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mostlymaudlin · 5 months

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Twenty Questions for Fic Writers 💫

thank you @decaflondonfog for the tag !! ill tag @sillyunicorn @starwarned @urban-sith @tea-brigade

1. How many works do you have on AO3?

98!! (woah) plus an unrevealed t&n fest fic, so 99. wow i need to do something rly crazy for 100 lol. what if i do a ridiculous crossover of all my fandoms and everyone in the fandom tags will hate me.

2. What’s your total AO3 word count?

544,914. (again. woagh)

3. What fandoms do you write for?

mostly all for the game and simon snow series, have dabbled in & posted even less for check please, captain america, and one direction! i feel like i’m missing something but regardless my fixations are hardcore, so all except like 4k of that posted wc is for either aftg or ss hahahha

4. What are your top 5 fics by kudos?

all are andreil! boyfriend privileges (4k, T) / Trigger (62k, E) / flashes of intimacy (10k, t) / Would you still love me if I was a worm? (6k, T) / Inside Thoughts (1k,T)

man this is long, rest is going under the cut lol

5. Do you respond to comments? Why or why not?

not very often, but i wish i did. i am stricken with a combination of being really awkward when people are nice to me & being bad at interacting with anyone in ways i fear could be perceived as ingenuine. im not sure if that makes sense LMAO. and sometimes when i put a story out, i kind of feel like i’ve said my piece — i’ve put so much into it that i don’t really know what else to say!

anyway, i always reply to questions, because that’s got clear social boundaries hahaha, and i DO love talking abt my stories!! and sometimes i’ll reply to comments that really get me thinking. but yeah, i know i reply less than i could, and i want to like double down on the fact that i am endlessly grateful for everyone who has ever left a comment on my work <3

6. What is the fic you wrote with the angstiest ending?

i have killed simon snow twice lmfao. i’d actually classify icarus as rather hopeful — it’s about grief & healing. but legacies is just fucked up lmfao

7. What’s the fic you wrote with the happiest ending?

oh man, i write a lot of happy endings haha. i feel like even when my story is tonally darker (rare), it still has a happy or at least hopeful ending. this is probably not the correct answer, but i think sing of the moon has a really vividly happy ending. like — the sun rises for the first time in the whole fic! amazing. or maybe my high school au, We Can Live Forever, which is just the happiest thing i’ve ever written.

8. Do you get hate on fics?

not really, thankfully! people are smartasses sometimes but overall ive been lucky. there have been a couple of fics where ive winced before hitting post, but it usually ends up fine

9. Do you write smut? If so, what kind?

yessss. i guess i mostly write tender smut, bc i write tender things in general. i think my smut tends to be rather exploratory/playful as well? intentionally sloppy and awkward choreography hahaha

10. Do you write crossovers? What’s the craziest one you’ve written?

sort of LOL. once upon a time i was betaing @tea-brigade's medieval snowbaz au, Reliquary of an Arsonist, and there’s this part where three highway bandits mug simon and baz and then get blasted by simon’s chosen one magic. i am sick in the head so im in the google doc like “lol what if its kandreil.” and then i was like… what if it was kandreil….. and so i wrote Reliquary of a Bandit

11. Have you ever had a fic stolen?

i don’t think so

12. Have you ever had a fic translated?

yes!!! and i’m really thankful for everyone who has done so <3333 shoutout to russian aftg translators, yall go HARD

13. Have you ever co-written a fic before?

i recently collaborated with @thewholelemon on our episode of Star Trek: Redemption, Heart-Shaped Box. by which i mean: i wrote the outline & a few scenes, got really overwhelmed, and jenny turned it into something worth reading!

i also wrote Good Boy in the snowbaz stoner verse with @starwarned, which was rly fun — we sat in the google doc for like, 5 hours trading back and forth on POVs as we wrote pure porn together LOL. it’s funny to think about this, because lauren knows like everything abt me now but we did not know each other as well back then!!! and we were just like “yeah lets write porn together” hahahahha

14. What’s your all-time favourite ship?

right now it is deeefinitely andreil… they are everything to me for reasons i just cannot possibly be brief about LOL so ill just leave it at that

15. What’s a WIP you want to finish but doubt you ever will?

i have a postcanon snowbaz time travel/time loop wip that i was going to try to write for COBB this year but i fucked up the deadlines then the brainrot was like “guess that means more andreil !”. i did SO MUCH research for it and i think it’s rather clever and smutty and fun bc they are yeeted back to watford era! but it’s also dealing with snowbaz, who are in their late 20s and are like in a relationship low point/actively fighting when they end up in the loop… so they are dealing with that tension at the same time as they are trying to get out of the loop. and also fucking around watford to fulfill fantasies HAHAHA

