shivver | Entries tagged with writing

Rules: How many letters of the alphabet have you used for starting a fic title? One fic per line, ‘A’ and 'The’ do not count for 'a’ and ’t’. Post your score out of 26 at the end, along with your total fic count.

I love memes like this. I love doing them because I get to think about the things I've done and talk about them. I love reading others' answers because I get to learn about my friends. I saw this meme and went, "Cool, that looks fun and interesting! I gotta do that!"

Then I thought, "Wow, that's a lot of work, sorting through fics to choose one for each letter of the alphabet, and then get the link and add all the info." But, that's in the nature of the meme, so I started working on it.

And then I realized, as I was looking through all my As, that though the meme had passed through my friends' list six times, I hadn't actually read a single title in any of them, much less clicked through to any of them. All I did was scan over the list, look to see what letters each person had missed, and then jump to their discussion about their titles.

To me, the interesting thing about the meme wasn't the titles themselves, but the distribution of letters and the self-evaluation of what that might mean. That's probably true for me for any meme, too. So, I decline to list titles -- I don't need them for my own reference and no one who reads this will care either -- and instead, I list my letter distributions.

Out of 170 works (it says 160 on AO3, but one "fic" is actually a collection of eleven works, so that totals 170):

A: 8
B: 9
C: 7
D: 7
E: 6
F: 12
G: 3
H: 5
I: 2
J: 3
K: none
L: 13
M: 9
N: 4
O: 15
P: 12
Q: none
R: 6
S: 23
T: 16
U: 2
V: none
W: 4
X: none
Y: 3
Z: none

I do not guarantee that this actually adds up to 170.

Total number of unique letters: 21

I think that's actually the smallest total of anyone's I've seen. (Edit: Nope, I'm wrong. There was a 17.) Almost everyone missed the X and the Z, and often the Q, but K and V were commonly covered.

I'm not surprised that S is the most common title starter. After all, S is the most common starting letter in English and alphabetization rules remove "the", "a", and "an" from the count. The one that surprised me is O, coming in just behind T with 15. It looks like I love starting titles with "One", eight of them in total.

I did notice two instances in which I repeated the same letter three times in the row: three Bs a couple of years ago and three Ls back in like 2014. Two of the Ys were due to "You". And only one fic title started with the name of a canon character; some fics mentioned characters in their titles but not directly by their names. One fic title started with the name of the original character.

This post is probably going to come off sounding really arrogant, so I'm warning you before you have a chance to click the cut. And if you read it and think that I'm totally off-base here, please let me know. I'd really like to hear why my opinion is wrong/not fair/conceited.

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My husband reminded me yesterday of a piece of content from the game The Kingdom of Loathing. It's a browser RPG by Asymmetric Productions that came out in 2004, which my husband still plays but I stopped playing back in around 2013. While it probably didn't invent the concept of "play through the game multiple times to gain a new, permanent skill or upgrade to use in future runs" which is common in games now, it's one of the oldest games to use it. It still has monthly and quarterly content updates, which is what's kept it alive with a rabid fanbase, enough that its revenue has been enough to fund the development of Asymmetric's other games, West of Loathing and Shadows over Loathing, which have also been hugely successful -- they're both "overwhelming positive" on Steam.

The thing that KoL is known for, though, is its absurd and irreverent humor. You can tell this from the fact that the characters and monsters are all stick figures, the main currency is meat, and in order to wear a shirt, you have to acquire a skill to do so -- people in Loathing (that's the name of the country) don't know that they have a torso, so in order to wear shirts, you have to learn Torso Awaregness. (Yes, there's a reason there's a silent "g" in that word, but I'm not going to explain it.)

The writing is also stellar. All the quests have stories and the characters are inventive and vivid. (Ed the Undying is my favorite.) Every item in the game has a description that's a joy to read. The reason I stopped playing the game was because it just took way too much time, and I'm lucky to have my husband showing me all the new stuff as it comes out.

Anyway, yesterday, he showed me an item that was in the game back when I played it. I'd completely forgotten about it, but wow, when I read the description...

----
Hippopotamus.
Anti-hippopotamus.
Annihilation.
----

I laughed to the point of tears. And I remember laughing to the point of tears fifteen years ago when this item came out.

Then, I thought more about it, and you know, it's the best piece of flash fiction I've ever read. In three words, it tells a full story that paints a vivid picture in your mind, AND it's a haiku. A three-word haiku.

