#ive been told this fic is marketable /j

[turtleplushi]

Art for chapter three of Hate Me Not :))

Maybe go read it if you haven't already hehe

[silentauroriamthereal]

Okay, so this is extremely long, but my good friend @ravenmorganleigh tagged me in this a few days ago, and I would never refuse her. I’ll put most of it under a cut! This was very interesting to answer! 

1. What was your first fic and could you stand to reread it today?

Ooof, that’s a big ask! My very first fic was a Harry/Snape (yes, I know, groan away!) and the fact that I haven’t re-read it in well over a decade is suggestive that I never will, lol. I couldn’t even remember what it was called, so I just looked it up. It’s called Things Change (not linking it, sorry!!) and it was posted on skyehawke.com after fanfiction.net banned me in September of 2004. Lol. It’s still there, along with all of my other Harry Potter fic (of which there is over 1.4 million words).

2. What’s your most recent fic and how far do you think you’ve come?

I just posted Out of the Woods yesterday, which is an intentionally light-hearted story. My last serious one is the one I wrote just before it, The Clouded Eye, and I would say that between these and my earliest stuff, there is a significant gap in quality, yes. :P

3. In your opinion, what’s your best fic?

That’s honestly impossible to say. It depends what you’re judging on. For intricacy of plot, clearly my novel, Against the Rest of the World. For sheer fixing for series 4, which is a herculean task to explain, fill in the gaps logically, and then actually make it palatable, I would give it to the fix-it that most clearly addresses the most issues with series 4 – the Holmes family history, Eurus’ existence in general, Sherlock’s memory problems, Mary’s wholly unbelievable and unsatisfactory death, the practical issues with the entire concept of John and Sherlock having a child at 221B, etc – and that fic is Hell Hath No Fury. It’s a bittersweet ending, and honestly the most realistic I can see after that disastrous series. For sheer levels of how much it explains and delves into, I’m very pleased with it. For depth and intricacy of emotion, my personal vote goes to The Wisteria Tree. For pure porn, it has to be Best of Three. For one of my overall personal favourites, Bridging the Ravine. 

4. In your opinion and without looking at any numbers, what’s your most popular fic?

Far and away it’s Best of Three, which is rapidly closing in on 100,000 hits, probably the only work of mine that will ever achieve this milestone.

Putting the rest under a cut! 

5. Is there any fic that makes you super happy to reread and remember you wrote that?

I’m equally proud of all of my stories, for different reasons.

6. Is there any fic that makes you super embarrassed to reread and remember you wrote that?

Nah. I’m frankly proud of the silly ones and as to the early stuff, everyone has to start somewhere!

7. What’s the fic you most want to continue (unfinished or no)?

I have no unfinished stories at the moment. I just finished one, so I’m officially between projects. That will probably last for all of 2-3 days and then I’ll start something new.

8. What’s the oldest (longest since last update) fic you most want to continue (unfinished or no)?

Not applicable; I always finish my stories.

9. Have you ever written for a fandom without watching/reading/playing the source material?

No, and no offense, but I find that entire concept ridiculous and rather disrespectful to the source material. Even when I disagree with the canon, I have legions of respect for it.

10. Have you ever written for a fandom without reading other fanfic for it?

Yes, I have exactly one Star Wars fic (though I think I took it down for some reason, years ago) and one Lord of the Rings fic, and I still have never read any fic for those fandoms other than my own.

11. Have you ever written a fic for a concept you know someone else has done before? How did it impact your writing process or feelings after posting?

Only once, at least knowingly: after writing three long series 4 fix-it fics (A Case For Domestic Propinquity, Hell Hath No Fury, and From the Bottom of the Well), I decided that I wanted to finally give in and write a well-known trope, and wrote a fake-couple-for-a-case fic (Bridging the Ravine), which is now up there as one of my favourite fics of my own collection. Happily, I have a personal policy that I don’t read other people’s stories while writing my own, as a deliberate attempt to keep myself free of influence. The downside is that I miss out on probably a lot of good fic. For this trope, I’d only ever read one or two stories that would fit that description and they were literal years ago, so I don’t remember any of their details and didn’t want to. I make a pretty strong effort to not just reproduce the same ideas that other people have already done, which is a tricky thing to do in a fandom that has a lot of similar ideas and desires for the final results (aka, Sherlock and John getting together). I really do try very hard, though! This particular story also contains way more original characters than any other I’ve ever written, many of whom have developed enough backstories to work as stand-alone characters in their own stories and I’m proud of that, too! There are 24 in total!

