#also prose style and what is popular and what ‘works’ is something that

[loverboydotcom]

purple prose might be another term that needs to be put on the high shelf of writing advice cause why does nobody seem to agree on what it actually means 😭😭😭

[samssims]

Hi Sam! I was wondering if I could ask for some advice on how to make simblr fun again? I love storytelling (it's how I have fun with the game) but lately with writing posts and even in game, I just find myself stressing over if it's good/interesting enough or if I took good screenshots, if my writing is good, etc. I love this game and sharing my stories with this community, so it sucks to feel like this. Thank you sm ♥

Oh Nonny, how I feel this pain. I wish I had a sure fire answer to this but sadly there isn't just one thing that will work.

I will put some advice below for some things that have worked for me in my experience if you're interested in trying them out to try to find that spark again!

Now I have been on tumblr sharing my sims since 2013 so I have seen the community change a lot. Things change, people come and go, it's just the natural way of things. So a lot of the time your community can change around you and so a few years ago sims storytelling was really popular and it was the thing everyone was doing. And I mean everyone.

But now things have sort of fallen off or shifted and there is no shame in that for those who moved onto other things and hobbies. Sims storytelling, at it's core, is a hobby. No one is making money off of it (unless you write it all down and get it published in which case, hell yeah go you!)

That being said, finding your spark again is going to be finding what YOU like about storytelling in the sims.

So here are some tips you can try out in the game to keep it fresh and exciting:

Play the Game

The game has changed a lot and added a lot. It came out in 2014. It's about to be 10 years old. With expansions still being added. Honestly having a family where you can just play through what the game offers you can offer inspiration on how to use in game things for story related things later on.

I have found having a lowkey gameplay (for yourself or even for your blog if you are posting) is an easy way to stay active in the community while keeping things low stakes and casual for yourself while you work on finding your spark again.

Change Up your Post Style

Idk about you Nonny, but nothing gets me less motivated than having to edit photos. If I could just point, shoot, and post, I would have content coming out my ears. Which is what I started doing with my Princess Legacy. All I do is crop it. I add some things here and there but really it's all pretty much easy.

Now I have done it all.

Prose on photos.

Prose under photos:

Icons Only:

Gameplay Only:

And finally just cropped:

Now what is the best? That is personal preference especially for the project you are doing. However I have definitely discovered the crop method to be SUPER helpful.

It makes me not have to worry about the whole photo. Sometimes I have this SUPER awesome detail in the back of a photo but when I crop them I lose all that. Which is not good for storytelling lets be honest but does force me to focus on what is actually important in the shot.

Example: Here is the full cottage photo from above You can see that I cropped out a lot of the cottage in favor of being able to see the deer and swans as i thought that was more a cozy fairytale vibe than just the cottage itself. I lost a lot of this detail yet the point still came across.

TBH the paired crop photos also makes me cut out a lot of access photos if they don't have a pair. It's sort of made me realize how much I don't need to take screenshots of. Though I am definitely an overtaker of photos so I always have plenty to choose from. Sometimes I even queue them then look back and realize they aren't needed and delete. It's humbled me a bit.

I could break down every one of these posting styles but that's a whole other thing you didn't ask about.

TLDR of this section is to experiment with how you post. You can have a lot of fun with that.

If Something is Boring, Skip it.

Do you hate the infant stage? Age them past it. Do you hate the winter months in game? Set seasons to never have winter. Do you hate in game holidays ruining your plans? Delete them all from your calendar. Is it a crucial part to your story? Not anymore. Write around it. Or find some creative angles and dialogue to write over it.

Make the game fit you!

Follow the Inspo

Have inspiration to make a new sim in CAS? Do it! Want to make a whole new save? Have an idea for one scene that could start a whole story but you have nothing else for it? DO IT!!!

The game is supposed to be fun. If you have inspiration for a project, live in it. Have fun with it.

But Sam, what if only lasts 2 weeks and I never touch it again?

Me too, babes. Happens to me all the time. Own it. Keep it around in case you want to mess with it later. Have 10 million saves. It's your life and if it brings you a moment of joy to work on it, then it totally is worth it.

If you want to be like me: Be chaotic and post it too. Then private the posts later when you decide to never touch it again. Never delete tho. I always tend to regret deleted things.

Find Your Community

You should ultimately write and create for yourself, but find others who are doing it too! Lift them up as well! Use one day a week on your blog to give reblogs or shoutouts to your fellow creators and writers! It's all about lifting each other up and making friends who all have the same hobby as us.

Try New Challenges

A lot of my sims storytelling started from inspiration around legacy challenges. I loved to take challenge rules and figure out how to make a story around them. But remember: Rules are made to be broken. Especially in favor of a good story.

