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taihua · 5 months

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20 questions for fic writers

Tagged by @gekidasa whose answers were excellent to read at 2am when I couldn't sleep <3

1. How many works do you have on AO3? 91

2. What's your total AO3 word count? 437,726

3. What fandoms do you write for? TGCF obviously is the main one, and Tolkien fic is something I regularly write because it feels like going home. I dipped my toes into Genshin fic this year and I've been known to randomly drop one-off fics for other fandoms when the brainworms hit!

4. What are your top 5 fics by kudos?

After Hours. The magnum opus. Deserves its place at the top.

I Want to Ki** You. I never expected this fic to get so popular so it amuses me that it's still near the top.

Further Precautions. Dumb humor win!

Carved in bone, heart engraved. The trope inversion amnesia fic!

Bet On It. So near and dear to my heart that I have spent the last two years trying to scrub off the serial numbers for publication and if that ever happens, it'll be amusing to see who recognizes it.

5. Do you respond to comments? Why or why not? I used to, but then a depression era hit and now I have Inbox (666) and it fills me with dread to look at the number. I do read each and every comment and 9 times out of 10 I start tearing up even if it's something short like "loved this, thanks!"

6. What is a fic you wrote with the angstiest ending? I'm too sappy to do actual unhappy endings, but Still Have Time sort of implies a cycle of toxic breakups that can't be fixed.

... I also forgot that I have that one Celebrimbor/Annatar pre-torture fic, which is objectively much worse than breakups now that I think about it. Does it count when Tolkien is the one who wrote the death-by-torture ending for Tyelpë, though?

7. What's the fic you wrote with the happiest ending? All of them!!!!! But I'll nominate Money Maker, because it's the only fic I think I have ever written, for any fandom, that involves the couple getting married at the end. I bullied them so hard in this AU that I decided they earned it.

8. Do you get hate on fics? Never in the comments themselves, but I saw people being dicks about my writing on Twitter every now and then, which is the unfortunate downside of having a well-known fic in fandom. Not everyone has to like my fics, but like... I can see what you're saying on the public forum in the community that I myself am active in, guys.

9. Do you write smut? If so, what kind? *gestures at my AO3 profile*

10. Do you write crossovers? What's the craziest one you've written? The most I've done is throw in a cameo from other MXTX fandoms, and I guess that one self-indulgent Sk8/tgcf fic that lives in my drafts and will never see the light of day. I just don't find "they meet!" to be enough of a plot to be worth reading or writing. The thought of writing all that introducing sounds like hell, sorry.

11. Have you ever had a fic stolen? Yup, there was that time the person almost word-for-word replicated Still Have Time. They claimed it was an accident and apologized before taking it down when I commented, but that wasn't fun. I felt like a jerk for commenting even though it was blatant theft; they even left kudos on my fic :/

12. Have you ever had a fic translated? Yes, I have a handful of my fics translated into Russian thanks to some Twitter pals!

13. Have you ever co-written a fic before? Sadly no. I always thought this would be fun, though, so if anyone wants to try it sometime... just sayin'........ my inbox open....

14. What's your all-time favorite ship? 300,000+ of my AO3 wordcount is for Fengqing and they're always going to be one of the most specialest ships ever for me for many reasons, but I also feel like I have to give a shoutout to Maedhros/Fingon in Tolkien fandom for being my longest-running ship? I got into them in high school and they're the ship that I feel I can just sit down and write something for them whenever I want.

15. What's a wip you want to finish, but doubt you ever will? There was that Fengqing police AU I started and I thought it would be good, but it ended up not really feeling like them and that was part of what pushed me to focus on original writing instead of fanfic this year. Funnily enough, I Frankensteined some of the concepts from that AU into Constellate, which is to date my only unfinished WIP on AO3. I never really had a plan for what I was doing with that fic and I thought I could just power through it, which failed miserably.

16. What are your writing strengths? Humor, probably! It's hard to be funny in writing, but I do try.

17. What are your writing weaknesses? I have about a year's worth of fic that needs to be line edited and reposted because I was cueing--sentences like "He felt that he was afraid" rather than "His heart pounded in his chest" etc. A writing teacher pointed it out to me this summer and I've been consciously trying to fix it, but I know a lot of my fics are worse because of this.

