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jacaranda-bloom · 2 years

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Annual Writing Self-Evaluation 2021

Thank you to all the lovely people who tagged me to do this @zanniscaramouche @so-why-let-your-voice-be-tamed @parmahamlarrie @disgruntledkittenface @kingsofeverything @justalarryblog @larrydoinglaundry @uhoh-but-yeah-alright @allwaswell16 and @larryyouknow. It’s sure been a helluva year!

1. Number of stories posted to AO3: 14

2. Word count posted for the year: 450,639

3. Fandoms I wrote for: One Direction

4. Pairings: Harry Styles/Louis Tomlinson

5. Story with the most:

Kudos: Love, Ever After (1240 - ABO wins out yet again lol)

Bookmarks: In A Twinkling (441)

Comments: In A Twinkling (1364 - still blown away by this)

6. Work I’m most proud of (and why): This would have to be a toss-up between Full Moon Dreaming, which was written for the Soulmates Abroad fest, and In A Twinkling, which I wrote independently as an advent fic.

Full Moon Dreaming started as completely different story, on two separate occasions; once for Big Bang last year, which I ditched, and once using a different soulmate prompt, before landing on the story it ended up being. If you read the author's note for this fic, you’ll understand why it was so special to me and I’m proud that I was able to tell this story.

In A Twinkling ahhhhhh my little Christmassy, 10k, meet-awkward, one-shot that briefly shifted to a 25k advent fic, before morphing into the 90k behemoth of an advent fic that it became. This one really came out left-field and knocked me flat on my ass. I never expected people to take to it like they did, nor for it to end up in a single month surpassing the success of every other fic I’ve ever written. But I think the reason I’m most proud of it is because the way the core messages of the story really resonated with people; self-discovery, self-reliance, looking within to find your own happiness, and that while relationships with others are great, it’s the relationship with yourself that is most important.

7. Work I’m least proud of (and why): Fuck U (Even) Betta - I learned a big lesson this year which is that writing Part 2’s/Sequels is absolutely NOT my thing. I had 3 of them planned for WordPlay and gave up after this one. It was a good process to go through though, because now I know I won’t try it again, but it was a frustrating couple of weeks and I’m not particularly happy with how the story turned out.

8. Share or describe a favourite review you received: I truly don’t think I could single one out, but I was completely overwhelmed in the best possible way with the comments I received on In A Twinkling. The kindness and generosity of people who read this story as it was being posted over December was something I had never expected. From the pages-long essays about character development, to the keyboard-smash all-caps outpourings of emotions, to the heartfelt sharing of personal stories as the story resonated with people, to the validation of the journey of self-discovery the main character went on; I appreciated them all so much. Lots of them made me laugh, many of them made me cry, reading how people were creating their own self-insert characters and subplots was utterly brilliant, and seeing the readers build their own little community and reply to each other's comments was really lovely.

9. A time when writing was really, really hard: I had some health issues at the beginning of the year, which really hampered my writing to the point where I thought I might have to drop out of the Big Bang. Thankfully, they abated and I was able to finish it, but yeah, that was really tough.

10. A scene or character you wrote that surprised you: 100% the epilogue for In A Twinkling. Originally it was just my standard 2k wrap-up; x period of time later, fluff and love, tie up all the loose threads, and add a heaping dose of closure. But then people started reading the fic and really getting involved with the main characters and the side characters too. I realised on around December 23 that the standard 2k wrap wasn’t going to be enough, and that the readers and the story deserved more. So I ditched what I’d written and wrote a 9k epic-logue in 2 days instead. In the chapter [spoiler ahead], I had them waking up in bed on Christmas morning a year into the future, and it was just meant to show how happy and couple-y they were, but then Harry followed Louis into the bathroom and then it kind of got away from me resulting in a marriage proposal in the shower that I never even saw coming. But it somehow felt like it fit perfectly and clearly, by that stage, the characters knew better than I did how they wanted the story to end, so I just rolled with it.

11. A favorite excerpt of your writing: Gosh. Having written as many words as I have this year, it’s kinda hard to narrow that down. I have favourite pieces from lots of my stories. I love the scene in the bar from Moments where Harry and Louis enact a bit of Ed Sheeran’s Shape Of You. The bushfire scene in Full Moon Dreaming where Louis gets injured. The scene from Man, Deconstructed where Harry’s secondhand embarrassment reaches new heights of mortification. The smut in Wild Hearts Run Free which felt so raw and was a bit of a new take on the concept of heat in an ABO fic. The sexual tension in the car on the way to the lake in my Dirty Dancing AU In The Still Of The Night. The scene in A Hungry Heart when Harry discovers Louis is the guest judge. The bit in Player where Harry has Instagrammed his dick to his 18m followers and Louis turns up utterly frazzled to try and sort out the mess. In The Future Is Now when Louis finally realises that the fortune telling machine has been trying to point him towards Harry the whole time. All the interactions between Louis and his Nan in In A Twinkling as well as the scene where Liam gets Louis to see things from a different perspective.

But I think my favourite standalone excerpt was actually from The Pirate and The Piper, my Hook/Peter Pan AU (note - Hook is Harry, but he’s under a spell, Smee is Smee, and Minerva is an evil Siren):

Finally, Louis’ gaze lands on Hook. He stands motionless, one arm hanging loosely at his side, his hook at the end, the other cocked at the elbow, hand resting on his sword. His mouth is set in a firm line, eyes glazed over, vacant, his soul in limbo. But Louis knows Harry’s still in there, somewhere, clawing to get out. He just has to find the trigger to break the spell.