12. Have you ever written a fic and decided never to publish it? Why?

No. There are story ideas I’ve refused to let myself write, though. Or several that I’ve sat on for months in trying to refuse to write, like my first Freebatch fic. I have mixed feelings about Real Person Fic and tried very hard to suppress the urge to write The A.G.R.A. Complex, and managed to keep myself from doing it for nine months. But then I caved. For the few I’ve refused to write, either it’s been because the concept itself made me sad, or it centred around an unpopular sexual kink, or some other reason like that. But generally, if I want to write something, I’ll just write it, and if I write it, I’ll post it.

13. What’s the biggest change between your style when you started in fandom and today?

I wouldn’t say that there’s been a huge change. I wrote more chaptered stories in the beginning, but I’m very busy and the stress of updating regularly is too much for me right now. I found my stride in the long novella. I strongly prefer the single-chapter format, but if it’s over 40,000 words, I’ll make myself break it up into chapters. The last WIP I posted as I wrote it was Against the Rest of the World, which I wrote over four months in the fall of 2013, leading up to the release of series 3 – in fact, I finished it two days before TEH aired! I was updating on average every six days, and some of those chapters were over 10,000 words long. It was a strain to keep it up, honestly – it meant that I was writing around the clock, day and night. It was the first thing I would do in the morning and the last thing I would do at night. I would come home on breaks at work to write, or take my laptop with me. I lived and breathed that story for four months. It’s told in first person voice (Sherlock’s POV), too, so it meant that I had Sherlock’s voice in my head at all times for four months. I missed him when it was over.

14. What’s the biggest change in your taste between when you started in fandom and today?

I wouldn’t say that there’s been one. I’m always trying to go further and further into the characters, their feelings, their experiences, and relate them so that the reader can ideally not just watch the story unfolding, but feel everything that the POV character is feeling at the same time. One can always go deeper, and I will never stop trying. Obviously different stories call for a heavier or lighter touch that way, but you get the drift.

15. Have you ever purposefully written one fandom/fic idea over another because you knew it’d be more popular?

No. I write the stories that come to me. I never write aiming for popularity. Though of course, I paradoxically always hope that my stories will be! But I never think, “Hmm, what would the fandom market really go for?” I just write the stories that I feel I need to tell.

16. Have you ever stopped writing a fic/for a fandom because it wasn’t receiving enough attention?

Never. I think that’s lame.

17. In your opinion, what’s your most overrated fic?

My most popular, Best of Three! Similar to Bridging the Ravine, I wrote this one after I’d written my initial big trio of series 3 fix-it fics (Deductions of a Lesser Mind, Act IV, and Vena Cava), and just needed to take a break and write something lighter. I wrote the entire thing in under 24 hours. I get why it’s popular – the combination of humour, sheer smut, nod to The Three Garridebs, and then the twist of romance at the end is a fairly unbeatable combination, but at the time I was indignant by its popularity, honestly! I’ve written many, many better, less popular stories. What can you do? Over time, I’ve stopped being exasperated and just rejoiced in Best of Three’s popularity.

