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feedthefandomfest · 1 year ago

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Hiya!

I love this blog and just wanted to ask- do you know any advice on formatting and tagging for AO3?

Or just general etiquette!!

I'm not new to AO3 (reading or writing) but I haven't interacted with the actual community much and would love to know more :)

oof, I still feel like a newbie posting stuff on ao3, and tagging is something i've always struggled with. and actually formatting is also on ongoing issue 😅 so with that in mind, here's what i try to consider:

TAGGING

relationships -> tagging the main is obvious, but i'm sometimes torn about tagging side relationships that feature in the fic, especially since it's annoying to be searching for that pairing and get a bunch of results where they're not the main focus; unless the other pairing is a prominent feature, i leave it out of the relationship tags and at most add it to the additional tags

characters -> i remember updating the character tags on my early fics every time another character popped up in the story, but now i'm of the same mind as the side pairing issue; unless the character is prominently featured, i leave them out of the tags

content warning/advertising -> if i know the fic features an element that some people might wish to avoid, i always tag it and also always fret that i've forgotten to tag something in that regard. when it's more about advertising what's in the fic, especially sexual content, i sometimes feel silly listing every flavor of physical encounter unless the fic is pwp/smut (in which case i gleefully list all the depravity); i sometimes worry that over-emphasizing the sexual content in the tags is misleading? like of this 100k fic, if 15k is spent fucking, how do i get the tags to reflect that while also tag cw appropriately? is there an established tag for that?

sometimes i see fics with TONS of tags, like an exhausting amount, and sometimes i see fics with very minimal tags... sometimes frustratingly few. i also know some writers add chapter-specific warnings in the author's notes. in the end, so long as you're making it possible for people to find or avoid your fic as needed, then you're good. Here are some good posts that dive into it more!

(i remember when people on tumblr would scold writers for monologuing in the tags on ao3 like we do on here, claiming it was a strain on the system, but i believe that's been debunked?)

FORMATTING

i've noticed some MEGA annoying quirks with copy & pasting over from Google Docs and Word, and I know there are some tricks to get around them, but i tend to just slog through the Rich Text window fixing everything manually 🙃 OKAY I FOUND SOLUTIONS LINKED BELOW.

spacing problem #1 -> pet peeve of mine, but i dislike it when the paragraphs have massive spaces between them (ditto for indented paragraphs). idk why, but it's tiring for my eyes to constantly leap the chasm between paragraphs. so whenever i copy and paste from Word, which for some reason ALWAYS appears with double spacing between line breaks, i go in and manually fix it. SOLUTION

spacing problem #2 -> when copying over from Google Doc, whenever there's a punctuation mark following an italicized word, a random space appears between them. and yep, i have to go in and fix every one because typos make me twitch. (this might not be an issue for everyone; i overuse italics and dashes like it's my job) SOLUTION

spacing problem #3 -> again probably a me issue, but i tend to include song lyrics a lot, and it's always a headache to format because when pasting from the doc, ao3 embeds these spaces between the lines that i can't remove by backspacing. only fix i've found is to copy and paste lyrics directly from a website, and then it formats fine. random and annoying and weird. (no solution 😔)

since this section has just been me whining about finding SOLUTIONS for formatting issues, i'll offer one tip that's more about general editing: i try to proofread best i can in Word/GDocs, but it's always easier to spot errors when i'm reading the draft on my phone. the typos always jump out at me from a phone screen. it's now my favorite way to edit!

every writer has their own preferences on formatting, and every reader has their own level of tolerance for formatting quirks. in the end, so long as the formatting doesn't interfere with the reading experience, you're all good.

#god and don't even get me started on summaries #i'm so bad at writing summaries #and coming up with titles #just the worst #those tend to plague me more than tagging #but tagging can also be tricky #like i want to crowdsource it or have an outside perspective just list the stuff in need of tags for me #fandom culture #ao3 etiquette #ao3 tagging #ao3 formatting #writer things

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shallanigans · 9 months ago

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So, you want to write fanfiction? Here's some advice from someone who spends too much time on ao3, Part 1:

Hey everyone! This is a bit of a deviation from my usual shitposts. I was looking at the "#writers on tumblr" tag today, and I got inspired to post this after some interesting discussions. I'm someone who has read a lot (and I mean A LOT) of fanfic, as well as written some myself... so I thought I'd make this little (no, I lied, it's Very Long) post with some writing tips that I find personally meaningful for those of you who may be getting started or want to try something new.

My qualifications? Honestly, because I said so. This is just my opinion. Feel free to ignore, disagree, hate, ask questions, whatever. I'll be discussing some common fanfic writing advice and what I think about it, as well as giving some general pointers.

Disclaimer: What is "good writing?"

Good writing is effective writing. There is no one way in which everyone should write. Effective writing compels the reader; it makes them interested in your story, keeps them turning the pages, makes them click that "next chapter" button and stay up all night to finish your 500k epic. Some people achieve this through flowery, descriptive prose. Others do so with their quick wit and snappy dialogue. Others write all their fanfictions in second person epistolary format only and make you cry harder than you ever have. The first thing to know is that 1) tastes vary and 2) confidence matters. Find your voice, and be proud of it. If you feel that what you are doing is working for you, and you love it, then keep at it. Someone has already made every "writing mistake" and made it well. Don't fall into the trap of getting bogged down with 674835 contradictory tips and being too terrified to write at all. The only real writing sin is being boring.

Furthermore, this post is for fanfiction specifically. A lot of this advice might be useful for traditional fiction, but it's not a 1:1 carryover. A lot of fanfic advice will be irrelevant for traditional fiction, and vice versa.

That's all fine and dandy, but what do I do?

Good question. First, let's break down what makes a fanfiction effective. Most people searching ao3 for a story probably want:

A compelling premise

With in-character characters

Good spelling, formatting, grammar, and syntax

Stylistically strong writing

A coherent plot

With a certain degree of wish-fulfillment sprinkled in (this is fanfic, after all)

In this series, I will be mostly discussing elements 2-6. Number 1, unfortunately, comes down to "don't be boring," and I can't tell you how to come up with an idea that's going to hook your reader. However, assuming that you already have The Coolest Idea Ever, and you only need the reader to see that, then here's what you can do:

Effective Summaries

No, seriously. Tell people what your fucking story is about. One of my favorite stories on ao3 has the worst, vaguest one-liner of a summary I've ever seen. It is a gem, and if it hadn't been for a friend's recommendation, I would have never read it. You may think that your epic out of context quote from the paragraph you spent hours perfecting will make people care, but it will probably just confuse them. This is likely to be the most controversial thing I say today, so I'm starting off strong.

When I say effective summary, I mean a summary that will tell people the basic premise of the plot while also making them want to learn more. I don't mean something fancy. I mean something like:

When Blorbo started his new tech development job at Tumblr, he never expected to have Blorbette for a boss. She is smart, cold, calculating - and, to his horror, totally irresistible. In order to win her heart, he decides to make her jealous by fake-dating his colleague and frenemy, Blorbinson. But he soon finds that there is more to his mysterious friend than meets the eye. Could it be that the real Tumblr sexyman has been next to him all along?

That's a pretty standard summary for a relatively long fic. It's nothing fancy, but it tells the reader what the story's about. Now this same summary, in the hands of someone who refuses to inform the reader about the premise of the story, would probably say something like:

His eyes are the color of spring.

You can get away with that kind of stuff more often in a one-shot, but best practice is always to tell your reader what the story is about. Say to your reader:

Blorbinson's eyes are too easy to get lost in. Blorbo cannot find his way out.

If you MUST include a quote from your story, then do it alongside your informative summary, in the much-loved format below:

"What do you mean Welcome to Nightvale is winning the contest?" --- In which things get heated at Tumblr dot com, and Blorbinson's the one making Blorbo get all sweaty.

I can already hear you arguing. You say to me, "But there are people who choose quotes that are both pretty AND informative! But writing anything is better than writing nothing in the summary!"

True. My response to the first point is this: if you had mastered that skill, you wouldn't be here. A simple, to-the-point-summary is almost never going to make the interested reader scroll past your story. You know what will? An out-of-context block of text about how much Sans Undertale loves the player from chapter 3, paragraph six.

To the second point, I say: obviously. This doesn't mean that you shouldn't seek to improve. No one is perfect. I'm certainly not. But you're doing yourself a disservice by spending so much time and effort on the content of your story and then fumbling it on the home stretch. If you take pride in your work (and I'm assuming you do, because you posted this story for a reason), then make like a chef at a five-star restaurant and start caring about presentation. It goes without saying that there shouldn't be any typos in the summary.

