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Fanfiction writer asks

@criminal-minds-fanfiction sent out an epic set of 50 questions under this title. (Thank you!) It took awhile, but these were excellent questions, and I enjoyed answering them. (I just reblogged them without answers, in case any of you want to have a go.)

I don’t expect many will want to read all 50 answers, but people who have recently started following me might be interested in the fics I write in the Jonathan Strange & Mr Norrell fandom (and even those I used to write in the Lord of the Rings fandom).

Fanfiction Writer Asks

Most of the writer ask posts I come across are only like ten or so questions long so I thought I’d try to make a longer one because we like talking about our writing! Feel free to reblog!

1) How old were you when you first starting writing fanfiction?

52, still going at 68

2) What fandoms do you write for and do you have a particular favourite if you write for more than one?

Started out in The Lord of the Rings, writing Gandalf slash. (My fics are available on my old website, “Meddling in the Affairs of Wizards.” Haven’t had time to add them to AO3 yet.) After a seven-year pause, got started again by the Jonathan Strange & Mr Norrell tv series, after having been a fan of the book for seven years. (Those fics are all on AO3.)

3) Do you prefer writing OC’s or reader inserts? Explain your answer.

I have written OCs, but only if they fit into canon, which I try to stick to as much as possible in most cases. (I had to look up “reader inserts.” Never done one.)

4) What is your favourite genre to write for?

Given my two fandoms, it must be fantasy.

5) If you had to choose a favourite out of all of your multi chaptered stories, which would it be and why?

I suppose it would be “From the Ashes a Fire,” a Gandalf/Aragorn romance. I tried to pair Gandalf with as many different guys from the novel as possible, but Aragorn always seemed to most logical lover for the wizard. I think most of my fics up to that point had been practice for that one.

6) If you had to delete one of your stories and never speak of it again, which would it be and why?

“Service at the Prancing Pony,” which pairs Gandalf and Bob. (Yes, there is a Bob in LOTR.) It was only my second fic, and it’s pretty trivial.

7) When is your preferred time to write?

Evening.

8) Where do you take your inspiration from?

The challenge of figuring out a fic with explicit content (usually) and keep it true to the original source novel.

9) In your xxx fic, what’s your favourite scene that you wrote?

“Thrice Returned” is a multi-chapter novel pairing Gandalf and Frodo. My favorite scene is when Frodo wakes up in Ithilien after the Ring is destroyed and discovers that Gandalf is alive. I always felt that Tolkien should have shown that scene, but he skips over it. Of course, my version is more romantic, which is partly why I like it.

10) In your xxx fic, why did you decide to end it like that? Did you have an alternative ending in mind?

I don’t recall ever having an alternative ending for a fic in mind. My funniest ending, I think, is in “Mr Norrell’s Breeches.” I had no idea how I was going to end it, and inspiration struck just as I got to the ending. (Usually I know how the story will end, sometimes down to the last exchange of dialogue.)

11) Have you ever amended a story due to criticisms you’ve received after posting it?

Yes. In Chapter 8 of “Two Masters in the Darkness” Norrell and Strange summon the new King of Lost-hope (to call it by its old name). I referred to the King as King Stephen, but as one reader pointed out, he wasn’t using that name after the death of the gentleman with the thistle-down hair. I amended the story to be more consistent with that premise.

12) Who is your favourite character to write for? Why?

It was Gandalf for six years, until I ran out of inspiration. (I just COULD NOT find a way to pair him with Sam.) Since I started writing JS&MN, it has been Mr Norrell. Although I write book-canon, I imagine my Mr Norrell as he is played by Eddie Marsan, who brings such warmth and empathy (and cuteness!) to the role, despite the fact that the screenwriter made him such an inconsistent character. (If he can do the fantastic York Minster magic, why can he not do sea beacons? And so on and on.)

13) Who is your least favourite character to write for? Why?

Generally I don’t write for characters I don’t enjoy. Lady Pole was the hardest; I only did her once.

14) How did you come up with the title for the xxx? - You can ask about multiple stories.

Often I do variations on quotations from the book. My favorite title of my own is “One Spell not to discover what My Friend Is doing Presently,” where Mr Strange speaks harshly to Mr Norrell, who casts a spell to make them invisible to each other. I loved writing the farce that resulted.

15) If you write OC’s, how do you decide on their names?

I generally do a search for Regency-era names, as with the Misses Whitworth and Bastable in “Mr Norrell, ladies’ man.”

16) How did you come up with the idea for xxx?

Often I rely on prompts, but I came up with the idea for “Stark Staring” on my own. It started with a simple premise, that Mr Norrell would get a little tipsy and cast a spell that would allow him (but no one else) to see Mr Strange unclothed. I thought it a pretty feeble idea, but it worked out very well.

