lady_karelia

Some lovely person sent me a PM telling me they liked my music. It totally made my day. Then Annie IM'ed me pointing to this. Thank you so much, Dreamy! I dropped ded several times before I was coherent enough to tell hubby via IM that someone thinks my writing is good enough to be recommended. *flails*

debjunk and machshefa further contributed to my squeefulness for musical and writerly reasons and ariadne1 for goofiness reasons.

It all makes me feel very much loved. *treasures love*

Right. Still 300 words to go. Or maybe sleep instead.

To all who write, I'm curious. Why do you write? I'm genuinely curious, and I don't want anyone to draw ideas from others' comments, so I'm screening comments for a day or two. I just want a really honest opinion. And if you don't want your comment to be seen, say so, and I won't unscreen it. I'm just really curious.

Following the poll and discussion about what puts readers off (thanks, everyone, who engaged in it; it was very interesting and productive), some of you asked which trend I've been observing, so I figured it's easier to do this in a separate post rather than answering the same thing individually to everyone who asked.

Yes, I'll admit that I see a lot more behind the scenes going on, being an admin and a beta rather than a reader only. But it's all about writing. And yes, I realise that every reader has preferences and they may vary to the extreme between one reader and another, and that's good, for that makes for a vast variety of reading material to choose from. And just to clarify: This is my personal opinion. I've not discussed it with any other admins or other betas or anyone so far aside from yesterday's thread here on LJ.

The trends I've observed over the past few months are sloppiness, carelessness, and inflated ego development. These traits have increased quite substantially. None of them have a place in fiction writing. In case you wonder, allow me to extrapolate:

Sloppiness: When an author submits a chapter (or uploads to unmoderated archives) either without having it read by another set of eyes, even though it would need it, or failing to re-read it in order to weed out the errors they'd find on their own, or not using a spellcheck (and then give the excuse of not having MS Word; um, hello, google spellcheck, and you'll have choices), that is sloppy. If you can't be arsed to invest the time to offer something worth my time, what makes you think I'll take the time to invest in your stuff?

Carelessness: When an author submits/uploads a chapter that says pretty much nothing and then admits as much in the A/N. If you want to write fiction, then at least learn the basics, eh? Because if you don't, you'll always dream of reviews except for the ones from people sorry enough to waste even thirty seconds on your sorry attempt. I readily forgive a new author any mistakes they make. I also consider myself quite tolerant when an author's first language isn't English, and yeah, I can spot those from miles away. ;) Most readers are kind, especially if the first attempt speaks to them in one way or another. But if authors still make those same mistakes a few chapters later--and I'm talking about basics here, such as dialogue punctuation or a period at the end of the sentence--then I get the feeling that the author doesn't care.

Ego: If you write because you think you need your ego stroked, do the world a favour and stop. Just because you might have written and posted 200k worth of fic in the last year does not mean what you produce is of any value whatsoever. And getting indignant that nobody seems to care is not the way to go. Ask yourself what's wrong and look in the mirror. Then sit down and figure how to make it right, okay? And then, *gasp* write something from your heart. Write something because you feel the need to write it, and don't think about posting it. Leave it for a few days and go back to it and see if you still like it, and be objective about it. At least as objective as you can possibly be. Don't write for the sake of reviews; it will not make you happy. Of course, a lot of us are royal review whores; I certainly admit that of myself. But we don't think about reviews until after the chapter is posted.

Those are my gripes. Another gripe I've developed recently is that all those rec lists out there seem to include a lot of drivel. I realise it's pc to be kind and encouraging to dunderheads. I don't like to see it going as far as insulting my intelligence by recommending I'd waste my time on reading something that is so poorly written that it has little to do with actual fiction. But that's okay; I usually don't have time for pure pleasure-reading. The only reason I did a few days ago was because I was sick with a sore throat and headachy and snotty and wanted some light reading that would distract me from feeling miserable and all the RL stuff that's been going on lately. It saddens me, though. Some established writers recommend extremely poorly-written fics while ignoring well-written ones, and I can't help but conclude that they're afraid of having competition. Why else would they lower themselves to that level?

So there. No need to tell me I'm opinionated; I've known that for a while.

Eats, Shoots & Leaves is an amusing read, but as an actual guide, I found it to be too inflexible to be useful. Thankfully, notsosaintly has found the answer to it here. I absolutely must rush to the bookstore tomorrow. I hope they have it.

It reminds me of English for Runaways, which causes never-ending giggles for German/English speakers. One-wall-free language, yup.

Tired because it's been a long day.