18. What’s your most underrated fic?

Ha! That’s so subjective! I really can’t answer that. Instead, I’ll just list some stories of mine that I’ve been very proud of and sometimes wish people would read more: Hell Hath No Fury (again, very proud of this one for its sheer amount of fixing), A Satellite Out of Orbit (this is a companion story to Where My Demons Hide that features Sherlock’s visits to Ella, set just before and during TLD, but also extending to after the point where the original story stops – not compliant with TFP, as both stories were written before it aired, but I’m still proud of them both!), Munich (probably less read because it’s an established relationship, which tends to be less popular), The Legacy of Martha J. Hudson (this one is SUPER sad and I’m not surprised that people have shied away from it, but I still think it’s worth the read! Good for when you need a cry? Because, as the title heavily implies, Mrs Hudson dies in it), Pater Noster (a rather dark fix-it, wherein Mary’s first job was to kill John’s father – I was looking for a reason that Mary thought that John really wouldn’t love her anymore that was that much worse than her trying to kill Sherlock!), The Final Proof (this is even sadder than the Mrs Hudson story – it’s a retirement fic wherein Sherlock dies, then John dies at the end, too. Everyone who has read it has cried (seriously, like 98%) but also said that they found it really beautiful, so - ?). 

19. If you had to pick one fic/scene/chapter of your work to describe your entire portfolio to a stranger, which would you pick?

Well, that’s easy! (Note: it’s not!) Possibly Vena Cava.

20. Have/Would you ever rewrite a fic? If yes, would you take the original down?

No, I wouldn’t rewrite a fic. What’s done is done. Although there are always the typos I missed the first time around. :P

21. If someone starts kudosing and commenting your fics in a spree and has a few works of their own, would you go look through theirs?

Only if I weren’t working on something of my own at the time, which almost never happens. What I really don’t like is when someone reads something of mine and then obligates me to then read something of theirs in turn. It makes me uncomfortable and I find it a bit rude. When I discover that a regular commenter also writes, then I will often make an effort to seek out their work when I’m between stories, but I hate having it pushed on me.

22. Has there ever been anyone who’s made you freak out because they read your work and followed/favorited/reviewed?

Yes, but not in this fandom.

23. What’s the nicest review you’ve ever gotten?

Impossible to say. I’ve been graced with some of the best, most thoughtful readers/commenters in the universe!!

24. What’s the meanest review you’ve ever gotten? Do you think the reviewer intended it?

I don’t like to focus on these, but I’ve received numerous death threats for my portrayals of Mary, especially back in 2014 (the year series 3 aired) when even Johnlockers still liked her. That only changed within the past year or two! Disliking Mary was an extremely unpopular stance at first. I received a number of these as comments on stories, particularly after I disabled anonymous asks here on tumblr. For a long time, one specific Mary stan kept on reading my stuff and leaving me hate. I really wondered why they kept reading my stuff when it obviously was never going to be what they wanted to see. Note to haters out there: that’s a piss poor persuasion technique. As to my writing itself, no, not really. When I started writing fanfic in 2004, in the world of Harry Potter, one of the worst things a reviewer could call a fic was “fluffy”. The meaning of this term has changed significantly in the past 14 years, but what it meant then was that it was a story seriously lacking in real substance, OOC as hell, and badly written. While these days it tends to me “romantic, light-hearted, heart-warming, sweet”, etc, it still makes me wince any time someone calls a story of mine “fluffy” for that reason.

25. What constructive criticism, however well-meaning, always makes you feel bad when you see it in a review?

I wouldn’t say that there’s one aspect that gets commented on in a regular way. Though @totallysilvergirl beta-read my novel and pointed out a specific thing I do in terms of sentence structure, but it never made me feel badly to have it pointed out.

26. What aspect of your writing do you most enjoy to see praised?

I’m always glad to hear when someone liked the main POV, and I tend to get that compliment the most when it’s a Sherlock POV. I’m also always pleased when people comment on how much a story made them feel – that’s really what I’m going for! Also, in Against the Rest of the World, I spent hours and hours on background research – locations in particular, but also things like local architecture, shipping routes and times, flight times, time zones, language, etc, so I’m always pleased when someone comments on that level of detail in that story.

27. If you could only ever write crossovers or single-fandom fics ever again, which would you pick?

Single fandom, all the way. I’m not a fan of crossovers or AU’s. I’ve written exactly two crossovers in my time. One was a Harry/Draco story in which Draco nominates Harry for the old TLC show What Not To Wear, to Harry’s fury. I had fun with that. The other, and this is pure crack now, was one of my earliest stories, a Darth Vader/Voldemort crossover. Though it isn’t actually a crossover, as DV was Harry in Polyjuice. It was very silly.