17) Post a line from a WIP that you’re working on.

From a fic with the premise that Mr Norrell is (of course) secretly in love with Mr Strange and highly distracted by his pupil’s habit of pursing his lips when he is concentrating on his work. He inadvertently lets slip some indications of his desire when the two are close together looking for a book in the library: “Mr Strange had not failed to notice the man’s gaze directed at his mouth and the faint whimper and the subsequent slight confusion and the heavy breathing and the mere pretense of examining the books when instead Mr Norrell was staring into space and blushing furiously.”

18) Do you have any abandoned WIP’s? What made you abandon them?

Nothing that I carried on beyond a few paragraphs. Just couldn’t find the inspiration to go on.

19) Are there any stories that you’ve written that you’d really love to do a sequel to?

I would love to continue my “Jonathan Strange ♥ Mr Norrell” series by taking the two magicians on one of the adventures that are only hinted at at the very end of the novel. I’ve gone so far as to set them up as planning to go to Egypt, but I have not had the time to do the necessary research to figure out a plausible evil spell for them to save someone from. Maybe someday, but I doubt it.

20) Are there any stories that you wished you’d ended differently?

No.

21) Tell me about another writer(s) who you admire? What is it about them that you admire?

I am very fond of the JS&MN fics by Predatrix. She also writes Norrell, pairing him with Childermass most often but also with Strange. She sticks less to book-canon than I do, but she has a great imagination when it comes to thinking up magic for the characters to do. I have not got that talent and usually derive the magic, when necessary, from Clarke’s book.

22) Do you have a story that you look back on and cringe when you reread it?

Not really.

23) Do you prefer listening to music when you’re writing or do you need silence?

Either way. As long as I’m not listening to vocal music with English lyrics, I don’t get distracted.

24) How do you feel about writing smutty scenes?

Love ‘em, though I have written so many by now, and for the same characters, that I kind of dread them.

25) Have you ever cried whilst writing a story?

Yes. At the parting (inevitable) of Gandalf and Aragorn at the end of “From the Ashes a Fire” and at the letter Childermass writes to Norrell in Chapter 9, the end of “Two Masters in the Darkness,” after he has been separated from Norrel by the Darkness. Even though my main pairing if Norrell/Strange, I loved writing the relationship between Childermass and Norrell in “Master and Man” and its consequences in “Two Master in the Darkness.”

26) Which part of your xxx fic was the hardest to write?

I did an AU version of “Thrice Returned” (the Gandalf/Frodo epic) where instead of being killed by the Balrog, Gandalf survived and went with Frodo and Sam (and Gollum) to Mordor. Figuring out what effects that would have on the rest of the book’s plot was a killer, but I struggled through it and came up with something that someone manages to be sort of book-canon and yet AU at the same time.

27) Do you make a general outline for your stories or do you just go with the flow?

Sometimes I do an outline for the multi-chapter fics. Not for the one-offs. In doing “Jonathan Strange ♥ Mr Norrell,” I had to do an elaborate chart with a chronology of all the things that happened to the two in the Darkness, since I wanted it to be absolute book-canon despite involving events in the final chapter that Clarke barely hints at. The chronology (when was Norrell born? 1765 in my head-canon) is the hardest part, since Clarke is so clear about hers.

28) What is something you wished you’d known before you started posting fanfiction?

More of the conventions. I just saw a prompt on Library of Moria requesting a Gandalf/Pippin fic, as if it would be something hard! I saw how to do it right away and just launched in.

29) Do you have a story that you feel doesn’t get as much love as you’d like?

I think “The Toasts of Venice,” a sequel to “Jonathan Strange ♥ Mr Norrell” that takes the two magicians to Venice immediately after the last scene in the book, is pretty darn good, but for some reason it got far fewer hits (averaging by chapter) than the original. It has an amusing scene of Strange trying to get Norrell to be a bit less shy about going out of Hurtfew by taking him to a sweets shop.

30) In contrast to 29 is there a story which gets lots of love which you kinda eye roll at?

I’m rather surprised that “A Book with a Strange Spell upon It” gets more hits than most of my other one-offs, some of which I think are better. But it’s a good story, so the disparity if not odd enough to make me roll my eyes, even a little.

31) Send me a fic recommendation and I’ll post it for my followers to see! (The asker is to send the rec not the answerer)

Having plugged Predatrix’s work already, I’ll say “The Perils of Being a Virgin in Faerie (Together with a Solution Thereto)” by Nothingshire. An excellent premise—that Mr Norrell’s virginity makes him an attractive kidnapping target for Fairies—with delightful humor and genuine affection between the two magicians.

32) Are any of your characters based on real people?

Not apart from the ones in JS&MN that Clarke based on real people.

