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ladyslvr at 03:48pm on 23/07/2003
ladyslvr at 03:48pm on 23/07/2003Gakked from ![[livejournal.com profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/external/lj-userinfo.gif)
tptigger:
Do ideas come in little tiny pinpricks and then get expanded, or do they start great big and scopy and then get refined?
Yes.
Erm, my ideas come from all over the place. Sometimes they're really generic like "If telepathy were the purest form of language, how would this affect a linguist and linguistic theory?" Sometimes they're more fan based like "Woudn't it be neat if Oz got silver poisoning from his earring?" And sometimes they come from a desire to match a story to a title, as in: "What would a story called 'The Atropos Project' be about?"
Usually they start with something fairly big and scopy but open-ended. I have never yet written a story over 5 pages long and known how it was going to end until I got there. Which could explain my problems with writing endings.
Why do you choose to write in the tenses you do (present tense, or first person POV, or third person) and how do you choose particular styles for particular stories?
I do fanfic in third person. The only exception to this I can think of off-hand is the Nightcrawler monologue, which has to be in first person or it's not much of a monologue.
Do you have music that inspires your writing? (That you listen to while writing, or certain songs that remind you of certain characters.)
No. If I'm listening to music, I'm probably in the car and singing very loudly and off-key. It's best that I not be writing at the same time.
How do you brainstorm what comes next in a story?
Sometimes what comes next is a logical and irrefutable consequence of what came first. Sometimes I have to ask the characters. This is usually done in the form of a written interview. Most frequently, I write a stream-of-consciousness rant to myself. My notebooks are full of them.
Example from the notebook labeled "On the Wings of Pigs":
What do you do when you hit a road block?
That depends on how big the block is. If it's a situation where I simply have no idea what's to happen next in the story, then I'll either go work on a different story, find something else to distract myself with, seek out someone to brainstorm with, or put the story down entirely.
If it's a situation where I don't know what's going to happen in the scene, but I do know what's supposed to come after the blocked bit, then I'll write a note to myself about what needs to go there, and get on with the story. I sent one story off totptigger with the comment "Insert chapter 7 here."
How often do you end up deleting a whole bunch of already-written stuff, and how hard is it to let that stuff go?
All the time. It's not hard at all. My stories are almost never written in anything resembling the final order. Each draft that's seriously different than the preceeding gets its own computer file. Bits that have to be snipped get their own computer file in case I find a place for them again somewhere else. Because the deleted stuff is still written down somewhere, then it's not really deleted, so I don't feel bad about letting it go.
What if you really, really want to include something but part of you is saying it's not right for that particular story?
Then I don't include it. Or I do, until some beta reader points out to me that it doesn't really belong in the story. Then we'll argue a bit and eventually they'll likely win.
Do you take notes longhand, and if so, when?
Sometimes. I mentioned my notebooks in a previous entry. As of this afternoon, I've located about a dozen of them. I have a notebook I carry with me most places in case I want to write when I'm nowhere near a computer.
There's no way to answer "when". All the time. None of the time. Occasionally. My backpack is my effectively my purse. There's a notebook in it. If I'm someplace and I have time to kill and nothing to read, I'll take out the notebook. It's 5 subject, so there's a lot going on in there, most of which isn't fanfic. The whole first section is taken up with notes from my Master's exam. The whole back section is the current draft of my conlang. The three sections in between serve whatever purpose needs serving at the time the notebook is in use.
Do you use challenges by other people to inspire you?
No. They don't inspire me because they're usually quite insipid.
Do you do anything in particular to get you into the right mindset to write a certain character or characters?
No.
Which characters are easiest for you to write, and WHY?
Umm .. none of them? The characters being used in a given story are the one the story demands. If I've listened and have matched the story and characters correctly, then they'll tell me their story and they're all easy to write. If I haven't, they won't speak at all, and they're all impossible to write.
Which ones are hardest, and again, WHY?
See above.
Which characters are most like you emotionally?
Oz is most like who I am. Richie (HL) is most like who I wanted to be when I was a shy, quiet teenager who secretly envisioned herself as wild.
How often do you feel like what you're writing is fulfilling some emotional need - ie, when you're writing comfort, is it because you often feel that you don't get it IRL?