18. Thoughts on writing dialogue in another language for a fic? I never see this done well in fic. Personally, if I'm writing Chinese characters in China in an English language fic, it's implied that they're speaking Chinese, so there's no need to stick "Hao jiu bu jian" in quotation marks, yknow? It only makes sense to change languages if it's implied that this section of language is different from the rest of the narrative, and even then it can be distracting in a bad way to have it written out rather than saying "'Hello,' he greeted in French."

19. First fandom you wrote for? Lord of the Rings probably. I'm not going to look at my FFN profile to check.

20. Favorite fic you've written? I have lots of favorites for lots of reasons, but I'll give a shoutout to No smoke without fire this time because it's my only OC-centric fic and I'm happy that people like it anyway even though OCs aren't really a thing in danmei fandom.

Tagging: I will take the lazy route and say steal it and tag me. I like reading answers to these

#meme answers #i miss fics so bad... rattling my cage rn!!!!

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sorcerous-caress · 7 days

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hope this isn't weird to ask but how long have you been writing and how old are you? did you ever take any courses related to writing or have you been improving through writing as a hobby?

Hey it's not weird at all, I'll happily answer!

I'm 20 years old, and I have been writing non-continuously since I was 12.

My first fic was written with colon punctuation for spoken dialogue instead of quotation marks bc I didn't know what those were at the time. For example:

Bob: nice weather we're having today (he said with a smile)

Bob2: I signed the divorce papers, they're on the counter. (Sighing at the other's stubbornness)

I posted it on wattpad.

Afterwards, I never wrote anything else, but I learned about Ao3 and kept enganging in fandom spaces. At 14, I joined roleplaying group chats, which made me think and write faster to keep the rp going. Eventually, it became one on one rp with another person where we would take our chat history log, freshen it up a bit, then post it as a fic.

By 16, I joined a fandom server with a semi serious writing subcategory in it. People more experienced and much older than me would beta for other's story. It's where I picked up the habit to write drafts in google docs so I can easily share the link for a beta reader to add suggestions to.

I still haven't written another fic by then, not by myself, at least. I got very insecure at the time about my writing and lack of knowledge. Mind you, I joined the server, not knowing what punctuation was. It took several beta readers adding punctuation for me until it finally clicked that I should use it.

It felt like I was an outcast in a way? Sure, everyone treated me just as nicely as others there, but I noticed the little things that added up over time. Like how no one would react or talk about the stories I post, but if someone else shares theirs, then the entire server gushes over it. Or how one time I reacted to my own story with an emoji, only for someone else to mention how it's me who clicked it and I shouldn't do that. It was a very unhealthy environment for a 16-year-old surrounded by 30-20 years old, but I stuck to it because I wanted to improve my writing.

Even if I was ignored, they'd still beta for me as a chance to offer "constructive criticism." Artists can be very petty when a low skilled person joins them.

My skills improved, and I posted my second fic! It was nothing remarkable, but it felt like the first stone into the stairway of improvement, yk? I loved that fic, it was my crowning jewel.

But as a result, I started to hate writing. It was a struggle, I'd spend hours on two sentences while others on the server were bragging about their 50k fics. I hated my own inability to perform better, to write better.

I got sick of reading my own writing from the number of times I'd rewrite it in an attempt to format it better. I couldn't even bare look at other's writing or read fanfics on AO3 because I'd always compare their writing to mine. Break their style down and analyse it in an attempt to spot what I'm doing wrong.

I left the server eventually, abruptly too. It was for the better.

I swore off of writing.

For two years, that was true. I gradually came to reading fanfics again, but just looking at a blank document was enough to get me nauses.

By 18, Aot happened, and the boom in x reader fanfics.

Everything I've written up to this point has been ships. Not once did I consider the idea of an x reader. For a while, I used to scoff at it and label it as cringe, as if the ship fanfics I was reading wasn't cringe either. Elitism, I tell you.

I saw these request blogs and how posting on tumblr seemed less intimidating than AO3. How intimate it felt to have an anon talk to you about your own fic that you wrote for them, to have people discussing your writing and stories with you! And they ask for more!

Sign me tf up.

