etc but reading your fic out loud can catch some very awkward phrasing that otherwise might be missed. If you don't have a beta, you read it out loud to yourself. Throw some passion into your dialog, you might find a better way to word it if it sounds stuffy or weird.

6.) The moment you have an idea, write it down. If you don't have paper or a pen, EMAIL it to yourself or put it in a draft etc etc. I have sent myself dozens of ideas while laying down before sleep that I 10/10 forgot the next morning but had emailed them to myself and got to implement them.

7.) Remember - hits/likes/kudos/comments are not reflective of the quality of your fic or your ability to write. Most people just don't comment - even if they say they do, they don't, even if they preach all day about commenting, they don't, even if they are a very popular blog that passionately reminds people to comment - they don't comment (I know this personally). Even if your fic brought tears to their eyes and it haunted them for weeks and they printed it out and sent it to their friends they just don't comment. You just have to accept it. That being said - comment on the fic you're reading now, just do it, if you're 'shy' and that's why you don't comment the more you comment the better you'll get at it. Just do it.

8.) Remove unrealistic daily word count goals from your routine. I've seen people stress 1500 - 2000 words a day and if they don't reach that they feel like a failure and they get discouraged. This is ridiculous. Write when you can, but remove absurd goals. My average is 500 words a day in combination with a 40 hour a week job and I have written over 200k words from 2022-2023.

9.) There are dozens of ways to do an outline from precise analytical deconstruction that goes scene by scene to the minimalist bullet point list - it doesn't matter which one you use just have some sort of direction. A partial outline is better than no outline.

10.) Write for yourself, not for others. Write the fic you know no one is going to read. Write the fic that sounds ridiculous. You will be so happy you put it out in the world and there will be people who will be glad it exists.

[lyriumlullaby-ao3]

ASTPTS sounds fascinating! Tell me more???

happily! 🥰

“AStPtS” is how i label all the work i���ve done on my longfic. it’s an abbreviation of “a sword to pierce the sun,” which comes from the Chant of Light! (it’s from the Canticle of Victoria specifically, and it refers to the Inquisition.) that may end up being the title when i finally post, but i’m not married to it!

anyway, this is the longfic i’ve been working on for *checks notes* a year and three months now lol, the one that was pretty much inspired by “my inky has two hands. this compulsory monogamy shit is garbage” 😂 i actually am not sure how many words i’ve written by this point, but i think it’s around 200k, and i am slowly working my way towards the end of my first draft. i’m just kinda… novelizing my ideal version of inquisition? how it would go if i had total control over the story?

so within this folder, i’ve got *another* folder that’s the draft itself, separated into five-chapter-long segments bc gdocs was starting to have a bad time loading such a long document at about 500 pages 😂💀 then i’ve got a handful of outlining docs, some separate pages for drafting sections that are being revised or that are going to be inserted into already written segments, and a file where i save anything significant that i cut while editing!

i work on it a little everyday, and i LOVE it because it’s my favorite oc of all time. 💖 i’ve spent the most time working with and developing Miri of any character, and i’m extremely attached to her 😂

so yeah!! this is my pet project wip, my favorite child, if you will 😂💖 thanks for asking about it!!!

[i-did-not-mean-to]

20 Questions for Fic Writers

Ah, my dear @cilil has tagged me, and I'll try to do at least one Tumblr thing today. I had hoped that I'd have more time this weekend!!! This week was madness...I swear!

1. How many works do you have on AO3?

391 (and yes, I am one of those who put between 7 and 133 different ficlets into one work to keep the number of individual works down).

2. What’s your total AO3 word count?

1,800,713 (this does not include 2 longfics I've orphaned and several fics I've posted anonymously)

(but I've been writing since July 2021)

3. What fandoms do you write for?

Tolkien, roles played by Richard Armitage, roles played by Adam Brown, the odd Dean O'Gorman fic for @laurfilijames, 1 Lucifer fic...)

4. What are your top 5 fics by kudos?

Tumblr Imagines (it's a collection of ficlets from when I started and has over 200k)

October 2022 Ficlet run (Yeah, as I said, I don't post all my fics separately)

Black (Local folkore meets The Hobbit retelling

Silm imagines and ficlets (Again, a 50k+ collection)

"The only way is up" or "thrice stuck" (Smutty dream sequence with Thorin)

These are mostly my first writings which had had time to amass some few kudos :D

5. Do you respond to comments? Why or why not?

Always!

It takes me a while sometimes, but I need people to know how much I love and appreciate their support! I love every comment, and I truly wish I was a little better at expressing myself when it comes to these things <3

6. What is the fic you wrote with the angstiest ending?

I honestly do not remember...Probably, Love letter to the man you've never got to be.

I usually don't do much angst 😇

7. What’s the fic you wrote with the happiest ending?

Very hard to say because I don't finish too many of my long fics lol. I'd want to say Sticks and stones (Christmas Hallmark story)...it's just that kind of story.

My TRSBs are usually "Happy End given the circumstances" rather than all-out Happy End...lol

8. Do you get hate on fics?

Thus far, no.