28. if you could only ever write for a single crossover or a single fandom again, which would you pick?

Single fandom, again.

29. Does the division of your writing across fandoms line up with your reading? What’s the biggest discrepancy?

Not applicable here; I only write for one fandom at a time. JKR turned me off Harry Potter with the ridiculous epilogue on book 7 and then her attempts to include more “canon” information in her interviews. It annoyed me hugely – but mostly it was the epilogue, which was (deliberately, most of us thought at the time) extremely difficult to write around, though I tried it for a few stories. When I finished that (my last HP story was posted in 2010, but it had been a year since the one prior), I thought I was finished with writing and with fandoms in general. Then I discovered Benedict Cumberbatch in May of 2013, and through him, Sherlock. By the time I was on ASIB, I knew with a sinking feeling that I was simply going to have to write this fandom, too. Lol. I posted the first chapter of my first fic on June 15th, 2013.

30. Do you continue to write for a fandom after you’ve moved on or do you focus solely on the new one?

History would show that I focus strictly on the new one. The only exceptions to strictly Sherlock have been my four Freebatch stories (The A.G.R.A. Complex, Having Your Cake, Always Through the Changing, and A Room with a View).

31. Who’s the one character you’ve just never managed to get perfectly right?

No one, I hope. I’ve written a large number of the characters in the Sherlock universe, including (in approximate order of frequency): Sherlock, John, Mycroft, Lestrade, Mary, Molly, Janine, Ella, Mrs Hudson, and Sally Donovan. Sherlock and John are my favourites to write, Mary and Molly my least favourites.

32. Who’s the one character who shines without you even trying?

Sherlock, absolutely. He’s where my heart lives. That said, some of my favourite stories of my own are John POV’s.

33. Is there any particular character whose scenes always wind up being longer/more frequent than you expected? Does the quality hold up?

No.

34. Was there any fic that you wrote that really surprised you in the fandom reaction? Was it just by the numbers or did they take it an entirely different way?

The first time I wrote a Mary POV (Moving on/Making do), I was honestly afraid that I’d made her too relatable, too likeable, but the people who read the story still disliked her. Ha! And again, the sheer popularity of Best of Three always surprised me.

35. Have you ever written a ship into a fic without meaning to?

Yes, I never meant to ship Harry/Draco, but it just happened.

36. Have you ever sincerely written a ship you do not support into a fic?

Yes, for the necessity of canon compliancy, I’ve written John/Mary, which I loathe.

37. Have you ever purposefully bashed a character/ship in a fic?

No. I do my very best to portray the characters as I see them in canon. There are definitely people who would said that I have bashed Mary in my stories, and I respectfully and thoroughly disagree. Mary is canonically: an assassin who killed for the highest bidder, meaning that she killed without principle, for nothing other than money. Personal gain. Gross. She’s also someone who cut and run, leaving at least half of her team alive to be killed or tortured without even checking to see if there was any possibility of rescuing them. She displayed the same urge to run away and leave John behind later, too. I find this distasteful and cowardly in the extreme. On top of this, she canonically gaslights and belittles John, which is emotionally abusive behaviour, yet “playfully” insults both him and Sherlock on an ongoing basis (“I’m not John; I can tell when people are lying” – two insults with one comment!). She displays incredible entitlement after she attempts to murder John’s best friend and doesn’t seem to think that she should need to apologise for what she did, nor that John had the right to be incredibly angry with her over it. She also showed zero signs of remorse for any of her behaviour, past or present – lying to John, anything and everything she did in her deeply criminal past, etc. When people comment and say, “I loved your evil Mary!”, my typical response is “do you mean canon!Mary?” because that’s all I’ve ever tried to write. The ONE exception I will make here is my story Scars, which is a deliberate attempt to extrapolate from Mary’s canonical gaslighting and show where that behaviour typically leads. I did my homework and consulted two therapists who work specifically with men who have been abused by women for this story, and both confirmed that they saw Mary’s behaviour as gaslighting and abusive, too. I wrote this story partly to combat the then-popular notion that Mary and John displayed “playful banter” or “bickering” at the beginning of HLV, when I saw it as clearly one-sided and not at all playful. I still don’t consider this “bashing”, however.