I started my first writing blog, and I didn't know shit. I learned as I went. The new formatting, the tumblr tag system, creating a masterlist.

How important presentation is in here.

In AO3, your fic has the same chance of being read as any other one. Only your description is there to judge it by. But on tumblr? The shiny bookcover was almost as important as the material inside. In here, you have to market your own fic, present it with a lovely bow on top, add a pretty eyecatching header, and all the right trending tags.

Luckily, it clicked easy for me. I used free domian paintings from past centuries to make my covers, and they stood out amongst the anime cover galore. It was a little pretentious, I admit, but I also was a little pretentious, so it's alright.

I played my cards right, answered requests enthusiastically, and delivered fics at a fast rate. Paid attention to what styles worked best and what genres attracted more attention. At that point, it was a numbers game for me. Play marketing right, and you'll win at capitalism.

It felt very degrading and dirty.

My personal style fazed out, and my fics had a sanitised safe for mass consume feel to it. It was written to appeal to you rather than written out of any real love or passion.

It was soulless garbage.

Not to mention at the time I still used the same unhealthy and needlessly convoluted writing method I learned from that server. Yes I cut ties with them but I still didn't have any other alternative writing method to use.

What's that? Just write however I want? Are you crazy? What like my 12y old self wrote on wattpad? My 18y old self would rather die than actually be true to themselves.

I was extremely insecure and afraid of being labelled as "cringe" I completely ereased any stray stains of personality that managed to trickle their way down into my writing. Not once did I write for myself during that time, and not once did I actually enjoy a single piece I made.

I hated all of them, I couldn't bear to even read the fics I wrote. But I still made more and more to appease the requesters, still forced myself to sit and write each morning for hours on end.

A tight timeline, an exhausting production and no friends or hobbies to fall back into and relax. It was a fucking nightmare.

What ircked me the most was how people would just keep requesting more without a thank you or even a fuck you afterwards. It's like it's a fast food drive-through and I should be grateful for any attention I get.

But I never said a word. I never complained because complaining drives away people and engagement. No, I needed to keep my happy chill imagine and never show any emotion or talk about my struggles in real life or writing.

Instead of realising I hated my writing because of its lack of essence and soul, I convinced myself instead that it's because my skill level is still too low.

So I searched online. I found writing courses I couldn't afford, and neither could I ask my family for money for anything at the time because of personal reasons.

So I put on my pirate hat.

Apparently, people don't bother uploading the scam writing tips courses to pirate websites. That's fair.

Instead, I pirated books from famous authors talking about writing. Read them and tried to apply their methods, ignored my own preferences, and wrote to fit their subjective standards of what good writing is.

I signed up for free trials courses that didn't require a credit card and copied every single file into my hard drive before the trail ended.

I had so much material to study. I watched youtube videos about writing. I really really tried everything I could.

But I still loathed every fucking word I put down on these pages.

And I hated how a general advice in writing was to "follow your heart" what is that supposed to mean? I can't do that. Others do not like my heart, It has been proven many times before so how about you just give me some useful advice instead you useless wrinkled piece of shit book?

...

You can't force or fake creativity.

You can fake an elegant writing style, you can copy interesting lines from famous books and apply them to your own writing, you can include every trendy word in all the right places.

But you can't fake creativity.

I wished I was 12 again. Writing fics on wattpad, where my style was worse than garbage, and yet I loved it. People loved it.

Because it was garbage with a soul, a garbage that had empty chocolate milk bottles and spilt sprinkles. A garbage that showed personality and where my priorities were. With kids' fingerprints in colourful paint and a toddler's fridge artpiece.

A garbage that mirrored my love for the art.

And I ruined it. I traded it all for stupid punctuation that I didn't even care for.

I was happy.

Like every other probome in my life, I ran away.

I hit my breaking point. The requests were never ending, the studying and writing books were getting more and more pretentious and contradicting themselves. I barely had time to eat, I don't talk to people or go outside.

I do not have the time for anything, I missed having friends.

I left the blog. I stopped writing, it was too anxiety inducing.

I got into videogames again, I enjoyed the text heavy ones. I chose to ignore what that implied.

They were so...beautiful.

And fun!

I made some friends, I was happy for a while.

Then, one of my favourite characters in my video game mentioned missing their parents, how hard the funeral was.