I am not relevant or known enough to attract that kind of attention!

9. Do you write smut? If so, what kind?

Me? No...(There have been spicy scenes in long fics, spicy fics, outrageous ficlets, Kinktober, Dead Dove December, MSV...Ok yeah, I do...and I do all of it. M/F, F/F, M/M, M/F/M...from vanilla to whips. You choose, I write)

10. Do you write crossovers? What’s the craziest one you’ve written?

I am an AU bitch. I've done a HP drabble once...Les Mis/LOTR for last year's Christmas event...it happens...

Right now? Twilight Crack parody for a good friend :D

11. Have you ever had a fic stolen?

I don't think so? Who would steal trash?

12. Have you ever had a fic translated?

Nobody has ever approached me...

13. Have you ever co-written a fic before?

Yes...Once for last year's S&D, I am doing it now for the Calendar fic...I love collaboration, what can I say?

14. What’s your all time favourite ship?

Ship-ship? Russingon.

OC ship? Ori x OC

Rarepair? Nerdanel x Anairë

15. What’s a WIP you want to finish but doubt you ever will?

Black - It's one of my first fics...and I've never written that last chapter.

I am also known for having written chapters and chapters of other longfics but just...never posting them lol

16. What are your writing strengths?

I am fast, I am versatile, and I am willing to write almost any character, dynamic, ship, and genre. From tooth-rotting fluff to noncon. From very vanilla M/F meet-cute to kinky sex.

17. What are your writing weaknesses?

I am bad at punctuation. I rarely have an outline, I just write. I do not plan, I do not come up with complicated worldbuilding, I have exactly 0 HC documents.

I just write whatever comes to mind.

Moreover, I have a real problem with posting. I write A LOT more than I post...because I just can't motivate myself to reread LOL

18. Thoughts on writing dialogue in another language in fic?

I avoid even Tolkien's languages for fear of getting something wrong. I am fluent in at least 3 other languages, but I am not entirely sure whether there would ever be a place for them.

If I did that, I am afraid that it would become incomprehensible as the only one I wouldn't use is my mother tongue. It would sound a bit...magniloquent...

19. First fandom you wrote for?

Tolkien. Only fandom thus far...

20. Favourite fic you’ve written?

I don't know. Every so often, I write something I don't hate, but I can't remember right now loool

Open tag for everyone who hasn't done this yet :D

Tell me something about yourselves!

[omgfloofy]

State of the WIPs

A lot of my writing has stalled due to work, chronic pain in my foot, and Tears of the Kingdom. It’s really hard to be creative on stuff.

But I figure it’s time to give some progress reports on the WIPs I’ve got going at the moment. Especially since I’ve not talked about them in awhile. Everything will be behind the cut.

dal segno al coda

This is the monster fic. Of course. I’m currently at 99,462 words currently in the draft files for the three sections. This does not include the out of place snippets that haven’t been written into the main story or content from the original draft file that I want to keep. All in all, I’ve written over 200k words for this story, but not all of it will be kept in the long run.

Currently about 95% of the story is outlined, though. Which makes life much easier for me in some parts.

There are sections for Lunafreya that I’ve been writing in part 1 that lean heavily in the spy / political thriller type genre. This is a type of story I absolutely love but feel a little overwhelmed dabbling in. So part of my ‘research’ for this has included reading stories in this genre.

Additionally, I’ve been working on sections of part 3 that I can’t really post any WIP content for, since I need to keep as much of it as secret as possible. However, I’ve also written the last chapter and the epilogue. Those were things I couldn’t shake. And there’s a Meanwhile, Elsewhere... chapter that is post-story. On top of that, I’ve also written a post-segno side story that may, or may not be published some day.

I’m clearly having too much fun dabbling around in the mental images I’ve got of the post-story time period for Eos. I don’t know if I want to publish these things because I don’t want to color what other people end up imagining post-segno Eos to be like.

Additionally, the story ended up needing the creation of an original character. I’ve named him Valens.

I was able to get an incredible commission from @teapots-and-hats​ for his design. And while I don’t want to post the whole art yet for reasons, I do at least want to post this portrait at the very least and a small snippet that features him that may, or may not, be kept in the final version of the story.

That chill ran down his spine again as the swordsman looked towards his advisor. Somehow, despite not being able to actually see his eyes, Noctis just knew that he could tell where the man was looking. This meant that somehow - impossibly - this man had magic. To make matters worse, it was somehow resonating with his own.

"You're impossible," Noctis mumbled softly, as he started to make some connection over this black haired, black leather clad stranger. This drew the attention of the swordsman and this time, Noctis felt like his breath had simply been taken from him. All of that magic he could feel was turned on him in an instant.

"Am I?" As the swordsman approached, Noctis began to feel his legs buckle again. It was not from a physical force this time, but instead the sheer overwhelming presence that buried itself into the very core of his being.

Noctis just wanted to shout for Luna and Ignis to stay away! Stay far away! However, he found himself frozen within the stranger’s overwhelming power and he was unable to even speak a single word.

