3 things: length complaints; grumbling about work; prompt me, please!

[edenfalling]

1. You know what? After splitting "Out of Season" into three chapters, none of which is over 11,000 words, I still got a complaint about chapter length in a review on ff.net.

...

I give up.

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2. Work was very frustrating today, partly because I am not used to working before 3:30pm on Sundays, partly because it was Parents' Weekend at Cornell and so there were a lot of random clueless tourists in and out of the smoke shop, and partly because the end of Daylight Savings Time means the alarm is out of sync with the clock and went off when I tried to take the newspapers into the back room at 8:35pm. Which I should have been expecting -- I have worked here long enough, and I am almost always the one who closes on the first day after the change -- but somehow it catches me by surprise EVERY. SINGLE. TIME. *headdesk*

I left a note for myself to try making the alarm talk to its central system node thingy via telephone tomorrow afternoon. Hopefully I will remember... except tomorrow is going to be weird again because I am working 11am-6pm instead of closing like normal, and that will doubtless throw me off all day. *sigh*

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3. I want to write something. I need to write something. But none of my stories are cooperating with me.

Please, please, please give me a prompt for something I can knock off in under a thousand words just to remind my brain and fingers how this creativity gig is supposed to work?

Comments

[marycontrary]

If it's any comfort, whenever AO3 returns more than 100 fics, my first sort is by wordcount so I can read the long ones first. (I am quietly resentful when I find a long one that's been published as a series instead of chapters.) The only thing I can think of that makes me less likely to comment or kudos a long fic is a greater chance that grammar or characterization issues will exceed my tolerance before I reach the end.

[edenfalling]

Most readers on AO3 seem to be fine with long stories -- this hypersensitive allergy to long chapters is, so far as I can tell, specific to ff.net. *shrug* Weird, but there it is.

[rthstewart.livejournal.com]

Shazan and Ilgamuth, of course. We just recorded the second part of AsCast and your name keeps coming up along with words like "awesome" and "I love her vision of Calormen" and "Isn't Little Sister great?"

As for the chapter length complaint and the, But didn't he die? I feel like humming in response, "Welcome to my world."

[edenfalling]

Do you want something pre-"Out of Season" or something between that and "A Change of Season"? (The latter begins on the night Rabadash calls 200 soldiers together to invade Archenland, FYI.)

I am just all kinds of *headdesk* over the length complaint. The canon complaint doesn't faze me, because yeah, the Hermit of the Southern Marches DOES specifically namecheck Ilgamuth as a casualty -- but seriously, in Harry Potter fandom I never got length complaints until I had a 16-17,000 word oneshot. I wrote 10-12,000 word chapters for "Secrets" several times and only got called out for the gaps between updates. (Which, again, doesn't faze me because I freely admit I am a horribly slow writer.) In fact, I have more often been called out for SHORT chapters than for long ones; that was the single most prevalent complaint about "An Ounce of Prevention" (a Harry Potter/Naruto crossover), and also about some other stories where I tend to keep wordcounts under 2,500 words per chapter. Heck, I have even been called out for too-short chapters on stories where I aim for a 4-5,000 word average length.

So I have to wonder if this hypersensitive allergy to long chapters is specific to Narnia fandom, or if it's developed over the past three to five years without me noticing. I am quite sure it's specific to ff.net, since it's not something I've had trouble with on my journal or on the AO3.

[rthstewart.livejournal.com]

I have no idea! Either! both! or 5 years ahead after the Four have disappeared!

And I have no idea why Narnia fandom is so weird. Well, I do. Your chapters were fine.

[edenfalling]

So, um, your story has turned into 3,000+ words about the initial gathering of Rabadash's companions and their first night in Tashbaan after they return from a minor civil war two years after Rishti takes the throne. This means it's much more Ilgamuth and Rabadash than Ilgamuth/Shezan, though Shezan does appear and even has a bit of dialogue (and Ilgamuth might kind of have the start of a puppy crush on her). Also, it very badly needs edits and extensions, since I was plowing through just to find an end point and now have to revise the beginning in light of what turned out to be the theme of the story. But the rough draft is done! So hopefully I will be able to post the fixed up copy in a couple days. *crosses fingers*

[rthstewart.livejournal.com]

Sounds fabulous! And it was not supposed to be a thing. I would have taken 30 words of barb trading between them in a Courting Dance style, or ANYTHING Love it all

[annearchy.livejournal.com]

A lot of people seem to want to read chapters that are basically one scene. And a lot of writers seem quite happy to oblige them. I'm usually not one of those writers, and apparently neither are you :)

Er... hmmm... prompt... Narnia, Lucy Pevensie, age 13, wanting...something?

[edenfalling]

I have written stories with very short chapters -- "An Ounce of Prevention," for example, had chapters ranging from about 650 words to 1000 words maximum because the original oneshot I later extended was only about 600 words and I have a Thing about chapter length symmetry -- but generally I am with you: a scene =/= a chapter.

*ponders* Lucy wanting something at about 13 years old... Aha! I can haz IDEA! *scurries off to write*

[Fic] "Commonly to the Wars" -- Chronicles of Narnia

[edenfalling]

Commonly to the Wars: Queen Lucy the Valiant rides to the wars, despite Father Christmas's prescription that women should avoid battles. How did that come about? (900 words)