Proximity to Louis hadn’t, on its own, been enough to keep the spell at bay for Harry when Minerva was right there, but maybe… maybe there’s a way to increase the effect, even just for a moment. That’s all they need, a few precious seconds.

He stares at Hook, imploring him with his eyes. Please, Harry, come back to me. But he gets nothing in return. Louis is about to turn away, resigned to his fate in the murky depths of the ocean below, and then he sees it. The fingers on Hook’s hand that are draped over the hilt of his sword move. It’s barely a twitch, but it’s there. Louis’ eyes dart back up to Harry’s face and there he finds the smallest crease between his brows, barely visible, but there nonetheless.

Smee prods him again, puncturing his shirt and pricking his skin. Louis knows it’s now or never. He’s got one last chance to save himself, to save Liam and the Lost Boys, to save Harry.

With all the courage he can muster, and with all the strength he has left in his muscles, he jumps toward Hook, landing sure-footed in front of him. He surges up, pulling him down by his neck and crashes their lips together.

Time seems to stand still as a bolt of electricity fires through his bloodstream, igniting him from within. Static rushes in his ears, loud, powerful. Hook pulls back and gasps, sucking in air like a drowning man finally breaching the surface of the water. Louis searches Hook’s face as his eyes come to life, the blackness replaced with the most beautiful green Louis has ever seen.

“Lou,” he breathes out as a smile spreads across his face.

“Harry,” Louis says on an exhale.

12. How did you grow as a writer this year: Wow. So, this has been a big year for me, but 3 things stand out the most. 1. I finally managed to move from writing exclusively on my phone to writing on my laptop. I had tried so many times before to do this before and had been unsuccessful, but this time I was adamant it had to happen and I’m so much happier for making the change. 2. I started exploring themes more heavily laced with angst and drama, which I feel has started to add a new depth to my stories. 3. I continued to develop the whole ‘show, not tell’ aspect of my writing and worked hard on my dialogue too.

13. How do you hope to grow next year: I learned a lot from writing In A Twinkling in terms of pacing and plotting and I’d like to take that forward into my other fics too. Having to write with a very rigid ‘one-chapter = one-day’ structure was a huge challenge, but I really enjoyed it and I feel that it significantly changed how the story came across to the reader. This fic also showed me that I can write outside of fests and people will still read my stories, and that WIPs aren’t to be shied away from, so I’d like to try my hand at that again in 2022.

I also made a few trailer videos for my stories this year which I thoroughly enjoyed, so I’ll be continuing that too and will also look into other software to enhance and streamline the process.

14. Who was your greatest positive influence this year as a writer (could be another writer or beta or cheerleader or muse etc etc): I was without a beta for around a year, which was super hard. But then I randomly saw a post about someone offering their services, and on May 13, I reached out and the rest, as they say, is history. I’m not sure I can even put into words (which is mildly concerning given the subject of this post) how much of a positive influence having @parmahamlarrie come into my life has been. From dealing with my overuse of ‘says’ in dialogue, to fondly side-eyeing my Aussie sayings, to all the wonderful comments you leave as you read my stories, to falling in love with the characters I create, for being the best cheerleader when I need it the most, for never letting me get away with plot shortcuts, for beta-ing the epic-logue rewrite for In A Twinkling on CHRISTMAS DAY (what!?!). You’re amazing and I appreciate you more than you can ever know.

15. Anything from your real life show up in your writing this year: Oof. Yeah, but very much accidentally. It was absolutely, hands down, Louis’ character in In A Twinkling. I will forever remember the day I sat on my deck, half way through December, and bawled my eyes out as people’s comments began coming in validating the core messages of the story around self-discovery, self-reliance, and finding your own happiness within. Until that point I hadn’t realised I’d essentially written a fairly autobiographical novel, so every new validation that was posted, was a validation of my own life decisions. I sent my wonderful beta a string of garbled messages through my tears to which she replied, with some level of confusion, that she thought I already knew and had done it somewhat intentionally, and then held my hand (virtually) as I proceeded to unravel. It honestly hadn’t occurred to me, so it was definitely a surprising (and quite confronting) day, but altogether amazing.

16. Any new wisdom you can share with other writers: I think this year has taught me a lot about how to structure my stories, to get the pacing right, and also to not be afraid to keep writing until the story is told. I used to try and squeeze the plot into the word count I had allocated time for in my schedule, whereas during the second half of this year, I started to just ‘let it flow’. It’s resulted in some fics that were much longer than I had originally intended (In A Twinkling, I’m looking at you), but it’s been wonderfully freeing too. So, I guess I would say to just let the characters take you where they need to go to tell their story and just go along for the ride.

17. Any projects you’re looking forward to starting (or finishing) in the new year: Definitely my Big Bang, the plot for which is a totally new adventure for me, and also a second advent fic because I enjoyed the interactive process this year with the readers so much.

18. Tag some writers whose answers you’d like to read: @falsegoodnight @crinkle-eyed-boo @juliusschmidt @evilovesyou @absoloutenonsense @lululawrence @beelou @louandhazaf @2tiedships2 and @princelyharry if you’d like to do this and haven’t already.

#December 31 2021 #Annual Writing Self Evaluation #2021 #tag games #this was super fun #and also ridiculously long #apologies

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