#give me five years and a 100k words

[alegocarmadein]

gods above I WILL get this fandom to 100 fics if it's the last thing I do!

[shanastoryteller]

Congrats on finishing See Something Say Something!! I checked the notification of the first AO3 email sent out and you initially planned on five chapters.

Would you say that the ending changed considerably since you started in October? Or has that stayed the same?

thank you!

it stayed the same lol. while my fics getting wildly out of control and becoming way longer than i anticipated is pretty common, i'm pretty much never changing overarching plot when this happens. the story that i become interested in telling is typically the story then i end up telling

almost every story can be made shorter or longer. it's less about what happens and more about how that information is conveyed. things that really tend to affect writing length are perspective and breathing room

the shortest fic i have on ao3 that's not part of a series is You Were (Not) Meant For Me (posted 11 years ago, jesus T_T). the premise is that claudia was a witch who intended trained stiles to be a witch and she arranged his marriage to laura hale, the future hale alpha. this is a traditional pairing as talia's husband was also a witch married to talia in service of the pact. except claudia died before she could train stiles or tell him about the engagement. stiles starts learning magic after scott is turned. derek falls for stiles and feels like he's betraying his sister by loving him, betraying stiles by not being the alpha he deserves and not telling him about the arrangement claudia made, and hates himself the entire time, but not enough to stop himself

that's a 100k fic easy

it's 1,696 words

it's extremely limited perspective (derek's) and it's made up only of limited snapshots of moments with very little context. there's no seeing what's happening, only told, which i think would quickly grow boring if it was longer and if the real point of the story wasn't derek's self hatred and how he fails to deal with it. that's the part of the story that isn't told, really - derek does think explicitly that he hates himself, but we're also seeing it in the way he talks and thinks about himself and the people around him

by contrast we have survival is a talent, which is obviously my longest fic. we're over 500k and we've got quite a bit to go

perspective doesn't just refer to character pov, but audience pov - are you being told a story, or are you experiencing the story? this is also tied into breathing room. there's no wrong way, i've done both and will do both, but one certainly requires more words than the other in my experience

siat is told only through draco and harry's perspective, but it's all happening in real time. the audience is being taken along for this story. the thing is that that things in real life don't all come tumbling one after another, not all questions have immediate answers. when depicting character growth and a plot unfurling, i think it's really important to include breathing room to give the audience time to feel that growth and change. i'm stricter about this with siat than anything else i've written, probably sometimes to its detriment. i want you and the characters to have time to feel the effects of emotional revelations and plot hints. i want you to have the time to question and wonder about things the same way the characters do

one time a friend criticized the good place for including the portion where they were alive again on earth because it wasn't as interesting as being in hell, but i disagree. we needed that breathing room both to live with the effects of character growth of going through hell and to have time for the effects of their actions on the plot to settle before they moved forward again. i stopped watching agents of shield because we weren't given enough breathing room - there was never a chance to see the characters not in crisis, the world was always ending, ect. the alchemyst book series has the first like 3 books taking place over a day and a half. i got tired of it after that. there's no breathing room

a story where i gave up on the concept of breathing room was build your wings on the way down. i liked that fic, but i wanted it finished, and to do it with i think optimal pacing would have made it twice as long as it was. so i said screw it, avalanche time, everything is happening all at once right now. there's very little breathing room there, which i think doesn't work too terribly in part because everything is so urgent and everyone is stressed so not being able to catch you breath sort of fits

See Something Say Something did not need to be 215k, although i'm not at all complaining. i feel very happy with how i told this story. but the basic premise - sam getting his powers early, getting involved in the large hunter world secretly from his family, and dean feeling misplaced and worried about how much sam needs/wants him - could have been told a hundred different ways and all would have pulled it off, so to speak

i considered doing the the entire fic from dean's pov (as a sam girl i love his pov because all he thinks about is sam and he's so insane about it) which would have effectively cut out basically the first five chapters. i thought exploring the slow realization of what's going on purely from dean's pov, with the audience having not insight would have been really interesting, just like what I did in dumb luck or good ghost with dean slowly figuring out that sam didn't die in the crash. another thing is the inclusion of all the side characters which i did to make the world feel rich and real, but we didn't need all these outsider povs to get the basic point across. very rarely is something vital being conveyed by an outsider pov, but it reinforced and adds to the main characters. i also initially didn't have wincest, which obviously added a ton of words. i loved exploring dean's self hatred and fear and sam's obliviousness, but bringing them to a place of ignorance to acceptance to happiness is a lot longer of a journey than just dealing with dean's propriety love as an unhinged co-dependent older brother. again, i'm sticking by all these choices, i made them because i thought it was the best way to the tell the story i was most interesting in telling, but my point is that you didn't need them to tell this particular story

it was also how i told the story. we spend a lot of time wallowing in character's emotions, especially dean's and sam's, but the others as well. part of this fic is convincing you that these two brothers should fuck, actually, and doing that effectively is going to take some time, especially at this point in their lives when things are pretty normal. comparatively, fucking your brother after starting the apocalypse is pretty small potatoes. i wanted you to understand these people, to feel what they were feeling, to not feel that it was inconceivable that jess would be willing to share her boyfriend with his brother, to buy all their relationships with each other in a way that isn't purely based on convenience

part of the reason i wrote dumb luck or good ghost before see something say something was that i felt i needed a firmer grasp on who the characters are before getting into who they were and who they could be - especially john, who i feel is exceptionally difficult to write without over excusing his actions or over villainizing them. the reason john doesn't get a single pov in see something say something is that while he's a motivating and underlying factor in much of the story, the story isn't about him. it's about the effect he has on those around him, and i didn't want to sully the pureness of that effect by introducing his internal dialogue, regardless of how persecutionary or absolving it would be. it's just not about him. it's how he responds to others and how they respond to him in turn

anyway! this is another example of something ending up longer than expected, but yeah. the plot of see something say something didn't change much from posting of the first chapter and my stories rarely do - i have plot points in siat that have been there since i posted the first chapter that are still relevant and happening. "harry and draco just. cut dumbledore's fucking hand off" my beloved

[argetcross]

Happy 4th anniversary to wasting beats of this heart of mine, my Zagreus becomes mortal AU! Another year, some more adventures undertaken.

This year, I've unearthed more concepts and half-finished paintings all the way from 2021. I've included notes under the cut about each piece, as well as more reflections.

If you told me in October 2020 that you'll write a fic over 100k words long, spanning multiple cities, with multiple POVs, I would have said, "Are you sure?". I think I never really imagined I could keep a story running, much less one that demands so much of its author. At the same time, this work has been my deepest and most fulfilling pleasure. It lives in my dreams, haunts my waking moments, and demands I regularly carve my heart out and poke through the viscera. I suppose such is the nature of art.

We've been approaching the end of Part III, and readers up-to-date know I've mentioned planning for five parts in total. Five acts, five biomes: it only feels fitting. Many things I had looked forward to (the chariot race! Kyane and Persephone! The return of Thymoetes!) have come to life on the page, but there's still so much of the yarn left to spin. I never expected needing years to complete this story, but I also feel strongly I am beholden to it now. To Zagreus, to Demeter's children, to the mortals and gods, above and below. I will continue to try my best.

Thank you to jules, val, nan, robin, and spleen for having beta'd for me during these years. This story wouldn't be what it is without you. Thank you to mag, for having crawled through the trenches of creating an enormous fanwork and countless hours of spreadsheeting, with me. To every artist that has ever drawn me anything, it is truly humbling to be able to inspire your work. To the House Party, whose friendship I am grateful for every day.

And to anyone who has ever read part of the story, left a comment, and stepped along on this journey with me, I cannot overstate how grateful I am. I remain baffled and pleasantly surprised that this world of mine can touch your heart. It's a story that I hope, when it completes, you will pick up again from time to time, and take pleasure in its telling once more.

With all my love,

Arget

--

Notes about each image:

Thanatos and Zagreus by the sacred olive trees of Athena. This painting was based on a photo I took in Athens. The quality of the sunlight astounded me and, in turn, made me think about life and death.

Thanatos anointing the body of the god Zagreus with nectar. This is related to the scene in Chapter 23, when he and Nyx converse by Zagreus' bedside.

Eleusis concepts. For such a powerhouse of a cult, Eleusis itself has a provincial feeling to it. I was captivated by the idea of the sea, and the fact that Zagreus had never spent any time on the coast. This would have been his first experience with it.

Athens. What can I say about Athens that hasn't been said? The trip I took late 2022 provided a lot of the inspiration for the citadel aspect of the acropolis. This is not the Athens of Classical Greece, the polis of democracy, but a fictionalized city-kingdom, under the rule of its royal family. The idea that Callisto had a student living in Athens was both a nod to the extensive trade happening during the Bronze Age and a deconstruction of the Amazon myth that the Greeks told themselves.

Clymene, the Oracle of Delphi. This was originally meant to be a Hades game-like portrait, but I scrapped the idea. She is dressed in the fashion closer to the Minoans, to give her a more Bronze Age feeling. As the head priestess, I wanted to show her age.

Apheidas and Thymoetes sketches. The two brothers are supposed to look night and day from each other. I tried to give Apheidas a pleasant sort of face, in comparison to Thymoetes' haughtiness.

The tapestry sketch. This was one of the first drawings I ever made about wasting beats, in an attempt to understand the type of story I was about to write. Key elements had already been decided, such as the chariot race and the way Demeter and Hades would play the role of the absent gods, for above as well as below. I had not written Apollo at this time, so you see him here with short hair.