Now, that's writing.

I love doing memes, so I yoinked this from

scifirenegade. Not doing their other one, because of its twenty-six questions, fully half are about shipping and two more are about Tumblr, neither of which I care about.

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My last post (well, not the one about my murderous intentions) was the AO3 stats meme, in which I wondered why in the world "Bloody Doctors!" was such an outlier in terms of number of hits, garnering nearly 1300 hits when most of my short stories are lucky to get 300 hits over ten years.

thisbluespirit agreed that popularity is often inexplicable, though there's often bias from how long the fic has been available and from the size of the fandom, but she got me thinking, and then of course, the only way to really think about things is to do a data analysis.

Not a real one, of course. I don't have the expertise to do a real data analysis. But I did take data and I did analyze it. :P

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I only just realized that the majority of readers would think my last story is just a rehash of the 60th from a different point of view, which it's not. This is a good thing, by the way: I absolutely love writing stories that most people won't actually understand, because it's doubly enjoyable for the ones that do. (Also, I love being obscure.) But, since this is my blag and I can talk about whatever I want, I thought I'd talk about what I intended it to be.

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I learned a new word today! "Nothingburger!"

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In other news...

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Lots of DW things going on in our house right now, much of it 60th-related but some not. Well, Disgaea 7 also came out recently and that's the latest installment of my husband's favorite video game series, so he's been nose-down in that, but otherwise, the DW excitement is certainly building. (Hm, I wonder, does he really like it more than NieR? He's certainly played that series more than he has the NieR games, but he's definitely more invested in the lore of NieR.)

The new theme
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Magic: the Gathering
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The Legacy of Time audios
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Anticipation

Random blather
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What I'm hoping the story is going to be but obviously won't actually be (do not read this if you don't want to be horrified by my callousness toward Donna :D )
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Writing
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I've been meaning to post something - anything - for a while now, but I haven't had the motivation, partly because things have been stressy and partly because all I ever seem to do on my journal nowadays is whine. So, when this meme from

lurking_latinist showed up on my feed, I thought it would be a great first start.

Note, I haven't actually written regularly in a long time. Maybe this will kick me in the butt.

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Hey! I'm not dead. I guess that's an accomplishment. I've been well aware that I haven't been active here, or anywhere really, for a very long time, and I've been meaning to write an entry, but I couldn't get myself to actually sit down and do it. One of the benefits of this is that I can do a better summary of the past few months using hindsight, rather than just bitching as things happened.

I will say up front that things have been pretty good in general - just very different from how they were a year ago.

( Work, cos that's the major part of it )

( Not Work )

( Writing )

And that's about it for now. I do want to talk about Doctor Who, but not in this post. I will say, though, that we're going to Gallifrey One in February, and we're really looking forward to it.

My husband told me something really interesting today. He was chatting with a colleague and the topic of Firefly came up, and she said that she didn't like it (which elicited a surprised pikachu face from my husband). He asked her why, and she said it's because she never found out anything about the characters - their histories, their motivations, etc.

That was strange, because Firefly, to both of us, is a shining example of developing the characters through showing. Mal doesn't talk about religion or his personal beliefs, but you know that he is contemptuous of religion and faith through the way he treats Shepherd Book. However, you also learn that he was once very religious from the scene where he kisses the cross around his neck during the Battle of Serenity Valley, and that the events of the battle cause his loss of faith and eventual contempt.

My husband mentioned this, and the colleague responded that she didn't learn any of that (or any of the other characters' histories) because he never talked about it. In contrast, she loves ST:TNG because the characters are always talking and providing exposition. You know Riker and Deanna had had a previous relationship and that they still love each other but have moved on because they talk about it and they tell other people about it, not because their actions now reveal that history.

It never occurred to me that some people prefer to be told, not shown. Interestingly, she added that she knew about "show, don't tell" in novels, but didn't think it applied to movies/TV. Maybe there's a difference there, but I still prefer to be shown in all media.

There's this:
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Back in December, I wrote an entry in which I mentioned that I had picked my writing back up and set a goal for myself of posting four stories in January. Well, it's January 30, and I just posted my fifth story to AO3.

Boo-bloody-yeah!

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All right, so I haven't posted since the end of September. I kept meaning to - I mean, I left a lot of DW discussions and fun life discussions and a daily meme hanging. But, I got bogged down. You might remember that I was having a lot of work stress. Well, that eased up and it was actually going really well... and then a new bomb went off and it was awful again, and now it's getting back to good. I want to write about all of that, but not today. This is going to be a happy, fun catch-up post.