If you are working on a current challenge/story, find another to merge with it or to give yourself a heck of a fun plot twist. There are no rules!

Have Fun!

This is sort of the whole crux of it, right? And if you're not having fun then...

Take a Break

You are not beholden to your queue! Let it die out! Disappear for 6 months. Return when you want. Go play Animal Crossing or BG3 or whatever it is at the moment. Sims is a hobby. But it does not have to be your ONLY hobby. Let your brain rest.

In my case, whenever I leave the sims I am always filled with ideas and ready to come back in like 3 days.

This could also mean take a break from your save too. Maybe spend some time in CAS. Or in build mode. Or cleaning out your mods. You can still do sims things while letting your story brain rest.

TLDR:

There is no right answer for this, Nonny. I promise your photos are all gorgeous and your story is wonderful! But creativity like anything ebbs and flows so give yourself that grace to let yourself rest and just enjoy the game again, or enjoy time away from it! You deserve it you superstar creator!

[wickedlyqueer]

i've been thinking of starting the wicked novels. have you read all 4 novels? are they worth the read?

I have read all 4 novels, yes. And whether they are worth it or not... heavily depends on what you want to get out of them tbh.

WHAT TO PREPARE FOR:

dense prose that clearly has its roots in post-modernism. If you're not willing to read long sentences that begin with a deep analogy for racism and end with some sort of sexual innuendo or disturbing event, this is going to be a hard read for you.

Just. So much sexual stuff. which ironically enough you can also easily read over. (The second time I picked up on it sooo much more than the first time reading it. but in my asexual defense, how tf should i have known what "dragonsnaked" meant).

Similarly to the bullet point above: you can easily read over incredibly important plot points. This is because Maguire sometimes doesn't bother to elaborate; skips years within a single sentence; and is unforgiving to the mind who wanders while reads. There's a reason my notes look like this:

No consistency in character arcs whatsoever. This isn't your average fanfic or even YA novel. Just to put it into perspective: the book is called "The Life And Times of the Wicked Witch of the West". Which is just "Elphaba's Life". But Elphaba barely focalizes (her point of view), and when she does, it's at a point in the book where she's starting to lose her goddamn mind, so there's always a sense of an "unreliable narrator". So just know going in that the politics of Oz have the center, and especially in the later books all characters start to blend together, with a similar tone of voice and sense of humor.

Maguire—bless him and may god help him—cannot write women. He tries, he really does, but anything about the women anatomy is so unappealingly written and I was not the least bit surprised to learn he's gay lmao. He also has a tendency to turn women (especially when they get older) into "waifs". When in the fourth book he describes Glinda as being sad she never got kids I wanted to scream and rip my fucking hair out. Glinda Upland of the Arduenna Clan would never want to be a mother. She'd fucking hate it. And I'll forever hold it against Maguire for ever having suggested otherwise. (He also did something similar to one of my favorite side characters in the second book; Sister Apothecaire. She gets an absolute character assassination by the fourth book).

The biggest "reveal" in book four was literally spoiled by the family tree in the beginning of the book. 🤦 so there's a built up for like 300 pages and all the while you're like "WE KNOW!! WE ALREADY KNOW!!" which made book 4 a particularly frustrating experience imo.

WHAT TO LOOK FORWARD TO:

Understanding fanfics and other fan work much better. A lot of fanfic is based on a mix of musical and book ("booksical"). Even minor characters like Pfannee, Shenshen, Milla, Crope & Tibbet, will make an appearance, even when a fic is more musical based. This was the reason I decided to read the books too back in the day.

Also understanding (popular) interpretations in fanfics better. Like. I tend to write Elphaba as intersex, non-binary and bisexual. That looks very out of the blue when you only have the musical's context, where Elphaba is played by mostly feminine women. But once you read the book you look at those same headcanons and go "word".

Delicious gelphie (sub)text is there, if you want to look for it. But you do have to look for it (twas written in the 90s, lads).

Very queer, actually! And not just in the sense of like "there's a lesbian couple" like we see nowadays in media, but it's just... present. This is written by a gay man, and it shows. You can see queerness popping up everywhere. There's a lot of sexuality and gender stuff going on. And even though nobody goes "I am a trans man" or whatever, you sometimes read stuff and go "that's gender dysphoria babe, idk what to tell ya"

Once you get used to Maguire's writing style... he actually can write some pretty gorgeous prose and he writes with a lot of wit. I like his sense of sharp (dark) humor.

WORLD BUILDING! I honestly just read the other three books for world building for my own fics, more than anything.