Zagreus, reaching for a bloodstone. The chlamys, a gift from his foster-father's wife, has been the simple denotation of mortal Zagreus. Something bright and red, simple for it was woven by a farmer's wife, and barely able to protect his weaker mortal body.

Megaera, hurt and angry, and Than, stricken and alarmed, amidst a storm of paper. This is a scene from Chapter 18, Primordial Winter, that I had always wanted to illustrate.

[lttawnymadison]

TGCF Revised Version Afterword by MXTX

Since I kept seeing snippets of this, I wanted to read the whole thing for myself. I'd already bought the book on JJWXC and did an MTL for this. It's so wonderful that she's back and sharing new things and that the revised is finally done! - Tawny --------------------------------------------- The author has something to say:

Seeing the small red clay stove again.

———— Afterword of "Heaven Official's Blessing" 2022

■ Finally done!

Long time no see! It's another afterword starting with "finally." Without further ado, seasoned readers would know that I make substantial revisions. For instance, scenes like the Bai Feng Mountain Hunt and the ending recognition of Sizhui in the serial version of "Mo Dao Zu Shi" were not originally there.

The revisions in "Heaven Official's Blessing" are the most extensive of all my works. It was a huge project, as it is also the longest in terms of length, serialized over eight months. Due to poor health and other reasons, the revision process was interrupted for a long time before I picked it up again, and it sporadically took about five to six months over several years.

In the era of web novels, there are endless new entertainments, and honestly, not many people re-read a story. Plus, some problems in the serialized version are structural and can't be changed, but I still tried my best to address my regrets. After all, when I was serializing it, I was almost always in a feverish and sick state, barely pushing through. Additionally, I often enjoy comparing different versions of my favorite authors' works back and forth, finding pleasure in the process. So, for readers, discovering "Wow, this part has changed!" is like starting a new journey with Easter eggs in a second round.

■ The new revised version includes about 100,000 words of new content!

These 100k words are mainly concentrated in the latter half of Volume 1 and Volume 3, but there are plenty scattered throughout the text. For example, I fulfilled a promise to A-Hua, giving him several new outfits. Seeing A-Hua dressed beautifully in a new hairstyle to meet his gege made me happy.

In terms of the intensity of revisions, personally, I feel it goes like this:

Volume 1 and Volume 2 > Volume 3 > Volume 5 > Volume 4.

Additionally, the new version cuts some redundant words and plots that weren't very meaningful. However, I tried to keep all the original interactions between Hua Lian as complete as possible. If some minor interactions are missing, they weren't deleted but moved around.

■ One day, I suddenly dug out something.

An antique from 2017, a folder called "Heaven Official's Blessing Setting Collection."

Curiously, I opened it and read with interest.

● Comparing the original setting outline and the main text, the highest fidelity is in the main storyline between Hua Cheng and Xie Lian.

A-Hua, restored at a ratio of 1:100.

Hua's character setting is the most detailed, and virtually every point made it into the main text, including details like "ghosts don't like the sun, so Hua Cheng sometimes drapes a red cloth over his head"...

Points not used, listed a few:

As a child:

· After being saved from falling off a city wall, he foolishly followed a parade over and over again, grabbing people to ask, "Who is that? Who is that person?" People told him, "That's the royal son, the future Celestial God, the most outstanding Crown Prince of Xianle Nation ever!"

(This point couldn't be used because in the text A-Hua was held in the Crown Prince's arms after being saved)

· At home, he was often punished to stand or kneel, not given food, and wore old clothes, accused of stealing money. Whenever he argued with his family, he would stubbornly sleep in the Prince's temple overnight.

· Went to Mount Tai Cang to volunteer sweeping red leaves at Huangji Observatory, just to sneak peeks at his future wife happily swinging.

After becoming the ghost king:

· One of his hobbies is buying and building houses everywhere.

· Very protective of his leather boots, would (badly) polish them until they shone.

· To other devout followers of Xie Lian, he said: "You have good taste."

· Secretly prepared many betrothal gifts for his beloved god, wanting to marry him!

The character setting of Xie Lian as a teacher in the serialized version compared to the initial draft, the serialized text subtly differs. The initial draft was more... exquisite and elegant, very serious. The serialized text is more... humorous. I think perhaps because some plot points were tragic, Xie Lian thought he should be happier to make the readers more relaxed, so he drove me to adjust his mental state! But due to the spiritual oppression at that time, the character's depth was not enough, while in the new revised version, I hope he can show a more self-content state on the same core basis.

Excerpts from the unused original setting:

· Super easy-going. Easy-going means: if given fifty bucks, he would happily dress in drag and dance. Accepts haggling. Thirty bucks works. Twenty bucks too!

· The observatory is small, the house is broken, wants to grow flowers. Leaks during rain, so he uses a bucket to catch rainwater.

· Because he can't afford a caretaker, he cleans himself, and also feeds chickens. Chickens eat flowers. Keeps a cat.

· Completely engrossed in discussing serious matters, he unknowingly finished all the broken sweet dumplings!

● Water, Earth, Wind original setting:

The highest fidelity is the main line between Hua Cheng and Xie Lian, followed by the Water, Earth, Wind subplot.

The main conflict hasn't changed. Just... how could the original setting of Water, Earth, Wind be so dark and terrifying!

The character morals in the main text improved a lot, otherwise, the original Black Water would be sheer scheming + murderous! The ending for the Wind Master would have been more tragic.

The Venerable of Empty Words suddenly became an improvised character. It seemed like an ancient fable-like monster, making the main text more interesting than the original setting.

Overall, the formal version is a bit better written than the original draft.

● The unfortunate life of Lang Ying:

Lang Ying? Is there such a character? I don't remember!

Ah? It seems there was such a person, but I don't remember any of his plotlines.

This is most people's feeling towards the character of Lang Ying. It's not a delusion because he barely had any significant plot. In fact, any valuable scenes could have been replaced equivalently, so in the new revised version, I deleted this character.

But, in the 2017 setting collection, I suddenly found that I had actually opened a separate document for Lang Ying, and his role was defined as a "growing-type BOSS!"

I was silent.

And immediately opened the document, curious about my initial setting. A "growing-type BOSS," how did he become someone whose deletion went unnoticed...? (I even don't know how to address him!)

Who knows, perhaps out of excitement, I accidentally pressed the wrong shortcut, and somehow it became irreversible, leaving only an empty document for me to stare in disbelief. The once "growing-type BOSS" has now forever become a mystery!

This is the unfortunate life of the deleted Lang Ying.

· There was another document in the setting collection called "Swordsmith." I opened the document and read it with interest.

I was shocked. Because I completely forgot I had conceived this story. Why didn't I write it?!

Darn.

I know why I didn't write it. This story... it had no ending!

——————— Thus, the magical glimpse into the "Heaven Official's Blessing Setting Collection" concludes!

■ I like men with stories!

Maybe because I watched an outstanding work as a child. It was a memoir, the protagonist in the biography was gentle and affable, and the protagonist in the memories was cold and ruthless. The story was scattered with the poignant fragrance of white plum blossoms amidst bloody and stormy circumstances.

This almost perfect work deeply influenced my aesthetics, leading me to be most interested in the memory parts of characters in various works. Although many viewers prefer the present scenes, often asking when the memories will end, I actually find these intense and painful memories to be the most fascinating!

A story is the history of a character, as well as the key to their personality. A person with a story stands before me like a puzzle. The way to solve this puzzle is to understand their story. Because the biography makes one curious to know more about a character they like, loving them more now because of their past. When serializing "Heaven Official," my greatest pain initially was telling myself, "This time I don't want to write a memory slaughter," deliberately trying to avoid a structure similar to previous works, yet I still hadn't found a better way to express it, resulting in my deep dissatisfaction with the later part of Volume 1. I was also hesitant to fully commit to the memory scenes in Volume 2, and with the heavy mental burden, this part was very painful to write. When revising, looking at Volume 2 was almost unbearable, because I'm the type of person who, as a child, would immediately switch channels when a TV show's protagonist was about to be wrongfully accused or embarrassed. I couldn't help but knock on a friend's door and ask:

Me: Was the author suffering some kind of mental trauma at the time? This negative energy is too horrifying, the protagonist is so pitiful, I really admire anyone who could read through Volume 2 completely.

Friend: Do you even have the right to say that?

But the memory slaughter in Volume 4 was much freer, written in one breath, so the revisions for this volume were also the least.

So, will you still write large segments of memory slaughter?

Um, well, we'll see, haha, hehe...

■ Closing Remarks:

Lastly, I'll address the question some asked me, "Will the new revised 'Heaven Official's Blessing' be more torturous?"

Me: You're talking nonsense. 'Heaven Official's Blessing' is a sweet pampering story, thank you!

Acknowledgments:

Shi Nai'an wrote in the preface to "Water Margin": "On snowy nights, about five or six people listen to my storytelling; on rainy days, about seven or eight; on bright and sunny days, about ten. I read, everyone listens, and we are all happy, with no other thoughts." When I read this as a young person, I was delighted. What divine days! Writing first to entertain oneself, then to entertain others. Self-expression and self-acceptance are certainly primary, but the affection of others is also a significant positive feedback. Thus, first, I thank the steadfast readers who have accompanied me all this time. I've thought about just walking away amidst the noisy disputes; abandoning the account amidst the tumultuous world! It seems not bad. But looking back, I can't bear to leave some truly sincere readers.