Once he was near Noctis, the masked swordsman settled onto a knee and reached out with a gloved hand to gently wrap leather-clad fingers around Noctis' chin and force the prince to look up at him. Noctis fought hard to keep his eyes forward and not recoil under the magic being pressed against him.

"I'm not the one who is out of time," the swordsman's words were heavy and cleanly punctuated.

Of course, Noctis thought angrily to himself. Of course he knows.

Oh yeah. I’ve also got a set of special dividers integrated into the workskin I’ve been working on for segno. It’s not the ones I’ve used here, but they do use this same style. I might as well use this as a preview as well, right? They have a very special purpose, and I’m eager for those to be seen as well. However, I want to keep the actual dividers a bit of a secret still.

Last, but not least, I’ve been in the process of designing and planning a ruins to kind of serve as a ‘final dungeon’ of the story. Sort of. It’ll make more sense down the line, I promise.

Speaking of the ending. That’s actually written. I know exactly where I’m going in segno now. I just need to get there.

You can find other stuff I’ve posted about this story under the tag ‘#dal segno al coda stuff’

Twilight

This little AU that has the chapter by chapter ‘end of life’ story for Noctis in an AU where he survived the end of the game. An important aspect of the story is that he gave up his royal title and has begun living a hermit-like lifestyle in Duscae while hiding his true identity.

I promised a bunch of other side stories and I finally got Granting Another Light out not too long ago.

There are multiple shorts that I’ve got outlined and need to finish. They have the following titles:

A Quiet Morning - This details Noct’s morning routine late in the story. Just a simple bit of fluff with no real direction. It just adds color to the whole story.

A New Restart - This is the short about the “incident” that was mentioned in the main story where Noct blew his cover, and how it forced him to change his lifestyle.

The Puzzle Box - The making of a certain puzzle box that has an important role in the main story.

Some Things Never Change - Noct runs into Sania after a job. The worst part is she recognizes him.

There are still three more stories worked up that don’t have titles yet. And a fourth that’s just going to be a bunch of random texting shorts between Noct and his friends.

Inconvenient Blessings

This will be a small pre-canon one-shot that is Regis-centered, following Regis and Clarus at a special event for a Children’s Day celebration, where little 6-year old Noctis is with them due to the holiday.

It features a very clear moment of “kids say the darnedest things.” And when that kid is the Crown Prince, those little things can be more troublesome than normal.

This may be the final outcome from an incomplete and untitled story that I finally posted to AO3 sometime ago. This little short explores the idea that the general public likely has superstitions around the Lucian royalty and their divine connections with the Crystal. And children mucking that up.

Nothing is fully written on it, but this has been outlined and it’s ready to start. I just need to get it more clearly in my head so that I can begin writing on it.

Untitled Psych Horror Story

This 5-chapter jaunt that I’ve started working on delves into psychological horror, which I’ve never played around with in writing before. I’m a little excited with the idea of the story, but a bit nervous on it at the same time. This is because it’s a genre I’ve never written before. However, once the idea for this story got into my head, and the more I played around with ideas for it, the more I found myself wanting to actually write the damn thing.

The most important thing that has me very daunted on this story is that I feel like I’m invoking stuff I’ve come across from other fic writers like @breakfastteatime​ and @every-lemon and I’m a little terrified and hope I can do their works justice. (by the way, read their fics, they’re amazing.)

---

"Iris," Gladio mumbled as he walked into the living room and saw her lounging on the sofa with a magazine. It looked very... off from the kind of thing she'd read. Cover lines on it included topics such as Increased Spam Calls to Insomnian Citizens Require Legislative Intervention and The Ideals of the Lucian Royalty: A Bygone Dream.

"Hey, Gladdy," she said cheerfully from behind the magazine, but yelped as he abruptly pulled it from her hands.

"What's got you reading this kind of shlock?"

"What are you talking about, give that back!" It wasn't too hard for the older of the siblings to hold the magazine out of reach.

Gladio looked at the magazine to show her the cover lines, when he stopped short after glancing at it again. The cover was now different from what he had seen before. It had originally looked like some sort of business magazine, but now? It was just a local fashion magazine. He quickly flipped through the pages to make sure he was seeing things. When he convinced himself that he was, in fact, imagining it, he just tossed it back onto Iris' lap.

"What's gotten into you, Gladio?" Iris sat up on the sofa as she snatched the magazine into a hand.

Gladio rubbed at the side of his head. "I'm not sure. Today's been a very odd day."

---

So there you go. A bunch of stuff on works that I’ve got on the sidelines and the monster fic itself. I’m always happy to answer questions in my ask box for these stories, as well. Especially since some of them are now playing with canon and stuff that was never really fully fleshed out in the original game.

[teriwrites]

2020 Writing Wrap-Up

Something that I do every year on the 1st is go back through absolutely everything I’ve written throughout the previous year and compile it into one massive word document. Everything from outlining notes to unfinished short stories to my NaNo project wind up in that file, where I like to read back and reflect on what I’ve gotten done through the year. 