A note on tagging: I will make a separate post on tagging your stories appropriately. This is a writing-related rant.

Now, onto characterization:

If you're one of those people who thinks that there's no such thing as "too OOC," congratulations. May you enjoy fanfiction free from the shackles of the narrative. Tag appropriately and have fun. If you're like the rest of us haters, you probably want to keep your characters as faithful to canon as possible. Yes, even in an AU.

I've included this wonderful addition because entryn17 said it better than I ever could have. There's difference of interpretation, and then there's Severus Snape deciding that James Potter was actually just misunderstood.

Being "in-character" is an elusive ideal that we all strive for, but no one can quite tell you what it means except for "the vibes." The way I like to define it is this: If you asked yourself the question "Would He Fucking Say That/Do That/Feel That?" and the answer is "yes, absolutely," then it's in-character. If the answer is "absolutely not," then it's out of character. If the answer is "maybe?" then your goal is to move that needle firmly into the Yes camp.

To do this, you must first determine what is making you unsure. Is it the dialogue? Is your stuffy Edwardian speaking like a Gen Alpha well-versed in Cocomelonese? Is your overconfident flirt stammering and stuttering through a conversation? Often, the content of what a character is saying agrees perfectly with the source material, but the how doesn't match it. Beta readers can help with this, as can going back to the source material to study a character's speech patterns in canon. You don't have to get it perfect. Just make sure it doesn't stand out. Would Snape perhaps say "Come over here!" in a much wordier, snarkier manner? Maybe. Maybe not. But he sure as hell wouldn't say, "Yo! bring your ass over and check this out!"

Actions and feelings are a bit trickier. There's always some leeway in personal interpretation here, and most of the time your reader won't question this very much so long as the rest of the story keeps them engaged. One OOC action or thought is easy to brush off. Ten, not so much. Read up on the wiki pages for whatever you're writing, go back to the source material, and maybe get the opinion of a willing beta reader. Ultimately, if your characters start feeling like featureless puppets subject to your whims rather than people with established personalities, you might want to go back and revisit what made them stand out to you in the first place.

Keep things consistent within your story. Especially in AUs and canon divergence fics, there are certain character traits that are malleable. Maybe Draco Malfoy wouldn't have been such a dickhead if he'd had caring adult mentors in his life. So, justify that within your story. You don't necessarily need to keep the characterization faithful to the canon, but you do need to convince the reader that their beloved character has a reason for their behavior. Keep things consistent. Whenever a character deviates from their canon behavior, make sure there's a valid explanation for it in your narrative.

Don't fall for the trap of confusing canon and fanon. Fandom is like a game of telephone. Someone writes one story of Blorbo adopting a cat, and suddenly he's the biggest cat person in the universe. The poor author who posts about Blorbo's canonical love of dogs gets trashed for writing OOC. You can't prevent people getting mad at you, but you can always grin smugly and go to bed happy with the knowledge that you were right. Someone will love you for it.

SPAG

Ew! It sounds like something your dog spit up. Spelling and Grammar might be boring, but they're necessary. You shouldn't break the rules until you know the rules. One day, you will write a run-on postmodern epic to rival the worst of Wallace's page-long sentences. Today is not that day. No one wants to open a story only to be greeted by a massive block of text, a lack of punctuation, and a heretofore undiscovered form of there/they're/their.

In the modern age, we have many tools at our disposal to clarify our SPAG doubts. Dictionaries! Spellcheck! The weirdos on those Substack forums! Oh, my. If you wrote your story at 3AM directly onto the ao3 editor, perhaps take a moment to run it through some kind of spellchecker before posting. Microsoft Word has a pretty good one, but Grammarly and other such software can help you if that's not available. There's also nothing quite like a beta reader. There are people in this world who love picking apart every comma, period, and quotation mark, and they'll be happy to do it for you. I am one of them, and I volunteer. There are many of us.

Here are some SPAG mistakes common in fanfiction.

1.Your/you're, they're/their/there, "could of," and "lie" vs "lay."

"YOUR" means that something is yours. You possess that thing. YOUR story is going to be great if you fix the grammar. "YOU'RE" is a contracted form of "YOU ARE." If you fix your grammar, YOU'RE going to be a great writer.

They're: Shortened form of "they are." They're going to the beach. They're very nice people.

Their: They possess a thing. A thing belongs to them. They're going to the beach in THEIR car.

There: Related to a place. You are going to be THERE. THERE are many pretty horses in the field.

"Could of" does not exist. It is an incorrect way of writing "could've," the shortened form of "could have."

The verbs lie and lay are tricky ones. You (a person) LIE down on your bed. You LAY an object down on a surface. However, the past tense of LIE is LAY. I know! Who invented English, am I right? Blorbo LIES on his bed in the present tense. He LAY on his bed in the past.

The past tense of "lay" is "laid." Blorbo LAID down his water bottle.

2. Run-on sentences.

Sometimes, when we're writing, we get a little excited. We have so many thoughts and we never know how to end them. You might think the solution here is to just keep throwing down commas, but you'd be wrong.

Run-on sentences can be effective if used intentionally, but a lot of the time, they're not. The period isn't your enemy. In general, you want to make sure your sentences have a subject, a verb, and an object, and that they end when you've finished your thought.

Blorbo was the most beautiful of all the tumblr sexymen. He really liked to show off his sick gains at the gym. He had a hot wife and an even hotter side piece.

This writing isn't very exciting, but it's correct. Contrast that with:

Blorbo was the most beautiful of all the tumblr sexymen, he really liked to show off his sick gains at the gym, he had a hot wife and an even hotter side piece.

Finish your thoughts. There are ways to connect independent clauses (a group of words that can work on its own as a sentence) correctly, like the semicolon; the semicolon is a great piece of punctuation. There is also the em-dash. Sometimes, you really need to add clarification to a thought — you really want to emphasize the second part of what you're saying. Em-dashes also work like a cooler version of parentheses — because who uses those, am I right? — and can help you seem like a chic and seasoned writer. Don't overuse them, though. I know you want to. And no, I don't heed my own advice here.

Look, these rules aren't intuitive. I can't possibly go through all of them in a way that's easy and digestible. There are smarter people than me who have written all about it, and I use incorrect punctuation all the time. Misplacing a comma isn't going to be the end of the world for your story, but at least give it a once-over with a beta or spellchecker to fix the worst of it. At the very least, make the reader think that run-on sentence was totally on purpose.

3. Paragraphs

Make sure your paragraphs stick to a single theme or thought. Fanfiction writers love to have one-sentence paragraphs for the impact, but you don't need to do that. Just keep them coherent. For example, if you're writing about Blorbo's weekend, you might say,

Blorbo loved Saturdays. On Saturdays, the world seemed to sparkle and sing with the whole of the city's shared happiness over not having to work. He would wake up on those mornings and leap out of bed while singing a jaunty little tune. Then, he'd text Blorbinson a string of heart emojis and plan to meet up for their weekly ice cream date. But Sundays — oh, how he hated Sundays! Sundays were the day before Monday, and he'd always spend so long worrying about going back to the office that, by the time he decided to do something, it would be dark outside already.

Each of the paragraphs above, clumsy as they are, have a clear idea that starts and ends within the same paragraph. If you talk about Blorbo's Saturday, Sunday, Monday, and Tuesday all within one paragraph, your reader will be confused!

On the other hand, if you make every single paragraph one line, your reader is going to resent you. You have unwittingly made them take part in a bad action thriller. One-line paragraphs are supposed to be impactful and create suspense. When writing, a good tip is to consider the word "impactful" a synonym of "sparing." See below:

Doesn't it suck? Not to mention all that scrolling!

3. Dialogue

Right off the bat, I'll say that the best way to learn how to format dialogue is by reading books. Not fanfiction. BOOKS. They have been checked by an editor, so you know you're getting the real deal. Generally, well-formatted dialogue achieves an engaging and seamless conversation between your characters. Poorly-formatted dialogue forces your reader into a game of Who's Who?

See for, instance, the following abomination:

"I can't believe you cheated on me with Blorbette!" Blorbo had been crying about it for a week. His tears would soon erode a riverbank down his cheeks. Blorbinson sneered at him, "I can't believe you ever thought this was real." "I was only with you for the tax benefits." No! How could you? Blorbo said. Blorbinson laughed a wicked laugh and looked at him. "My heart is shattered into a million tiny pieces. Love isn't real!"