I've had authors I liked disappear from the internet, and I always feel like a part of my youth has vanished, a feeling quite distressing, reminiscent of overly grand and harsh things like the tears of the era or the torrent of history. So, I want to accompany my readers as long as possible, hoping that the day of parting comes later. Perhaps I'm not good enough now, but I will strive to be better in the future. Or perhaps you've never truly understood what kind of person I am, or even completely misunderstood me, but as long as you genuinely like my stories, we can sit down and chat.

And, I must mention my friends, who can be described as having the courage of a hero. Long time no see, Teacher Changyang's illustrations are still as beautiful as those of a celestial being, I hope Teacher CAS can go to bed earlier and worry less, and Teacher Kuohao, who despite a heavy workload, still fully honored our agreement. The "Heaven Official's Blessing" radio drama is really fantastic! It reminded me of the original intention of writing this story, and I was very moved. If it weren't for the silent companionship and efforts of these old friends, Mo Xiang Tong Xiu might have stopped writing back in 2016, disappearing from the world of martial arts, and thus, "Heaven Official's Blessing" would not have been born. I look forward to retracing the paths we once walked together when gathering ideas. And many friends who reached out to help and encourage me, thank you for accompanying me through the snowy nights.

[graciereadshannigram]

hey fam, welcome to the April 2024 roundup of the best hannigram fics i've read this past month! i read over 100 fics total, and these were the cream of the crop.

as a reminder: the ingredients for a five star rating typically (but not always!!) include some combination of a.) believable characterizations of both Hannibal and Will, b.) compelling plot and/or character arcs, and c.) high quality smut.

that being said, my judgment of the aforementioned ingredients is powered almost exclusively by vibes and as such, is incredibly subjective.

you can find past recs below:

February March

and if you have any recs of your own for me, PLEASE SHARE.

anyway, in no particular order, let's go!

~

A place you can never go by det395

Word Count: 84,596 Summary: When things don’t go according to plan, Hannibal makes a wish. He finds himself a year-and-a-half in the past and seemingly given another chance with Will. His feelings about the situation only get more complicated when he realizes he may not have completely lost access to his old timeline after all. A Digestivo canon divergence.

If you follow me, you probably saw me already raving about this fic. This was so fucking good, holy fucking shit. And also heartbreaking. Made me think a lot about the nature of reality and what does it mean for something to be "real." Plus, I really love fics that explore their shared mind palace because I genuinely think that is one of the more underexplored aspects of their relationship. Definitely heavy on the angst, but there is a happy ending!

even though our love is doomed by bleakmidwinter

Word Count: 82,427 Summary: Hannibal solves the mystery of time travel and he and Will decide to go into the past and take opportunities previously missed along with rewriting the regrets they each hold. Changing the past does not effect the future and they have free reign to play as the please.

GIVE ME MORE THAN FIVE STARS PLEASE. I am obsessed with this fic. I've mostly stayed clear of time travel fics (aside from, you know, the one right above this) because the execution can be hit or miss, but let me fucking tell you. This was a god damn home run. There's a little bit of angst, but then there's also a chapter where Will challenges Hannibal that he wouldn't have been able to seduce him while Will was still working in Louisiana fixing boat motors. And obviously Hannibal decides to take that challenge.

Railroad Romance by OneWhoSitsWithTurtles

Word Count: 12,400 Summary: Hannibal is still Hannibal, and Will is still Will. Except Will is not part of the FBI and they meet on a two day train trip from New Orleans to Baltimore.

Dirty. Talk. In. FRENCH. Holy shit. Okay this was excellent. EXCELLENT. Perfect characterizations, and wonderful dialogue. Wow. Also, I love trains. Who doesn't love trains?

patroclus in furs by bleakmidwinter

Word Count: 130,185 Summary: If Will and Hannibal hadn't gone into their respective careers, they would have become porn stars.

I had my doubts about a pornstar AU, but I've really enjoyed everything else by this author and it was over 100k, so I gave it a shot! And WOW. The characterizations of both Will and Hannibal were spot on and believable. A good mix of fluff and angst, and the author clearly put a lot of thought into the porn scenes. Tbh I'm probably going to reread this shortly.

Pavlova by nbcravenstag

Word Count: 33,369 Summary: It’s not like Hannibal didn’t know that Will was hiding something. It was after the third body drop a week ago that it became clear that Will had a secret that somehow involved the case, one he wasn’t willing to share yet, not even with Hannibal. At 6:43 AM, Will had texted Hannibal that a fourth body had been found and that he was on his way to the scene with Jack. At 8:06 PM, Will had stepped into Hannibal’s office, thirty-six minutes past his appointment time, and practically shouted “I used to be a stripper!” as loudly as his hoarse voice would allow him to. Hannibal Lecter, though not phased by much in life, has never been entirely able to predict Will Graham, but this is just… getting out of control. Alternatively, the FBI is hunting a serial killer targeting male strippers, and Will decides to throw himself into the fray. Hannibal is beyond pleased.

An AU where Will was a stripper in college and now he's working a case where he can be live bait as a stripper? Shut the fuck up. Mostly told from Hannibal's perspective, and it's just *chefs kiss*. Who knew Will giving Hannibal a lap dance would be so HOT. (I could have guessed.)

Lessons In Submission by wyldefire

Word Count: 5,173 Summary: Hannibal was stubborn, independent, and Will had always loved that about him, but there were times, times like these, in the midst of heat, in the midst of such a thorough breeding, when lessons in submission were necessary.

My only thought at the end of this was, "Shut the whole fuck up" in the best way possible. Smut. Just all smut.

A Very Special Guest by LesBeanBurrito

Word Count: 56,660 Summary: Season 1 AU in which Will stays for Hannibal’s dinner party after bringing the bottle of wine at the end of 1X07 Sorbet. Embarrassed and Sassy Will Graham meets Smitten Hannibal Lecter.

I LOVE a good season 1 AU and this was checking all of the boxes for me! There's a secret relationship, Hannibal actually gets Will treated for his encephalitis, Will finds out about Hannibal, etc. Very much loved the plot, and the characterizations were spot on.

lover to your nightmare (look what you made of me) by merrythoughts and ReallyMissCoffee

Word Count: 123,367 Summary: Driving back home, it’s then he reflects on Hannibal asking him to run away that night. To forgo their plans altogether, to slip away. [Canon divergent. Will confesses his betrayal and asks Hannibal to run away with him, but Will has a plan of his own...]

You want dark!Will mixed in with some incredibly jealous and possessive Hannigram? Hooo boy do I have a fic for you! The ending was a little abrupt, but it was the perfect mix of gut-wrenching angst and toxicity + smoking hot smut. I genuinely had to stop and focus on my breathing more than once.

On the Lam by shotgun_sinner

Word Count: 63,992 Summary: Post-Fall (Hannibal)season 4Crack Treated SeriouslyOn the RunWill Graham Discovers FanfictionExplicit Sexual Contentsexual identity crisisThat's Not Really A CrisisWill Graham is HannisexualMurder HusbandsHomophobiaMurder of a HomophobeHannibal Lecter Loves Will GrahamWill Graham Loves Hannibal LecterPower Bottom Will Grahamthey love each other your honorvery meta

This was such a fun read – I love the implication that hannigram fanfiction exists and it's all there for Will to accidentally discover. I adore this author and just thoroughly enjoyed how Will learned a thing or two about himself by reading smutty fics (same dude).

Golden Promises by shotgun_sinner

Word Count: 68,488 Summary: Hannibal (TV) Season/Series 01Alternate Universe - Canon DivergenceEpisode: s01e07 SorbetHallucinations?Will Hopes SoLELOplugSexuality CrisisThat Ends Up Not Being A CrisisWill Graham Has EncephalitisHannibal Gets Will TreatmentDeveloping RelationshipWill Graham's Dogs - FreeformBonding over fooddoting hannibalEventual SmutHannibal Lecter Loves Will GrahamWill Graham Loves Hannibal LecterAlana DisapprovesRimmingOral SexBottom Hannibal LecterTop Will GrahamBottom Will GrahamTop Hannibal LecterWill Graham KnowsNon-Consensual Drug UseWill Gives Him Shit For ItMurder HusbandsCannibalismis that tag even necessary?Hannibal Lecter Loves Max

This was fluffier than I typically read, but I told y'all I love this author. Pretty much no angst, and the smut, as always, was next level. Also, the idea that Hannibal would wear a solid gold butt plug to his dinner parties had me laughing before I even started reading.

What Hatches by HotMolasses (@snazzymolasses here on tumblr)

Word Count: 107,847 Summary: There is a village, nestled on the edge of an ancient forest where it is always winter. Few of the townsfolk ever venture into it, except for one lonely hunter named Will Graham. A loner who makes his living selling stag meat and spends more time with dogs than people, he finds his life changing when he comes face-to-face with a magical beast, one that he cannot get away from, and isn’t even sure he really wants to.

What started out as a curiosity about the monsterfucking tag on AO3 brought me to one of the most unique and interesting hannigram AUs I've read??? I'm as surprised as you are, if not more. I adored this fic and I loved how both Will and Hannibal were characterized and the plot and the smut (oh my god, the smut) and the ending? Phew. Go read this.

lay like a flood spills away by bleakmidwinter

Word Count: 35,733 Summary: Will starts going to a nude beach that happens to be for gay men, even though he considers himself straight.

