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edenfalling7 – Have you ever had a fic change your opinion of a character?
A fic I read or a fic I wrote? For reading, the short answer is yes. I don't have a good enough memory to give you any details about character or fandom, let alone story, but there are often characters I haven't paid much attention to until a fic made me give them another look.
For writing, the short answer is also yes. The long answer... hmm. Well, "The Courting Dance" made me think about Cor and Aravis as an actual romance instead of an asexual marriage of convenience. A bunch of the one-shots I wrote back in my HP days were attempts to make sense of various characters, so I figured out what I thought about them via writing. A lot of my writing is like that -- I am playing with meta theories in stories instead of essays.
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8 – Do you write OCs? If so, what do you do to make certain they're not Mary Sues? If not, explain your thoughts on OCs.
I write lots of OCs! When I have a story role that needs to be filled, my first instinct is to create a person tailor-made to fit, not to search for a minor canon character who could be forced to fit with some degree of contortion. I also tend to structure my longer fics as if they were original novels, so there's a fair bit of world-building (or world-extension) involved, which means I keep creating empty story roles that need filling.
The way to make sure an OC is not a Mary-Sue (by which I mean a character who warps the rules of the world and the personalities of the canon characters around him- or herself) is to play by the established rules of the world, both implicit and explicit. Your new character has to fit in -- which doesn't mean ze has to be completely forgettable, just appropriate to the setting and genre. You also have to think through the implications of anything you create. If a person has unearthly beauty, how would that actually feel to hir? How would it make people react? If a person is amazingly talented at some skill, how long and hard did ze work to acquire that ability, and how much work does it take to retain the skill? Stuff like that.
I think I worry less about this than most fanfiction writers, precisely because I wrote original fiction first. (The stories were bad and mostly unfinished, but the point stands.) I learned how to create and introduce characters, over and over and over, because that's what you have to do in original fiction. And those characters had to play by the rules of my own worlds. The only difference in fanfiction is that the rules I must obey were first laid down by somebody else. *grin*
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9 – Pairings: for each of the fandoms from day two, what are your three favorite pairings to write?
I am not a shipper. Insofar as I have favorite pairings, they show up much more in my reading than in my writing. That said, I will try to do this for those fandoms in which I have written any romance worth speaking of.
Harry Potter: Harry/Ginny, Harry/Hermione, Ginny/Harry/Draco, Hermione/Ginny, and, even though I only wrote it once, Harry/Luna/Draco. (I like Harry/Draco too, but more for reading than for writing.) I also find the Petunia-Lily-Snape dynamic fascinating in a non-sexual and largely non-romantic way -- and on that note, why do we not have a specific word for non-sexual and non-romantic groupings? I, for one, would find it immensely useful.
Naruto: NaruSasuSaku, whether platonic, romantic, sexual, or what the hell ever. They are my One True Team and that is all. Hinata/whoever-she-chooses is also nice, because Hinata is lovely.
Narnia: Cor/Aravis, because they are both awesome and if they must get married, I want to make sure it's a functional and happy marriage. (I think Jill/Eustace is adorable, but I have no urge to write it myself.)
Angel Sanctuary: Kira/Setsuna/Sara, in all incarnations and all permutations thereof. (...which suggests that someday I really ought to write an AU wherein Nanatsusaya finds Alexiel a few incarnations sooner, becomes her sword, and Jibril absconds from Heaven to wander around the Earth with them for a couple decades. Oh, help! *frantically wards off plot bunnies*)
Labyrinth: Sara/Jareth, obviously.
Inception: Ariadne/Arthur/Eames, because Arthur has moments with both of them, and I think Ariadne and Eames would get on like a house on fire (in a good way).
The Dark Is Rising: Blodwen Rowlands/John Rowlands, because I refuse to believe she spent twenty years with him without caring at least a little.
Hexwood: Vierran Guaranty/Mordion Agenos, because they just fit.
Seaward: Calliope/Westerly, because I believe in promises fulfilled.
Saiyuki: Kanan/Gonou, because they are so fucked up and it fascinates me.