Did you follow that? Because I sure didn't. Generally, here are the rules of dialogue:

Start a new line for each character that speaks, and keep a single character's dialogue within the same paragraph.*

Use dialogue tags to CLARIFY who is speaking. Note: I said clarify. If it's redundant take it out. I will write more about good (not merely correct) dialogue in a follow-up post.

Put a period after or before an ACTION tag in dialogue, but a comma before a SPEECH tag. The reason you do this is that ["Here is an example line of dialogue," he said] is a complete sentence, but ["Here is an example line of dialogue." He looked at his watch.] is TWO sentences. The quotation marks are merely to indicate speech. Whether or not something is a sentence is determined by the content of what the writing actually says, not by any punctuation it may have.

Use quotation marks to indicate speech. If you want to quote something within quotation marks (in American English), you put it in single quotes, like so: "And then he called me 'a lost cause who's doomed to be single forever.' Can you believe that?"

By following these rules, we get the much nicer:

"I can't believe you cheated on me with Blorbette!" Blorbo had been crying about it for a week. His tears would soon erode a riverbank down his cheeks. Blorbinson sneered at him. "I can't believe you ever thought this was real. I was only with you for the tax benefits." "No! How could you?" Blorbinson only laughed a wicked laugh. "My heart is shattered into a million tiny pieces. Love isn't real!" Blorbo said.

Obviously that's still pretty bad, but now it's readable. Formatting your dialogue properly will fix a lot of problems with your story, make it clear who is talking, and make the reading experience much nicer for everyone.

* An Important addendum: sometimes, characters will speak for a long time, and you'll want to split up their dialogue into paragraphs. To do that, you start the dialogue in quotation marks, but you leave them open until the character is done speaking, like so:

"My favorite thing about Blorbinson was that he always knew just what to say. He had this magical ability to always tell when I was sad, and he showed up with ice cream every single time. It always made me feel better," Blorbo said. "I can't believe our relationship is over now. I should probably tell you all about how that happened. "I walked into my house one day to find another pair of shoes by the door, where Blorbinson's usually are. I knew Blorbinson would never wear those shoes, because his style is more boho-inspired. Anyway, my worst fear was confirmed when I walked into the bedroom and found him there with Blorbette! My two loves, betraying me so callously!"

This is common in fantasy stories where you need to impart some deep lore knowledge on the reader, or for characters who like to talk a lot.

4. Verb tenses (edited after posting, in true fanfic writer fashion)

Us writers tend to have very strong opinions about verbs. You could even say things get a little bit... tense sometimes. Ok, but seriously; whether you write in past or present doesn't matter. What matters is that you keep things consistent.

Nothing takes the reader out of a fanfic faster than abrupt tense switches in the middle of the narrative. If you are writing in a specific verb tense, stick with it.

Don't say:

Blorbo is never sure what Blorbinson is thinking. He watched him chew his pencil from across the office, that beautiful face scrunched in concentration as he stares at his computer. Blorbo knows he's in love the minute Blorbinson looks back.

DO say:

Blorbo was never sure what Blorbinson was thinking. He watched him chew his pencil from across the office, that beautiful face scrunched in concentration as he stared at his computer. Blorbo knew he was in love the minute Blorbinson looked back. or Blorbo is never sure what Blorbinson is thinking. He watches him chew his pencil from across the office, that beautiful face scrunched in concentration as he stares at his computer. Blorbo knows he's in love the minute Blorbinson looks back.

When we write in past tense and we want to talk about events that happened prior to the narrative, we use the past perfect. When we write in present, we can use either simple past or past perfect. This one's kind of iffy. As you write more, you'll get a sense of what "sounds correct."

Ultimately, your choice of verb tense is personal opinion and what you feel best fits your story. Just make sure that you keep whatever you choose consistent. A beta reader can help you with this.

And that's it for Part 1!

This post dealt with some technical, basic things about fanfic that will mostly be useful to new writers. I will be going more in depth about making your prose stronger at the sentence level in Part 2, where #4 is getting an entire post. It'll probably be even longer than this one. I hope it was able to help someone!

#fanfiction #writers on tumblr #writing tips #writeblr #writing #creative writing #I make long posts about things that no one cares about series

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kenobster · 1 year ago

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3, 18 and 29 please <3333

From AO3 Wrapped [Writers' Edition]

Thank you for the ask, anon! ^_^

#3. What work are you most proud of (regardless of kudos/hits)?

I hate to be a cliche of myself again, but Five Peggats Each. (And this includes all things I've ever written in my life actually :D). There's a few reasons for it, I think. One, it's like HUGELY within my comfort zone. The limited setting, the noncon, the tropes of the characters themselves. This is the type of story I have the most practice with, so it naturally comes easier and in better quality I think? Two, how, despite it being a comfort zone, I've used this fic as kind of a sandbox to experiment a lot of different writing techniques. For example, this is the most POVs I've ever written in a single fandom, let alone a single story (which usually stays around 1-2). For other examples, like, I've tried to be really mindful about metaphors/prose and how they can twist reality (like that time I spent like 8 hours researching in-universe Star Wars bands & instruments just so I could write one paragraph lmao)... or even how I recently tried to use second person POV to give the reader the same disassociation/discomfort/dysphoria that Anakin was feeling after regaining use of the Force. These experiments were all really hard to pull off, and I'm proud of myself for attempting them. And three, how I've allowed 5PE to be a project that can take as long as I want it to take to finish, so long as I do finish it. So on one hand, it's been a really good exercise in self-discipline & practice in maintaining my passion for the story, despite the constant barrage of shiny new plot bunnies. And on the other hand, the lack of a time pressure allows me to really spend time on the quality of every single line (excepting human mistakes & typos of course lmfao), while also not letting that perfectionism stand in the way of progress. It's really helped me become more confident in storycrafting from beginning to end, in a way I've never really felt in my old fandom or writing. On top of all that, it's the only fic that I can actually read after posting updates without feeling like it's exfoliating my entire body to do so lol. I actually enjoy reading it sometimes. So that's nice.

#18. The character that gave you the most trouble writing this year?

Answered here. :)

#29. Favorite line/passage you wrote this year

Really hard one omg. If I have to choose something I've already posted on ao3, then it'd probably be one of these three: (1) in Five Peggats Each, the passage I also described above regarding Anakin's fever as it relates to the jizz band & cantina in chapter 6; the passage I put in the fic summary for Every Shadow, but the full version of it as written in chapter 2, not the abridged version in the summary; and (3) the opening paragraph of What Dead Things See.

But but but imo -trembles with excitement (I've been dying to show this, folks, what a good opportunity)- none of those passages even hold a candle to this thing that poured out of my brain one sleepless night at 2am for some unposted/unfinished oneshot:

For a moment, when he was nine years old, Anakin thought himself to be a whore. In an effort to scrub the slave out of him, the temple healers had pumped him full of vaccines and medications and water and food. He'd been lying on a brand new bed in a brand new room and counting the speeders whose lights flashed across the wall. That's when the memory burned. If they want you for your strength, his anma said, then they won't squander a second of it. Your back will ache and your feet will throb before the very first sunset. But Anakin's back wasn't aching and his feet didn’t throb. If they want you for your mind, they'll test your skills and put you to work, and they'd tested him, yes, but not his ability to steer the yoke of a podracer at the drop of a pin, nor his ability to disassemble and reassemble any gadget known to sentient life. They'd only studied the gaps in his knowledge and he'd had none of the answers and he'd seen the pity in their gazes. And if they feed you, said his anma, if they let you rest in a bed and say they'll take care of you, then the first chance you get, you must run. As fast as you can, as hard as you can, even if they activate your bomb. Because some fates, my love, are worse than death. You must always be wise enough to know that. And Anakin, well fed and well rested, hadn't wanted to run fast or run hard or detonate his bomb. Anakin hadn't wanted to escape this new place that sang of plenty and of love and of home. So he pushed himself to his feet and stumbled through the darkened shared quarters until he found his new master's bed. Clammy, feverish, and half-asleep, Anakin crawled under the covers and felt around for his master's trousers. Obi-Wan awoke in an instant. That night, they found no rest at all—rather, hours of conversation while Anakin shivered on the couch huddled in afghans and quilts and comforters and tried to explain that, yes, he knew he was free and he knew he was safe and he knew all he had to say was a word and he'd be taken wherever else he wanted by whomever else he wanted and that, no, Obi-Wan had never said or done anything to suggest such a thing was wanted and that if he ever did going forward, Anakin would tell him straight away, and that, yes, he understood the difference between a master and a Master and that, no, he didn't need to use a different word—because Obi-Wan didn't yet know that there are some things you learn with your mind but other things you learn with your body, and that there's no actual function in the branding of a slave because the brand is already burnt into a slave's mind, as crisply and as permanently, as a molten pattern pressed to flesh. As he kneels before his Master, Anakin decides that Palpatine would have liked the gift of a nine-year-old groping beneath the bed sheets better. It would have saved them all a lot of time.

