30 days of fanfic meme: the FRIENDSHIP (not romance) IS MAGIC edition

7. Have you ever had a fic change your opinion of a character?

Oh yes, all the time. I actually find it very difficult to write a character unless I've read lots of fic about them, preferably by different people, because my first understanding of a character is always nowhere near the one I end up with.

8. Do you write OCs? And, if so, what do you do to make certain they're not Mary Sues? If not, explain your thoughts on OCs.

Yes!—although, strangely, not all that often. I love reading about original characters, but I'm not so good at creating them yet. Takes quite a bit of time & effort. Making sure they're not Mary Sues . . . eh. My general guiding principle is to not write stuff I wouldn't want to read, so it's just the same as for canon characters.

9. For each of the fandoms from day two, what are your three favorite pairings to write? ( I wish people wouldn't ask me these questions. GENFIC: YOU ARE DOING IT WRONG. )

10. Have you ever gone outside your comfort zone and written a pairing you liked, but found you couldn't write? Or a pairing you didn't like, and found you could?

Two words: Gen. Fic.

Combinations of characters that I like but can't write interacting, oh yes. Lots. Usually it's because I don't have a proper grip on one of the characters in question, or because I'm not good at writing scenes in which people decide that their best course of action is, indeed, punching this smug jerk right here in the face.

Characters' interactions that I don't like but can write, not at all. If I don't like something (unlikely) then I just won't try write it, except as an exercise in getting myself to enjoy something new.

11. Do you prefer certain genres of fic when you're writing? What kind do you tend to write most?

In-universe works are my favourite, I think. Letters! Essays! History books! Research papers! Critical reviews! Poetry! Excerpts of classical novels! Popular fiction!

I don't actually write those very often, but I want to.

Other genres: domesticity, close friendship & created-family, big famous heroes deciding/attempting to live a quiet life, music, characters being fannish, slice-of-life, culture smash, cities/towns/buildings/schools as characters, genderfuck, loneliness/solitary-ness, youkai (or equivalent local spirits), crossovers.

12. Have you ever attempted an 'adaptation' fic of a favourite book or movie but set in a different fandom?

I don't think I quite understand what they're getting at here. Do they mean fusion-fic?

If so, not really. Thought about it a few times, but I tend to do crossovers instead. It's easier.

13. Do you prefer canon or fanon when you write? Has writing fanfic for a fandom changed the way you see some or even all of the original source material?

It depends! Fanfiction is, by its nature, generally based on canon. When there's a certain fanon thing I really like, though, I'll jump on it and completely ignore canon if I need to. (For instance: To me, Hermione will always be the girl who said 'Oh, for God's sake. They're tampons. They're made of cotton wool. They absorb blood. They obey the laws of physics. They don't need to be fucking magical,' no matter how assimilationist she ended up being in canon.) And sometimes I'll change things that don't make a difference to the overall story, just because I want to—is it really bad writing to make KHR full of girls instead of bishounen, just because I can?

So basically I write what I like, whether it's based completely on canon or not.

As to the second question: oh goodness yes. Almost always, and even when it hasn't it makes me look harder at what I'm already thinking. Reading changes my opinions more than writing does, just because I do more of it, but writing makes me think things out all the way to the end. Which, I suppose, is why it takes so long.

30 days of fanfic meme: the LAST-MINUTE BEFORE CAR TRIP edition

14. Ratings—how high are you comfortable going? Have you ever written higher? If you're comfortable with NC-17, have you ever been shocked by finding that the story you're writing is G-rated instead?

I'm comfortable with T, and could probably go M for things like discussion of genocide, etc. And I don't think I'd be comfortable writing too many details w/r/t violence. Writing about sex I am definitely not comfy with. I just want everyone to be frieeeends.

I have been shocked by finding that I was writing something that could be considered romance, though. Deep and complicated relationships do tend to get the romance label, I suppose, though I'm not sure whether the romance text/sub-text in that fic was intentional or not.

15. What do you feel it most important to warn for, and what's the strangest thing you've warned for in a fic?

I think it's very, very important to warn for explicit violence and rape/sexual assault/general non-consentuality. It would be very nice if people would warn for stalking, excessive bigotry, pregnancy, destruction of books, and large amounts of tasteless jokes, so I could know what not to read on a bad day.

I generally don't write things that need warnings. I think I jokingly warned for "a teenager saying the word 'fuck' " when I was thirteen or so, but that's really the most esoteric thing I can remember warning/contains-ing for.

16. Summaries—do you like them or hate them? How do you come up with them, if you use them?

I tend to stay away from stories without summaries, so of course I use them. I do rather like them; they're really just a combination of hook and accurate description. What's the most important thing about this fic that I can tell people without them having read it? And how can I phrase it to make it as attractive as I want it to be? A summary needs to tell you a lot about the fic it's distilled from, even if it's just a plain "Character X goes to college, and enjoys it very well. Post-canon" sort of thing.

I find them pretty easy to write, most of the time. Sometimes I come up with the summary before I write the actual fic, because it's just the basic idea behind the writing.

17. Titles—are they the bane of your existence, or the easiest part of the fic? Also, if you do chaptered fic, do you give each chapter a title, or not?

It depends! Sometimes it's very difficult to come up with a title that fits a fic I've already written, sometimes I come up with the title first (I still haven't found a use for High-Heeled Blues, except possibly for a Tiger & Bunny/The Big O crossover) and sometimes it just takes a few minutes of thinking. I have just lifted titles straight from poetry before, and I desperately want to write an asexual-life-partners fic to (not gonna write you a) Love Song. On the other hand, I really like making up titles that sound like they should be quotes from something but aren't; cf. music is no match for happiness (and grandness none for music).

I tend to plan same-universe-but-separate-fic stories just for getting around that second question. It's working so far.

18. Where do you get the most inspiration for your fics (aka 'bunnies') from?

Things people say or write, or moments in the canon, or similarities/differences between two characters will lead me to think Wouldn't it be cool if. . . .

Or I see someone's prompt and go Ooooh!

Or I read a story that's okay but not fantastic and think Y'know, I could take this idea and do it ninety degrees sideways & a whole lot better.

And I wonder about the things people write or make or do for fun in a canon universe that don't get shown. That sort of thing.

19. When you have bunnies, do you sit down and start writing right away, or do you write down the idea for further use?

Usually I just keep them in my head, poking at them and turning them over occasionally until I'm ready to type the first sentence. Sometimes I just start writing, if it's for something whose background I already know or a short promptfic.

20. Do you ever get bunnied from other people's stories or art in the same fandom?

Yup. Sometimes I want to write fanfanfic, but usually it's just disappointment at a good premise poorly executed, or a general idea not followed up on. Usually nothing comes of it, but sometimes something does.


And now off to the library, and then off to Indiana.