Star Trek: AOS: Spock/Uhura, because they are awesome and I refuse to listen to anyone who disagrees. (I also enjoy reading Kirk/Spock, but I am deeply uncomfortable with writing Uhura out in order to glorify the men's dimension-transcending bond -- choice trumps destiny every time in my book, and Uhura and Spock chose each other -- so I highly doubt I will ever write any.)
Crossovers: Faith Lehane/Duo Maxwell/Uchiha Sasuke [BtVS/Gundam Wing/Naruto], and Rupert Giles/Indiana Jones. Because they're fun and because I can. *evil grin*
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I hashed out a couple plot points for "The Courting Dance" at work tonight, and will hopefully get Bree's chapter finished tomorrow. *crosses fingers* I also want to revise the scene I chopped out of my NFE fic, because I think it's kind of interesting in its own right (comparative religions, argh) and also because I might want to stick it back into the eventual revised version, depending on how my edits go. And it is where I worked out a couple metaphysical points and the motives of one character, so it might also be useful just to clarify some details.
Ah well, I will deal with it tomorrow.
A fic I read or a fic I wrote? For reading, the short answer is yes. I don't have a good enough memory to give you any details about character or fandom, let alone story, but there are often characters I haven't paid much attention to until a fic made me give them another look.
For writing, the short answer is also yes. The long answer... hmm. Well, "The Courting Dance" made me think about Cor and Aravis as an actual romance instead of an asexual marriage of convenience. A bunch of the one-shots I wrote back in my HP days were attempts to make sense of various characters, so I figured out what I thought about them via writing. A lot of my writing is like that -- I am playing with meta theories in stories instead of essays.
-----
8 – Do you write OCs? If so, what do you do to make certain they're not Mary Sues? If not, explain your thoughts on OCs.
I write lots of OCs! When I have a story role that needs to be filled, my first instinct is to create a person tailor-made to fit, not to search for a minor canon character who could be forced to fit with some degree of contortion. I also tend to structure my longer fics as if they were original novels, so there's a fair bit of world-building (or world-extension) involved, which means I keep creating empty story roles that need filling.
The way to make sure an OC is not a Mary-Sue (by which I mean a character who warps the rules of the world and the personalities of the canon characters around him- or herself) is to play by the established rules of the world, both implicit and explicit. Your new character has to fit in -- which doesn't mean ze has to be completely forgettable, just appropriate to the setting and genre. You also have to think through the implications of anything you create. If a person has unearthly beauty, how would that actually feel to hir? How would it make people react? If a person is amazingly talented at some skill, how long and hard did ze work to acquire that ability, and how much work does it take to retain the skill? Stuff like that.
I think I worry less about this than most fanfiction writers, precisely because I wrote original fiction first. (The stories were bad and mostly unfinished, but the point stands.) I learned how to create and introduce characters, over and over and over, because that's what you have to do in original fiction. And those characters had to play by the rules of my own worlds. The only difference in fanfiction is that the rules I must obey were first laid down by somebody else. *grin*
-----
9 – Pairings: for each of the fandoms from day two, what are your three favorite pairings to write?
I am not a shipper. Insofar as I have favorite pairings, they show up much more in my reading than in my writing. That said, I will try to do this for those fandoms in which I have written any romance worth speaking of.
Harry Potter: Harry/Ginny, Harry/Hermione, Ginny/Harry/Draco, Hermione/Ginny, and, even though I only wrote it once, Harry/Luna/Draco. (I like Harry/Draco too, but more for reading than for writing.) I also find the Petunia-Lily-Snape dynamic fascinating in a non-sexual and largely non-romantic way -- and on that note, why do we not have a specific word for non-sexual and non-romantic groupings? I, for one, would find it immensely useful.
Naruto: NaruSasuSaku, whether platonic, romantic, sexual, or what the hell ever. They are my One True Team and that is all. Hinata/whoever-she-chooses is also nice, because Hinata is lovely.
Narnia: Cor/Aravis, because they are both awesome and if they must get married, I want to make sure it's a functional and happy marriage. (I think Jill/Eustace is adorable, but I have no urge to write it myself.)
Angel Sanctuary: Kira/Setsuna/Sara, in all incarnations and all permutations thereof. (...which suggests that someday I really ought to write an AU wherein Nanatsusaya finds Alexiel a few incarnations sooner, becomes her sword, and Jibril absconds from Heaven to wander around the Earth with them for a couple decades. Oh, help! *frantically wards off plot bunnies*)
Labyrinth: Sara/Jareth, obviously.
