"Two roads diverged in a yellow wood..." (on writing Angel Sanctuary fic)

[edenfalling]

Last night I started writing an Angel Sanctuary fic. It's a oneshot, but a very long oneshot with several sections and a sort of alternating structure.

The thing is, I know the overall shape very clearly, but I could write it two extremely different ways.

See, it's about Alexiel's cycle of incarnations. In which she dies horribly, again and again and again. (This is not a happy story. It would be like "Knives," or "Wonderland," or Draco's section of "Restoration," or "Mona's Blood," or "Day of the Dead: Stains," or "The Gordian Solution," and quite possibly worse than all of those.)

Anyway, I can either be vague about each incarnation, naming no names and places and dates, which helps emphasize a thematic point I am trying to make in the story...

Or I can get very specific. Of course, getting specific will require a metric ton of research, so I have appropriate names, and so my geography and history and cultural attitudes are accurate. I am not sure I want to put in that amount of time and effort for a oneshot fanfiction story... but on the other hand, I think it would help ground the mystical elements, and it could be really cool.

I dunno. Thoughts, anyone?

Comments

[darksideofstorm.livejournal.com]

Personally I would go for the first one myself. The second one sounds great, but that sheer deluge of information may make it quite a heavy read to slog though, and then your theme could end up a little buried.

Awesome idea for a one-shot anyway, I look forward to seeing it when you're done =)

[edenfalling]

Oh, the information would be very subtle in the story -- just a detail here or there to fix the place and time. But I'd need to know at least two or three times as much in order to know which subtle detail to use.

Mneh. I may write it the first way and then go back and do an alternate version with actual historical details later, since I do know roughly when and where each life and death occurs.

[(Anonymous)]

Oh dear. I like your writing too much to choose one... I would forever be wondering what would the other one be like. *sweatdrops*

[(Anonymous)]

Well, I'm not sure without reading the story first, but personally, I think adding details like that about the previous incarnations would help the reader feel closer to the poor schmoes.

I've only watched a few episodes of Angel Sanctuary, but I'd probably be interested in reading whatever you write, regardless.

-- Guile