Doctor Who

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Hobbies

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Writing

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Crossposts: https://shivver13.livejournal.com/203278.html

So, I just had this happen...

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Crossposts: https://shivver13.livejournal.com/198270.html

Last week in

ushobwri, they mentioned looking back in old folders and finding stories that you wrote but don't remember, reading old stories and going "wow, did I really write that?" and looking back at old ideas that you started but never finished. I started thinking about the fact that I haven't written anything for David despite the fact that I still have tons of ideas for him in my braims (and one completely written first draft that simply needs editing, though I admit it needs tons of it), I never finished the "Calling the Doctor" series, and I totally forgot about "A Teacher and a Housemaid."

Then

bas_math_girl started posting her new Doctor/Donna-in-a-Regency-AU story, and that reminded me that I have a 1/3-done "the Doctor and Donna meets Jane Austen" story. That one is completely plotted out in my brain, but never made it onto paper. Well, e-paper.

This only serves to remind me that at one point, I counted over fifty WIPs in my Google docs, ranging from single-paragraph starts to multiple chapters that somehow got abandoned. And this doesn't count that I've been trying to finish this one that I keep hinting at in my journal posts.

I want to write. I just never do it.

I find that if I do actually write, it's only if a prompt at

who_contest grabs me, or if some idea pops up that I just can't let go of. If I do pick up a WIP, I read through it to figure out where it's going, and by the time I get to the end, even if I know what happens next, I wander off.

Feh. This is just me whining about my lack of motivation. :)

There's one multi-chapter 3/4-done story that I know why I won't finish it. It's set in the real world, and when I wrote the first draft, I had assumed that the real world setting worked like this. Then I discovered that it worked like that, so I rewrote the entire thing to make it work correctly. Then I found out that no, I was wrong: at the time that this thing was set, it worked like this other thing. I have not gotten up the motivation to re-write the entire thing yet again. :P

Crossposts: https://shivver13.livejournal.com/188654.html

The thing that I probably hate the most about being a canon-compliant fanfiction writer is that the show can and, in the case of Doctor Who which changes gears and revisits itself all the time, will invalidate your stories. I don't begrudge them the prerogative of course, since after all, it is their show and not mine at all. But when you write a story, even though you know you don't own the characters or the world, you still get attached to them and the idea you concocted. I love exploring the guest characters after the credits start to roll, or establishing backstory, and I like to think some of what I've come up with is pretty cool. It's disappointing when new content comes out and your favorite headcanon is nullified.

The BBC's been producing shorts on YouTube called "Doctor Who: Lockdown", which are written and produced in the content creators' own homes and intended to entertain while asking for donations to COVID-19 relief funds. An example is "Pompadour", written by Steven Moffat and performed by Sophia Myles - I will warn you to get the Kleenex before you hit 'Play'. There aren't many, but most are concerning some of the most popular episodes of the past fifteen years.

The one that broke my writer's bubble is "The Shadow in the Mirror". You probably can figure out exactly what it's about from the title. TSinM is written by Paul Cornell, who wrote "Human Nature"/"Family of Blood" and "Father's Day" as well as the novel HN/FoB was based on, Human Nature. The video reveals the fate of Daughter of Mine, trapped in every mirror by the Tenth Doctor.

That sound you just heard was a headcanon misfiring.

I wrote her fate, a long time ago. It's been a part of my imagination for over five years now: the fall of the Doctor's footsteps (and later, bootsteps) as he approaches the mirror every year, the angry eyes watching from a shadowed corner, the string of the red balloon clutched tightly in a tiny hand forever, and what she saw that finally made her think. I can't describe how it felt to watch a different reality settle into place. Ah well. It's happened before (though not to a character or story that I've loved this much), and it'll happen again.

I will say this, though, because this is my journal and I can say what I want here. To Mr. Paul Cornell, who I have actually met and talked to about DW and writing: I've adored your work ever since I first saw "Father's Day". HN/FOB is my favorite DW episode, and the original novel is stunning. Also, that Third Doctor comic you did with Christopher Jones - I totally did not see that coming. I've always felt that Daughter of Mine deserved some closure, that the Doctor felt more responsibility for her than for the other Family members, and I think it's wonderful that you created this short piece to address that. However, there's something you need to know: Mine was better.