I will finish this one day... Have about 3 scenes written, and just need to write 1.5 scenes more. But the above part stands pretty well on its own so hopefully you all enjoyed! ^_^

#kb post #kb wip #AOP oneshot #text #game #reply #anon #obi-wan #anakin #obi-wan & anakin #palpakin

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shamera · 1 year ago

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20 questions for fic writers

Tagged by @bbcphile 🥰🥰🥰

1. How many works do you have on AO3? site says 21! (I also have 50+ on ff.net from when I was younger, and uhhh idk how many that I shoved into my dreamwidth/livejournal never to see the light of day again.)

2. What's your total AO3 word count? 619,848

3. What fandoms do you write for? Currently Mysterious Lotus Casebook! (Although I might sneak something for Love and Redemption or Scum Villain.) I am mostly a writer in the Final Fantasy XIII fandom, although I have spent years in Code Geass and Merlin fandoms. Before that, it was Fullmetal Alchemist, Naruto, Harry Potter, and Star Wars.... loads more.

4. What are your top 5 fics by kudos?

Leave Me Your Starlight, Code Geass fic Nunnally-centric time-travel fix-it

Five Minutes, FFXIII fluff oneshot featuring Noel and Hope

World Enough and Time, Code Geass AU post-apocalyptic rewrite

First (and Second) Impressions, FFXIII modern babysitting AU Noel/Hope

Lost in a Moment (lost in a song), Mysterious Lotus Casebook post-canon fix-it casefic

5. Do you respond to comments? Why or why not? I try to! I'm, um. I'm really bad at it. In that I will attempt to respond to everyone in the first few days, but then I get distracted doing/writing something else and I am so tunnel-visioned that you won't hear from me until a week later and then I feel bad about taking so long to respond. Also I am very, very bad at responding because while I love love love seeing comments, it's just happy reactions and incoherent noises from me. How do I words to translate my appreciation???

6. What is a fic you wrote with the angstiest ending? ...probably everything I wrote as a kid? I have very different ideas on angst nowadays, but I guess while I was writing it... between Gedächtnisse (FMA fic) and Sound of Silence (HP fic), I guess!

Newer stuff might be between The Other (FFXIII fic) and Test Subjects (FFXIII fic).

7. What's the fic you wrote with the happiest ending? I write a lot of fluff pieces nowadays! But overall, probably Something About December (FFXIII fic), since it's a Christmas fic or Family (FFXIII), which was written to give Sazh more support in the third game.

8. Do you get hate on fics? Once, someone pointed out my join date on the website and asked me why I was still writing fanfiction.

9. Do you write smut? If so, what kind? I have, but generally don't. Even most of my ships are closer to gen than not. I'm closer to the repulsed spectrum of ace, but I do like attempting to write all sorts of things.

10. Do you write crossovers? What's the craziest one you've written? Yes! Love them! I've written a good handful-- but the craziest one was when I was... 10? 11? and I wrote Orions'Ka on a notebook and when I typed it up, it was well over 60,000 words. It had absolutely everything I loved back then.

11. Have you ever had a fic stolen? Not by a person, no. By website bots, yes.

12. Have you ever had a fic translated? I have had... people ask me if they could translate my fics? My answer is always yes, but I don't recall seeing it anywhere.

13. Have you ever co-written a fic before? I had an entire online journal with my best friend back in middle school.

14. What's your all-time favorite ship? ...MXTX ships, maybe? I don't feel particularly strongly about ships most of the time, only about characters, who I will ship around for the fun of it. But for MXTX pairings, that just doesn't feel right. They just belong together.

15. What's a wip you want to finish, but doubt you ever will? ....my old Harry Potter stuff, I'm sorry. Not a fandom I got back into again.

16. What are your writing strengths? I've been told it's characterizations! And descriptions.

17. What are your writing weaknesses? Everything else. Confidence, I guess. Also energy and interest. And once I overcome those, plot.

18. Thoughts on writing dialogue in another language for a fic? ...me, or fics that do that? Because I've seen fics do that, full on paragraphs of dialogue in the original language but descriptions in English, and I don't understand. But if it's just... an important word, a statement, something the fandom would normally understand kept in its original language because there's just no good translation in English for it, then it absolutely works. Some things don't translate well, and fans usually like learning more about their canons. I personally try to keep things mostly in English nowadays, though, but I slip time to time.

19. First fandom you wrote for? Star Wars. I was in the single digits age, and wrote an introspective ficlet on Luke and Leia's feelings about how the original trilogy's ending, sitting together on Endor to watch it all burn.

20. Favorite fic you've written? ...I don't know if I have one. I either tend to be proud or hate what I've written, depending on the day, my mood, wind speeds, and cats. Currently I want to say Lost in a Moment, because I finished that recently and I had so many doubts about it so I'm proud I got through it.

Tagging... omg, anyone who still follows me all the way from FFXIII days and writes, or all the way from the Gundam Wing days gosh.

but also @seventhstrife, @rhystheceo, @teekettle, @adriannasharp @tunnelofdusk 🤭 ya'll suffer through my random selection because I know you guys are writerssss

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randomfoggytiger · 1 year ago

Note

😎

Thanks for dropping in! :DDDDD

The below might seem like I'm gassing you up or being overly sugary and sweet; but I cannot underestimate how much I mean every single word. Your fics were in my first round of xfiles fics ever; and they were cemented into my cracks before I ever got adventurous enough to feed the addiction and read 800+ authors.

This'll be long, so I included a cut.

(**Note**:Editing and proofreading my paragraphs? What is that?)

I begin, again, after 20 minutes of thorough combing

I spent 15-20 minutes grabbing link after link after link because... quite simply, your fics are grafted into my brain because of how many rereads I've done-- I can't separate them from each other, I can't pick favorites, I can't. I had to go by my tip top, cannot-pass-by-without-reading fics:

Whispered Words (Tumblr): Everything about this is perfection. Every time I read someone else's cancer fic, I immediately think of this one (and hunt it down for a reread.) Scully's symptoms, how and when Mulder notices; the blend of sickfic and angst and fluff together, no parts outrivaling the other... it's, again, perfection.

A New Day Has Come: It's such a cornerstone of my earliest cancer fics that this is how I always expect Mulder to react in other fics I read-- it's automatic programming at this point.

Every. Single. IVF fic you've written. I kid you not. To name a few (because it's not fun to just read "I liked it, lol" without some examples): Name Calling/Archive is the pinnacle post IVF failure: the best, ohmyword. Unnamed post IVF treatment fic and Five Minutes - Chapter 1 are seared into my brain as a part one and two; but if it's a sheer numbers game? Five Minutes - Chapter 2 wins out. It's just... how do you hold a moonbeam in your hand, y'know? How can I describe something that IS me? I refer you to Scully's Memento Mori speech-- she says it more eloquently than I do. ;))))

Every. Single. AU Requiem fic and S8 fic and S9 fic and S11 fam fic. You do loving relationships so well: they talk, they breathe, they exist like real people. I treasure the S8 fics you wrote from my prompts and reread them frequently--though I forgot to label the second and need to find that link hmmmmmm. This is exactly how it appears in my docs: Here's a prompt (if you want): Scully goes into... (tumblr.com) THIS WAS MY PROMPT Ao3 By Your Side Is Where I Belong - Baroness_Blixen - The X-Files [Archive of Our Own] LOVE THIS

And for nonspecific genre fics that I adore and cannot live without:

#58 Mulder to Scully thanks! Ao3 Prompts & Drabbles - Chapter 3 - [Archive of Our Own] Scully gets hit in the head with a baseball bat and you nailed every. single. aspect of this fic and I can't read it enough (going to read it again right after this.)