This was highly enjoyable. I LOVE AUs that manage to keep the characters true to canon. Also nude beaches. Hannigram and nude beaches. Eating ass and public sex with some actual plot sprinkled in. Say LESS.

Now, What Should We Do Next? by HigherMagic

Word Count: 51,116 Summary: Kinktober 2018

Smut. All smut. I showed this fic to a friend who has literally never read fanfiction, let alone Hannigram, before and she is now hooked. So. Do with that what you will. And it's so clear that this author has actual, real-life experience with kink and it comes across so well! Bonus point: there is also an equally good sequel.

To Mend With Gold by beforethedawn, ConstructFairytales, Destinyawakened

Word Count: 98,863 Summary: Will and Hannibal have been living as a gay married couple for three years, but they haven't slept in the same room let alone the same bed. Will Graham has a reckoning, one way or another.

THIS WAS TENDER. Fluffy, angsty, smutty, I loved it. Molly showed up with Will's dogs and decided she wasn't going to turn them in, which was a little weird, but I really loved this fic. Just them learning how to be with each other. Also EXCELLENT marathon smut scenes. Like yesssss, of course they can each cum like three times in a row.

A Clutch at Balance by Deverauxs_Disease

Word Count: 25,466 Summary: When Will Graham storms into Hannibal's house muttering about kissing Alana Bloom, the good doctor makes Will an offer: Pretend to date Hannibal in order to prove to Alana that Will is not only stable but capable of being in a relationship. When Alana is convinced Will is the man of her dreams, Hannibal will step aside and Will can get his girl.

Y'all know I love fake dating that all of a sudden, whoops! Isn't so fake anymore! Sprinkle in some jealous and possessive Hanni and Will? I'm sold. Say less.

~

And that's a wrap on this month! See ya next time!!!

[tssidesfics]

Updates

We've entered the holiday season, which I don't really give two shits about except kinda Halloween and even then I never do anything. But my abusive parents do, and the way they manifest that is, weirdly, by just increasing the abuse for the last three months of the year. I think I'm fine enough, but I'm going to be struggling with depression through the end of the year, meaning I likely won't get much written. It's all tricky writing from here on out with all my series.

Said series are: A Story of a Soul in All Its Stripes (best known: Morality Is Grey, my 100K+ word series about how I think Virgil defected from the Dark Sides including all the episodes written out with minor differences explained by Thomas remembering these conversations back to write the scripts). In All the Fifty-One and a Seventh Realms (uneducated disabled dhampir Virgil, disabled Janus/Remus in an anarchists-with-benefits relationship, namely exemplified by the one where Janus is cursed to be a politician and Remus insists an over-it succubus sex worker's help in saving him). And Superhero Toddler Roman, which speaks for itself, I think it's a pretty original concept. Along with many, many one-shots. Browse my AO3 and see if there's anything you recognize I've worked on. https://archiveofourown.org/users/thein273

If you have some spare money, and my writing has ever touched you in any way, please consider donating to my Paypal. I'm disabled in several ways, I can't work, I have months more at a minimum to wait on disability, and the only source of income I have isn't particularly helpful. I can't afford mentally to really do commissions right now except with very generous donations, but I've written a lot, and I've shared a lot with my communities. If I mean anything to to you as a writer, it would mean a lot to get just a little better of cushioning to get through the holidays, for my safety.

But there are also a lot of people who need the money more than me, so if it's between donating to a Palestinian family or me with your spare five dollars, choose the Palestinian family. Just check yourself so you're not giving money to one of those vile scam artists who are using people's real pain and unimaginable trauma and suffering to fleece well-meaning people out of a quick buck.

One of these days, I'll try to launch and maintain a Patreon, but that's for another day.

paypal.me/everdean03

[late-to-the-party-81]

Answer the questions and tag five fanfiction authors you know!

Thank you @metalbvcky. NPT for @mrs-illyrian-baby @doasyoudesireandlive @km-ffluv @labella420

🍓 How did you get into writing fanfiction?

As a teen I was a voracious reader and tried to write my own stuff based on other books I'd read. I also loved ST:TNG and wanted dearly to be in an episode and had lots of the books. I wrote my own ST stories with OC's (gratuitous self inserts), but they never went anywhere. In my late teens I read some Xena fanfic on the internet. But that was it for a great number of years.

At the beginning of 2021 I sat and watched the entirety of the MCU films in chronological order (I'd seen most of them before and was mainly a Thor gal.) I fell down the Stucky rabbithole. Deep. I decided to look up fanfic. AO3 was now a thing! I wrote (a very poor) Stucky fic and here we are, almost 3 years later

🍇How many fandoms have you written in?

As my ST stuff never made it further than my parent's old PC in the days of dial-up, I won't count it.

I've written for MCU, various Chris Evans and Seb Stan Characters and one fic for RWRB. I've been toying with writing a one-off Criminal Minds fic as a gift for a friend.

🍈How many years have you been writing fanfiction?

Three in July since I first published anything on AO3.

🍎Do you read or write more fanfiction?

I try to balance it out. If I have a period of hyperfocus writing I try to then go through a period of reading. I read on both Tumblr and AO3, so try to keep that even as well.

🍌What is one way you've improved as a writer?

Getting betas to pick me up on tense changes, overuse of words and rogue commas. Reading more. Practising. Writing outlines for longer stories so I don't go off-piste.

🍑Do you have any bad habits as a writer?

Getting bored half-way through a long fic, especially if the first few parts haven't had a lot of interaction. Which is why I try to write the whole thing before I start posting.

🍍 What's the weirdest topic you researched for a writing project?

Engineering courses at MIT and, for a separate fic, Violet wands, including the ways to use them and the differnt types of accessories you can use with them. I even watched a Youtube video.

🍉What's your favourite type of comment to receive on your work?

Any comment! Anything that gives me the validation I need!

🍐What's the most fringe trope/topic you write about?

I wrote a transformation into Tsum-tsum fic that was both cracky and smutty. That's pretty niche.

🥭What is the hardest type of story for you to write?

Action scenes. I loathe them. I'm constantly wondering if they are long enough, and make sense.

🍏What is the easiest type?

Short things that are either PWP or fluffy slices of life.

🍑Where do you do your writing? What platform? When?

Mainly on my elderly laptop on G-Docs, and in every moment I can - normally afterwork before dinner and on Mondays when I don't have work.

🍋What is something you've been too nervous/intimidated to write, but would love to write one day?

There are a few characters and ships I haven't written that I'd like to. And I suppose I'd like to write a proper long, over 100k fic at some point.

🍇 what made you choose your username?

When I made my AO3 account I felt as though that at 40, and only really starting in Fandom in this way, I was late to the party, so that is who I became.

[chromatic-lamina]

2024 Writing Roundup

I think I deleted my round up on the AO3-looking template, so, at the nnntthhhh hour, using it in text form, tagged by @hyperions-light . Thank you very much! I'm taking this from AO3. I've had a few meta on tumblr, but not many. I've got five fics outstanding for 2024, that I guess we'll see in 2025. I also didn't do any secret santas this year (I told myself I was too busy). It was a bit strange! Anyway--

words posted: 28,656 on main, and 12,362 on anon

additional words written: not sure what this means. I didn't have too many meta, so I'd say about 500? Ooh, wait, unpublished zine pieces: about 8000.

fandoms: One Piece

highest kudos: It's been a quiet year (no Bioluminescent Hearts this year!) so Heart Pirates' Week at 47 kudos. 72 on anon, and cumulatively, Dark like the North Blue Sea (aka The Sea-Hill you Die On) drew in 336 kudos. valuta , which was published in late December 2023, 92 kudos.

highest hit one-shot: Decomposers, my fic for the LawZo zine, has 586 hits. Fic on anon, 5,500 hits (but it's not a one-shot!).

new things I tried: I did the Davy Back Fight <- fic here, written with 3 others, and the remix project <- fic here. I was happy to try both!

fic I spent the most time on: Probably Welding, which was written for the KidLaw zine, just because the timeline/schedule on preparation for that zine stretched across almost two years. Also, it had a higher word count, and I really wanted to do it right (as with most pieces!).

fic I spent the least time on: Probably Sunk Cost Fallacy, which is a Heart Pirates fic written for the Davy Back Fight. Mostly because it was written between four people, and we wanted to keep a fairly low word limit. The ficlets I wrote for the Heart Pirates' Week took longer, but not that long.

favourite thing I wrote: It's a draw between three: Welding (6,767 words), my KidLaw fic; Decomposers (3,006 words), my LawZo fic; and water fills the shape of the holder (2,125 words), Law reflection fic, remixing one of @purplehairedwonder's fic.

I also had fun with the Kaidou, Queen, King and Black Maria piece (Remedy for Errors) I wrote for @crowbarsolo in support of Palestine, and Widi's Waddle (about Penguin's penguin), written for the OP Friend-Shaped Zine.

favourite thing(s) I read: Aw, a ton of stuff. I always like @anarchycox's LawZoLaw (also a great SmoLaw, but I'm not sure if it was this year), and all of the stories for the LawZo and KidLaw zines. I especially liked @alpha-hydra's Liminal Space (KidLaw), beautiful story by @/gammacavy from 2022 (The Caravel who Dared the Tempest) about Going Merry, but I just read it this year, and anything @crowbarsolo wrote, but especially the Cavendish/Nico Robin piece The Special Guests. ALSO! must mention home (the gilded lily remix) by @gladdecease who wrote a beautiful story springboarding from an older story of mine (house / yorishiro). Also loved Only You And I Remain (KidLaw) by @betsib and Give it to me, show me what you're feeling (show me that you need me) (LawZo) by @/CursedHoneyB. Maybe just check out my bookmarks (watch out for the kink!). Have been reading the multi-chap Warsong about my favourite rarepair, MarcoLaw, but it might've just gone beyond my word count limit (it's about 100K beyond my limit. Haha). It is beautifully written, though.