Every year, I end up having written more than I expected, and this year was no different! 

Total for 2020: 203,119!

This is the first recorded year (I think it’s year 4 that I’ve done this for?) in which I’ve cracked 200K! It’s also the first year I’ve ever actually followed through on my resolution to share some of my writing online! So as rough as 2020 has been, I still somehow managed to break some personal records in writing. Which probably has everything to do with the fact that I joined this community earlier this year, and it’s been incredibly encouraging and supportive!

I also branched out a bit more this year in a few ways. I worked on some poetry and prose, which is not something I’ve put a lot of time into before so tends to be a challenge. It’s nothing that I’ll be posting anytime soon, but it was fun to work on in the moment, which is especially important in such a wild year as 2020.

One snag that I definitely hit was the fact that I have a lot more unfinished work than most years. A majority of the short stories I started working on never got finished. But I can’t even be too upset about that, because I totally loved being able to read back on even the fragmented pieces I ended up with. And while I do think a large part of that (for me) is discipline over inspiration, I’m willing to accept that, sometimes, things will remain unfinished. And it’s okay to stop working on them. 

My overall focus shifted a bit this year, too, which was interesting. I worked more on longer things than most years - started out the year by finishing my first draft of Castle on the Hill, continued making some edits and reworking its outline, did a large part of Beneath Alder Creek’s first draft in November. Right now, I’m working on what I expect to be a novella by the time I’m done with it. It’s a big contrast to the usual, short and snappy short stories that fill most of my previous wrap-up files. But I still definitely write those sometimes, and it’s nice to be able to try stretching and testing my own boundaries. 

This is the part of my wrap-up where I go ham throwing in some of my favorite out-of-context quotes from a variety of different things I’ve worked on. Some of them might be familiar, a lot probably won’t. I’m going to post it beneath the thing so this doesn’t become even more absurdly long!

Some of the ~highlights~ of 2020:

First Thoughts in the Morning: wow the sexual tension between me and the alarm clock right now. Later Reflection: wtf? (a literal note on my notes app that I included because I Cannot remember writing any of this and it made me laugh)

Edriele’s gaze trailed down to the woman’s armor, and her stomach twisted. “Where did you find your attire?” The woman glanced down in surprise, as though she’d forgotten she was wearing it. “It was fitted to me when I gained my ranking. I suppose it draws attention, but after my confrontation at… you mean to ask me whether I’m impersonating a Knight!” “The thought had crossed my mind,” the Sister replied dryly. (novella WIP)

“Do you need to make a stop at your house before we head to the chapel?” Leslie asked as they started off. “What for?” Winnie asked. Leslie looked pointedly at the tip of her galoshes poking out from beneath her dress. With another roll of her eyes, Winnie sighed. “Oh, I suppose so.” (Beneath Alder Creek)

When the third meeting for the Society of the Hidden Immortal Tribe was called for the decade, I knew heads would roll. Gathering the entire society together took months. Everything had to be hush-hush; that was the entire point of spreading ourselves out. Plus, every time a letter arrived in the mail, it was a reminder of the idiot who had decided we needed a name change. Everybody agreed that being deemed the ‘S.H.I.T.’ was humiliating, but nobody could agree on a better title, so it had remained the same for nearly a full century. That was the problem with living forever. You always had more time to make decisions, and, in the end, nothing ever got done. (S.H.I.T.)

When she leaves, I’m not sure I remember a word of what she’s said. But as the stresses of the semester wash back in, and my mind clears like being pulled out of a dream, I suddenly understand how one could crash upon the rocks without realizing they’d ever changed their course. (A Modern Siren)

When Georg arrived later, he found Klaus leaning forwards onto the table, staring vacuously at one of his textbooks. "Studying hard?" he taunted as he approached and dropped into the seat Ingrid had been occupying. "I talked with Ingrid," Klaus explained. Georg's eyebrows shot up in genuine surprise, but he quickly recovered and looked pointedly at Klaus' posture. "Go that well, then?" "She said I'm arrogant and completely self-involved and that I never take what a girl says into account whenever I'm on a date." With a haunted gleam in his eye, Klaus stared up at his friend. "I think she's right." "Well then it's a good thing somebody pointed it out," Georg offered, and he turned to his work. (Castle on the Hill)

Takemoto Hana rested a hand over her face. She couldn’t see the swirling of darkness over her head, but she heard the whine behind its words. With a wry smile, she asked, ‘Do you not know how to brew tea?’ ‘Of course I know how to brew tea!’ The dark spirit’s voice boomed with a defensive defiance that rang false in the funny little woman’s ears.  (The Funny Little Woman)

“None of us want to be here right now,” Edgar called out to the hall. “None of us want to go back through the handbook and listen to the steps of proper etiquette in immortality. But it seems that, once again, it’s necessary.” “Dammit, Dave,” muttered the man next to me. I said nothing, but I couldn’t help but agree with the sentiment. Dave was… how do I describe Dave? To call him an idiot would be underestimating his craftiness. To call him a genius, I’d have to ignore all of his dumb antics. Cruel was too strong. Misguided was too innocent. Mischievous fit best, but even that fell short. Dave was a trickster god, if ever one existed. (S.H.I.T.)