38. Have you ever purposefully written something you know your readers would find uncomfortable/would not enjoy? If yes, why?

Yes, the above story. Why? Because it was a story I felt had to be told. Also: The Final Proof (the one where Sherlock dies of old age), which I knew would make people cry. Again: I write what the muses prompt me to write!

39. Do you consider yourself to have a readership?

Yes, I’m very lucky to have a huge readership and it’s wonderful! (Thank you!!!!!) I don’t have any specifics on the numbers in this fandom, but when I was writing HP fic, someone wrote her doctoral dissertation on HP fanfic and she collected stats from the various archives that were active at the time, then contacted the twenty most read authors in the fandom. To my shock at the time, I was apparently the eighth most read author in the slash fandom (male/male fic), though I was far from being the eighth most popular!! She estimated my readership at close to 200,000 readers. This was HP, though, the biggest fandom in history. I don’t imagine that my readership is anywhere near that here in Sherlock-land.

40. Do you feel like you put out enough content?

Um, yes. I’m now close to 1.9 million words over 78 stories. I write constantly, when I have the time to do so. Occasionally a commenter will say something like, “write more, please!” and while I know it’s meant as encouragement, it can also feel slightly exasperating. I honestly don’t see how I could humanly be producing MORE. But I try. :P

41. If you cross-post your fics on multiple sites, do you have a favorite? Are there certain fics you would only post on certain site?

I only use ao3 these days.

42. How many views has your most popular fic gotten?

As I said, Best of Three is closing in on 100,000 hits now.

43. Your least popular?

My least-read story would have to be my most recently posted, which I wouldn’t consider my least popular by a long shot. That’s honestly difficult to identify because of course one has to consider the length of time a story has been posted. It’s not fair to consider a story posted yesterday against a story that’s been up for four years. But the newest story has about 2,000 hits at the moment.

44. Do you follow/favorite/kudos/comment/review more stories than you have received?

Thanks to my readership, I don’t think that would be possible.

45. If you had to call yourself an author of a single genre (besides fanfic) what label would you give yourself?

I really only have one major work that isn’t fanfic, which is the original novel that I’m still working on getting published (and by “still working on”, I mean that I haven’t had time to work on this since July or so, whoopsie). Its technical genre definition is spy thriller, so let’s go with that! It’s loosely based on Against the Rest of the World with a dash of Vena Cava, a spy thriller with a gay romantic subplot.

46. Do you consider yourself a diverse author?

Yes. While my stories typically come to a similar result, I think they all get there in noticeably different ways! I’ve written amnesia, hurt/comfort, disability, many different character POV’s, gentle romances, heavy angst, deathfic, retirement fic, thrillers, fix-its, addiction (more in HP), magic (HP again), long novels, short sketches, character sketches, silly stuff, dark stuff. If you look at my stories chronologically, you will see a pattern of dark-light-dark-light – if I’ve just written a heap of angst, I’ll typically switch it up and write something lighter, or a different character voice, or a completely new idea (such as the Mary/Molly pairing in The Clouded Eye), etc. I do try to keep it fresh!

47. If someone you know in real life who isn’t involved in fandoms asked to read your work, would you let them? If yes, what would you recommend they read first?

Only if they were already familiar with the canon and open to reading graphic male/male sex, and that limits most of the population that isn’t already in the fandom.

48. Does anyone you know from outside of fandom know you write fanfic? Are they involved in the same fandom too?

A few people know. I’m very careful about who I tell.

49. Has anyone in your life ever read your fanfic just because you wrote it?

My mother. :) She reads all of my stories. We have a very good relationship!

50. Has writing fanfic had a significant impact on your life? Would you say it’s entirely positive?

Yes, it’s had a huge impact on my life. It’s been my secret other life since 2004, with a 3-4 year hiatus in there. Sometimes the drama gets to be a bit much, but the creative outlet of writing and the joy of sharing the love for these characters with a whole universe of other people is just unbeatable.