#second question is something i alternate between making fun of myself abt and sometimes still wanting to just sob heavily for so

[landwriter]

💝 & 🍭 for the fic asks! :)

Thanks, Nate! :)

💝What is a fic that got a different response than you were expecting? For sure it’s gotta be Black Shore! It’s the strangest thing I’ve written, and I felt in my heart it was really neat but did not expect much engagement at all from a story that opens by addressing the reader, has poems, is broken into arbitrary sections, and is from the POV of an ocean that is technically also Dream. This was the third fic I'd ever posted. Not only did it get read, but @missmisnomer made insane and gorgeous art for it, and @btwimkindagay wrote an ESSAY that made me weep. To me, writing is just loving things loudly into the void and it’s such a fuckin’ incredible and life-affirming experience when people love a thing back. Especially when it’s a bit weird.

🍭Why did you start writing? I sure didn’t plan to! At all! I’ve spent my life telling stories and writing creatively in every way that did not force me to actually own up to Writing, because perish the thought that I might do something I love dearly and be witnessed Trying, and potentially Failing. Better to just love it from a distance! When struck by bouts of awful desire to Be A Writer, better to just say Someday Soon! Better to bear it and go on.

Then two things happened last September: I watched The Sandman and liked it a lot; and I remembered that I had once started writing a fanfic over a decade ago, and I suddenly remembered the title. I looked it up expecting the cringe and laugh, and instead found lots of nice comments, including this one written nine years after the last update:

What am I doing, I said. I used to be brave enough to write when I was 12. And it had meant something to someone, even then. I left lots of insane messages in my best friend’s DMs. And when I was done crying and unpacking all my grief for the kid who wrote and frustration with the grown-up who wouldn’t, I went to bed. I was too wired and raw to sleep. So I got up and started writing a Sandman story. Then I kept writing all weekend. And the rest is history.

(let’s get real! fic writer asks)