Ridiculous, he told me with a self-conscious laugh of someone who didn't expect to be believed. I smiled, but I didn't join in. (The Little Roads)

“Hey, where did Alina go?” Lorelai asked. Zoe shrugged, but Jaiden cleared his throat. “I think you crossed one of her boundaries, Lo. She specifically asked not to involve her girlfriend in this, and then you did anyways. I know we needed the help, but friendships have to be built on mutual trust, my dude. You should’ve at least let her know your plan before you went behind her back.” The two women stopped and shared a look. “Hey, Jaiden,” Zoe asked. “Do you know the capital of Canada?” He shook his head. “I dunno, Ontario?” “Amazing.” (Mirror, Mirror)

"We had a bet going over whether you'd make it in time," Hans told him. "Did you win or lose?" Josef replied. Hans flipped a 5-Deutsche Mark coin over to Peter, who grinned as he pocketed it. "I'm glad you have so much faith in me." Josef's voice dripped with sarcasm. (Castle on the Hill)

Taliesin reached over his head and grabbed at one of the low-hanging bows, picking leaves from it. “I’m not sure.” Winnie stopped. “What do you mean?” “I mean that I don’t know.” (Beneath Alder Creek)

While she attended to these, the man beside her began to stir. Ella could see him out of the corner of her eye, attempting to push himself up into a sitting position. ‘You may want to lie back down,’ she told him, scrubbing uselessly at her skirt. The man continued to sit up anyways, pressing a hand against the side of his face. ‘Am I killed?’ ‘No, but your savior may be.’ Ella threw her skirt back to the ground. ‘When the Madame sees the state of me, I’ll be spending my future afternoons off making a new dress out of the fabric scraps.’ A frown crossed the man’s face as he considered her words, followed by a scowl of understanding. ‘You work for them. The bourgeoisie.’ (Cinderella)

Ingrid took the seat and began digging through her bag for a book. As she did so, she explained, "There were no other tables open in the building - even in the quiet section upstairs - so I figured that I would just ask the first person I recognized if I could sit with them, and well... here we are." "Don't worry about it," Georg answered when Klaus found himself dumbstruck again. "Just ignore the oaf, he'll leave you alone." Ingrid shot a grin at Georg, and Klaus suddenly wondered whether it was a good idea to have the two of them sit together. (Castle on the Hill)

Up ahead, I could see the glass walls of the bus stop. Usually, I waited for the bus leaning against the metal frame of the stop, leaving the seats inside open for children on their way to school. But the seats were empty now. I still avoided them. (Flo’s Magical Emporium: The Pandemic)

Now, I ask that you do not feel too much self-pity. For as easy an error as it may be to mistake a visiting aristocrat’s son for the hired help, the true talent in such a display causing his immediate departure lies within you alone. And to think that the meeting was the work of your father’s tenuous sway over the court! Well, I am sure the time away will do him some good, lest you begin to consider that you’ve ruined his position as well as your prospects. (Dearly Detested,)

Edgar was at the front of the lecture hall, and standing beside him was Dave, smirking as though at some private joke that only he was in on. He was wearing sunglasses, despite the dim lighting of the room, probably because he thought he looked cool. I rolled my eyes. What a tool. (S.H.I.T.)

 The work is different now. Countryside pathways winding through the forest lie forgotten for years without the familiar steps of a traveler. Off beaten paths in the city are never unknown for long, and sometimes streets that were once crossed by thousands a day fall back into obscurity. (The Little Roads)

“How much time will you give me to think on it?” she asked suspiciously, wrapping her arms around herself as though afraid they’d reach out to him if not kept in check. “You have all the time in the world,” the golden man said. “The boy’s, however, runs out with every passing second.” He extended his hand. (Beneath Alder Creek)

You ever met a rich person? Not comfortably wealthy. Not ‘my Uncle Kenny is a lawyer’ rich. Not even ‘widow answering the door to her manor on a hill dressed in fine silk’ rich. No, I mean proper, so-much-money-you-literally-can’t-spend-it-fast-enough rich. They say it isn’t worth Bill Gates’ time to pick up a $100 bill off the floor because he’ll have earned more in the time it takes to grab it. That kind of rich. They seem to be bred for times like these. Their houses are a source of endless entertainment – movie theaters, bowling alleys, personal gyms with a view of the sprawling landscape they overlook like cruel dictators. There’s no need for them to leave during a pandemic; they have access to the equivalent of a luxury resort most families have to save up month to visit. Necessities can be stockpiled in one of the useless extra spaces in the house. I mean, I once had to hide out in a luggage room for a contract. That’s right. An entire room dedicated to holding luggage, bigger than some of the apartments I’ve rented. I thought their residential labyrinths were my greatest source of grief. But social distancing? I’m one bad contract away from retirement. (Bounty Hunter During a Pandemic)