16. What are your writing strengths?

characterization is the thing i care most about! and i think that’s the draw of fanfic in particular to me — i love getting such a grasp on a character that i can translate them into endless situations while still making them feel true to self. i rarely let myself publish anything until i can read through the whole thing without any he would not fucking say that moments hahahha. this is of course pertaining to my own interpretations of the characters, which is the only thing i care abt lmfao

17. What are your writing weaknesses?

i rely a lot on body language because im always writing abt reticent fuckers who cant use their words. but i think i sometimes overcompensate, or describe actions that don't actually fit the scene. i've seen this described as "cheek-biting" -- like, throwing in action during a conversation just to delay the pacing/further the tone, but when you really look at it, it's not necessary. (cheek-biting being like, "character bites at their cheek" in the middle of a tense conversation)

18. Thoughts on writing dialogue in another language in fic?

i don’t really know any other languages! i think i’ve put a little bit of french in neil/kevin/baz POVs before, but my french knowledge is elementary at best. love the idea of it though.

19. First fandom you wrote for?

one direction babyyyyyyyy !! i wrote quite a bit of it in like 2012-2015 but published very little. there’s 1 on my ao3, some lost somewhere on fanfiction.net (i dont rmr my username lol), and tons in my folders from my old laptop lol.

20. Favourite fic you’ve written?

hmmmmm. im gonna cheat bc i cant pick a single favorite. i always say i think No Turning Back is some of my best writing from a craft standpoint, and it also includes my favorite type of conflict (andrew self-destructing lol). however, i reread both that fic & We Can Live Forever on a plane trip recently after not having touched either for 6+ months — and the solidness of We Can Live Forever actually surprised me, especially because i wrote the majority of that fic while i was stoned and also view it as just exceedingly silly. the world of it is just very rich, and also very very different from the typical character backstories, and i’m very proud of how much that reread played with my heartstrings.

ok last one — there are several installments of my flashes of intimacy series that i come back to a lot, because i’m proud of what they each accomplish in 500 words. especially because i often turn to those when im trying to express my own emotions lol. specifically, my favorites are picking fights, i don’t mind, swimming lessons, and practicing gratitude.

that was such a bullshit and cocky way to answer this lmfaooooo. but tbh i am my own biggest fan and that is by design — i write stuff so that i can reread it months later and have it be perfectly catered to my tastes. i love all my fics <3

#my writing

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honeybyte · 11 months

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Can you explain all your OCs and worldbuilding in detail? I've always seen these beautiful drawings and sketches of your character is based on song lyrics and stuff, but I've never really figured out much from a cursory scroll of your blog

OKAY i'm gonna take this as an invitation to spill my guts abt my verses. so let me start by saying these get tweaked all the time, little details might change but generally once i settle on a plot it typically stays the same. And, for the most part, these are all outlines w scenes and A》B subject to change. BUT 👏

Honey Verse Compendium: Start!

Axe + Cleaver

》Agnes, Elle, Goliath, Angus, Euan, Odelia

Agnes Laroche is a theologian hellbent on writing an esssy of the Harlach Parish, a cult in a small town called Kencree. While searching for leads she meets Elle Sinclaire, a butcher in the Rhodes District of Kencree who specializes in. Less popular cuts for the smaller crowd. Elle points her in the direction of Goliath Abernathy, a former cult member and champion for the priestess Odelia Harlach.

As it turns out, the Harlach Parish is darker than Agnes imagined; members offer pieces of themselves to the priestess for her favor, trophies she collects in reliquaries. Her most favored happens to be an eye she keeps on a necklace, stolen from Goliath shortly before he left her court. As Agnes pokes around (meeting blacksmith Angus Reid and unwilling court member Euan Harlach), she catches Odelia's attention, who makes a bid to ensnare her in the cult. Outraged and fueled by old anger, Goliath finds his way into her church and a confrontation. He takes back his eye, steals documentation, and sets the church alight.

The town will take time to heal, but Odelia's death is everything she didn't want it to be: quiet and unremarkable, alone in a dark hall.