FINAL VERDICT:

I do generally recommend reading at least the first book. Especially the first half of the book is just so solid. There's a reason why "Shiz Era" is so beloved in this fandom. Easily the best chapters out of the entire series. It gives so much more backstory to the musical (and bigger Oz lore). The latter half drags on imo, but that's also kinda the point?

The other three books..... depends. I read them for my world building in my fanfics. And I honestly found the second book to be rather cathartic, because it really goes through the motions of mourning Elphaba and that's what I kinda needed after the devastating ending of the first book, but I've heard other people say book 2 was their least favorite.

Basically. If Maguire hasn't utterly broken your spirit by the first book, the other three books still have plenty of joys in them. (For instance, I fucking love Nor. and whenever Glinda shows up in the sequels, it's always the biggest joy ever!)

Usually I describe the novels as such: "I didn't enjoy reading them, but I sure am glad I've read them."

[cartograffiti]

February '24 reading diary

I finished 19 books in February, which sounded like a mistake until I realized I read most of them as audiobooks while doing manual tasks. It's always nice when my ears are on my side (says someone with a hearing disorder).

I like poetry, but I don't read enough to feel knowledgeable about it. I've been trying to read a bit from various countries, and after I enjoyed the Pablo Neruda collection so much in January, I went on to read three other poetry books.

Khalil Gibran's The Prophet is one of those works that I've seen quoted out of context so much that I was shocked to discover I didn't actually know what it's about. It's a series of prose poetry fables with a linking plot in which the titular prophet converses with the people of a city he is departing about different aspects of life. A lot of it is really beautiful and thought-provoking, and I thought it was great. It's become a popular source of quotes for weddings and inspirational goods, but I was surprised and moved to find it's also a text about multi-faith unity; Gibran was Lebanese, and Lebanon had and has striking diversity of religions.

I also really enjoyed The Poetess Counts to 100 and Bows Out, a collection by the important Venezuelan poet Ana Enriqueta Terán. I find her wordplay unusual and her subjects interesting, and even in translation, I found her work to give a powerful sense of humor and hopefulness, and a gift for creating a scene.

I did not enjoy Rupi Kaur's Milk and Honey. Kaur is one of the most famous living poets, and I had read so much praise and disdain for her work that I wanted to form my own opinion. There are turns of phrase I really liked, and it is laid out in an interesting way that means some related poems could be read either distinctly or as sections of a longer thought, which I found neat. But I found myself so grumpy the more I read of it that I ended up also reading a lot about Kaur and other people's analysis of her work, trying to contextualize why I bounced so hard off it. Many critics wrote about trying to separate her style from her content, and chose to praise just one or the other, but I am critical of both. Her style lacks personality that would tell me it was her work as opposed to any other poet's, and her content is full of basic, played-out sentiments of popular feminism and bathetic viral posts. Being reminded of "take me to a museum and then make out with me," "but they said not to touch the masterpieces," is not what I'd hoped for out of this. I do think it's a good thing and a strength of Kaur's that she is able to speak to so many people's common experiences through her clarity and intimate tone; it's a shame it didn't click with me. And unlike several professional opinions I read, I think she's completely entitled to write poetry that is not all self-revealing confessional pieces; that should not be something we demand of any art form. But it's a shame some of her verses suggest that certain kinds of shame and violence are a collective and integral part of womanhood and South Asian identity. She's only a little older than I am, and we were both students when she wrote these. I wonder whether her recent work is more sophisticated. I'm not motivated to find out.

The title of the Kaur book reminded me of some enthusiastic praise I'd read for Mary Robinette Kowal's Regency fantasy romance Shades of Milk and Honey, and I found that disappointing, too. I almost liked it; there's some great bits about making art with magic, and it's a good little world. The most interesting character doesn't get enough page time, a lot of secondary characters feel like flat loans from Austen, and the late-book resolution was forced and rushed.

In the Emelan group read, we finished! We read Melting Stones, an Evvy-centered book that I really enjoyed until it became repetitive in the second half, and feel pretty mild about, and The Will of the Empress, reuniting all the original kids as older teens, which I thought was just great. Pierce in top form, and one of the best of this setting.

Lois McMaster Bujold has a new Penric & Desdemona novella out that I haven't been able to borrow yet, but in the meantime I discovered there was one I missed. Penric is a physician mage devoted to an unusual god, which means he's benignly possessed by his demon friend Desdemona, and they have adventures and solve mysteries. This one was Knot of Shadows, about a puzzling corpse and curses. Great fun. Don't start here.

In the land of romance, I've been really enjoying Mimi Matthews's Belles of London series, about a friend group of interesting Victorian horse girls, so I read The Lily of Ludgate Hill as soon as I could. These are no-sex but sexy books with a lot of skill. I've been easily invested in each couple so far, the friends are well integrated into each other's lives even after resolving their own storylines, and their new beaus are introduced smoothly. More than that, there is a lot of consideration for the social issues and new ideas of the period. My favorite is still the first, but Anne and Felix have a strong second chance romance backstory and they're fun to see squabble and cooperate.