Shaking his head, Detlef pulled a new sheet from his notebook. “Look, I’m just saying, if we can get the satire right, we can be a modern Jonathan Swift.” “I don’t want to be a modern Jonathan Swift, I want to be a student actually passing his debate course!” Peter snapped. (Castle on the Hill)

Moonlight illuminated the German’s fair hair and pale skin, the effect more malevolent apparition than man. (Face on the Other Side of a Dark Window)

Back then, he’d been known for commissioning the exact same portrait of himself every hundred years, hanging them in a hallway in his manor and trying to pass them off as his line of ancestors to any of the locals. It had been a far less skeptical age, and Dave had earned himself a small band of worshipers before Jeff Goldblum himself had been forced to intervene. (S.H.I.T.)

Clara stood before the board of advisors assisting with her thesis. She was one, very intense paper away from her M.A., and she wasn’t about to risk it all by being too proud to ask for help. When she’d made the appointment to meet with them, she expected a series of questions surrounding her topic. Instead, they’d opened by offering her a job. “You want me to steal from the school?” Dr. Pye wrinkled her nose at the suggestion. Next to her, Dr. Pritchard said, “Don’t think of it as theft, dear. It’s merely redistribution.” Clara hadn’t amassed tens of thousands of dollars in debt to be lectured on the definition of robbery. “Either way, it involves me sneaking into the Chemistry department and taking a huge risk to get you some new toys to play with.” (Origins: The Ghost)

“Why is undermining Pryderi so important to Queen Ceridwen that she would risk breaking a timeless alliance just to dismantle them?” Her stomach twisted into a knot, protesting against the answer. “There are few members of the Dusk Court that we know by title.” A shadow passed over Enid’s expression. “The Lord of the Undernell is second only to the Queen.” “Great deeds build the reputation of one in their own court. Cruelty builds it in both.” Taliesin buckled under Winnie’s weight as she suddenly leaned against him. (Beneath Alder Creek)

“Why are all my friends so quick to endanger themselves?” I muttered as I packed up Midas’ crate. Natalie swiveled around from the candy aisle. “So you’re finally willing to admit that we’re friends?” “Save it.” (Flo’s Magical Emporium: The Pandemic)

[goldenkid]

morai ramble bc i’m procrastinating my nano writing

ok so out of curiosity i looked at the unfinished morai draft 2 i re-outlined and then never finished last year, and....it’s 87.5k words long. and i stopped a few scenes short of the halfway point. nearly 90k words and not even halfway.

anyway apart from whatever that says about me and the insane amount of plot i tried (try) to cram into my wips, it just reinforced how badly ari needed to be cut out of this current version - his story was enough to fill a whole separate novel and with it, morai became this huge complex beast that was too much for me to juggle, with too much plot and an over-complicated world and way too many events happening at the same time.

and of course the whole thing would have been pushing 200k words, which is just...not only unpublishable, but probably unreadable too. and unwritable, if i’m being honest--it was getting impossible to plot and i’m sure it would have been a massive enterprise to write that also would have needed massive edits, and then if i ever did send it off to beta readers or hell, a publisher, they would have immediately told me to cut huge bits out.

not that morai is gonna be short without ari - it’s definitely gonna go over 100k and probably end up at about 120k. i’m hoping to cut about 10k of that as i revise and edit, maybe simplify some bits of the plot and streamline everything. 

but it feels manageable, like a story and not a mammoth with too much to keep straight in my head. it feels almost like a real book - which none of the other drafts ever did. i don’t know if i’m just older now, or if i’m really making progress with this story. either way, i’m excited.

[aelaer]

Been sitting on this long enough! Tagged by @dragonnan

Author Name: Aelaer (though it was not my first author name! I changed it because the original had too many connections to my rl name, which is rare to the point that the first and last name combo are the only one in the world. It's that nuts)

Fandoms You Write For: 

MCU (Basically Doctor Strange centric stories)

LOTR (though after writing exclusively for Tolkien in fanfic for 8 years and RP for 7, I'm taking a bit of a much needed break outside of my crossover)

Sherlock (only in a crossover WIP at the moment but I think I could be game for more)

Where You Post: AO3 and fanfiction.net (though the reviews and faves in the Avengers category in the latter are depressingly low considering the amount of hits the fic gets).

Most Popular One-Shot: 

On AO3, based on kudos and hits: The Calm Before the Storm

On fanfiction.net, based on faves and reviews: An Elf-lord's Patience. Oh God, this is a parody about common Mary Sue tropes in the LOTR fandom. FROM 2005. Absolutely no promise regarding the quality of the fic, I was a baby. But it's a neat bit of history to compare my old writing to how I write my comedy now!

Most Popular Multi-Chapter Story:

On AO3, based on kudos, comments, and hits: Strange in a Strange Land. I'm quite fond of this crossover (LOTR/Doctor Strange) and I'm working on the last chapter now.

