#but i mean - i'm also trying to envision an alternative timeline where the booking was way better i'm just like | Explore Tumblr Posts and Blogs

purplefictionmom · 7 years

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I'd normally be like "ALL THE QUESTIONS" but I'm really interested in 7 and 15 (but like if you wanted to do them all then hell yeah pls do)

You know what, Imma answer them all, cause I love you darling~

All answers under the cut, cause I’m sure I'll get long winded, as usual haha

1) is there a story you’re holding off on writing for some reason?I mean, there was a story that I had been sitting on for...10 years, I think? I just didn’t know how I wanted to tell the story. It started as a mockumentary type of thing, then when that didn’t fit the narrative style I wanted to tell, I moved to a classic modern fantasy style, but that didn’t pan out either.

Then, the game called “What Remains of Edith Finch” came out and it hit me so hard that I nearly passed out: that is the perfect narrative style for the book idea I’ve been sitting on!!

Incidentally, if you haven’t played/watched someone play it, “What remains of Edith Finch” is an excellent game and Jacksepticeye does a wonderful let’s play of it :D

2) what work of yours, if any, are you the most embarrassed about existing?Not as much anymore, but I used to hate bringing up “...And the Things That Followed.” Just for a short what-for: ATTTF is a Left4Dead/2 fanfiction, reader-insert that started as a sort of experiment: I perused lunaescence and picked a fandom that I was familiar with, but that didn’t have a lot of fanfiction to choose from. I mostly wanted to see if smaller fandoms stay active, even with very little content to choose from. And boy, did I get my answer.

The biggest reason that I ended up embarrassed over it was because I hadn’t intended it to be a romance fic (I mean...the two main characters are the reader and a Hunter, and what with necrophilia being really gross and all...), but I had readers out and out demand for it, to the point of going on strike from reading my fanfic. This was years ago, mind you, so I caved like a wet noodle and now hate that particular fanfic, to the point where I don’t even want to write the two sequels that I already had planned and half-written.

So, it started out as embarrassment, now its more I wish I could just delete it and forget it exists, but I’m one of those authors who has a really hard time deleting anything, even things I hate haha.

3) what order do you write in? front of book to back? chronological? favorite scenes first? something else?For the very first, ultimate scene I picture in each fic/story/novel, it could really end up anywhere in the final version.

After that first initial scene I see, I try to start as far back as I think I can get away with and move forward from there, so I guess the short answer is I write from beginning to end, no matter how it ends up being at the end, haha.

4) favorite character you’ve writtenI guess this is supposed to not include characters I don’t own, but that’s no fun so here you go:

OC: A supernatural Hunter named Silva and another hunter (who I have an rp blog for) named Theodora ‘Timmie’ Wilson

Non-OC: Writing Yusuke from YYH and Asgore from UT

5) character you were most surprised to end up writingI’m not quite sure what this question means, so I’ll just take a stab and guess it’s talking about how a character can end up differently on paper than how you first envisioned them in your head.

And that award goes to Silva. I expected her to be a hard, cold killer, but she had so much inner turmoil and hidden thoughts that she was definitely the hardest character to write until I actually started to understand her.

Which took an ungodly amount of time, tbh haha.

6) something you would go back and change in your writing that it’s too late/complicated to change nowProbably how often I use the double-hyphen. Its meant to be an alternative to using commas (which, I use to many as it is anyway haha), but now they litter my writing like popcorn on the floor at a midnight release, haha.

7) when asked, are you embarrassed or enthusiastic to tell people that you write?Honestly? A little of both.

I’m someone who sees fanfiction (and any fanwork at all, tbh) as legitimate art forms, but there are so many who not only don’t agree, but they belittle and question those who participate in fandoms.

There are days I have all my shit together and I’m ready to defend my fanfiction to the death, along with all my original content; I have my sources, I have examples, so on and so forth, but other days...

Well, let’s just say there are days I don’t even volunteer that information to people willingly haha.

8) favorite genre to writeOther than fanfiction, I love horror, fantasy, and scifi the best, though there are plenty of times it feels like I’m hardly writing for any of those genres at all, haha.

9) what, if anything, do you do for inspiration?Fanfiction, most of the time, but I also listen to songs on the radio, discuss ideas with friends/family (my step-dad was the only person when I was growing up who nurtured my love for telling stories and many of my ideas for novels came from talking with him over the years), or I also like to free-write.

At least, I think its called free-writing haha. I basically just put my pen on paper and just talk to the page with my pen. Sometimes, its just a rant, but more often then not, I’ll find a story or character hidden there.

10) write in silence or with background noise? with people or alone?All of the above, haha. In the perfect atmosphere, music is playing in the background, and I’m completely alone with no distractions, but since that’s not reality, I’ve sort of forced myself to adapt to what I can.

My computer (where I do 90% of my writing) is in the living room of my house, so my hubby is usually around, and if he’s playing overwatch, then its usually a few voices playing in the background.

If it gets to be too distracting, I just put headphones in, but I also write in notebooks and I take those everywhere, so for that, I just write when/what I can as I go along.

11) what aspect of your writing do you think has most improved since you started writing?Definitely dialogue, but also my prose. Honestly, all of it, haha. I look back at stuff I wrote years ago and I wonder how anybody thought I was any good, haha.

12) your weaknesses as an authorIf I had to pick one, its probably that I tend to either over-explain, or under-explain. There is no in-between, haha. My first drafts are often a mess of me focusing in on the details of one room and then not describing a setting for two chapters or more.

13) your strengths as an authorProbably my ability to logically follow order of events, even though I don’t plot, like, at all. This also makes it easy to see where I can divert from what’s expected and explore different avenues.