Give @hyperions-light's The Road(trip) to Hell Is Paved with Questionable Decision Making a read! It's a lot of fun, but all of their work is good (paying back, but also true!) They write under @flyiing-giraffe

Two more!

I'm really enjoying the Going Merry: A Poor Substitute for Romance series by Springtime4Persephone. Focus is ZoSan, and I'm not a ZoSan shipper, but I enjoy it, and what I enjoy even more is the LawBin, and side servings of ZoLaw and LawSan. Very empathetic, fun and also a good serving of angst. Also, @/TerrifiedAristocat's Somebody Write Down the Recipe (LawSan, vampire and creatures of wonder in a modern day setting) is very good. Ongoing. Last two are E ratings.

Also, there are a dozen things I've read and loved and haven't mentioned here. I read a lot less this year though. All of the stuff for the Heart Pirates' Week was great, and I really enjoyed the beginning of ghosts speak in whispers and lies; can't know what's real 'til you're the one who's died (E rated, LawBin) by @nehswritesstuffs (Nehszriah) on AO3.

writing goals for 2025: None so far. Maybe return to my own work (rather than fanfic). BUT, who knows :D

new works: Again, nothing lined up at the moment. I do have a story in the gorgeous Pigment of Imagination (ophuezine). Pre-sales open now (closing soon). And four ficlets for the upcoming Fate and Fortune, one piece anthology digital zine. Stay-tuned for both! OH, also, I have a piece for the Baltigo Manifesto zine (about one piece revs). Due for publication in 2025.

tagging: only do it if you want to! (and I know there's not much time, and I know you might've already finished!). @purplehairedwonder , @ninhaoma-ya , @anarchycox , @kookoofufu (even if you don't play on tumblr anymore :D), @fowlfics @starlightbelle and anyone, anyone who'd like to play.

[malfoyesque]

Fanfic writer. Mostly Dramione, but I drabble dabble in others

Follows back from @mrsbsmooth

🌷- Cute | 🔥 - Smutty | 🤡 - Funny |😖 Angst | 🏳️‍🌈 LGBTQIA+

🌿A Little Pick-Me-Up - Hermione/Draco - 🔥

A competition to see who has the best pickup line backfires when Hermione uses Draco’s hand as a necklace, with sExXxXyY rEsuLtS (I’m so bad at summaries) - (7.4k words)

🌿 Hands Off - Hermione/Draco - 🔥🤡

Possessive Malfoy doesn't like hands on his wife. Only his. So she finds something else for him to do with them - (9.1k words)

🌿I was just thinking about it, I’m not gonna do it - Hermione/Draco - 🔥🌷

Draco has a breeding kink and is supposed to pull out but accidentally, like, doesn’t - (2.2k words)

🌿LDWS: Shakespeare in Love (Winner!) - Multiple Pairings - 😖🌷🤡🏳️‍🌈

A collection of Shakespearean drabbles as part of the Last Drabble Writer Standing competition (which I won!) - (3.9k words)

🦋 All I want for Christmas is five fucking minutes - Hermione/Draco - 🌷🔥 🤡

Colleagues and single parents juggle their lives to get some... 'grown-up' time. The office Secret Santa means Hermione can give Draco what he really wants for Christmas. (14k words)

🦋 Cut, Expose - Hermione/Severus Snape - 😖🌷🔥

Severus takes an eighth-year Hermione on as an apprentice. He acts professionally around her… Until she makes it impossible for him to do so. (14k words)

🦋 I warned you there’d be consequences - Hermione/Fred/George - 🔥🌷😖🤡

Ron's been cheating on her. His twin brothers are even angrier about it than Hermione is. Oops. (12k words)

🦋 If the Shoe Fits - Hermione/Draco - 🤡🌷🔥

Size queen Hermione gets stuck in the wall of the Room of Requirement. The man with the perfect cock finds her. But he keeps disappearing x so now, she has to try and find him. (24k words)

🦋 Keep Your Wand Up - Hermione/Draco - 🤡🌷🔥

Draco lowered his wand. And now, people are joking that he’ll never get it up again. So if the entire school were to just so happen to find out he was still a virgin– Yeah. You see the problem. But he soon finds out that he's not the only one. And that might be the thing that saves him. (19.6k words)

🦋 Overturned - Hermione/Draco - 😖🔥🌷

Voldemort's followers were punished harshly. Stripped of their magic, their money, and everything but their names. Hermione Granger, magical lawyer, won't stand for the cruelty. One by one, she's tracking them down to have their sentences overturned. But Formula 1 superstar Draco Malfoy doesn't want her help. And Hermione’s going to find out why. (WIP - Currently 5.1k words)

☂️Tell Me What You Want - Hermione/Draco - 🔥🌷🤡😖

Tensions are high. People are remembering how much they used to hate each other. A masquerade ball will keep things calm.

It won't leave Hermione frantically trying to cover up the fact she's slept with her worst enemy.It won't mean she now sees Draco Malfoy in a different light than she did before. It definitely won't make things awkward now that she might be his boss on a permanent basis. It won't. It won't.

A masquerade ball is a great idea.

(WIP - 100k+ words)

🌷- Cute | 🔥 - Smutty | 🤡 - Funny |😖 Angst | 🏳️‍🌈 LGBTQIA+

[anneapocalypse]

AO3 Year End Roundup 2024

Thank you for the tag, @crackinglamb!

Tagging: @farfromdaylight @dreadfutures @rosella-writes @myreia and anyone else who hasn't been tagged yet and wants to do this!

Words posted: 15,777

Additional Words Written: A little over 100k by the looks of it! I had at least a little of what I posted this year written in 2023, so I don't have an exact number.

Grand total of words: 121,950

Fandoms: It's been an FFXIV year! I posted my first XIV fic in February and my most recent one this month.

Works: 5

Highest Kudos: At present, it's the one from February, In Thine Arms, Ere Long, with 55.

Highest Hit Oneshot: Same as the above, with 534.

New Things I Tried: I don't think I've written phone sex before? Honestly, it's all been pretty thoroughly in my wheelhouse.

Fic I Spent the Most Time On: Without a doubt, Harsh Light, Ariane's post-Heavensward fic. I have hope of having it and its companion fic, Gentle Dark, finished and posted in 2025!

Fic I Spent the Least Time On: I'd guess Of the Depths was probably the fastest write.

Favorite Thing I Wrote: Of the ones I've posted, I think The Pursuit of Idle Pleasures is my favorite. The Starlight fic was fun too! but I just so dearly love writing Urianger's POV. Of the unposted work there is much of Harsh Light and Gentle Dark that I am proud of and excited to share, though there's a lot of work yet to do.

Favorite Thing I Read: @myreia's Divergence of the Heart (Aymeric/WoL, Thancred/WoL, Thancred/Hilda, 53K, rated E) was a really standout read for me this year. A beautifully-written fic about two of my favorite things--complicated relationships, and the Warrior of Light having a bad time in Ishgard--this story moved me in a variety of ways and has lingered with me long after I finished reading! Highly recommend.

Something I Finished: I finished five one-shots! Also a first draft of a nearly 60k longfic.

Miscellaneous Highlights: I'll give a highlight to my Starlight fic, No Sweeter Gift, started last winter and left unfinished until I returned to it this month. I'm not sorry I let it sit for a year; I think I have a much stronger grasp of both Ariane's voice and Urianger's now, and was able to make it what I wanted it to be! (Also, I've learned a lot about gpose, and it was a lot of fun doing some shots to go along with the fic.)

Writing Goals for 2025: Finish and post Harsh Light and Gentle Dark. Beyond that, I got where the wind takes me. When I set goals for a whole year, they almost always end up either not realistic or not mattering to me by the end of the year because something else seized my attention, so I'm just not going to worry about it.

Final Thoughts: I considered 2023 to be kind of a rough year for writing, and I feel like I came back pretty strong in 2024. Not just in raw word count, though that's definitely a part of it (I wrote about 40k in 2023). While I am sorry last year lost me so much momentum on the Dragon Age longfic that's currently sitting on the shelf, I cannot be sorry for having fallen so hard into FFXIV, because it truly did so much to revive my energy for writing and help me find the joy in it again.

Also, it's been fun writing so much smutfic again! In recent years I've kind of struggled with writing sex scenes, not for any conscious reason or inhibition, but I'd just start something and then get bored with it quickly and move onto something else. Perhaps falling so deep into a new ship has revived my inspiration! Whatever the reason, that's been most of what I've posted this year, and it's been a blast!

I am really looking forward to sharing more of Ariane's story as it comes together! There's also a lesson I'm hoping to take from how much fun I had writing this year, and that's that not everything has to be a longfic. I did make a lot of longfic progress this year; it's the vast majority of what I wrote, and I'm very happy with the numbers. Nonetheless, I think periodically writing a one-shot has really helped with keeping my energy up. I think I've had a bit of a problem in recent years with putting too much pressure on myself to turn every idea into a Big Story, and squirreling ideas away to use in some theoretically longfic later instead of just developing them into a perfectly workable short story today.