Flock

》Kaz, Valentine, Mozzwood, Gabriel, Neera

Years after a series of HEMP bombs take out tech worldwide, knowledge on agriculture and horticulture are considered scarce and precious. Kaz, a tractor driver, and Mozzwood, a variant of apex predator gone anxious, are traveling cross country looking for... something. Neither is quite sure yet. They meet a ghost from Kaz's past, a seed dealer and arsonist named Valentine. In a fight to understand their actions comes the revelation Valentine was a cult child-- one that burned down the church that kept them captive, and who continues to burn churches now. Its cleansing, they say.

During their journey, Valentine burns one more church, saving a single little girl named Gabriel. This event inspires a new direction for the group: a cross-country trek to find Kaz's mother and shelter with her.

From there, the story is a road trip. It comes with the ups and downs of having a family along for the ride, with the trials of tribulations that comes with adventuring across a post-apocalyptic land. But they find Kaz's mother, find a safe place with her, and build a home.

Red Heron

》Alec, Librarian, Johann, Kairos

The Red Heron Project is an experiment in body modification, its extreme and practical uses. Alec and the Librarian are abandoned projects, experiments deemed failed but just functional enough to keep in the program as archivists. They rarely receive visitors (there's often fights when they get them), and they like it just so. Its when the doctor Johann and their subject Kairos visit that things become strange.

Alec has never known much about the Librarian; they met in the archives and he's never seen the actual body behind the modification. It happens that Johann knows everything there is to know about the Librarian-- in fact, they're the one that made it. The question isn't so much where the body is as much as it is who has access to it? Certainly not Johann, and definitely not Alec. Not now that they're both considered failed experiments.

Now. How do they get the body back?

Farmer's Bible

》Eremiah, Garrett

This is admittedly my most threadbare concept. What I know is this:

Garrett is a priest in a small town beset by a plague, one which consumes the host via spore and mycelium. The host becomes feverish, then demented, then becomes a mushroom, and Garrett is sick to death of watching his people die. He sets out to find patient zero, tracking lead after lead, until he is brought back to his hometown, and the woods behind it. He finds patient zero there: a man named Eremiah, who keeps to himself and tends an infected farm.

Eremiah doesn't really know he's infected, and if he did he wouldn't much care, benefit of having a mushroom for a brain. The real trial for Garrett is whether it would sit right with him to kill a man like Eremiah, someone who just happened to wander into town with a bad cough.

Kor

》Adriana, Frogmouth, Grace, Andrew

Adriana spends her whole life blaming herself for the death of her best friend when she was a child. Wrought with grief and self-blame, she becomes skilled in ways she shouldn't and takes up work as a mercenary. Work eventually brings her home, where she meets a strange jester with the circus visiting town. She calls him Frogmouth when he won't say his name, but soon annoyance turns to fondness as he gives her a peek of his world. She takes up singing, something she hasn't done for years, and finds herself a new life within the tents. She can almost leave her grief behind like this. Almost.

Alas, work brings her to an audience with the duchess of the town and her advisor. In a breakdown of negotiations, a fight ensues, and Frogmouth finds himself at the center of it. He steps in to protect Adriana, but in the process loses his mask, shattering against the edge of a blade as it reveals the face of the elusive jester:

Adriana's childhood friend, Kor.

#ask #ocs #verses #this is HUGE #like i said all of this is subject to change BUT this is how i like it for rn #but yeah here it is #all my secrets on a platter

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carryonthroughtheages · 3 years

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Hello everyone!

Another year of Carry On Through The Ages is over and done! We have emotions and exhaustion, but we're so happy that this year had the hype and excitement that it did.

Thank you, from the bottom of our hearts, to all of the AMAZING creators who spent the last several months working away at their historical content!

Thank you also to the hard-working mods: @bazzybelle, @giishu, @palimpsessed, and @xivz . This fest would not have been as successful as it has been without you!

We encourage everyone to look under the page break for all the fics and art. They're all fantastic!

Here is the link to the AO3 Collection: Carry On Through The Ages 2021!

Thank you all, and until next year! 🧡🧡🧡

MONDAY:

1) sun on the sea (T) - @trenchcoat-moth : AO3 // Tumblr

Tensions run high in England, and Malcolm decides it's for the best he sends Baz to live with Fiona, where he'll be safer.

That is, until Baz's ship is attacked.

2) The Words I Long To Say (M) - @bazzybelle : AO3 // Tumblr

Simon Snow was dead.

Baz Pitch was sure of it. Simon had gone away seven years ago to fight a war in the jungle and he hadn't come home.

So, when Simon shows up in Baz's club, investigating a string of brutal murders, all Baz wants to do is hold him close and never let him go.