Inception: Ariadne/Arthur/Eames, because Arthur has moments with both of them, and I think Ariadne and Eames would get on like a house on fire (in a good way).
The Dark Is Rising: Blodwen Rowlands/John Rowlands, because I refuse to believe she spent twenty years with him without caring at least a little.
Hexwood: Vierran Guaranty/Mordion Agenos, because they just fit.
Seaward: Calliope/Westerly, because I believe in promises fulfilled.
Saiyuki: Kanan/Gonou, because they are so fucked up and it fascinates me.
Star Trek: AOS: Spock/Uhura, because they are awesome and I refuse to listen to anyone who disagrees. (I also enjoy reading Kirk/Spock, but I am deeply uncomfortable with writing Uhura out in order to glorify the men's dimension-transcending bond -- choice trumps destiny every time in my book, and Uhura and Spock chose each other -- so I highly doubt I will ever write any.)
Crossovers: Faith Lehane/Duo Maxwell/Uchiha Sasuke [BtVS/Gundam Wing/Naruto], and Rupert Giles/Indiana Jones. Because they're fun and because I can. *evil grin*
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I hashed out a couple plot points for "The Courting Dance" at work tonight, and will hopefully get Bree's chapter finished tomorrow. *crosses fingers* I also want to revise the scene I chopped out of my NFE fic, because I think it's kind of interesting in its own right (comparative religions, argh) and also because I might want to stick it back into the eventual revised version, depending on how my edits go. And it is where I worked out a couple metaphysical points and the motives of one character, so it might also be useful just to clarify some details.
Ah well, I will deal with it tomorrow.
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(no subject)
Date: 2011-08-16 12:52 pm (UTC)And a Rupert Giles/Indiana Jones crossover would be very interesting to read! I've never thought about having those two characters meet but it would definitely be fun for the two of them to go on an adventure.
(no subject)
Date: 2011-08-17 01:05 am (UTC)I have the rough draft of Bree's chapter done! I want to sit on it another day, though, because the ending is awfully abrupt and spare.
(no subject)
Date: 2011-08-17 01:10 am (UTC)Errr? Friendship? Joking. Really. I've also heard the term Bob fic, but I think that's more sexual or relational content in the background without it taking center of the story. Also, YEAH for Courting Dance?
That is VERY good news.
(no subject)
Date: 2011-08-17 05:29 am (UTC)I am revising Bree's chapter right now, actually. :-D Then I should move onto Aravis's POV, before I forget the main incident I want to include in her chapter...
(no subject)
Date: 2011-08-16 11:46 pm (UTC)a Mary-Sue (by which I mean a character who warps the rules of the world and the personalities of the canon characters around him- or herself) Love the definition and the ways you make your OCs.
why do we not have a specific word for non-sexual and non-romantic groupings? It would be helpful. I suppose there's friendship, frenemy, bromance, rivals and enemy but... these terms are rather specific in quantifying the relationship and also seem to mostly be only between two people.
Hinata/whoever-she-chooses is also nice, because Hinata is lovely. Very true :)
Also, am excited to hear you're making progress on the Courting Dance! Very exciting.
(no subject)
Date: 2011-08-17 01:53 am (UTC)The thing about Petunia-Lily-Snape is that Petunia and Lily have a fraught sibling relationship, Lily has a fraught friendship with Snape while he has a one-sided obsessive love for her, and Petunia and Snape have a fraught "we'll pretend to get along for Lily's sake" thing going when they are forced to interact at all. It's clearly a triangle with Lily at the apex/hinge, but it's not a romantic rivalry (couldn't be, even if Snape's crush was reciprocated) and it's not a friendship rivalry either, because again, Petunia and Lily are sisters first and foremost; while that can include friendship, it's not the same thing. And I can't even call it a platonic triangle, because there is the issue of Snape's unrequited crush. *hands* It is just a giant MESS, that's what it is.
I finished Bree's chapter of "The Courting Dance," but I am going to sit on it until tomorrow night because the ending is very abrupt and bare right now.