I do love writing longfic, and I'm pretty good at motivating myself through those long first drafts, but nonetheless... sometimes you just forget what it feels like to finish something. Also when a fic can take months or even years to finish, it keeps me living with this perpetual terror that I won't be able to sustain the interest long enough to finish the thing before my fixation moves on to something else... and leaves me feeling guilty and sad when that does happen and a big project needs to go on the shelf, unfinished and largely unseen. I love writing, and I love writing fanfiction because there's no reason to do it but love, love of the source material and love of the characters and love of the community and love of writing itself. But there are moments when that feeling starts to creep in that I'm making it a job for myself, and I don't want to do that.

It's caused me to give some more thought to how I want to structure future work, Ariane's stories in particular, because while there's lots more I want to write about her, not all of it needs to be a longfic. Most probably doesn't, in fact. Harsh Light did and does, but I already knew that the next thing (chronologically) was going to be more a series of vignettes than one long story. The big question will be how I want to write about Shadowbringers. I know broadly what I want to write about in Shadowbringers, and it's such an important part of Ariane's story that for a long time I felt like it had to be a longfic... but seeing as it pretty closely follows canon other than the ship stuff, I don't think making it a longfic would bring enough new to the table to justify how much canon I would have to straight-up rehash. (Even in the current draft of Harsh Light, there are a few points where I'm struggling with this--I think I probably need to give myself permission to pare certain canon events down to a summary or a passing mention where I don't actually have much new to say about them.) So now, I'm considering that maybe it doesn't need to be a longfic at all! Maybe simply writing the vital moments and letting the reader's memory of canon events carry the rest is enough. Furthermore, I'm pretty sure anything I want to write about Endwalker and Dawntrail can be done in one-shots.

And realizing that... honestly, it's very freeing. In addition to lifting a lot of the pressure I tend to put on myself, it also means I don't need to write everything in order; I don't need to be constantly plowing forward chronologically with no breaks. If I want to work on some Shadowbringers fic while I'm finishing Gentle Dark I can do that. I don't have to look at my character's story as a massive, daunting project that will take years to finish, but rather as a well of possibility that I can dip into whenever I want, and wherever chronologically I want, and I can leave and work on other things and come back whenever I want, and it's okay.

2024 in general was a lot about freeing myself from other people's expectations. So maybe the next step is considering the expectations I set for myself. I want to keep writing, and fanfiction in particular, a joy. I may always want to write long stories in some capacity, but I think right now opening myself to writing more short ones has been very good for me and something to embrace in the coming year.

[tedwardremus]

🪅 brag about any project you want to! tell us why we should be reading it RIGHT NOW!!!

⏳ what project(s) did you spend the most time on?

🎁 hype up one of your writing buds! what of theirs did you enjoy this year? 💞 HAVE A HAPPY NEW YEAR!!!

brag about any project you want to! tell us why we should be reading it RIGHT NOW!!!

I am once again going to tell people to read She Faced Danger, But Never Feared It 

For anyone who is tired of seeing the wizarding war depicted as a bunch of teens fighting each other like its the Hunger Games please give this fic a chance.

Members of the Order are seasoned professionals in various fields. Aurors to fight on the frontlines, ministry officials to help funnel information to Dumbledore. And Dorcas. My healer who is a grandmother who is recritted to the Order after she published an article calling dark magic a public health crisis.

She is dedicated to a hopeless cause becuase she knows it is the right thing to do.

She is a hufflepuff.

She, of course, is killed personally by Voldemort.

Have a little snippet:

As she arrived, Aurors were levitating several bodies into the ward. She spotted Frank Longbottom leaning against the entrance, casually lighting up his pipe. He placed it between his teeth, puffing a cloud of smoke. “They don’t allow smoking in hospitals,” Dorcas said, her voice tight as she approached. “Shame,” Frank replied, not bothering to remove the pipe from his mouth. “It’s a health hazard.” “So is being an Auror,” he muttered, eyes still fixed on the scene. Dorcas glanced around at the floating bodies. "What happened?" Frank’s expression darkened. “A group of Squibs was holding a support meeting in Manchester. Death Eaters found them."

what project(s) did you spend the most time on?

After almost a year of writing and 100k words, Rage Against The Dying Of The Light is definitely the project I spent the most time on.

Which is why I'm taking a bit of a break before I start the sequeal.

hype up one of your writing buds! what of theirs did you enjoy this year?

Just one? Can I do several?

Like cozy fall vibes reminiscent of Gilmore Girls? I cannot recommend Bewitched by @starlingflight

All fans of hinny and Bridgerton should run over to read 7 Scandals and a Baby by @ginnyw-potter

@celestemagnoliathewriter's Wed the Witches will make remadora shippers out of all of us.

And one of my favorite delights of the year was from a little writer named @eastwindmlk (don't know if you know them) and the Galavant Ren Faire series. As one of five Galavant fans out in the world I love this series so much!

HAVE A HAPPY NEW YEAR!!!

Same to you, Babe!!!

Send me Year in Review writing asks!

[cirrus-grey]

20 questions for fic writers

Tagged by @magnetarmadda; thank you!

1. How many works do you have on Ao3?

252, of which a full 227 are TMA

2. What’s your total Ao3 word count?

905,246

3. What fandoms do you write for?

Recently? TMA/TMagP, Discworld, and Good Omens. I'll jump into anything that gives me plot bunnies though, and there's been quite a few different ones over the years!

4. What are your top five fics by kudos?

Yesterday is Here

Déjà Vu

Misfiled and Misinformed

Humanity

Against All Probability

5. Do you respond to comments?

Always! I try to clear my inbox weekly and/or before I post a new fic, though I'm falling a bit behind right now with JonMartinWeek.

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

Hmm, probably Wedding Blues - it's a bad-ending Lonely!Martin fic

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

So, I write a lot of happy endings and I'm not sure how to rank them. Probably either Yesterday is Here again, or the Castaways series.

8. Do you get hate on fics?

I think I've only ever gotten one hate comment? So no, not really.

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

I... try? I'm not very good at it and it takes absolute ages. It's been described as "very polite" smut, though I'm attempting to get a little raunchier with it as I get more practice.

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

Yeah, I've written a couple! The craziest is probably the first one I did, a Good Omens/Skulduggery Pleasant crossover that I'm still quite fond of.

11. Have you ever had a fic stolen?

Not that I know of!

12. Have you ever had a fic translated?

Yep, Unsent and Courage in the Dark have both been translated into Russian!

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

Nope.

14. What’s your all time favorite ship?

I don't know if I can give just one, honestly. For different reasons, both JonMartin (TMA) and Ineffable Husbands (Good Omens, primarily book not show).

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

This is a throwback but I still have notes for an epic, multi-part, 100k Gracious/Donegan origin story fic from back in my Skulduggery Pleasant days. I wasn't a good enough writer back then to finish something that ambitious and I doubt I'll ever get invested enough in the fandom again to go back to it... but it still lives on in my daydreams.

16. What are your writing strengths?

Hmm... I'm good at conveying character emotions in a scene, and with pacing a story to make sure each new development or twist lands the way I want it to. I like to think I've got a knack for making dialogue sound in-character as well, even if I've put the characters in a situation that their canon selves would never be in.

17. What are your writing weaknesses?

Action scenes. Balancing conversations between more than two people without having some of them drop off or dominate the scene. Keeping track of large casts of characters in general - I've written so many 2-person romances, I just don't have practice with larger groups.

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

I love it when other people do, but it's not something I've attempted myself. I'm only fluent in English and I'd worry that I'd written something completely inaccurate if I had to rely on google translate or similar.

19. First fandom you wrote for?

Good Omens! (Book)

20. Favorite fic you’ve written?

Oh, do not ask me that, I beg of you. There are about a hundred fics I've written that could all qualify, depending on the day and what mood I'm in.

...I'll say Vous, et nul autre, for now, because I'm really proud of how that one turned out and the fact that I finished it at all - it's one of those that I had the idea for years before I was good enough to write it, and I really like being able to look at it now and see how far I've come.

Tagging... @my-lonely-angel, @fridayyy-13th, @grahamfolgersdeliciousnotebooks - only if y'all want to!

[echodrops]

The Promises I Made (2023)

Oh man. Oh man.

At the end of last year, I said that I had really struggled through 2022 and hoped that 2023 would be an easier year, but also that I didn't want to count any chickens. Which was... ultimately the right mindset to have, because 2023 was even worse for me than 2022. Between the stressors of work, money, and things just falling apart on me left and right (car is still in need of $3000 worth of work...), I couldn't be more glad that 2023 is over.

Consequently, it was a very bad year for promises. Possibly the worst year I've ever had since I started, actually. Oof, icing on the cake after all the disappointment I dealt with this year.

Still, a tradition is a tradition. Here are the promises I made for this last year!

2023 Promises

1) Work on the Texas house yard. It’s still never really recovered from the frost that killed everything in 2021 and it looks pretty shabby right now.

Status: Broken, mostly. I did have the gardener come and do a lot of trimming as well as take out one dead tree, but still, one dead tree remains, and the tree in the backyard has grown roots so big now that they've exposed a underground wire, so uhhhh... gonna have to deal with that this year...