But these aren't the same boys from 1960 and Baz has a lot of processing to do before he's ready to believe in Simon again.

3) we are slaves to gods, whatever gods are (M) - @wellbelesbian : AO3 // Tumblr

I don’t fully understand what plagues him, but I know it’s bad, and I know it goes deeper than guilt. He didn’t want to kill his father, not really, but we were instructed to do so by Apollo. Cleanse the house of its sins, dispose of a murderer to set things right. It was only right that I join him; he was avenging my mother as much as his. Clearly, Apollo didn’t seem to consider that such an act would make Simon a murderer in his father’s place. It seems I got off fine, but as far as Simon is concerned, the vengeful spirits that once spun and danced on the roof of the palace now hunt him down, determined not to stop until he rids the world of himself.

4) World War II Era Art - @stardustasincocaine : Tumblr

TUESDAY:

1) the art of loving you (E) - @one-more-offbeat-anthem : AO3 // Tumblr

1955. London. Young love.

Forbidden love.

A year ago, starving artist Simon Snow met Baz Pitch, son of a wealthy art patron, at a party, and their days (and nights) together have been a wonderful secret.

But Simon is tired of being a secret and knows it's time for things to end.

(Baz has other ideas.)

2) Reliquary of an Arsonist (T) - @tea-brigade : AO3 // Tumblr

Simon Snow grew up a ward of Watford Abbey, but when his magic manifested in an explosive accident as a child, he became the Abbey’s anchorite—never to leave Watford’s walls, for his own protection. That is, until Abbot David sends him on an important errand…

Basilton Pitch paints portraits for his patron, Lord Grimm. But he’s never forgotten the magic he learned from his mother—nor the men who condemned her to death as a heretic. When Simon arrives and offers Baz a commission from Watford Abbey, he sees his chance to avenge his mother once and for all...and he’s willing to burn down everything in his path to that end.

But it was no coincidence that pulled these two unlikely souls together. Something more sinister is underway at Watford Abbey, and only Simon and Baz can uncover the truth before everything goes up in flames.

3) Westward Son (E) - @aristocratic-otter : AO3 // Tumblr

Simon and Baz have found each other again, but there's nowhere in Brooklyn or Virginia where they can safely be together. So now, they venture the hazards and struggles of the Oregon trail, to perhaps find a little homestead in Oregon of their own.

4) A Way Out (T) - @lying-on-the-sofa : AO3

I frown at him..“You don’t know me.”

He offers his hand. “Simon.”

Simon. I feel the name around in my mind and assign it to his face. Simon. I don’t shake his hand. They’ve still got my arms pinned. “Basilton.”

Simon nods at me. “Now we know each other. Let him go.” Very casually, he takes his other hand from behind his back. A sword, flashing. He leans on it and smiles invitingly. “Let him go.”

This time, they listen.

Simon Snow has been trained for years to become a tribute—one of the fighters Athens sends every ninth year into the Minotaur’s labyrinth. He wants to know the way out, if only for Penny’s sake. Luckily for him, Prince Basilton of Crete also wants a way out—off the island, where no one will know he’s the half-brother of the Minotaur.

Unluckily for both of them, they don’t exactly form the most agreeable pair.

WEDNESDAY

1) long is the road the leads me home (G) - @wellbelesbian : AO3 (Version 1) (Version 2) // Tumblr

Baz has a rather unremarkable life, and he's fine with that. Running his late mother's beloved inn with his temperamental aunt, estranged from his father and step-siblings, he's successfully convinced himself that he's better off without attachments.

Then Simon barrels into his life, guns blazing and rapier drawn, and Baz is swept up in dramatic plot he never bargained for.

Worse still, he finds he quite likes the thrill.

2) New Romantics (T) - @ninemagicks : AO3 // Tumblr

Basilton Pitch, twenty-two years old and a famed poet of the Romantic era, has fled to the countryside. In Mummers House, the fabled haunt of literary greats, he sulks himself into oblivion and awaits a sad, disappointing end to his brief years of brilliance. The cause of his downfall? None other than Simon Snow, the so-called “bad boy of English poetry”, breaker of rules and eternal thorn in his side. Baz hopes that Mummers House might mean an escape from London, from Snow and his increasingly virulent popularity... but the rain that comes has other ideas.