More romance: I finished another Gail Carriger novella, this time Defy or Defend. Dimity Plumleigh-Teignmott in the Finishing School series was only learning to be a spy because her evil genius parents wanted it. Her actual dream was to marry a nice politician of not too much importance and be a domestic goddess and social power. Now an adult working for the government, her professional partner is also her perfect man, and she hopes he'll admit to mutual feelings while they're on a mission to rescue a vampire hive from dangerous disintegration. It's very much a Cold Comfort Farm or The Grand Sophy plot of a cheerful girl solving everyone's problems, which is perfect for Dimity: I love her and I love this premise. Felix's internal conflict is a bit of a nonentity, but I don't care, he's too busy adoring Dimity and taking the trans vampire to buy new clothes.

And the last romance for the month, The Companion by E.E. Ottoman. An extraordinarily efficient novella about Madeline, a writer whose spirit has been crushed by trying to break into the industry in NYC in the 1940s. A friend arranges for her to go stay with Victor, a successful author lonely in a too-big inherited house upstate. She is quickly attracted to both him and his artist neighbor Audrey, and they adore her. All three are trans, and the core of the plot is Madeline navigating these new relationships while settling into the unfamiliar safety and encouragement offered to her. In Madeline's POV, Ottoman very much treats the poly triangle as two distinct romances and a third observed at a close distance, which means doing about 2.5 times the work of most. I went wild for the execution, which felt like magic. You do have to like reading about people trying to write and cooking, which fortunately I do. Highly recommended.

A very different book about a writer that I was impressed with this month is Malice by Higashino Keigo. In translation, this is the "first" of a longer detective series that I can't remember where I heard about. That was to my advantage, because I wasn't primed for the premise, alternating between the deductions of Detective Kaga and witness statements. It quickly becomes apparent who did it, fitting best into the why-dunnit class, and using my expectations as a mystery fan against me. Higashino does not idly use an author as one of the POV characters; his profession creates a surprise that taught me something about how writing works mechanically. Very cool.

Also a book about books: Sunyi Dean's The Book Eaters. My oldest friend and I both listened to this as the audiobook wonderfully read by Katie Erich, and we both complained that the interview in the bonus material killed a little of the mystery for us. Despite that, we loved the main character, Devon, and it's full of interesting ideas. It's about a group of families who eat information instead of food. It's about...fairy tales and it has a unique form of dragon and vampire myths and a slow-burn escape from Christian cults. It's about figuring out you're gay when you're already a parent. It's weird and fascinating and upsetting. I think Dean made very smart choices about when to reveal information through flashbacks, and I think Dean sometimes over-explains things to the reader in the narration that would have been stronger if I was left to interpret them myself. L and I both think we'd be interested in another Sunyi Dean book, but not a sequel to this one. It is a complete concept.

I feel that way about Shigidi and the Brass Head of Obalufon by Wole Talabi, too. This one is a fantasy heist with lots of backstory starring Shigidi, who is a kind of minor nightmare god, and Nnemoa, who is a kind of succubus. They have gone freelance, breaking from the corporation of Orisha and taking their own jobs through the living and spirit worlds. I particularly like Nnemoa's backstory chapters and the heist, but Aleister Crowley is involved for some reason and much less repulsive than in real life, and I was disappointed the heist is a pretty brief element. I'd like to read another Talabi book, though, and this was the first adult book I've read that features the orishas of the Yoruba religion which have been a welcome part of several recent YA fantasy books.

The Order of the Pure Moon Reflected in Water is not the Zen Cho book I thought it was when I checked it out, but I'm glad to have read it. It's a wuxia novella about a nun and some bandits involved in rebellion, told with a lot of humor and thoughtfulness about the role of holy objects through the POV of a trans bandit with his own history with the nun's order. I love Cho's style!

That was a one-sitting project audiobook, as was a full-cast play recording of The Importance of Being Earnest. This is a sensational play that I had put off reading because I thought it had probably been overhyped. It hadn't. This is the source of a lot of Oscar Wilde's best quotes, and it's a jewel of drawing-room comedy and dialogue that operates on multiple levels of significance. I'm glad I happened to listen to actors doing it, which I wasn't expecting when I tapped on the first audiobook that came up.

More old books: I found an Agatha Christie mystery I didn't like! How sad! This was The Big Four, a series of spy short stories starring Hercule Poirot and Captain Hastings, compiled together into a loose novel. The effect is somewhat disjointed, and not every story shows her ingenuity. It's full of 20th century political paranoia of conspiracies and spies, with anti-Asian racism and antisemitic tropes I can often count on Christie to avoid or subvert.