Since you were looking for an angsty prompt for... (tumblr.com) Ao3 We Will Find Our Way Home - [Archive] Scully and Mulder on the ice and Scully makes Mulder go alone to the Snocat? YES PLEASE.

I hope your muse comes back. I know she will soon!... Ao3 Things You Forget - Chapter 1 Mulder has amnesia and he and Scully have dinner with her mother and Bill while he remembers-- iconic.

A realization

...I'm staring at 20+ pages of your fic links (and 84 specifically marked ones that have LOVE THIS in bold and caps) and thinking that there is no way I can fit all of this into this ask. XDDDD

I'll close this by thinking of random moments in your fics that twirl around and around in my brain and put them down here:

Mulder waking Scully up by sneezing in her hair in Rain King.

Mulder and Scully crying after her recovery in Redux II.

Scully's annoyance and Mulder's complete stillness in the airport while waiting for their luggage in Five Minutes Chapter 2.

The hilarious way you wrote Mulder and Scully and Krycek and Doggett and Reyes in an Essence AU (Will is born in the car while they drive away from the FBI.)

Scully's head being squeezed like an orange in the baseball bat attack fic, and Mulder's irate panic from afar ("HE HIT HER")

Mulder's tie got stuck in a copier and Scully has to help him out (and Skinner doesn't even want to know.)

Maggie's not a fool when she catches Mulder and Scully a day or two after Chimera.

Scully gasses in the car and Mulder evens the playing field.

Mulder having amnesia after Millennium and only remembering his partnership with Diana (for a couple hours.)

Mulder delicately taking and holding and smiling over his scratchy list of baby names.

Scully feeling woozy in Three Words and Mulder helping her sit down.

Mulder panicking after Lamaze in Alone.

S8 Scully including Mulder in her late night snack and waltz session, as they discuss her neighbor's recently deceased husband.

Mulder swallowing the suddenly-too-sweet cake at Scully's baby shower (AU Essence~)

Mulder swapping places with Reyes in Essence-- it's he and Scully on the road, just like always.

Post Existence Mulder papa bear with little Will.

Revival baby girl being born on Mulder or Scully's birthdays (and the unique ways you changed the details of both versions.)

Mulder and baby Will showing up for Scully's "take your kid to work day" (and him rubbing Will in Colton's face, my word.)

(I'm not kidding when I mean every. single. one. of your IVF and S8 and family fics, so I'm not even going to BEGIN.)

All of your Millennium fics. All. But particularly the one where Scully is woken up by a grumpy Mulder who felt betrayed that she'd left and drove over, despite his injured arm, before calling her and asking for permission.

Mulder sobbing and holding Scully after the other agents tricked him into thinking she'd died in a car accident.

Diana locks Mulder and Scully up in the One Son fort for the night; and Scully's hurt and Mulder's hurt and their reconciliation and re-understanding is one of the fics I turn to when I need to sleep but also need a story to focus on. Makes my brain go wild.

TFWID Mulder having nightmares of his past lives with Scully. Another one of those stories that sets my brain on fire.

Revival Mulder's psychic powers comes back and he tells Scully in the restaurant (part I) and later senses their daughter's heartbeat (part II.)

An ending

And while I could go on and on and on, there's already a lot I put down. XDDDD Maybe I'll make a fic list with my top 85? fics that cannot be passed up-- although, I don't know if Tumblr will allow me that enough word space to fit them all in. Hmmmm.

Anyway, thanks for dropping in! :DDDDD And hope this was a good enough answer~. ;))))

#asks #baronessblixen #txf #fic #as the saying goes: these have my whole heart #I am a rereader more than a new reader #I live in the comfort of my “already read” collections #and these are absolute musts #couldn't find one of the links for a hot second and literally almost panicked XDDDD #xf fanfic #x-files #the x files

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cinderflower · 1 year ago

Note

🍛🍠🍣🥮🍡!!!!

🍠 How long does it take you to write one of your fics or a chapter/part?

This varies so much depending on the length of the fic or chapter, if it's a longfic or one shot, plot or pwp, etc. I can usually crack out a ~4k word oneshot that's either a pwp or not too plot-heavy in a weekend (2 writing sessions between 3-6hrs each) then usually another hour for editing after sleeping on it. For my very long fics that are plot heavy I try to trend more toward 5k words per part which usually take 1-2 weeks to write (anywhere from 10-24hrs total writing & editing time) just because I have to triple check lore, make sure I'm keeping all my plot threads in sync, and layering in the echoes and callbacks appropriately.

Also I just tend to write very, very slowly because I'm always rewriting sentences/dialogue/etc and researching miscellaneous details on the fly as I go. For example, I spent a good hour lost researching information about the pain and process for resetting a dislocated shoulder for the last UtFF chapter to write like 2 paragraphs "accurately".

🍣 What helps you focus or get in the mood to write?

I have to set time aside and make sure I have as few distractions as possible which is why I write mostly in the dead of night or on weekends. And then personally I have to have a playlist that matches the mood of what I'm writing, if the music vibes aren't right, nothing is getting written. I have some fic-specific playlists and some mood-specific playlists I rotate through. Also, art! I hoard art I enjoy for ships I write because just looking at certain art pieces help reignite the inspiration or even provide the inspiration for what I'm writing.

🥮 Do you have any writing milestones you're working toward?

Not particularly. I do have two books I'm passively working on that I'd like to finish but both are at very tough points in the creative process so I've been ignoring them. I should pick them up again though.

🍡 Which of your fics was the most emotionally difficult to write?

This is a fascinating question because my approach to writing fics is in a very detached manner. Even if the characters are going through emotional turmoil or it's covering a very difficult/squeamish topic, I don't necessarily personally connect with those emotions while going through the writing process. When I write it's more like that meme that when an artist is drawing a character with a specific expression, they mimic that expression on their own face - I sort of "project" those emotions to tap into them for what I'm writing then put them away again.

From that aspect, I'd have to say the ficlet "Guilt" was probably the most challenging to write from an emotional perspective.

🍛 Answered in another ask!

#ask games #cinder answers #fenharael #these were such interesting questions ty!! <3

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queenharumiura · 1 year ago

Text

Meet the mun. Basics

NAME: Neo

PRONOUNS: She/her

PREFERENCE OF COMMUNICATION: Discord > Asks > Replies on posts = Tumblr IM

SINGLE / TAKEN: Taken

— three facts

I have an excel document where I keep track of all art that I've purchased/commissioned since 2021 because that's when my huge craze for collecting art from artists I like started. I did this to really put into perspective how bad my 'nochillitis' gets. I've--- spent a lot on dA artists lol. (don't get me started on gacha games)

If anyone knows Prince of Tennis, I have all of the 'Valentine Day Kiss' songs. Wouldn't you know that they keep releasing a new one every year? I collect them!

I don't know how accurate it is because I was doing it in my car and people were walking around so I got nervous but, according to singingcarrots, My lowest singing note is a F#3 and my highest is a D6.

— experience

I believe I've been rp'ing for about 16-17 years? I think only 7 years on tumblr.

— sub-genres

Tbh I don't understand what this means. KHR has a bit of crack humor to it, which appeals to my troll heart. It's easy to do wholesome fluffy things with Haru as well as it is to do angst. IDK if that answers the question.

— plots vs memes

Mmm... so I'm fine with winging threads and seeing where things go, but plotting things out usually does retain attention for both sides. Memes are fun, even if I tend to write them as if they are standalone things. Some memes are fine to be continued- but the drabble ones usually aren't. I do always make sure to specify that somewhere, either in tags or in the response itself.

If I had to say, I have a stronger preference to plots since it's easier to cater things to your muse. Memes are something I throw onto the dash when I have the time or in the mood for it. I don't have the best relationship with the inbox, so I personally don't have a good association with memes in general.

— long or short replies

Depends on the definition. I'm honestly not very good with sentence threads, and I will often slowly veer into paragraph territory. I tried sentence threads before, but that's when I was hit with 2 word responses- which is why it's in my rules to never give me 2 word replies. It became a peeve of mine.

The shortest I can go is probably a paragraph. The longest... I think to date may have been something between 1.5-2k words? I write whatever feels right for me in the moment, and I honestly don't mind however much or little my partner wants to write.