I don't set out to write in categories. The only style I've ever tried to write was parody, and I ended up with a non-parodical drama each time. That said, I'm always writing to fulfill some emotional need. IMO, that's the function of any art.
The dominant themes in my writing are family and acceptance. Frequently that means acceptance by the family. My parents are divorced. They separated the same week I started high school. It went quickly downhill from there. I have lots of issues with who makes up a family and what individuals' responsibilities are as family. Further, I was terribly bullied in school. If you want to know the details, read "Odd Girl Out" by Rachel Simmons. Although I'm not one of her case studies, I could just as easily be all of them. I'm also gifted (as in High IQ) which has caused no end of difficulties from people who seem to believe that I believe that I'm better than they are, and must therefore be cut down. That's my "superpower," which experience has taught me to keep hidden from people if I want them to want me.
What about writing smut - do you find it easy, difficult? What kinds of smut are easiest for you to write, and WHY?
Dunno. I don't write it. I'm not that interested in reading it, with some exception, and I have no interest at all in writing it.
Which of your stories is your favorite and WHY? Least favorite?
Favorite: "Grimm's Law" because it's my most recently finished work and because I think it's my best work to date. It most tells the story that I wanted to tell, which, oddly enough, bears no resemblance to the story I set out to tell.
Least Favorite: The "Of Benefactors and Angels" series, which you'll notice is conspicuously absent from my archives. I pulled it many, many years ago because not only was it going nowhere, it wasn't even sure where it was. It's hard to write a main character who is depressed and who doesn't do anything.
Which of your titles do you like the most/least, and why?
I like all my titles as titles. "Grimm's Law" is probably the title that least matches the final story, which ended up having nothing at all to do with telepathy being the purest form of language. As such, I guess that qualifies it as my least favorite title.
How do you choose titles for your stories?
The titles almost always come first. "When the Music Stops" was originally called "Bathory" as a play on the Sliders episode "Stoker" which it was based on (Stoker : Bram Stoker, author of "Dracula" :: Bathory : Countess Elizabeth Bathory, famous "vampire"). In the story, Bathory is the name of a vampire rock group. The idea that they lure their prey through their music became a central element, and the story then retitled itself to "When the Music Stops," with "Bathory" becoming the name of the trilogy (that never ended up getting stories 2 and 3).
"The Atropos Project" was originally called "The Delphi Project" because it was supposed to deal with someone who could see the future. The basic idea changed before any of the story had been written, and with it the title: Atropos being the name of the Greek Fate who cut the thread of peoples' lives.
"Grimm's Law" was always called "Grimm's Law" because of the real linguistic principal of the same name.
Usually some phrase pops into my mind and I think "wouldn't that make an interesting title." Then I have to work out what story goes with the title.
"Leave Youth Its Roses" is a huge exception. That story was called "AfterImage" during the whole of its writing. On finished it, I knew the title was all wrong, but I couldn't think of any better. So I pulled out a poetry anthology and started leafing through it until a phrase caught my eye.
Do you write differently with a cowriter than you do alone? Is it easier or harder?
Never done it, so wouldn't know.
Do you write original fic differently from fanfic (if you write it at all)?
Not really. My original fic to date has all been short stories, whereas I'm primarily playing with the novella format in fanfic. That brings its own differences. My original fic usually also starts with a first line instead of a title. Other than that, they're written pretty much the same.
For series and long works, do you decide a goal in advance to stop at or are they open ended? If you do choose a goal, how often do you stick to it?
I always start with some goal, then revise the goal constantly as the story is written. I've never finished a story that ended in the place where it started out going.
When a scene feels forced, what are the first few tricks you try to fix it?
That depends on the scene in question. If the whole scene feels forced, then I'll probably just delete it and start over. If it's a scene that was going along swimmingly until suddenly it wasn't, then I'll go back and look for the place where it sunk. Ususally it's a dialogue line that's out of character. Sometimes it's me trying to force the scene to go an unnatural direction. In that case, I'll delete everything from the troubled spot and rewrite.
If the whole scene refuses to come, I may have to sit down with the characters and ask them why. Or skip over it and go on to a different scene.
Are most of your fixes deletions or additions?
Yes. And rewrites.
I guess you could say that a lot of the fixes are additions because I'm finally getting around to responding to those notes I wrote to myself.