2) Get both bedroom floors sanded in the Utah house upstairs.

Status: Broken. This just didn't happen. No money. But it really, really needs to happen soon though... Oof...

3) Get the Utah house sprinklers up and working ALL the way for this summer.

Status: Broken. This is the hardest promise on this list, I swear to god. This city in Utah has NO ONE who is willing to work on normal residential sprinklers. Please someone save me.

4) Actually get the back fence fixed up and the greenery back there trimmed and managed.

Status: Broken. Well, one day...

4) Put a new sink/vanity in the downstairs bathroom of the Utah house.

Status: Broken. I sure... made a lot of promises about the Utah house, didn't I... Where did I think all this money would come from...

5) Related to that, lose at least 20 pounds. 2020-2022 was not kind to me and the stress eating was real.

Status: Broken. I didn't gain weight this year but I didn't lose any either. RIP.

6) Take my mom on a road trip to one of the U.S. states that she has not been to before.

Status: Broken. I was busy all summer and we just didn't do this.

7) Get back in touch with the allergy specialist to continue working on my allergy/inflammation issues.

Status: Broken. Yikes, seven in a row without a single kept promise. Anyway, I did want to do this, but again, the surgery they want me to have will take all my insurance and then $2000 out of pocket. It's just... not going to happen...

8) Go through my closets and donate or throw away clothes that I know I will not wear.

Status: KEPT. Oh my god, one I actually did. I ended up donating SO MANY shirts to Goodwill.

9) Finish at least five books this year.

Status: Broken. I finished two I believe. But... maybe the 50+ 100k word fanfics I read this year could count instead?

10) Organize my documents (especially student papers)—my desktop and documents folders give me nightmares just looking at them. 

Status: Broken. Jesus, why am I so allergic to this promise? I think it's been on the list for like three years running now.

11) Help Kacchan through her first semester as a teacher! Exciting!!

Status: According to Kacchan herself, this promise has been kept. Go me.

12) Get a decent paper shredder to shred old mail. 

Status: Kept! I finally got a shredder!!

13) Clean off my back patio/car port area so I can park my car there again.

Status: Broken. Literally there's not that much stuff out there other than my coworker's old bikes she dumped on me. Why have I not done this...

14) Get the Texas house dishwasher fixed… I’m so tired of washing dishes by hand… How do people do this, oof.

Status: Kept! I got a newwww dishwasherrrrrr. I am so happy...

15) 100% complete FF16 babyyyyy!!

Status: Broken. I played it, but did not 100%. Too busy. TvT

16) Talk to an HR rep about my retirement savings so that I can consolidate my retirement accounts. I have been putting this off for like five years now.

Status: Broken. I think this has been on the list for years too. And given the current uncertainty of my workplace, I honestly think at this point I might be better off not asking anyone who works there for any financial advice...

17) Do at least one artwork to actually use that new paint program I bought. 

Status: Broken. Well, I THOUGHT about it. Does that count?

18) Pay my credit debt down by at least $2000. I’m still paying off the hell year but I hope I can make progress on this.

Status: Broken. The hell year of last year became Hell Year 2.0, Economic Boogaloo this year. So many things went wrong and had to be paid for. My wallet is C R Y I N G.

19) Finish making changes to master courses. No more major revisions!

Status: You know what, I'm going to count this as kept, because we're now down to the really specific courses that only one or two professors teach. So, close enough!!

20) See a zone-tailed hawk. This is another rare-but-possible bird for my area.

Status: Kept! Conveniently, one flew over my car one day?? I got only a terrible cellphone photo, but I did see it. Yay!

21) Attend the FFXIV Fanfest in Las Vegas!

Status: Broken. I tried!! But I did not win the lottery for a ticket, so I was not able to go. This one was pretty much out of my hands, though.

22) Update HaaH at least once. Please, Echo???

Status: ...I'm sorry, forgive meeee. OTL

23) Get the small leak fixed in the side bathroom of the Texas house and have the faucets replaced.

Status: Plumbers are... so expensive... Broken.

24) Look into the cost of light housekeeping services to give myself a little more time to do things that aren’t work.

Status: Technically kept... in that I did look into the costs... But ultimately, I chickened out of contacting anyone. I don't know why, but I feel like even if I got a housekeeper, I would be so embarrassed by my house being messy, I would frantically clean it the day before the housekeeper arrived anyway...

25) Catch up with hanging up all the charms/pins I’ve gotten recently on my corkboards; these are just sitting in boxes/bags around the house. D;

Status: Broken. My god, I thought about doing this so many times this year but I just never did it... I even both MORE charms and then didn't hang them.

26) Use Spotify more often or cancel my Spotify Premium subscription; it’s not worth it if I don’t use it.

Status: Kept. I cancelled it when they decided to raise the price. Cancelled Amazon Prime and Netflix this year too. Honestly way too tired of companies raising the prices of subscription services while offering LESS quality than in prior years.

27) Get an art display book to preserve my great grandfather’s artworks.

Status: Kept. They are safeeeee now.

28) Fix the screens on the Texas house.

Status: Broken. Probably for the best I didn't do this though, since the dog developed a habit of scratching at the office WINDOW to be let back into the house...

29) Bird watch at a specific location in Texas. It’s my secret where since I’d rather not share my specific location on social media, but let’s hope I can finally make it to this place!

Status: Kept. I didn't see many birds there though, RIP.

30) Finally get rid of the dirt pile in the front of the Utah house.

Status: Broken. I feel like the dirt pile is getting smaller and smaller over time as erosion takes its natural course, but I didn't really do anything to decrease the pile this year.

31) Sign NeNe (my puppy) up for the intermediate dog training course.

Status: Broken. I thought about this several times, but decided not to in the end. I wasn't massively impressed by the trainer she had for her puppy class, and honestly she's pretty decent at learning things at home anyway.

32) This is super nerdy, but my bro got me the FFXIV cookbook and made me promise to actually use it, so I guess I’d better at least try to make something from it.

Status: Broken. I keep making this promise and continually forget it, over and over.

33) Take down the remains of the wooden fence posts at the Utah house.

Status: Broken. This one I could have done and just... did not do. I'm pretty useless.

34) Take part in the fitness challenge at work this coming semester.

Status: Broken. To be fair to me though, in August I fractured my pelvis and basically couldn't do anything past basic walking all the way until December so I kind of have a semi-reasonable excuse for this one.

35) I will remember to take my medicine on time, all the time. Taking them late is messing things up quite a bit.

Status: Mostly kept. There was a night or two where I did forget, but since I literally require this medicine to live, I can basically immediately tell when I need to take it again, so most nights I do take it on time.

36) Get a stand for the toaster oven in the break room so we can finally use it!

Status: I'm going to count this as kept even though we did not get a new stand. Instead, we rearranged the order of the room to make it possible to fit both the toaster over and the microwave on the same countertop. So the toaster oven can indeed be used now!

37) Get my car detailed because the inside really needs to be vacuumed.

Status: Broken. My god, the car needs this so desperately now. But... money...

38) Go horseback riding on the island. I’ve never ridden on a beach before!

Status: Broken. Nobody really seemed that interested in going with me, and I thought it would be weird to go alone...

39) Eat healthier. Maybe cutting out snacks is too much to ask, but at least replace some average meals with salads, etc. and overall make an effort to actually eat better. Sometimes the fact that I feel like garbage is my own fault.

Status: Broken. The stress eating was extreme this last year. Please save me.

40) Wait, I should probably acquire a Playstation 5 so I can actually play my new copy of FF16, lol.

Status: Kept.

41) Help make sure the new tutoring requirement for the English classes goes over well.

Status: Kept, in that I did the best I could with a very, very weird plan. We immediately abandoned this plan the moment the grant expired anyway, since no one liked what admin had wanted us to do.

42) Finish decorating the main office. I’ll feel better if my workplace reflects the level of professionalism and school spirit that I envisioned it having this year.

Status: Broken, and I'm not going to roll this one over to the next year because I am 100% stepping down from my current administrative position and going back to being a full-time instructor again, so I will not need to decorate the main office anymore! Whoo!

43) Catch every variant of Vivillon in Pokemon Go. I’m currently missing Icy Snow, Marine, Meadow, Monsoon, Ocean, Polar, River, Sandstorm, Savanna, Sun, and Tundra, if anyone would like to be friends!

Status: Broken. I caught some of the ones I was missing but I really didn't play as much Pokemon Go this year. Broken pelvis decreasing walking ability but also just got tired of the game pushing more and more microtransactions, so I kinda took a longggg break.

44) Try to be more comprehensive with giving feedback to students. I’m always good at providing detailed comments on essays, but I’d like to spend more time commenting on smaller assignments too this year.

Status: Broken. Every year I try, every year I feel like I still haven't given enough. Maybe the issue with this promise is that I don't really know what is "enough" for the students compared to what I personally think I should give...

45) Make sure the retirement party for my coworkers who retired this year goes off without a hitch and honors them well.

Status: Kept. Oh, this was so nice and so much fun. It was really great seeing the retiring faculty members so emotional over how much we were able to honor them and their contributions to the school.

46) Take part in more activities on campus; I have a tendency to not attend many events because they’re in the evening when I’m tired, but I should really stay more often.

Status: Kept, though mostly by necessity. I kept constantly getting called in to help on things, even in other departments.

47) Write some Chainsaw Man fanfic for @mistystarshine!