And Steppenwolf, by Herman Hesse, which is a very strange and influential work of literary fiction about a man who believes--not to minimize it by putting it this way--that he has a secret wolf-self inside him, much like certain middle schoolers of my acquaintance. The edition I listened to opens with a letter from Hesse in which he remarks that this book is frequently misunderstood, which I will admit put my back up. Maybe there's stuff in your book you didn't intend, Herman! I enjoyed its vagueness, I adored the complexity embodied by Harry Haller's friend/alter-ego/mother/girlfriend/boyfriend Hermine, and I got a lot out of reading literary analysis that gave me better context for the transmigration of souls and Jungian theory. It also suffers from didactic passages, racism and antisemitism, and dogmatism about artistic quality. Very worth reading, difficult to say whether I "liked" the book.

Carrying on with Dorothy Dunnett's Lymond books, I went straight from GK into Queens' Play, which I loved every moment of. It's easier to read than the first book, as she pulled back on stylized spellings and puzzling quotations, without losing any sparkle or punch. It's sooo fun. It's sooo distressing. Spies! Plots! Assassins! Disguises! Escapes! Messy bisexuals! I told my Lymond friends this book was funnier, but that feels like the wrong word for some of the things that happen in it. Giggling and kicking my feet and crying.

And a book I am very solidly neutral on: The City Beautiful by Aden Polydoros, full of vibrant personality and a great premise, but the plot gets in its own way in complexity and the pacing was a real struggle for my taste. The core cast is really strongly varied Jewish immigrant characters in Chicago in the 1890s, some teens have been murdered, there's a dybbuk, and gay kissing. I think I would have enjoyed it more when I was a teen; some YA takes me that way.

[theoriginalcarnivorousmuffin]

Hi Muffin, I have read your fanfics and think you are a great writer. I was wondering if you had any tips for improving your prose?

Well thank you, I'm glad you like my stuff.

I suppose here's what I've got for you off the top of my head.

Read Great Literature

To learn great prose, the first and easiest thing you can do is look to the best.

Young Adult is not allowed. No, seriously, it's verboten. I can list two, maybe, young adult books that have what I'd consider to be good prose and it's none of the ones people gravitate to on tumblr.

You're going to have to read the classics.

Now, who you pick is up to you, lots of great authors have very different styles and none of them are wrong. Steinbeck, for example, very purposefully writes the way he does and it works brilliantly.

I'm going to suggest two: Kafka and Nabokov. If you can stomach the material, Nabokov has the best prose, hands down, I've ever seen from an author. There are other great authors out there, but what Nabokov does with imagery, with wittiness and puns, with everything is unparalleled. Read any book by Nabokov. Kafka too, has great, surreal, imagery and particularly does extremely well things that shouldn't be natural to describe. He expertly writes scenes where he has to explain what's happening because it would not be intuitive otherwise.

Do a first pass if you're unfamiliar with the work to get the reading the story part out of the way and then go back and try to see what you thought worked, didn't work, and most importantly why it worked.

Why was X section good at a) conveying to you the reader what was happening b) sticking in your brain. Read enough and you'll start to get an idea of what you really like in prose.

Read Shitty Literature

On the other end, once you've read really good things, go and read really really bad things. Yes, I'm serious, because this is where you're going to see people who thought they knew what they were doing fall flat on their face.

Everyone makes fun of My Immortal for going above and beyond describing Ebony's outfits. What they don't mention is that half these people making fun of My Immortal make the same mistake and describe, in excruciating detail, every article of clothing their beautiful character is wearing.

Here you will see what you do not like and, again, ask yourself why it's so bad. What is it about it that just doesn't work.

This will inform you what not to do and, most importantly, that there's no hard and fast rules. I see people claim that there are "never do X", "only do X if you do Y", but I have also seen all of these rules broken masterfully in real literature and clutching to them too tightly results in prose that obviously came from this kind of draconian logic.

Find a Beta Whose Style You Like

Sit down and write something, it may not be good, but that's not important right now. Right something you really want to write, feel passionate about it, then go out and find a beta.

Specifically, find someone whose writing you want to emulate. Not just because they're popular, but because you specifically like the way they write.

Often, I see people with betas who either a) have never written themselves b) have not written much or c) they have betas whose style they don't actually like much. Betas here are great, but their limit is really spellchecking and grammar as well as general sounding board for ideas, they won't be able to help you sound the way you wish to.

With the right beta, they can help walk you through which paragraphs should be rewritten and why, and eventually you'll get an instinctive feel for where more imagery should go, less, what should be expanded on, what shouldn't, etc.