I can however be asked to keep my replies within a certain length (ie 3 paragraphs) and i'll adhere to that. 8)

— best time to write

Any time i'm not distracted with youtube/discord I tend to be more active in the afternoon to late evening hours. As for chatting, I tend to prefer hours 10am-4pm because it feels like it's still early in the day that I can afford to be distracted with conversations. After that, I do try to stay away from discord if I can so I can focus on writing.

If I have nothing to work on, then any hour of the day i'm awake is a good time to talk.

Stole from: @whiskeysmulti

Tagging: I don't tag, but I can if you'd like me to.

#Tagged meme #Whiskeysmulti #((The 3 facts took me the longest bc I do try to come up with new facts that I haven't revealed before if possible))

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celeste-fitzgerald · 1 year ago

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thou brought this upon thyself.

get to know your fic writer asks:

7, 10, 11, 12, 19, 20, 23, 24, 25, 34, 37, 43, 45, 46, 53, 56, 59, 63, 64 and 74

Girl you're crazy lmao ily

7) How do you choose which POV to write from?

Oh damn that's a good question! I don't have a good answer to this one, I usually just think about whose eyes it would be more interesting to see through for each fic.

10) Cltr+f "blinks" on your WIP & copy paste the first sentence/paragraph that comes up

Uhhhh. I haven't been doing much writing lately. And the one fic I have been working on, "blinks" isn't in there (and neither is "blink"). So I went back to 2 other wips I haven't added to in a couple months and THOSE DON'T HAVE "BLINKS" EITHER. So I just searched "wink" instead so here's that one. (Unfortunately for you dear rufusrant you've already read what I have so far on this wip, but for everyone else, here's a teeny tiny snippet of the next chap of Learning How To Love You.)

Richard winked and inched toward the seat on George’s right. “Well?”

11) Link your three favorite fics right now

Oh lord let's see. I'm interpreting "right now" as "currently on my mind," so these are ones that I've been reading and/or have been posted recently. for mutual benefit by thestartofnothing (fandom: JJBA; ship: jotakak) Not Lost In Translation by @007waffles007 (fandom: JJBA; ship: avpol) She Makes Me Smile by @007waffles007 (fandom: ELO; ship: mik/kelly)

12) how does receiving or not receiving feedback/support impact you?

Well as with any writer, I love feedback! Though after being in some tiny fandoms (or at least tiny from a fanfic perspective) I've gotten more used to not getting much feedback. All feedback is very very very appreciated of course, but feedback/support from 1 or 2 friends tends to make me very happy regardless of what other kudos/comments I get.

19) What is the most-used tag on your ao3?

To the surprise of literally no one, it is "fluff" (283 fics).

20) Have you noticed any patterns in your fics? Words/expressions that appear a lot, themes, common settings, etc?

Already answered!

23) Best writing advice for other writers?

Write what YOU want to see, regardless of whether you think other people will like it.

24) Worst writing advice anyone ever gave you?

I honestly can't think of any?

25) What fic do you wish you got more of a response on?

I don't knowwwww!! I spent a while looking through my fics to see if any of them fit, but that just ended up being me going "oh I forgot I wrote that, that one was cute!" for 15 minutes haha. I think I'm fine with how things are tbh.

34) Five years from now, where do you see yourself as a writer?

Man I don't know where I see myself in five weeks XD Mostly I just hope I'll still be posting fluffy oneshots on ao3 and sharing fic ideas with friends.

37) How do you choose where to end a chapter?

Not really a good way to answer this one, just where it feels right. But that's entirely dependent on the context of the fic.

43) Do you take a sadistic joy in whumping your characters, or are you more the "If you hurt them I would kill everyone and then myself" kind of person?

😭I'm definitely more of an "I want everyone to be safe and happy" kinda girl. When I make the characters suffer it's usually very mild suffering. Though, fun(?) fact about me, when I daydream about my fandoms, the daydreams often get pretty angsty and rough. But those ideas usually remain as daydreams because it would be too hard to actually write them.

45) Do you want to break your readers‘ heart or make them laugh?

Laugh and smileeee.

46) How would you describe your style? (Character/emotion/action-driven, etc)

Oh emotion-driven 100%.

53) How do you spend your time when it comes to fanfiction? Are you primarily a fic reader, writer, or a perfect 50/50 split of both?

Ooh, that really depends on my mood and how long I've been in the fandom for. When I get into a new fandom, I tend to read tons and tons of fics, then much later I'll actually start writing for it. And I tend to spend less time reading the longer I've been in a fandom. But every once in a while I get hit with an urge to spend all night reading fics.

56) What’s something about your writing that you pride yourself on?

Oh boy let's see...I think I'm pretty good at giving readers warm fuzzy feelings? And I love when I'm able to do that.

59) Does anyone in your personal life know you write fic? if not, would you tell anyone?

Yes. A small number of my in-person friends. Plus my parents and my sister. But I'm pretty sure my sister still thinks it's stupid lmao. My dad's great about it though. Oh and my gf!!

63) Something you hate to see in smut.

Huh, when I read this question, I thought "oh boy, I'm gonna have lots of things I hate." But now I'm...struggling to come up with any? There are certain things I like more than others, and things I need to be in a certain mood to read. I guess maybe just when the relationship feels unequal. Don't like that.

64) Something you love to see in smut.

When the characters laugh/joke around/etc. Just anything to show them being really comfy and genuine with each other in such an intimate moment.

74) You’ve posted a fic anonymously. How would someone be able to guess that you’d written it?

I have posted a fic anonymously. Try to find it >:) (not you, rufusrant, you already know it's me.) Haha but in all seriousness, probably by me going "ahhhhh thank you" in every reply to every comment lmaooooo.

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aerick-cosmic-cauldron · 8 months ago

Text

My mom died a few days ago, I couldn't even write how painful the sadness was... But after going crazy thinking and thinking I feel kinda numb.

My mom was fine a few days ago, I went to the hospital to see her and we talked we joked we laughed a bit. When the visit hour ended, I kissed her goodbye, we did a silly clumsy move and I ended up kissing her in her lips, I told her "goodbye, see ya tomorrow". And she just said "goodbye". The next day she was in bad shape, she was hallucinating and feeling bad, I still spent time with her. I put Bon Jovi (her all time crush) music until it started to bother her.

That same day, at almost midnight they called us and told us that my mom was dying. I was playing League of Legends, the match ended quickly, me and my sister got dressed and then went to the hospital. She was agonizing and barely could breath, we spent the whole night by her side crying and trying to tell her how much we love her. I was like telling her to try and get better and my sister was like telling her to rest and find peace. She was anguished, she barely could talk but she still said she wanted to go home, she also said "help me" in the most agonizing way possible, I talked to the nurse she said my mom was beyond help but we could talk to the doctors the next morning, we stayed there until next morning, sleeping a few short times, then we decided to go home and rest fr. We did that, we ate something and we went back to the hospital, the moment we stepped in the room my mom vital signs, started to slowly go down, she asked for help again, I talked to the nurse, she said there was no hope, that they couldn't do anything and she died an hour later.

There are a lot of guilt, shame, regret in me for not insisting more, for almost ghosting my mom these last 2 years and for being so useless in these situations. But all of that is meaningless to her, my mom is gone, none of this ugly feelings have to do anything with her. Nothing that happened after or that is going to happen will do something good for her anymore. I've been being a pessimist depressed bitch my whole life, obsesed with suicide, and still cannot fully comprehend death. She's gone, the person I loved more, I trusted more than anyone else.

Her only sin was she destroyed herself with alcohol little by little, not knowing she hurt my sister and I deeply by doing so. I barely could catch glimpses of the cause of her alcoholism, It's no mystery anyways, shame, extreme sensitivity, lots of pain and injustice. And instead of doing something for her I just entered in survival mode, fell into the comfort of deep fantasy and cut her off when she needed me the most.

My worst sin is I cannot find the strength to be a person who can be relied upon, I cannot stop being a childish, self-indulgent person, obsesed with safety and comfort. My worst sin is I refused to change for so long, that I let everyone who loved me the most die without my company. I'm like a black hole, my mom and grandmas tried to shine and give me love the best they could, and it was for nothing, it got lost somewhere inside of me and I couldn't give anything back, other than pull them closer and absorbing more and more of their light.

Since my mom is gone, and all of this is pointless for her. I might as well and try to make something good out of it for me, something she loved until the very end.

I need to remember the agonizing pain my mom was in whenever I can't find the strength to do something hard and uncomfortable. I need feel this guilt and regret of abandoning the people I love and watching them die, everytime I can't find the strength to get out of my head and prioritize others. I need to go back to this paragraph everytime I can't find the strength to transform words into actions...like rn.