Status: Broken. I'm so sorry, this just did not happen. I wish my work schedule was manageable instead of actually insane. There are so many things I want to write and do for myself, rather than for work...

48) Help my parents tear out the carpet in my old childhood bedroom.

Status: Broken. My mom talked about it a lot, but it never ended up happening.

49) Do something to destress (massage, pedicure, something?) at least once per month. I gotta take better care of myself…

Status: Broken. So broken. I only got more stressed this year. More and more and more and more...

50) I will keep my promises! 

Status: Oof, mostly broken. Next year I'm going to set a reminder for myself so that I remember to check my promises every few weeks or something...

Kept promises: 15

Broken promises: 35

Another year, another chance, I guess. See you all in 2024!

[aparticularbandit]

Top 5 Things You've Written That You're Most Proud Of!

Ask Me My "Top 5" Anything....

CrossRoads. Which is not posted anywhere except on Facebook, and even then it's only the first...2/3 of it? I think? I've used it a bit here and there in some of my RP stuff and have tried to reboot it and done some of that here and there but. The original CrossRoads was the first full length novel I finished writing. It took me...three? years? Yeah. So this.

Soulless. Which also I haven't posted publicly anywhere. But this is my book that delves into the soulmate timer world I built. (You in particular would like this. For reasons.) But of all of the soulmate timer stuff I've written, this one is my favorite and the one I'm probably the most proud of. Because I finally figured out how to novel it.

Surrogate.

Luisa and the Fox. Maybe this shouldn't be on Top 5 proud but. It's one of my favorite things I've ever written, and it's the singular one of my fanfic that I've printed out and have in a binder (with a fanmade cover! Actually!), so like. This goes on this list.

Finding Family (and really also this should include the Finding Family Holiday Special because it's part of the original). Because I can't a Top 5 list of things I'm proud of without mentioning this. This mammoth thing. This nearly 375k fic (it passes that if you include the Holiday Special. Which you should) that I wrote in five months and for a while was posting a chapter a day - sometimes two chapters a day (I think maybe three chapters one day? I think) - and which gave me a month of over 100k in one month (and the next month was 90k) like. This mammoth thing. Praise God for this thing because like. I'm so proud of this thing. And I'm so proud that I actually finished it. And I'm so proud that I was able to give it the ending it was meant to have - the one I planned from the beginning - and that like. It evolved and expanded and the community that grew up around it and discussed it with me and left comments like. This fic. is SO important to me. And like. I can't words this one fully, I don't think. And that's okay.

[physalian]

(decided to throw this ask here since ur last post encouraged me to lol)

tl;dr: going thru a breakup with my current WIP so I'm in limbo and can't move on to a new one

I'm actually not working on anything right now because I'm going through a form of breakup with a WIP I had worked on for so long (6+ years).

My beta readers (3) deemed it uninteresting and full of plot holes from the start. I thought the amount of editing and rewriting I put it through helped with that, but now I believe the problem runs deeper. Maybe it's the plot itself that's too underdeveloped or something.

Long story short, I decided I didn't want to give the trilogy more time (I've given it enough already) so I'm moving on. But it's kind of hard to pick up something new when all I've known for so many years is this one WIP. I even had noncanon fanfic about it just for fun.

Any thoughts, takes or advice is welcome really! And thank you for your time ofc 🌸

I actually had this happen. I had a WIP I started in 2016, unofficially abandoned last year—mentioned it a few times across my posts as the sci-fi WIP with multiple POV. What had happened was that I started writing it my freshman year of college, and the person I grew into through college had completely different goals from freshman me, which meant the very foundations of my world and my characters were no longer meshing no matter how many times I tried to fix the plot.

It didn’t have any holes and my betas said they were interesting enough, but it was a five-book series and upon starting book 3, I just could not figure out how to move on. I had too many characters with conflicting arcs, too many directions I wanted to take it, and it was deeply political (shaped by the 2016 election year) and I just got exhausted with the tone and the parallels to the real world. It wasn’t fun anymore, and a couple of my characters were my therapy stress balls, and I put them through hell that I wouldn’t be comfortable publishing today.

So it sits there, mostly abandoned, while I steal names and themes and a few monologues that fit in Eternal Night. The breath of fresh air I had when starting Eternal Night, a brand-new world with brand-new stakes and brand-new characters that could be whatever I wanted? 100k word first draft was written in 31 days and went straight to beta readers. That sci-fi WIP had multiple magic systems, was deeply political with a lot of moving parts, a rather large ensemble cast that had nearly doubled by book 3. I designed my own alphabet and language, I had cover art and maps done for the first book, I was writing fanfic crossovers in my head with my characters and other media I liked. It was my writing career, everything centered around it.

Eternal Night actually began as me ripping my two favorite characters from that WIP and tossing them into a kind of ‘fanfic’ and seeing what happened. To this day, I still accidentally think of my protagonist and deuteragonist using their original names from the old WIP, and my protagonist's name was only updated like, last week on my character excel sheet, because I never noticed. Whenever I need a new fantasy word in my much-less-robust fantasy languages for Eternal Night, I consult the language matrix I made for the old WIP and change some letters around where needed so in a way, it lives on.

It took me until about halfway though Eternal Night to start actually caring about the new iterations and the rest of the new cast of characters, going through the motions with zero plan, until it kind of hit all at once. Suddenly I could imagine their faces and how they sounded and what dreams and aspirations they’d have. I was rooting for them to succeed and daydreaming about different ways I could take their arcs, what themes I wanted to explore with them.

And now Eternal Night is due back from my editor, today, and it’s about to go up for preorder on Amazon.

So, advice? Just because you abandon a long-running WIP doesn’t mean it was a waste of time. That’s six years of practice, six years of trial and error trying to make it work. There’s no reason you can’t take your favorite aspects and blend them up into something new. Write your own ‘fanfic’ with your favorite characters. Hell, make it a coffee shop AU, and see what happens. You might find yourself onto something to reignite that spark.

[tsarisfanfiction]

For the writers ask game: 1, 5? ✨

Hi! Thanks for the ask :D

What fic of yours would you recommend to someone who had never read any of your work? (In other words, what do you think is the best introduction to your fics?)

I have vague recollections of being asked this a few years ago (maybe it was the same ask game coming back again), and my answer then was Black Widow - a Naruto fic based on Rin&Obito - because I thought it best showcased my tendency to play around within the canon narrative, but at the same time twisting things around so it's basically a canon compliant alternate universe - although technically it might not be AU at all.

The one downside with recommending that one now, I think, is that I write for several fandoms, and Black Widow was my last foray into writing for Naruto, and was also written several years after my previous fics for that fandom, so it's almost certainly my best work for that fandom purely because I was a better writer when I wrote that one. (That's not to say I've lost interest in the world of Naruto - I still have a few ideas knocking around including an Obito&Shisui one that I really love - my muses have just categorically refused to engage with writing anything for it for the last few years.)

More up to date with what I currently write, I would instead say that Dawn Rises From The East - a Michael Yew-centric Percy Jackson fic - might be a better introduction. It's a far more recent fic for the fandom my muses have been solidly engaged in for the past year, but it shares some broad strokes with Black Widow, if not in plot in how my mind worked to play within the letter of canon without actually following the heavily-implied spirit of it.

Both are oneshots, because I think that's a more realistic ask than to direct someone towards a longfic from the start, but for people who prefer wordcounts the other side of 100k, Tales From The Heart - a 260k+ Heart Pirates-centric One Piece short story collection - runs through all the genres I write and gives a much broader scope of what you're likely to find from how I handle fluff, whump, angst, found family, friendship, etc. The only genre that's almost entirely lacking from that series is romance - and I very rarely write that anyway, so I'd call that an accurate representation!

5. What do you wish someone would ask you about [insert fic]? Answer it now!

You didn't specify a fic for this, so I suppose that leaves me to pick a fic as well, which is a bit of a choice when I've got *checks AO3* almost 350 of the things, but I'll go with a currently-backburnered project I am very fond of (and will continue to write one day!) - Long Way From Home - a Scott-centric Thunderbirds fic.

What surprised me the most about the differences between TOS and TAG's technology, and is it going to be relevant later on?

I had a lot of fun researching this fic. For the most part, for the TOS worldbuilding anything that I can't take straight from canon, I've extrapolated based on what technology existed in the 1960s, and tried to jazz it up appropriately as though I was someone from the 1960s trying to imagine the future. It gave me a great springboard to follow when I started reaching holes in the original worldbuilding which turned into glaring chasms when using a narrator from a very different futuristic imagination.

That being said, the thing that surprised me the most - despite the fact that, logically, it makes sense - was not a difference, but rather a similarity. Of course, TAG was very faithful to the broad strokes of at least most of the Thunderbirds' designs, with Three and Five being the ones with the biggest shifts (understandably so, given how much we expanded in spacecraft between 1965 and 2015), so there were always going to be more similarities than differences between the controls of the two Thunderbird Ones, but I hadn't expected that to expand further into aircraft controls in general. Poor Scott was originally doomed to a long haul of re-learning how to fly from scratch, before I discovered that jet plane controls have apparently barely changed in the last fifty years - this immediately changed a few things, which have even started to show themselves in the published chapters so far. Scott will regain his wings a lot faster than originally planned! As for where else that might take him in the story... well, readers will find out one day!

---

This got long, whoops. Thanks for the ask!

Questions for Fic Writers