Hope this all helps.

[duckprintspress]

Round Table: Poetry Month

April is National Poetry Month. Duck Prints Press has to date only published prose fiction, and while some of us do write poetry on the side, it’s generally not our focus. Thus, we thought it’d be fun and interesting to have a discussion about poetry, how poetry has impacted us, and our favorite poems. The people who joined in on the round table chat are: Nina Waters, Tris Lawrence, Shadaras, Zel Howland, boneturtle, E C, Shea Sullivan,  theirprofoundbond, and an anonymous contributor.

1. What are your favorite types of poems?

Nina Waters: I tend to like either extremely free form or extremely structured poetry, with nothing in between. I always loved silly poetry (Shel Silverstein…) especially.

Anonymous: Same. I generally like either narrative poems or poems that are about a specific moment. I’m especially fond of reading haiku, though I don’t know how good I am at writing them.

Tris Lawrence: I tend to have favorite writers more than favorite styles. I love the cadence of Shakespeare. I love the imagery of Emily Dickinson (I cannot even count how many times I read the book of poetry of hers that I received for Christmas as a young child). I adored Robert Frost as a child. For modern poetry, Amanda Gorman‘s book was an incredibly wonderful kick in the gut.

Zel Howland: I’ve always had a mixed relationship with poetry – I struggle with understanding figurative language, so often the meaning of poetry escapes me, but I love the technical forms of poetry. This means that I end up being better at writing poetry than reading it. That said, I love silly poems and nonsense poems because they are more about the form than the content! Shel Silverstein and Lewis Carroll come to mind first.

E. C: I love seeing/hearing poetry read aloud. Slam poetry or Shakespearean monologue, the way the act of speaking them gives additional meaning to the words is just *chef’s kiss*. I also love poets (like Silverstein, as Zel mentioned) who use the form to play with the words. Prose can do this, too, but reading or hearing good poetry… it’s like I can feel the words rewiring my brain in real-time.

Shadaras: +1, poetry when performed is absolutely incredible. And it doesn’t need to be slam or a monologue; most poetry when read aloud is fantastic! (Shape poems might lose something, but… that’s aiming for a different style)

Shea Sullivan: I love poetry that viscerally evokes feeling with word choice and has rhythm. I love Rainer Maria Rilke first and last, but also Seamus Heaney and Mary Oliver.   I struggle with so many popular poets because the work doesn’t scan for me and I can’t make sense of the rhythm. But the poems that hit take me out at the knees.

Tris Lawrence: Coming back to this discussion this morning, I remembered I should add song lyrics to this… for me, really excellent songs are the best poetry, and some writers (like [Bob] Dylan) I remember more for the poetry of the song than the performance of it. Much like how poetry when performed comes alive, music is that taken to even further down the line. As for poetry being performed, that’s why Shakespeare is so awesome when staged. Sometimes it’s easier to hear the lyricism than to read it. I also often recommend when reading a book of poetry, take it slow, and read one poem aloud  per day. This is how I savored Amanda Gorman’s book and how I really got the most out of every poem in that book.

theirprofoundbond: I want to echo what Shade and captainhaterade were talking about with regards to poetry and sound. I took a poetry class in college and when the professor had us read “Player Piano” by John Updike aloud it awakened something in my brain. I have never forgotten that experience and the absolute delight I felt, reading that poem.

When I went to university and took another poetry class, my instructor stressed that we should try reading poetry aloud – to slow you down a bit, to experience the sounds, to get just a little more out of it. He recommended reading it a little more like prose, not pausing at the end of a line if there’s no end-line punctuation. I always do these things now and it’s made poetry feel more accessible to me, and helped me enjoy it more.

Alfred Tennyson also does some great things with sound—no standout favorites just yet because I’m still exploring, but I like “Break, Break, Break”

Joyful Noise: Poems for Two Voices by Paul Fleischman is really wonderful book of children’s poems about insects, meant to be read aloud by two or more people.

I also love poems that have some specific structure. My favorite is the haiku, but I also really enjoy villanelles, sestinas, and pantoums. Not only do they have specific rhyme schemes but some lines must be repeated in specific places; I admire the skill they take to craft. “Villanelle for the Middle of the Night” by Jacqueline Osherow is a lovely example.