On fanfiction.net: My magnum opus, Pirates of the Ring. 45 chapters, 200k words, 7 years, and dozens of rewrites as I grew as I writer (especially the first 15 chapters). It was my first fanfic and it will always have a special place in my heart. This story still gets hits, which astounds me. But as you can see I have a thing for crossovers.

Favorite Story You Wrote: Asking me to choose my favorites between my children is horrendous. But for now, I believe that honor will have to go to Within the Shadows (MCU) due to the fact that it just wrote itself. I somehow regurgitated 16,000 words in about a week. I've never written that fast in my life.

Story You Were Nervous to Post: Hmm I haven't really been nervous to post anything since I was a teenager posting on a strict Tolkien fanfic site, well over a decade ago. But I've not written non-con, smut, or anything that may be more "nerve wrecking". I'll read most anything but I tend to keep teen and below for my stories.

How Do You Choose Your Titles: Usually with great difficulty. It's not uncommon for the title to be one of the last parts I finish in a story. Titles come from lines within a story (A Kaleidoscope of Butterflies), are inspired by songs (Dawn of Red Skies), or are rather straight and to the point (Strange in a Strange Land). One title that came almost immediately was "The Opening" because I knew there was going to be a chess theme throughout the story to match the "Endgame" title. Chapter titles in Dawn of Red Skies were all taken from quotes surrounding red, while in my untitled WIP are all from soundtrack titles of the two pieces being crossed over. So yeah, a lot of variety.

Do You Outline: Depends on the length of the story! For one shots, not usually. My outlines for stories less than 10 chapters long are pretty loose and informal and tend to have chunks of text in between notes. Anything over 10 chapters in the past for me (which was 3 fics, one never completed) were heavily outlined, though not necessarily in chronological order. One reason I know my pseudo!villain Stephen story is going to take for freaking ever is because the outline I have for it right now is 3 pages long and nowhere near complete. I truly have no idea when it will see the light of day. Hopefully before the second DS film :P

How many of your stories are…

Complete: 30 over 16 years (with a hiatus for 6 of those years)

In-Progress: 3; one discontinued, one that will need to be entirely rewritten if I ever want to try an epic for LOTR again, and then the last chapter for the DS/LOTR crossover.

Coming Soon: Uhhhhh.

Strange/Sherlock crossover: About 70% complete.

This two shot dark comedy: Maybe 50% done?

Sequel to Within the Shadows: No idea how many more scenes will demand to be written for this.

Pseudo!villain Stephen: Absolutely no idea but it's 10k words thus far but that includes the outline

Hopefully some one shots?

Do You Accept Prompts: Yeeeeessss but shorter ones please so I have at least a hint of a chance of completing the bingo before the deadline. Give me your one-shot prompts.

Upcoming Story You Are Most Excited to Write: Varies from day to day. Having 4 multi-chapter fics allows me to bounce to the one I want to work on most. I haven't written much this July so we'll see.

Tag Five Fanfic Authors to Answer These Questions As Well:

Ugh this dumb thing erased who I tagged. @amethyst-noir @babywarg @calamityskies @cairistiona7 @xxgwenstacyxx if y'all want

[paintedrecs]

You're such a good author!! What are you thinking when you're writing? And what's your editing process? If you don't mind me asking!!

Ah, thank you!! I’m very often thinking “wow I am not a good author” while I’m writing, so it’s always nice to hear positive responses once the finished work is out there. :)

This ended up (unsurprisingly) long, so be aware there’s gonna be a Read More.

My editing process is very, very nitpicky. To begin with, I edit a LOT as I write, so those two questions share some answers. 

I considered posting a photo of a page I handwrote this week, but I don’t want to subject you to that. Suffice it to say that if I’m writing in pen, there’s a lot of scribbling and paragraphs that branch off into the margins and spiral around the edges of the page as I rework sentences and expand sections. Before I switched to writing almost exclusively on my computer, I used to use a mechanical pencil to make all that a little less messy. Still, though. Eraser shavings. Everywhere.

It seems like most of fandom swears by writing sprints, and I can’t do it. I either write in long, tireless stretches where I forget to move for hours, or I spend an hour writing a sentence, frowning thoughtfully at it, tweaking a few words, tilting my head to the side, changing it back, muttering, “No I don’t like that,” and shifting the structure until it fits with the rest of the story.

I spend a lot of time reading my own writing out loud, which is part of why I’m not usually that productive when I try to write in public. (Although once I’m in the zone, I’ll write on my phone as I walk to the grocery store, take the bus to work, etc. I probably still mutter to myself.) At this point, my poor neighbor has probably heard the entirety of all my fics in scattered bursts. I’ll read a single paragraph to myself six times in a row to make sure the pacing sounds right and the dialogue feels natural.

I’m a start-to-finish writer: if I write scenes out of order, they won’t work in the final version. With tide pulls, I wrote all this emotional, ultra angsty dialogue that I was expecting to stick into one of their final scenes, but by the time I got there, it didn’t fit. I initially tried to squeeze stuff around it to keep those lines intact, but it’s never a good idea to force your characters into something that they don’t naturally want to do over the course of the story. It rings false, and I think readers can generally tell.