33) What’s the biggest compliment you’ve gotten?

So hard to pick, but I really appreciated one I got for my series “Jonathan Stolen & Mr Norrell.” The premise is that after a few years in the Darkness, Jonathan attracts the attention of a beautiful lady fairy who kidnaps him, and Mr Norrell has to get up the courage to rescue him. I was a bit trepidatious about writing a Fairy character, especially given my lack of imagination when it comes to writing magic. But I gave it a try, and one reader made me confident that I had succeeded: “I love Lady Turn-of-Tide! You've pinned down the character of Clarke's fairies exactly: capricious, self-centred, vain, generous and cruel all at once, and utterly incapable of seeing humans as anything but cute playthings. As Strange says, she's a good sort (for a fairy), but I know I wouldn't want to meet her! She was a lot of fun to read about, though.” Yay!

34) What’s the harshest criticism you’ve gotten?

There was a troll on tumblr who was lambasting those of us who write really explicit stuff about JS&MN characters. She or he was denouncing a group of us (specifically by our pseudonyms) for ruining Mr Norrell and the others. As if anyone was forcing her/him to read the stuff! Fortunately the fandom sprang to our defense, and I actually got more hits than usual on my latest Norrell fic, “Stark Staring.”

35) Do you share your story ideas with anyone else or do you keep them close to your chest?

I’ve run some stories past Predatrix and even collaborated with her, and I’ve done that with past betas.

36) Can you give us a spoiler for one of your WIP’s?

I only have one, which I quoted above. It is based on a prompt that requests that Norrell be the top in the sex scene, for a change. That goes against my head-canon, but I shall do my best.

37) What’s the funniest story you’ve written?

Hard to choose, but I guess I would say “The Epic Battle over Mr Norrell,” where Childermass and Lascelles both want Norrell sexually, for different reasons, and they decide to have a contest demonstrating their various skills for a delighted but increasingly frustrated Mr Norrell (since of course they have to start over at each stage of the contest without him coming). Guess who wins!

38) If you could collab with any other writer on here, who would it be? (Perhaps this question will inspire some collabs!) If you’re shy, don’t tag the blog, just name it.

I’ve collaborated with Predatrix, but the sort of stuff we write requires very similar tastes, and I doubt I would find anyone else.

39) Do you prefer first, second or third person?

Definitely third, though I have done some first person in letters within the fics.

40) Do people know you write fanfiction?

Only people online.

41) What’s your favourite minor character you’ve written?

I don’t know whether he counts as minor, but I have built up Mr Norrell’s servant Lucas into a fairly major figure in my “Jonathan Strange ♥ Mr Norrell” fics. He agrees to return to Hurtfew, even in the Darkness (as do some other servants), and he works his way up to essentially replacing Childermass as Norrell and Strange’s Man of Business. I quite like him as a character.

42) Song fic - What made you decide to use the song xxx for xxx.

I’ve never done one.

43) Has anyone ever guessed the plot twist of one of your fics before you posted it?

Not that I know of.

44) What is the last line you wrote?

I added this to the WIP quoted above, in 17: “The exchange of Jeremy’s Tott’s little monograph, ENGLISH MAGIC, for its mirror had been a thrilling revelation that there was a second genuine practical magician in England.”

45) What spurs you on during the writing process?

Like Tolkien, I write what I would like to read. I am a professional writer and love dealing with the English language. It’s fun, and I love reading the results.

46) I really loved your xxx fic. If you were ever to do a sequel, what do you think might happen in it?

See number 19.

47) Here’s a fic title - insert a made up title. What would this story be about?

I fear I cannot come up with a title before starting to write the fic.

48) What’s your favourite trope to write?

Basically my Norrell/Strange fics are based around the idea that Norrell, who in the book is so boring and dry and selfish, becomes a different person when he’s with Strange. More lively, talkative, and even passionate. That makes writing about these two when they’re finally reunited in the Darkness is such fun. Norrell is transformed into a fascinating character.

49) Can you remember the first fic you read? What was it about?

It was called “No Windows,” and it was a LOTR AU in which Gandalf seizes the Ring because he loves Frodo and wants to spare him the agony of carrying the Ring—and naturally he’s corrupted by it. It was a terrific story, but unfortunately the author apparently withdrew from the fandom and deleted the fic. I was lucky to have started with such an excellent fic, since it made me go on and read more and then start writing.

50) If you could write only angst, fluff or smut for the rest of your writing life, which would it be and why?

I would say smut, since virtually all of what I’ve written has included very explicit scenes. But I’ve also enjoyed working out the other scenes and making them book-canon. I think I would choose fluff if I could only do one, since I enjoy writing comedy and farce.

#Jonathan Strange & Mr Norrell The Lord of the Rings fanfiction asks

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