And narrative poems, because it’s so cool to get a story in a small, unique format. “Letter to the Person Who Carved His Initials into the Oldest Living Longleaf Pine in North America” by Matthew Olzmann is one that I found recently that really stands out to me

Nina Waters: Maybe the “best listened to” is why I struggle with it. Understanding and processing spoken stories like that is one of my weaker tricks.

theirprofoundbond: That may be it! It’s not for everyone, but I know it helped me. And I started reading academic stuff aloud to help me focus, and then I started reading my own writing aloud which has helped me improve it in many ways (dialogue, flow, style), and I read my editing assignments aloud because it helps me pick up on little things I might not, if I read silently. But yeah, everyone’s brains work differently so it might not be the trick for everyone – just something to try, perhaps, if it hasn’t been tried before or recently

2. What inspired/convinced you to start reading poetry and did you have any preconceived notions and biases about it before?

Shadaras: as far as how I started reading poetry… well, the thing is that a lot of children’s books are poetry, right? They’re written in rhyme because it’s a good way to help kids learn! So in that way, simply by being someone who loved reading (from a family who loved reading), I was always surrounded by poetry as a kid by the nature of early reader books. I know that I was also introduced to poets who are thought of as poets as I grew up, and generally liked poetry even if I didn’t seek it out much. I wrote poetry as a kid just as much as I wrote prose!

Nina Waters: I’ll own I had some preconceived notions about poetry and reading poetry hasn’t really dispelled them? I’ve always found most “high literary” poetry quite inaccessible. Things like epic poetry (such as Homer) I love and can read no problem, and things like silly poetry (Silverstein, Dr. Seuss) I also love and can read no problem, but the kind of poetry that’s ~deep~ and tends to win accolades, I often feel like my eyes glaze over when I try to read it. I just really struggle with it.

Shadaras: I feel like that’s almost more a problem with the idea of “high literary” mode in general? Because I feel like that about a lot of different kinds of media. It’s like people think that if they struggle to understand what a piece of media is about, that means it’s ~higher art~ or something. (There’s a certain style of movie I call “award bait” and I think it is adjacent to what you’re thinking of with poetry here.) And yes, deep and thematically complex art is fantastic and deserves praise, but there’s also something to be said for praiseworthy works being enjoyable/accessible to the majority of people who encounter it? and that doesn’t seem to factor in to those “high literary” assessments.

Nina Waters: That’s definitely true, and something I used to talk about when I was still doing academic reading and writing. This idea that these ~great minds~ would write these papers, and they weren’t good, they were jargon-laden bullshit. Their sheer inaccessibility would always convince a subset of people that it must be genius, because the alternative would be to admit they didn’t personally understand it and no one wanted to confess that.

With poetry it’s harder but there’s definitely that line between “this is so eloquent and deep” vs. “this literally means NOTHING.” (And with poetry, there’s the added “sometimes the line that is eloquent and deep to one person is exactly the same line that means nothing to someone else and because of the nature of poetry that’s kinda the point and both interpretations are ‘correct'”)

theirprofoundbond: I have been, and still am, a bit intimidated by poetry. A lot of it can be really inaccessible, whether it’s classical or modern. I’m not sure I’ll ever truly grasp the meter stuff, lol. But as with any other written work, poetry can be for anyone. Even if I can’t understand a poem on all levels, it’s okay because it’s still worth exploring and I might find something that resonates with me, or teaches me something, or inspires my own (prose) writing.

3. What can a prose writer learn from reading poetry?

Tris Lawrence: It’s really all about the way the words taste, and how that evokes imagery and sensation and emotion for me. Which is also what I take from it as a prose writer – I’ve always been about the way words feel in my mouth when I write.

Shadaras: I might mostly write prose now, but the poetic instinct is still in my head; it’s very visible (audible?) in descriptive passages I write, because I think about rhythm and shape and sound all the time even in my prose writing.

theirprofoundbond: Reading poetry has inspired me to think more carefully about choice of word, pay attention to how certain emotions are evoked or impacts achieved, and to play with sounds.

Shadaras: I think that reading poetry is a fantastic way to think about metaphor/simile and descriptive language more generally. It also emphasises the rhythm/shape/sound of words and asks for a focus on specificity and thoughtful word-choice to maximize the impact of any given piece. Those elements are just as useful to prose writers as poets! Poets might be able to sustain that in-depth focus across a whole piece (since they usually work in shorter forms), but even if a prose writer only uses that specific attention at points of intense emotion where they really want to ensure there’s an impact, it’s still fantastic.

Anonymous: So I guess what I’m saying is that is that reading poetry will make you a better short story writer.

Shadaras: Yeah, the dividers between poems, prose poems, and prose is… sometimes about framing/intent?

Anonymous: Often I find short stories are structured like poetry, in that the narrative is kind of intentionally picked apart and rearranged to evoke emotion rather than straightforward understanding of the narrative.

Shadaras: And then there’s epic poetry, which is a long-form narrative as well as being poetry!

Anonymous: It’s harder to do that kind of thing with long-form fiction but it does happen occasionally.