It hit home.

I'm not writing, I convinced myself with a lie, I'm just gonna put down my thoughts on them...in a google document.

See just around 1k words, easy peasy. I AM NOT WRITING. It doesn't count.

But I did write it. Not with any calculated formula or method. I wrote my thoughts like how I hear them in my head and what I felt, what I imagined the character would feel.

Then, I added some dialogue, trimmed the corners, and sprinkled in euphemism.

It was simple and bare, vulnerable.

I posted it. It never got much traction.

But I was happy, I liked it, even loved it and kept rereading it.

I was 19.

I nervously showed it to my friend. They mentioned how much they can't stand reading books or fics because the words overwhelm them courtesy of their ADHD.

But they managed to read mine. Very smoothly.

Because my style, my own personal style that is set to my preference, makes me write in small paragraphs and straightforward. I never linger on details or focus on one thing for too long, I always give breaks and seperate events from each other.

And it clicked for this one person who struggled with reading, a style that will get criticism in any serious writing circle for being too simple or childish.

They liked it.

I hate needless convolution.

I just turned 20 years old, I asked for Baldur's Gate 3 early access as my birthday gift.

I received it, I played it.

I fell in love with its writing.

Then I made this blog, and I promised myself not to follow rabbits into any holes again. To reject the requests I don't want, to write because I love to, because I find it interesting or fun.

To never feel obligated to any thing or person. Only write if I want to, only post it if I want to. And if I don't want to? Then I simply won't.

And yes this blog gets much less attention than my first one but the people in here, the anons and my readers, they interact much more with me and my writing. It feels much better to have a handful of people genuinely excited and curious about your stories than a hundred people who would only leave likes and leave.

I have never touched a writing course or a helpful book since then. I block every writing tips blog, I see. I hate each and every single post about writing tricks and immediately skip past it.

I don't care if I improve anymore. I don't care if people don't read my stuff. I do not care if my style degenerates so much and reverts back to wattpad. All I care about is the fact I love writing and I enjoy it, I plan to keep it this way.

It's also funny that I'm writing in English since I when I first started writing at 12 it was in Arabic. My first fic? In Arabic.

And I was willing to go down that road yk. Keep true to my heritage and culture, write in my own beautiful language.

But. I wrote about queer topics and stories. Homophobia is still a massive thing in our society. My story was more infamous and taboo than famous and beloved.

I had so many people coming to my dms to "educate" me about religion and sin. How what I'm doing is wrong and the message I'm spreading is haram.

It was funny at first especially when it was the quran that made me want to write in the first place. Because it's actually a collection of poems! It just loses its rhythm when translated to English. It was so beautifully written, I'd listen to it always as a kid.

But then those dms became unbearable and I decided to learn english to join the western fandoms instead. A 12y old just deciding to fuck it and learn a whole new language to write gay fics.

A lot of my struggles in writing at 12-17 was because I was still learning English at the time.

This was fun. Thank you so much for asking this, anon! I had the chance to reminisce about the past.

I made so many mistakes. But I'd rather having made them and reached this point of content with myself than not having made them at all.

#♡other #♡writing

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little-ligi · 3 years

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So it’s a day late, but it’s here! Mini @mercelotweek day 5: Gifts!

Blackberries, Griffins and a Kiss For You

💕 Read on Ao3 HERE! 💕

“Oh,” Lancelot exclaimed quietly. He stepped around Gwaine and reached for a small cherry wood sculpture of a griffin. He turned it over in his hands, a chuckle rumbling in the back of his throat.

“I have to buy this for Merlin,” he said, lifting the tiny wooden creature up to his face.

“He likes griffins, does he?” Gwaine asked, confused. He’d never heard Merlin express any kind of fondness about them.

“Not particularly, no.” Lancelot chuckled again and moved over to the stallholder, holding the griffin statuette up and pulling out his moneybag.

Lancelot is a sweetheart and likes buying Merlin gifts. 🎁

#minimercelotweek2021 #day 5: gifts #mmw2021fill #bbc merlin fanfiction #mercelot #ligi writes #gwaine being gwaine #lancelot is a sweetheart #happy merlin #merlin/lancelot #mod ligi #this fic has been in my ao3 drafts for two hours because i couldn't think of a bloody title #this will have to do

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noobtiedoo · 4 years

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WIP Wednesday

I was tagged by the amazing @marvelousmaize. Who is very talented, if you don’t follow her yet i suggest you go check out her blog. She’s great.