Tired because posting a story as a "validated" author is supposed to mean you can see your story posted as soon as you've updated, and yet, I don't see it until at least twelve or more hours later, followed very quickly by other updates so mine never shows for more than a couple of minutes on top.

Tired because it's just tiring to post a new chapter for a mere four or five reviews. That's about one review per 50-80 readers. Since so many "readers" are left so entirely unimpressed by my writing, I don't see why I should bother. It's very different to reiki or being harmonically defiant because in that respect I know every single reaction means one more awake person. With fanfic, that simply isn't the case. So I guess I won't bother so much in the future.

Of course I go by my own standards here: If I don't like a story, I stop reading during the first chapter and don't leave a review. If I do like a story, I leave a review somewhere and make the story or even the author my favourite. Sometimes I get sucked in and don't remember to review until chapter 2 or 3 or 4, but leave reviews for subsequent chapters.

Yes, I write for my own pleasure, but why should I bother with posting to various archives if there is no feedback? I might as well spend that time with my original works. I would understand if there were no reviews or poor reviews. But the few reviews that are there are glowing.

So, yeah. I guess I'm telling too much and showing not enough *snerk*. On to other things.

Yessssss! I've finally made some progress with writing. Now that I'm no longer unhappy with either the sshg_exchange fic or Chapter 13 of Without Magic after lots of scrapping and re-writing, I feel considerably more light-hearted. I almost see the end of the non-posting-fic-update-tunnel, yay.

I also made some progress on my musical patchwork skirt for Phoenix Rising, phew. The piece is nearly big enough to start cutting the pattern. That just leaves about two cloaks and the masquerade ball dress. Still sounds daunting, but not quite as daunting as yesterday.

And just as I thought Shrimpcast will soon go into hibernation, the next convention, Terminus is announced. Maybe not quite a full hibernation then. If Pansy Vanilla reads this, she'll probably AK me, LOL. Maybe just the odd irregular episode when something news-worthy happens until three or four months before August, then the mischief can start again *snicker*.

Now, if my son returns my laptop, I can actually get some work done on the website. But if he doesn't, that's fine, too. I might write some more, or actually read for pleasure. I see pern_dragon updated Phantom of Hogwarts, yay.

This plot bunny has been biting at my ankles for months now, worse than Miss Snark's Killer Yap, so I've finally succumbed and started to write it. *Sigh* Only because the bites were becoming painful, otherwise I'd have stuck to one WIP and one unpublished and as yet unfinished podcast idea.

Chapter XII of Without Magic is about one third done, and I'll concentrate on that this week. littlebeloved's demand might even be met in this chapter - I'll see what I can do. By the way, I think littlebeloved likes the LJ thing and would probably love to have some more friends. She's started writing a SS/HG story, so go on, encourage her!

Chapter I of Teh Podcast, which I would love to see turned into a videocast (but unfortunately I lack the expertise for that - any takers???), is seriously cleaned up, thanks to the huge help of a friend. I will give due credit once this project is completed, as I have a number of people to thank on this one.

Chapter I of The New, Plot-Bunny-Bullied, Story is nearly complete. The outline is done, I expect it to be between four and six chapters.

As far as RL is concerned, I don't even want to mention it. The waiting is taking its toll; someone, and I have no idea who, is polyjuicing Dorkboy; and I spent a day and a half between bed and bathroom, being way too ill to think straight. All I want to do right now is jump on that plane. But at least I'm happy writing away.

I've been thinking about upcoming stories to write. I've signed up for the Paintbrush and Quill Society at Phoenix Rising, which I'm rather excited about. Have not received the assignment so far, and I think the deadline is sometime in December. Then there is WM, which I'm currently writing at the rate of roughly 500 words a day. So far, I haven't deviated too far from the outline, but then again, I never know what The Muse decides.

There is the likelihood of a Christmas HG/SS Exchange, which I'd love to participate in. Firstly, it was great fun, and secondly, it was a great challenge that taught me a lot. I'd love to see that I can do better next time. I'm not exactly unhappy with the outcome of my story, but I hope I can do better, ie. write something a little bit deeper.

Doing all of the above seems quite a task, especially considering that we'll be moving from one continent to another in the next six to eight weeks. On the other hand, of course, moving half way across the world means plenty of time in an airplane, with plenty of time to write.

Now, to Phoenix Rising. I saw on phoenix_chat that someone already created a community for one ship, I think it's Snarry. Should we create one for Snermione shippers? We could pimp it both on LJ and on the PR forum, and I think it would be fun getting to know those who attend before the event. What do ya'll think?

We played around with the Macbook, or rather, with its built-in camera and snapshot feature - I'm sharing the fun below.



The "x-ray" mode



The "comic" mode