I needed to write this tho, writing sincerely like this is definitely hard, these events and it's memories are the most painful experience I've ever had, just besides the ones my brain has put me through, but I know worse things will come until I fucking change for the better.

I beg to my self, go for the shit you really want, and help everyone on your way to do the same. No matter how hard it is to do both. Please at least do it for a delusional sense of justice for the people betrayed by you and your lazy, egocentrical tendencies. Please do that justice that you care so much and minimize those tendencies as much as you can.

#mybs.swf #i just had a rage moment after writing this how the fuck did i met my mom died so easily without even insisting more #without fighting more for her like she's done her whole life with me #im so mad at myself for not knowing how to love despite all the love my mom and everyone showed me #ugh i dont know what to with this rage #well i wrote it and i stopped myself when i started disrespecting me thats a start ig

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deathbecomesnerds · 1 year ago

Text

20 questions for fic writers

Thanks for the tag @supermarine-silvally! Sorry for taking so long on this!

How many works do you have on ao3?

I have an impressive 81 works.

2. What's your total ao3 word count?

*checks A03* Holy Banana Nut Muffins...a whopping 664,798 words. That's impressive, Liz! Thanks, Liz!

3. What fandoms do you write for?

So, I currently write mainly for the Guy Ritchie universe? But I focus on 'The Gentlemen' but that doesn't mean some characters from any of his other works don't creep in.

I write also for 'Control', it's my favorite video game. Everyone should play it.

Sometimes, depending, I do write the occasional Stranger Things fic.

4. What are your top five fics by kudos?

Trouble (The Man From U.N.C.L.E): 240 Down, But Not Out (The Man From U.N.C.L.E): 189 Little Girl/Old Man (Stranger Things): 151 Mess (The Gentlemen): 125 Til Death Do Us Part (Stranger Things): 110

5. Do you respond to comments?

Sometimes. It depends on what is said. I like to let comments/reviews be, but every so often they'll say something or ask a question and I feel compelled to answer.

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

Ooff. Umm...The Imposter? Maybe? I don't know. I like to make sure all of my work has happy endings for the most part.

7. What is the fic you wrote with the happiest ending?

'The Unfortunate Reunion'. All the shit went sideways, people died, and a pregnancy was lost. But the bad guys were killed, and there was peace and love...

8. Do you get hate on fics?

No.

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

Yes. I do. I guess I write all kinds of smut? Idk, it's smut! What more do you want? lol.

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

Sometimes? But not really. I like to keep all my dollhouses separated.

11. Have you ever had a fic stolen?

Yes! A long, long time ago...and it was translated into Spanish, too!!

12. What's the longest you've spent working on one fic? And the shortest?

I guess my ongoing one, Bark Like A God. I'm going on two years with it and I've still got a long ways to go.

My shortest? I'm not sure. I do write a lot of one shot/stand alones. But if you are talking about something with multiple chapters, probably 'The Unfortunate Reunion', or "...And Baby Makes 3', I wrote them both in two months.

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

Nope.

14. What's your all-time favorite ship?

I prefer to write OC's, and like to pair them with characters.

BUTTTTTT...I am a sucker for Jesse Faden/Dr. Casper Darling (Control) and you can fucking fight me on that one!

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

There is this one fic, "Did You Hear About Jackie?', it's a Castle Rock fic, I've gotten 3 chapters in and then dropped it for my current fic spiral of 'The Gentlemen'. I'd love to get back to it and finish but I doubt it. It's been like, 3 years.

16. What are your writing strengths?

I'm not sure. Character development? Dialogue?

17. What are your writing weaknesses?

Run-on sentences and paragraphs. Like...I go full blown Stephen King with describing things sometimes.

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

I wish that I knew other languages so I could very openly do that. I do use Google Translate, or if I happen to know someone who speaks the particular language, I'd ask them.

19. First fandom you wrote for?

Okay, hear me out...CSI: Vegas. I was in middle school. Greg Sanders/OC. The fics I still have on my A03 & FF.Net accounts. They're horrible written. Lol.

20. Favorite fic you've written?

Y'know what, I am so proud of 'New Daddy', it's a smut that I literally spent a whole year writing. Nobody really paid it any mind, but I don't care. I put so much time and energy into it. I fucking love it.

I guess I'll ask @rayslittlekitten @kesskirata @autumnleaves1991-blog @spacegoldilocks

#writing #bunnie does a thing #the gentlemen #control remedy

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an-inbetween-place · 2 years ago

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15. This was a going to be a 2 minute high note but ended up being a very enjoyable hour of straight writing

10:03 PM?

A note -- I've been beating myself up for feeling immature and insecure with David but it's because of my lack of a defined relationship (aka commitment) combined with a lack of reaching out (like reaching out and having good, long convos) and seeing each other/making time for each other (we didn't even see each other when he was on break lol) has led me for a long time (since before thailand even) to feel like I'm fighting for him to continue liking me. Didn't I send him that semi nude because I wanted to ensure I still had his interest? I felt like I was losing his interest because he was no longer making me a priority in terms of time and making time. Is that what's making me feel so terrible these last few weeks? The fact that I've been fighting a losing battle with him for his interest? Is this what it always means to be in a relationship? If so, I don't think I can bear it. I have to imagine not though -- that being in a actual relationship with commitment and constant reminders of a person loving you reduces one's insecurities. Potentially not to 0 I suppose. But when will one be able to ever not feel that? I suppose the same question lies with your friendships -- as long as you've made enough of an effort and aren't always an asshole, they cut you some slack and you feel comfortable in trusting that y'all will be in each others lives forever. When did I start feeling that with Deanna and Tina? I suppose that's all it is.. another iteration upon that.

I will say though -- as this draft grows ... I cannot go back. Sitting here and thinking about how I was about to type 'If love means being in this constant state of chasing and ensuring I kept his interest ... I don't know if I want it' is literally a sign in that I cannot go back. I spent the last few months in agony -- waiting for his texts, waiting for our dates.. and how shitty was that feeling? He literally just gave me just enough to keep me hanging... just enough attention at the end of the week to keep me on the line ... just enough conversation a day to keep me invested in him and let me not imagine a life without him. But I always wanted more -- more time to spend together, more conversations to go on... and for so long I feel like the power has been in his court. And that's what led to the last few months to be terrible... just a jumbled up emotional mess who's happiness depends upon when David decides to text me back. Or call me. Or do anything without me first asking for it. And that always made me feel like I was the insecure girlfriend, the one asking for too much from him and the only one who would bend over backwards to accommodate what he needed.

Why was I so touched yesterday when he said 'he would want me to be in his life forever'? I was lowkey shocked when he said that ... which means I wasn't expecting that to be true/wasn't anticipating him saying that cause I didn't think he meant it.

Shouldn't that be something that you should expect someone you're currently dating and want to be currently dating to think? I guess it was the long term-ness about it that shocked me.

That's it really. I am in my love sucks era because right now I cannot imagine love without this desperation.. this insecurity. This constant fighting for his attention and fighting to keep it. Like I must keep fit.. I must say something funny.. I must .. never be mad. I feel terribly embarrassed re: admitting my feelings for him to him .. but why? Because now that he's caught me, there's no more chase in it? But if all there was was the chase.. I think we were past that long ago.

I guess that's it -- I cannot imagine the beautiful aspects of love without associating it to the toxicity of the previous paragraph. If only I had more from him -- more commitment, more verbal and physical affection, more time and energy that shows me he cares ... And the fact that my view on love right now is so ... piss poor I think states why I can't go back.

He's showing me in all the ways that it matters -- in our text convos, in our time (1 in a month?), in our calls (the 15 min hard end) that it's just all not enough. I've been MISERABLE -- my self esteem feels like it's been stomped all over -- hoping that he doesn't move onto some other prettier girl and just hoping I don't lose his interest.. that our current setup won't work.

I don't have enough access to him -- I don't feel okay blowing up his phone and texting him and calling him and I'm trying to play it cool

Why am I trying to play it cool? Why was he making me chase for so long? It's clearly not working so I need to back off.

Keep thinking about how desperate you've been for his attention over the last couple of weeks. It shouldn't be like that. Not for a long time. It feels like when I was pining for Sung. It feels terrible -- like he's always going to be the conventionally hot and muscular guy that everyone in the office like and you're always going to be the fat girl in the class that nice but "just as a friend". And him talking to you is like him being kind and he's secretly embarrassed inside cause he knows you like him but he would never like you. It was the same way with Dennis Kan.