14) do you make playlists for your current wips?Not really? I tend to either put my whole library on shuffle, or I have a dedicated writing playlist that’s full of background music from video games and other things like that.

15) why did you start writing?It started as an outlet.

When I was about 10, my dad came home from work one day while my mom was still at work and while I watched, packed all his stuff into his car, called my mother and told her that if she didn’t get off work soon I’d be home alone, and then left.

I was in a complete and total depression from around then until well into my late teens (I have a little depression now, and a slew of other problems, but now for diff reasons). On top of my dad leaving, my mother, step-father and I all moved to a completely new state, where I started to bomb academically and had literally no friends until almost a year later.

It started out as angsty pre-teen poetry (a lot of which actually still pretty good, even as I go back to read it), then it spilled into fanfiction and fandoms, and around the age of 13--once my step-dad found my love of writing and wanted to pull me away from fanfiction--I finally started writing original ideas out.

16) are there any characters who haunt you?Silva, and a few others. Not so much because their stories are left untold, but moreso because of the way they helped shape me as a writer and the things I was interested in writing about.

The debate about whether or not a writer should write about a certain subject usually stems from readers, but I tend to lean toward the argument from a writer’s point of view: there are subjects that I broached as a teenager that I needed to explore in order to be who I am today, as a person and as a writer. Not to say I have something horrible in my writer’s past that I wouldn’t be able to share, but more that it might be questionable about the age that I delved into those topics. (and no, I don’t mean just smut, though that is included in what I’m talking about)

17) if you could give your fledgling author self any advice, what would it be?Stop wasting your time trying to please family members with what you write. Most of them are going to ignore the whole of your writing and focus in on the one swear word you threw in for characterization anyway.

Write what makes you happy; whether or not its publishable isn’t the point. You’re just starting out and you need to write; to get better, to learn the ropes, so just go WRITE!

18) were there any works you read that affected you so much that it influenced your writing style? what were they?Oh geez...at the beginning, everything I read affected my writing style. Fanfiction, published novels, everything.

Probably my biggest influencers would be “The Green Mile” by Stephen King, “The Hobbit” by JRR Tolkien, “This Present Darkness” By Frank Peretti.

And while these are hugely different authors with different writing styles, they more influenced me in my way of thinking. Of expanding my imagination of what could be if I just had the courage to write it.

19) when it comes to more complicated narratives, how do you keep track of outlines, characters, development, timeline, ect.?I either have a notebook filled with notes about characters/information, or I use a website called Hiveword(dot)com. It’s a novel tracking website that also advertises its program (which you have to pay for), but the website itself is free and you can store all the information about your book, characters, timeline, etc.

20) do you write in long sit-down sessions or in little spurts?Both, but I get more done with longer sessions. I know that seems like a no-brainer, but its more because of how I prep myself for my writing time:

I have to have a glass of water or cup of coffee, I have to have my music playing (which, with spotify could take a few minutes to load), I have to re-read the last page or so of what was previously written so I can get back into the feel of it, then I can actually sit down and write.

the little spurts end up being in my notebooks and they’re a mess, honestly, haha.

21) what do you think when you read over your older work?I used to cringe and close it immediately, but I’ve been trying to analyze and see the biggest differences in my writings from a then and now standpoint. Sometimes its really hard, if its particularly bad or whatev, but its been a real confidence booster when I can see where I was and where I am now.

22) are there any subjects that make you uncomfortable to write?Not uncomfortable, per se, but I tend to try and think of things from a reader’s perspective at the same time I write, so there are times when I get a little too involved in what’s happening on the page, haha.

HIAPOTS was a terror to write at some points because of this.

23) any obscure life experiences that you feel have helped your writing?All of it, if I’m being honest, but obscure things specifically? Hmm...

I mean, probably the fact that I give all my pets personalities and conversations between each other? I do it without thinking, but there are times where I’ll find myself using lines or situations from this weird little thing in my actual writings, haha.

24) have you ever become an expert on something you previously knew nothing about, in order to better a scene or a story?OMG SO MUCH. Like, idk about ‘expert’, but I have so much useless trivia in my head because of being an author. Talk with me for an hour and see if I don’t throw ‘fun facts’ into the mix of our conversations haha.

25) copy/paste a few sentences or a short paragraph that you’re particularly proud ofOh ugh...umm...let me to look...

From a currently unpublished reader/sans fic I’m writing:You understand, don’t you, Sans?

Sure, Sans understood. Sans always understood. He was the one who didn’t make waves, or overturn boats--you could always count on Sans to be the reassuring nod when you felt lost or the understanding ex who’s perfectly okay with just letting things die, even though the ending came as the greatest punchline ever written in history:

He hadn’t even seen it coming.

(I love delving into characters’ heads, and i love it more when i can do it well enough to feel comfortable with letting other people read it, haha)

From Part 6 of my Garrus/Reader serial fic:“They were my cases,” Garrus admitted, his eyes finally leaving Castis’s in favor of looking at the floor, “And I can’t watch it happen again.”

If Castis didn’t have such a steely reign on his composure now, Garrus might have been clued into his father’s line of thought. As it was, Castis was being forced to realize that he had been wrong in his assessments of his son.The older turian had always thought Garrus shirked the rules and regulations as a form of rebellion, since Castis stepped in and forced him to quit training for the spectres--as if to prove he didn’t care about what his father cared about. Now, Castis realized the reason Garrus pushed them aside so easily was because he did care, maybe too much.

(Honestly, the whole argument between Castis and Garrus in this part of the fic is something I’m proud of)

#wowee look at me go #elainapoststhings

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