That’s not to say that I don’t plan ahead or map out certain arcs or important scenes. I just don’t write them in their full form until I’ve reached that point. PDIW was much, much too long to plunge through without an outline; if I hadn’t marked down and organized all the emotional points I wanted to hit, I would’ve lost control over the scope of it. (Which is ridiculous to say when it’s over 200k, but it had the most detailed outline I’ve ever made for one of my stories.) 

Still, though, pieces moved around a lot. I’d push a scene into a later chapter when it turned out that Derek and Stiles needed to talk to each other more before getting to that exchange. Or a conversation that was meant to be between Derek and Laura ended up being between him and Cora instead, catching both of us by surprise. Laura was always Derek’s best friend and confidante, but he turned out to have a lot more in common with his younger sister than he’d ever realized. Of course I had to let that play out. 

There are a few sentences I desperately wanted to get into the final version, but they’re clumped at the bottom of my notes doc, along with all the other unused or deleted material. Sometimes you think a phrase sounds really, really pretty, but if your character doesn’t want to say it, that’s all there is to it. 

I don’t have a beta for my shorter fics, because by the time I’m done writing, I’ve probably spent more time editing than actually putting new words down on the page. (Unless they’re tumblr fics or notfics, in which case please forgive the fact that they’re wobbly; they’re just me having fun!) That doesn’t make the final product perfect by any means, but I don’t have a regular beta set up to read over my fics for me, and I don’t like bugging people unless it’s necessary.

For my longest fics, I tried to rope in at least 2-3 betas. It seems like most people in fandom just share their fic’s Google Drive link, sometimes while it’s still a WIP, and have their betas all work in the same doc. It may be annoying that I don’t do that…but I want to get separate, unbiased responses. If multiple people tell me to fix the same thing, it definitely needs more work. With that said, I’ve found that there actually doesn’t tend to be all that much overlap, because betas have different styles in much the same way that writers do.

The fandom dream (or any writer’s dream) is to have a set, longterm writer-beta relationship, because it really does involve a lot of trust and communication. One of my PDIW betas was the wonderful @bleep0bleep​ , who prodded tirelessly at all my pronouns and long paragraphs but also took the time to learn my style and where I most need/want help. (She also laughed at me when I had conversations with myself in the comments while figuring out how to fix passages that she’d told me weren’t working.) She and other betas found gaps that you simply can’t see for yourself after spending that long immersed in your own story. I ended up writing a few extra scenes and expanding some other areas, and the final version is absolutely better as a result.

If this was going to be a published work, I would’ve ideally set it aside for several months so I could come back to it with fresh eyes. My posting schedule for PDIW was already months behind what I’d originally planned, and I was super eager to share it, so I rushed right into the next stage. I also very much wanted to start posting on April 1, since that was Stiles’s birthday in the fic.

So I finished writing the final chapter, gave myself about a day to celebrate, then went right back to the first chapter and started editing. My betas got those pretty-much-completed chapters, and I took their edits and suggestions and transferred them back into my central doc. Then I started drafting the fic on AO3, editing each chapter one final time as I was posting. 

It was…tiring. I wrote the fic in about 7 months and edited the entire thing twice…almost three times?…in a little over a month. I’m going to give myself more leeway if I ever do that again. Thank goodness for my speed-reading betas, though.

I don’t know if any of that was the kind of information you were interested in hearing. Welcome to my writing world, I guess? It’s a little messy, but it has pretty intricate organization if you know what to look for.

As for what I’m thinking as I’m writing…that’s a complicated answer. Is it weird to say that I’m kind of not thinking anything? Writing is a craft, but it’s also a strangely instinctive part of myself that I tap into when it’s going well. I absolutely cannot write if I’m busy thinking about where a scene should go or whether anyone’s going to like reading it or if I even remember how to string words together. That’s the kind of thing that makes me slam right up against writer’s block. Or, if I do manage to get words down, they’re clunky and I’m never really satisfied with them.

When I sit down to write, I do my best to clear my mind out. I tap into my characters. If I’m writing from Derek’s POV, I’m seeing him - all his gestures, mannerisms, the actions he’s taking in a scene - but it’s more important to me that I’m feeling what he’s feeling. The same goes for Stiles, or anyone else whose eyes I’m trying to see through. I guess I’m an emotional writer? I want to feel things as I’m writing, and if I did it right, my readers should feel things, too. It doesn’t always work, but when it does, it’s incredibly rewarding.

Reading has always been an escape for me. When I’m wrapped up in a book, I lose touch with the world around me and slide into the pages, living alongside the characters. Writing’s the same way. It’s an indescribable, addictive feeling. 

When I finished PDIW, it almost felt like I’d lost a part of myself, because I was letting go of something I’d been living with and dreaming about and spending so much time getting to know.

I’m glad I got to share it, though. It’s a wrenching, terrifying process, but you all made it worthwhile. The final step of a story is its readers. Thank you for being amazing ones, and for letting me share my words with you.