Wow I feel like I really am going to need the time and energy to work through that one. That was quite a nugget uncovered.

I think this time is even worse because David is really like ... not hot. It's embarrassing that I'm fighting so hard over a medium ugly man. But it'a repeating itself! That's why I'm so hesitant to tell him that I like him -- because I think he'll feel bad inside that I like him more than he likes me. Which is what I felt about Spencer -- and I knew all along that it would never move into a relationship for me. I even said so to Deanna multiple times.

So I suppose I should really dig into that -- that I thought Spencer was kinda embarrassing in his ... lack of being hard to get. And now I feel like the Spencer of the relationship -- coupled with all the stereotypes of girls trying to lock men down.

I guess what I'm thinking about ... is that a lot of my past few experiences with dating has left me with feeling very unlovable and with very low self esteem recently. Like I feel like every time I get close to a man ... he never likes me enough to make his girlfriend. I'm just desperate for a boyfriend right now that I'll take anyone that has lasted long enough it seems.

I'm lonely because I feel like everyone's found someone. I'm feeling very unlovable. I don't like that energy at all.

So do I even like David that much or do I simply like having someone around? To call when I'm drunk and let's be honest... horny? I remember doing that a little with Senior Diaz as well -- just liking having someone but for some reason I could cut away with that one. Maybe it was because school consumed me -- there wasn't as much emphasis on dating (at least in my eyes). Ever since I prioritized dating .. it's become much more of a emphasis.

Maybe that's what we need to do. Cut back down the emphasis. You gave it a good two years -- it's time to work back to enjoying what you had without the men.

I think that's the only way forward -- the only way to stop this from running your life and dictating your happiness.

Think of all the things that you didn't really enjoy this last year. The holidays! The first few days in THAILAND!!! Now that's truly a shame and you should be mad at him for that. For ruining your trip to thailand.

And think of the lack of courtesy he showed by also RUINING YOUR TRIP TO SPAIN?! Like .. this man only thinks about himself and what's best for him. And isn't that one of your least favorite things?

Doesn't that show what a good for nothing mfker that guy is? He couldn't even let you enjoy your vacations? Where you felt like there was this umbrella of doom around you?! Isn't that the way you felt yesterday?? You had to lie and pretend to be happy even though you haven't felt at ease or happy/content in your normal day to day life in months. And you felt terrible when you were at home and had to fake it in front of your mom. Or this week when your mom was here.

And what good thing is there about this man that is even worth mourning over. You don't think he's that hot, you don't have good sex with him, he doesn't make you feel special or treat you right. He's never taken me to do the things that I've mentioned that I wanted to do. And I'll always harbor some shame and sadness around that and my wants not being met.

Like was i not good enough to go hiking with?

I let this man make me feel this way and I cannot anymore. He is a nice man and .... whether or not I like him because of him OR if it's because I haven't had anyone else stick around as long or wanted to stick around as long (I guess if I didn't want them to stick around... then that means I was the one that broke it off and thus can't be THAT desperate yet). anyways -- he is a nice man but look at the way he's making me feel about myself.

I need to go back to back when my own life -- just me! -- made me happy.

Truly, I understand now -- you gotta make sure you can just be happy in your own life before you can merge it with anyone else's.

I guess I became codependent on having his interest and affection. And since I haven't been getting enough of it recently ... that's why I've been feeling so terrible.

Clearly it cannot continue. I will find someone that I can do cute couples shit with. It isn't going to be David so if I want to achieve that, I need to move on.

I should get more edibles. TO be fair -- David was right about this ... writing is so easy and touch feels great. We'll save it for our next boyfriend -- there's always a new opportunity out there.

10:57 PM

UPDATE -- WE ARE MAD NOW. WE ARE MAD THAT HE CAN'T EVEN SPARE THE TIME OR ENERGY TO THINK ABOUT US AND WHAT HE'S PUT ME THROUGH UNTIL HIS STUPID PAPER IS DONE. CAN YOU JUST WRITE YOUR PAPER??? YEAH SCHOOL IS HARD BUT IT AINT THAT HARD. FIGURE IT TF OUT. 23 YEAR OLDS CAN DO IT, AND I HAVE NO MORE PITY LEFT FOR YOU. SCRUB!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

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heycoyotegirl · 2 years ago

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@ibrushmyteeth-donttellanyone I (a Benvi) am actually really interested in what you mean by this. Could you elaborate? I'm curious I promise I'm not looking for trouble!

Yeah, no worries! I love talking meta :)

So I've realized that Devi and Paxton were actually on parallel arcs for the entire series, but I'll focus on the college/career aspect of the show, since that's what I was talking about in the original post.

Every major character other than Devi and Paxton knows what they want to do in the future. They either have a specific career in mind, or a field that they're interested in. Fab has robotics, and Eleanor wants to be an actress (and later, director). Ben plans to go to Columbia and then be a lawyer like his dad. Even Trent has an (admittedly bad) plan to make a career out of reacting to reaction videos. ((Aneesa's an outlier here, but she was barely in season 4 at all (and was only introduced in s2), so she doesn't really count for this discussion.))

Even when there are bumps on the road—like Ben sending himself to the hospital in s3 or having a bad visit to Columbia in s4 or Eleanor being rejected by Julliard—the end goal doesn't change. Ben is still admitted to Columbia and then Devi gives him a pep talk that convinces him that he can fit in there (and, if you take the alternate ending into account, ends up becoming a lawyer). Eleanor decides to pursue directing so that she can cast herself.

But unlike everyone else, Devi and Paxton don't have plans for after college.

In season 2, Paxton tells his parents that he wants an education and a career. But he doesn't actually say (or know) what career. And in season 4, Devi literally admits that she's worried about the future because she's never thought about what comes after getting into Princeton, but that plot line is never meaningfully explored.

For both of them, the goal was getting into college. Full stop. No idea what comes next.

Obviously the fixation on just-getting-into-college comes from different places (Devi clinging to her memories of her dad and unable to think of anything other than getting into Princeton vs Paxton who had his plan to go to college on a swimming scholarship ripped away and then had to fight to even have a chance of being admitted), but it gives us the same result: Characters who are uniquely aimless compared to everyone else.

Even their struggles with getting into college are similar. Fabiola and Ben both get into colleges right away, and then any conflict that arises is whether the school they're thinking of going to is a good fit. But Paxton and Devi both have a "maybe I'm not good enough for college" arc. Paxton's conversation with Ojichan where he asks if he's too stupid to get into college parallels Devi's conversation with Dr. Ryan after she's deferred by Princeton.

(sorry, my daxton bias is gonna show for this paragraph) This is also why I think the post-prom scene would've been stronger with Paxton. It was sweet with Ben talking about how hard she's worked and how she would regret not writing the supplemental essay, but he can't actually relate to that experience. He hasn't lived it (and, in fact, his arc was the opposite: learning to work less rather than pushing himself). But Paxton has. He spent an entire season realizing that other people's opinions don't matter; all that matters is that he puts in the effort and believes in himself.

Devi and Paxton both have a series long arc of figuring out who they are and fighting to escape from the boxes that other people put them in (which I will probably make a post about in the future). And season 4 gave us the conclusion to that arc for Paxton: He's returning to college to become a teacher.

But the insane part—the part that makes me froth at the mouth and rave and believe that something went seriously wrong in the writers' room this season—is that we never get a conclusion to that arc for Devi, our main character.

She gets the dream college and the boy, but narratively, she still has no future! In real life, yes, it's totally normal to go to college not knowing what you want to do (though, often if people don't even have a specific area of interest, they take a gap year), but it doesn't make any sense for this character in this show.

The logical conclusion to Devi's story is her finding a passion to pursue, which would've shown her growth and how much she's healed; she's now able to think about her future, rather than centering her entire life around this goal she made with her dad.

currently going feral over the way paxton's arc (wrt figuring out life after high school) is a mirror of devi's, while ben's is more similar to her friends/the supporting characters

#kinda went off on a tangent at the end there but hopefully i did a decent job of explaining my thoughts?#obviously feel free to ask me to explain more or add your own thoughts to the discussion #nhie meta #nhie discussion #my meta #nhie #never have i ever #long post #my post #daxton #hmm should i put this under a readmore

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