How long does it usually take you to write a story? How many revisions do you go through?
Years. "When the Music Stops" took 3 months of intensive writing (8-10 hours a day, every day), but was still being extensively revised years after its posting. "The Atropos Project" took a year to finish writing, and I'm working up to doing a complete rewrite one of these days. "Grimm's Law" took three years, but there was long gaps in there when the story wasn't getting worked on at all. "Silver" (my Buffy story) has only about 5 pages written and it's been on the table for almost four years. Same thing with the gaps. Some of the short stories ("Impossible Things," "Onwards," "The One-Tenth") took only a few hours.
Revisions are uncountable.
Do you use beta readers?
Oh god, yes. I couldn't write without them.
tptigger: Yes.
Erm, my ideas come from all over the place. Sometimes they're really generic like "If telepathy were the purest form of language, how would this affect a linguist and linguistic theory?" Sometimes they're more fan based like "Woudn't it be neat if Oz got silver poisoning from his earring?" And sometimes they come from a desire to match a story to a title, as in: "What would a story called 'The Atropos Project' be about?"
Usually they start with something fairly big and scopy but open-ended. I have never yet written a story over 5 pages long and known how it was going to end until I got there. Which could explain my problems with writing endings.
I do fanfic in third person. The only exception to this I can think of off-hand is the Nightcrawler monologue, which has to be in first person or it's not much of a monologue.
No. If I'm listening to music, I'm probably in the car and singing very loudly and off-key. It's best that I not be writing at the same time.
Sometimes what comes next is a logical and irrefutable consequence of what came first. Sometimes I have to ask the characters. This is usually done in the form of a written interview. Most frequently, I write a stream-of-consciousness rant to myself. My notebooks are full of them.
Example from the notebook labeled "On the Wings of Pigs":
Okay, it looks like I'm adding Arturo as a character towards the end of this story. Why? Perhaps Alexandra is the daughter of this world's version of Arturo. Perhaps not. That may just make too many coincidences. Or not. Arturo-Prime is going in search of Quinn. He runs into Quinn2 and foolishly assumes it's the Quinn he wants until Quinn2 shrugs him off. Then Arturo gets a clue. Except this doesn't help accomplish or complicate anything . . . .
That depends on how big the block is. If it's a situation where I simply have no idea what's to happen next in the story, then I'll either go work on a different story, find something else to distract myself with, seek out someone to brainstorm with, or put the story down entirely.
If it's a situation where I don't know what's going to happen in the scene, but I do know what's supposed to come after the blocked bit, then I'll write a note to myself about what needs to go there, and get on with the story. I sent one story off to
tptigger with the comment "Insert chapter 7 here."All the time. It's not hard at all. My stories are almost never written in anything resembling the final order. Each draft that's seriously different than the preceeding gets its own computer file. Bits that have to be snipped get their own computer file in case I find a place for them again somewhere else. Because the deleted stuff is still written down somewhere, then it's not really deleted, so I don't feel bad about letting it go.
Then I don't include it. Or I do, until some beta reader points out to me that it doesn't really belong in the story. Then we'll argue a bit and eventually they'll likely win.
Sometimes. I mentioned my notebooks in a previous entry. As of this afternoon, I've located about a dozen of them. I have a notebook I carry with me most places in case I want to write when I'm nowhere near a computer.
There's no way to answer "when". All the time. None of the time. Occasionally. My backpack is my effectively my purse. There's a notebook in it. If I'm someplace and I have time to kill and nothing to read, I'll take out the notebook. It's 5 subject, so there's a lot going on in there, most of which isn't fanfic. The whole first section is taken up with notes from my Master's exam. The whole back section is the current draft of my conlang. The three sections in between serve whatever purpose needs serving at the time the notebook is in use.
No. They don't inspire me because they're usually quite insipid.
No.
Umm .. none of them? The characters being used in a given story are the one the story demands. If I've listened and have matched the story and characters correctly, then they'll tell me their story and they're all easy to write. If I haven't, they won't speak at all, and they're all impossible to write.
See above.
Oz is most like who I am. Richie (HL) is most like who I wanted to be when I was a shy, quiet teenager who secretly envisioned herself as wild.