3) thnétos (T) - @snowybank : AO3 // Tumblr

thnétos: subject to death, mortal

a retelling of Apollo and Hyacinthus

4) A Medieval AU art piece - @thewriterxj : Tumblr

THURSDAY

1) From Eden (E) - @orange-peony : AO3 // Tumblr

I wonder if his skin is warm or cold to the touch. I tell myself it’s simple curiosity, that I’m an artist and capturing things on paper or canvas is my way to make sense of the world. That drawing him feels so natural, so I should just follow my instincts. Ebb used to say it all the time. Follow your heart. It knows where you’re supposed to go.

I wish I could. I wish I had enough money and freedom to just draw what I want. To paint him in his unattainable beauty. To draw him the way I want to. Naked and vulnerable, raw. Without frills and expensive suits.

Just Baz on paper, my fingers tracing his delicate and beautiful lines with simple charcoal.

2) Slings and Eros (M) - @palimpsessed : AO3 // Tumblr

Young god of love Simonides is tasked by his father, the god of war, to bring about the ruin of a mortal prince to punish his blasphemy. However, once Simonides sees his intended victim, he begins to have misgivings. Prince Tyrannus might have offended the gods with his very existence, but all Simonides can see is how beautiful and lonely he is.

Or, a very loose interpretation of the Eros and Psyche myth.

3) I Don't Want to Set the World on Fire (M) - @knitbelove : AO3 // Tumblr

September 1940: Going back to Watford feels different this year, and not just because England is at the brink of war with Germany and Italy. Penelope seems unsettled by everything, and Agatha is distant, and Baz is … simply not here.

What if Carry On but during the Blitz?? Yeah.

4) A Fool's Oath (M) - @thewriterxj : AO3 // Tumblr

A simple soldier is invited to join the ranks of the royal guard. He and his appointed mage arrive at the royal city to find themselves at the mercy of an unmerciful court. As he struggles to find his place in this foreign environment, he also finds himself entranced by music that only he seems to hear that floats out about the city. He makes an oath to wed whoever makes such beautiful music.

Too bad that person is the crown prince.

FRIDAY

1) Stranger Tides (T) - @tea-brigade & @xivz : AO3 // Tumblr

“If some god shall wreck me in the wine-dark deep, even so I will endure…” Captain Simon Snow of the Chosen One is many things—cunning, handsome, ruthless. Greedy. It’s no surprise that Snow finds a way to piss off the God of the Sea, he always manages to get himself into some type of trouble. This time, however, he’s not the only one who will suffer the consequences. Poseidon promises to not stop his pursuit until Snow and all of his men are dead.

Enter Basilton Pitch—rich, beautiful, mysterious. Suspicious. He offers the crew of the Chosen One a hefty sum to take him back to Europe from the Caribbean. And who is Captain Snow to refuse so much coin? After all, Greek gods aren’t real.

Right?

2) The wayward heir [comic] (M) - @letraspal : AO3 // Tumblr

Like a folk song, our love will be passed on. Simon Snow wants to be an artist. He used to live in Fiesole where he worked in the wool shop of his good friend Ebeneza Petty. He has now chosen to return to his native Florence in order to participate in an art contest hosted by the Pitch family, the most important bankers in all the three continents and Simon’s last chance for an art patronage. No matter how much he hates them.

But being back in Florence also brings back the memories Simon wanted to leave behind : his days as an orphan, the mystery about his mother, and once more being under the inquisitive eyes of his godfather, the new archbishop Davy. The archbishop is very same man who would never forgive him for dropping out the priesthood and ruining his secret plans against the Pitches.

The last thing Simon needed was an unbearably handsome jerk getting him into trouble on his very first day in Florence. How can focus when this man is the most annoying person he has ever met and yet his major source of inspiration.

3) Prohibition Blues (T) - @heyyyandrea : AO3

Simon Snow is a baker and aspiring playwright in Prohibition Era New York City. When he meets a handsome man at Shepherd's speakeasy who is interested in his work, he can't help but think it feels too good to be true.

4) Earth Below & Sky Above (M) - @phoxphyre : AO3 // Tumblr

In the depth of the palace of King Minos of Crete lurks a creature known as the Minotaur.

Baz, prince of Athens and chosen of the god Poseidon, has heard the stories. And now he’s volunteered to come to Crete as one of the annual tributes—to dance with the king’s bulls and fulfill his destiny. He just wants to survive the bulls, protect his people, and go home.

But what if the Minotaur isn’t a monster—but just a boy? And what if instead of slaying him, Baz fell in love with him?

A Carry On retelling of the myth of Theseus and the Minotaur, set in Bronze Age Crete.

5) A 1980s AU Art piece by @stardustasincocaine : Tumblr // Instagram (Slightly NSFW)

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