Lots of milestones recently. I posted my 120th story on AO3, which means the next one starts page 7! Not many hits, since it's for Good Omens and that's a dying fandom (it really has been nearly a year since the show was released), but people seem to like it. I go by kudo percentage, not by total kudos or total hits: if I can get a 10% kudo rate on a story, I'm happy, and so far it's gotten 20%.

I also just finished my Camp Nanowrimo goal of 10k words for the month across all things I'm working on, so that's done and I'm never coming back. I completed the story I posted, did a good amount of work on the other story I've been picking at for a while, and put some words on paper for an original story that I've been thinking about.

I don't know how anybody else works, but I usually have some kind of narrative rattling around in my brain all the time that I think about while I'm not doing other brain-intensive things, like when I'm cooking or something. Even though I've only actually written fiction since I started doing DW fanfic in 2013, I've always had a narrative going on, as far back as I can remember. By "a narrative", I mean some kind of story with characters I've created, and I imagine scenes or situations, and over the course of however long it's in my head, I replay and refine the scenes and the plot. Nowadays, the narrative is often the story I'm working on; most of the individual scenes for Blue Rain started this way, and then it was just a matter of figuring out how to link them together.

My current one, which I have to admit has the main characters originally inspired by the Tenth Doctor and Donna Noble but have completely changed into something else, is a lot more fully formed than my usual narrative, in that there actually is an arc with only a few handwaves for sections of plot I haven't thought about yet, but it's never going to be written, as I really don't have any interest in writing original fiction (and the plot and the world are actually kind of weak). However, I still do enjoy writing the more interesting scenes as an exercise, and so the last thousand words of Camp was spent doing that. These characters, and this world, has been occupying my idle moments for going on six months now, so it was nice to see them on paper for a bit.

Hm. Two milestones. That's not "a lot". I have actually started on learning some pointed pen calligraphy, which is something I've been poking at (ha ha bad pun) but haven't made a concerted effort toward. It's a lot different from broad-edge pen calligraphy, so I'm learning new skills. I haven't decided if I'm going to try learning a formal script like Copperplate, because it is freaky hard (here's an example), or if I'm going to concentrate on learning the general strokes and then do a modified Italic because it's easy. I mean, a few weeks ago, I was messing around with an oblique pen for the first time during a really boring video meeting and this is what I came up with. It doesn't look too bad, considering I was working with only a basic knowledge of how to use a pointed pen.

Anyway, that's life today. Take care and stay safe, everyone!

Crossposts: https://shivver13.livejournal.com/185628.html

I haven't posted any new fics in a while. Part of it has been lack of time, due to the holidays and to other activities taking up my week. Though I learned my lesson last season and don't have three different rehearsals and classes eating up my weekday nights, I do have two rehearsals through the end of February and I'm enrolled in an online class and falling further and further behind. I'm hoping to catch up this weekend.

Thing is, I look at my posted works on AO3 and I wonder to myself, how did I ever write this much? At this moment, I can't conceive of writing of 50k multi-chapter. It's like a totally different person wrote all that stuff. Maybe I died and regenerated into a goomba, wandering back and forth between two walls and staring mournfully out of the screen.

On the other hand, I am actually working on two fics - one Blue Rain and the other Good Omens - and I've gotten 4k words down over the course of about six weeks. Most of it's on the BR fic, but every night I add a bit more and wonder, when is this thing ever going to end? It just seems to keep getting longer and longer. I do have a plot and a roadmap, but it's taking far longer to travel the distance than I anticipated.

Ah well. At least I'm accomplishing something.

Crossposts: https://shivver13.livejournal.com/182793.html

Me, that is.

As a side note, today in the car on the way to work, my husband and I had a long discussion about how, of all the character in Good Omens, he relates best to R. P. Tyler.

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Crossposts: https://shivver13.livejournal.com/176311.html

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Maius Intra Qua Extra

Entries tagged with writing

Alphabetical fic meme

The difference between good writing and good storytelling

Pure genius

Writing meme

When you put too much thought into something

A bit of meta on my last story

New word!

Random DW excitement and thoughts

AO3 Meme

Where has the year gone?

Tell, don't show?

How not to write fanfic

Bragging rights

Lots of catch-up

The most amazing comment ever

WIPs? What WIPs? I never! (in which the author overuses emphasis italics)

And there it goes....

Milestones

How did I ever do this?

Still as clueless as ever