I don't set out to write in categories. The only style I've ever tried to write was parody, and I ended up with a non-parodical drama each time. That said, I'm always writing to fulfill some emotional need. IMO, that's the function of any art.
The dominant themes in my writing are family and acceptance. Frequently that means acceptance by the family. My parents are divorced. They separated the same week I started high school. It went quickly downhill from there. I have lots of issues with who makes up a family and what individuals' responsibilities are as family. Further, I was terribly bullied in school. If you want to know the details, read "Odd Girl Out" by Rachel Simmons. Although I'm not one of her case studies, I could just as easily be all of them. I'm also gifted (as in High IQ) which has caused no end of difficulties from people who seem to believe that I believe that I'm better than they are, and must therefore be cut down. That's my "superpower," which experience has taught me to keep hidden from people if I want them to want me.
Dunno. I don't write it. I'm not that interested in reading it, with some exception, and I have no interest at all in writing it.
Favorite: "Grimm's Law" because it's my most recently finished work and because I think it's my best work to date. It most tells the story that I wanted to tell, which, oddly enough, bears no resemblance to the story I set out to tell.
Least Favorite: The "Of Benefactors and Angels" series, which you'll notice is conspicuously absent from my archives. I pulled it many, many years ago because not only was it going nowhere, it wasn't even sure where it was. It's hard to write a main character who is depressed and who doesn't do anything.
I like all my titles as titles. "Grimm's Law" is probably the title that least matches the final story, which ended up having nothing at all to do with telepathy being the purest form of language. As such, I guess that qualifies it as my least favorite title.
The titles almost always come first. "When the Music Stops" was originally called "Bathory" as a play on the Sliders episode "Stoker" which it was based on (Stoker : Bram Stoker, author of "Dracula" :: Bathory : Countess Elizabeth Bathory, famous "vampire"). In the story, Bathory is the name of a vampire rock group. The idea that they lure their prey through their music became a central element, and the story then retitled itself to "When the Music Stops," with "Bathory" becoming the name of the trilogy (that never ended up getting stories 2 and 3).
"The Atropos Project" was originally called "The Delphi Project" because it was supposed to deal with someone who could see the future. The basic idea changed before any of the story had been written, and with it the title: Atropos being the name of the Greek Fate who cut the thread of peoples' lives.
"Grimm's Law" was always called "Grimm's Law" because of the real linguistic principal of the same name.
Usually some phrase pops into my mind and I think "wouldn't that make an interesting title." Then I have to work out what story goes with the title.
"Leave Youth Its Roses" is a huge exception. That story was called "AfterImage" during the whole of its writing. On finished it, I knew the title was all wrong, but I couldn't think of any better. So I pulled out a poetry anthology and started leafing through it until a phrase caught my eye.
Never done it, so wouldn't know.
Not really. My original fic to date has all been short stories, whereas I'm primarily playing with the novella format in fanfic. That brings its own differences. My original fic usually also starts with a first line instead of a title. Other than that, they're written pretty much the same.
I always start with some goal, then revise the goal constantly as the story is written. I've never finished a story that ended in the place where it started out going.
That depends on the scene in question. If the whole scene feels forced, then I'll probably just delete it and start over. If it's a scene that was going along swimmingly until suddenly it wasn't, then I'll go back and look for the place where it sunk. Ususally it's a dialogue line that's out of character. Sometimes it's me trying to force the scene to go an unnatural direction. In that case, I'll delete everything from the troubled spot and rewrite.
If the whole scene refuses to come, I may have to sit down with the characters and ask them why. Or skip over it and go on to a different scene.
Yes. And rewrites.
I guess you could say that a lot of the fixes are additions because I'm finally getting around to responding to those notes I wrote to myself.
Years. "When the Music Stops" took 3 months of intensive writing (8-10 hours a day, every day), but was still being extensively revised years after its posting. "The Atropos Project" took a year to finish writing, and I'm working up to doing a complete rewrite one of these days. "Grimm's Law" took three years, but there was long gaps in there when the story wasn't getting worked on at all. "Silver" (my Buffy story) has only about 5 pages written and it's been on the table for almost four years. Same thing with the gaps. Some of the short stories ("Impossible Things," "Onwards," "The One-Tenth") took only a few hours.
Revisions are uncountable.
Oh god, yes. I couldn't write without them.