I have been working on the same fic of which i sometimes post different bits and pieces. I might as well post another bit of it for today. Of the most recent chapter.

But... I have another fic in draft for the near future. One of arranged marriage, Alternate universe fantasy setting and drama and intrigues.

I’m feeling pretty good about that one. Stay tuned for more on that later. But first: Another snippet of my story Sacrifical Lark (find me on AO3 under the pseud From_Other_Spheres)

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After eating they cleaned up the camp site and went on their way. Geralt had -despite protesting- done as Jaskier asked him and taken place on Płotka's back. Because he was injured still, despite feeling a lot better and not being in beast form anymore, Jaskier still insisted he would not exhaust himself by walking. Płotka could easily carry them both, but Jaskier had refused to get on her back. Even when she nudged him.

"Will you let Cahir ride too?"

He asked her. Płotka scraped her foot insulted and snorted at him. Jaskier had chuckled and shook his head.

"Then i'm walking too. He's really not so bad."

It took a bit of convincing but finally Płotka had let Jaskier introduce them. He had plucked one of Cahir's gloves from his hands and pulled his hand up to the air to let Płotka sniff him and get to know him. Finally, she seemed to be okay with his presence and had pushed her velvety nose against his hand. And he politely thanked her for her judgement which now laid in his favor. She was a real lady, Cahir had said as he pulled his glove back on. Still, it was by Cahir's own choice that he kept walking next to Płotka. She would tire too quickly if she had to carry three people. Not that she couldn't. She was far larger then any ordinary horse. Nearly twice their size, but Cahir didn't want to burden her with it. So he and Jaskier walked beside her while Geralt sat on her back. Jaskier chatted with Cahir and Geralt listened to their conversation in silence. All while his eyes from time to time caught a glimpse of shiny metal around Jaskier's neck. And it filled him with pride.

"At this pace you might be home just after dark."

Cahir mentioned. They were closing in on their home. Geralt could tell. He recognized these meadows and woods. He knew them like the back of his hand. Their home was close now. It would take another few hours to travel there on foot. But Cahir had other plans.

"Geralt, Catch this."

He said. Geralt turned to see Cahir pick up Jaskier with some effort and push him up next to Płotka. It was a little heavy for him since Jaskier was nearing his full grown body. And he certainly wasn't scrawny. But he managed, Geralt quickly hooked his hands under Jaskier's arms and pulled him in front of him on Płotka.

"Whoa hey Cahir! Wait. What are you doing?"

Jaskier asked him. Cahir looked up with a smile.

"We're good. I think Geralt understands me now. But we're close to your home and despite me only having the heart of his kind, i don't want to provoke him or test how bad it gets. Let's just say goodbye here."

Jaskier seemed to slump against Geralt who held onto him with an arm. A soft sadness rolled off of the boy. Oh this human... so easily attached. Geralt could only smile inwardly. He understood. But he also understood Cahir. And it was not his place to argue.

"Will we see you again?"

Jaskier asked softly. Cahir petted Płotka softly and earned a friendly snort from her before he stepped back.

"Who knows. I hope so. Meeting you has made my life... better. Stay out of trouble you two."

"We will try. And be careful Cahir. Please."

"I will."

Geralt and Jaskier watched as Cahir turned on his heel and walked back the way they came. They watched him until he disappeared in the distance after waving at them one more time. Geralt heard Jaskier sigh before him.

"I hope he's going to be okay." Then the boy looked up at him.

"Shall we go home then?"

Geralt let a smile roll onto his face and hummed.

"Hmm.. Home."

#geralt of rivia #Jaskier #geraskier #the witcher #the witcher fanfiction #jaskier x geralt #geralt x jaskier #soft geralt #geralt x dandelion #netflix the witcher #romance #sweet #fluff #Cahir is not such a bad guy okay?#Cahir is actually badly misunderstood #Cahir is a good guy. Fight me #Cahir ships Geraskier too #Płotka is Roach #roach the horse

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