#can you tell i just got out of my creative writing class? klsjdflksjd

[igarbagecannoteven]

oh megs these are good ones i have a lot of questions. 1, 2, 7, 10, 20, 21, 28, 33, and 38 if you would like! -hazel

hiya hazel! thanks for sending these in i hope you're having a good evening!

1. which of your fics would you keep the basic plot of but rewrite completely? oooo that's a hard one! ig if we're talking about my posted fics (since i'm doing just that with some of my unposted fics lol) maybe roll the window down (let the air blown 'round you)? not because i think it's a bad fic or anything, i'm actually rather proud of it as a drabble, but i think it would be fun to take that from a little snapshot of a moment and expand upon it into a full length fic.

2. anything you'd like to write but feel unable to? i talked about one concept here, but another thing i'd love to write that i'm currently unable to write but am determined to get there eventually is my hotel california songfic concept. it will happen someday or i will cry but it'd be long and have a lot of moving pieces plus the plot is hard to puzzle out so overall it's just. not at my level atm. but i promise when i do finally become good enough to write it it'll knock everyone's socks off

7. your favorite ao3 tag? answered here and here, but my favorite unofficial ao3 tag is the "no beta we die like [insert character(s) with a canonic death]" it's just so fun and gets tailored for each fandom which i enjoy! (i'm down the rabbit hole of the batman 2022 fics and there's been a lot of "no beta we die like bruce wayne's parents" which is exactly my kind of morbid humor lol)

10. top three favorite fic tropes? slowburn!!! friends to lovers!!!!!! mutual pining!!!!!!!

20. do you work on a single project or many projects at a time? how does that work for you? i am currently working on well over thirty wips (it's grown significantly since the last time i counted so we could be around 40) and those are only the ones i'm *actively* working on so. yeah def many projects lol. it both works very well and not so well in that it's great bc no matter what mood i'm in to write a specific kind of vibe i have a wip ready and waiting to be expanded, but it also means it takes me even longer to finish things so. bit of a give and take thing going on lol.

21. can you accurately predict how long your fics are going to be? if you can, what’s your secret? answered here, but i didn't really go into the second part of the question so i'll touch on that! i can estimate shorter fics lengths largely because i tailor the idea to fit that word count (even if it's longer & less specific than a drabble/555 fic). generally this means the fic will take place over a short period of time with only one or two locations and with little need for exposition, as well as being okay with the reader only seeing a specific fragment of the character's/story's arc!

28. any writing advice that works for you and you feel like sharing? be kind to yourself and keep writing! writing is hard, and anyone who tells you differently is lying. but it's also a skill that can be honed over time as long as you practice it. if you let your insecurities hold you back then you will not get better at writing! so write something terrible! write something so bad you want to set it on fire and then write something worse! everything you write is part of the learning experience, even if you can't see it right away! and when you finish something or see a great line that you wrote, stop and say "hey! i did that! look at me!" because you deserve some love for your writing and there's no guarantee other people will give that to you! so you gotta give it to yourself first and foremost! if there's a writer whose style you want to emulate but don't know how, slow down when reading their stuff and look for the mechanics of the story! how do they make you feel this way? what about that line you loved makes it good? then take all that new knowledge and apply it to your own writing! after you've been writing for a few months/years, open up a word doc just to hype up how awesome you are and describe you overcoming writing obstacles like you're an action hero and then save it to read back on a bad writing day! don't be afraid to look your writing flaws in the eye! never delete anything permanently, you never know when you might want to look back on it/frankenstein it into something new!!

33. give your writing a compliment. (i'm referring to my own action hero writer doc for this one lol) i like that i'm able to tackle a lot of different kinds of stories and themes! you can call my writing many things but one-trick-pony is never one of them lol. also i love how i've grown and am still growing even though writing is very hard for me!

38. “this never happened” fix-it fics or “this happened but” fix-it fics? "this happened but" fix-it fics! in terms of writing, i like the challenge of having to wrestle around the flaws in canon so as to still create the story i want out of it! it's a lot harder to do imo *presses cheek against the glass of my percy weasley character breakdown that's been incomplete for several years and sighs* but it can be worth it in the end!

writing asks!