Nina Waters: I think reading poetry can really help a prose writer with lyricism and flow.

Zel Howland: Seconded what everyone has said about reading poetry helping with lyricism and rhythm. I think having a good understanding of poetry technique can really develop how your prose manipulates (for lack of a better word) the reader beyond what is in the content – building tension in horror, for example. Great for genre work in general!

Shea Sullivan: From a writing standpoint, poetry helps me improve metaphor and simile by encouraging me to look beyond common comparisons and really dig into the question of what I want to evoke. I agree with everyone else that it helps with rhythm as well.

Anonymous: One thing I will note is that a short story can be very close to poetry and vice versa. Some of my favourite poems are in fact short stories that blur the line between stylized prose and outright poetry. Neil Gaiman has a few short stories that are especially good in this way, for example.

4. Our favorite poets

Many of our favorite poets were already discussed and linked in the above discussion, but here’s a few more…

Nina Waters: I’ve especially enjoyed Silverstein, Shakespeare, Walt Whitman, and T. S. Eliot. I went on a big Eliot kick when I was young cause I saw the musical Cats, and while I didn’t care much for the musical it made me curious about the poems that the musical was based on. I loved Silverstein so much that I memorized a couple of his poems for school. I also memorized a [J. R. R.] Tolkien poem and performed it at a school talent show when I was in middle school, so those plus reading Eliot because of Cats (which I was probably in early HS for?) is how I got started reading poetry for fun instead of just cause I had to.

Shadaras: Some other poets I’ve appreciated whose names haven’t come up yet: Mary Oliver, Ursula Le Guin, Pablo Neruda, Langston Hughes, Allen Ginsberg, Edgar Allen Poe, Sylvia Plath, Robert Graves, W. B. Yeats, Rainer Maria Rilke, William Carlos Williams (I once wrote a short essay about “The Red Wheelbarrow” for a poetry class wherein I attempted to argue it could be about aliens/ritual sacrifice, because it was funny and I thought the professor would enjoy it, and I was correct about that).

Nina Waters: Langston Huges is i.n.c.r.e.d.i.b.l.e. W.E.B. Du Bois too. (Not his focus but there are a few)

boneturtle: Seconding Rilke. I will also add Annie Dillard.

How about you, dear blog post reader? How would you answer these four questions?

[lynne-monstr]

Fic author interview! I was tagged by the fantastic @glorious-spoon. thanks, this was so fun!!

No-pressure tagging: @afincf-tirwer @shadaras @undead-robins @tka-trashfire @hils79, @nyelung, @vampirenaomi, @prince-of-elsinore

How many works do you have on AO3?

As of yesterday, 202!

2. What’s your total AO3 word count?

678,560 words. which i have mixed feelings about because. i'm proud i've managed to write so much but at the same time, i've been at this for over 10 years i wish the number was higher for all that time.

3. What are your top 5 fics by kudos?

Things Best Kept Between Three People (Leverage, Eliot/Parker/Hardison) - 1,389 kudos

Escalation of Commitment - (Leverage, Eliot/Parker/Hardison) - 1,360 kudos

I say goodbye but mean hello - (Leverage, Eliot/Parker/Hardison) - 1,283 kudos

This is the Place Where I Sit - (Leverage, Eliot/Parker/Hardison) - 1,006 kudos

In Possession Of - (Leverage/Supernatural crossover) - 715 kudos

looking at these fics, it's very obvious that another way of asking this question is: "what's the most popular ship you've written." though i am very amused that an actual crossover made the top 5, considering how deeply those have fallen out of favor in the past twenty years.

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

I try my best! some years i am better at it than other. but even if i'm in a low energy moment, i appreciate every single comment <3

5. What’s the fic you’ve written with the angstiest ending?

The leverage theme continues, apparently.

Just One Last Time (Leverage with Highlander elements. Eliot is immortal. Parker and Hardison are not).

I'm not usually a sad ending person but every one in a while I indulge.

6. What’s the fic you’ve written with the happiest ending?

Basically all of them lol. But I guess I'll say that ghost story fic because it got really sad before the happy ending.

This is not a ghost story (The King's Avatar, yuhuang, magical realism)

7. Do you write crossovers?

Yes! They are my original fandom love and such a wonderful self-indulgence. I should try to write more of them in 2024.

8. Have you ever received hate on a fic?

Not on a fic, but I got plenty for my silly ramblings back in the shadowhunters fandom, sadly.

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

Yes! yay smut. I prefer mine with some kind of kink in order to hold my interest. (not that i don't enjoy non-kinky smut but when i do i tend to enjoy it for the emotional payoff rather than the sex itself)

10. Have you ever had a fic stolen?

Not that I am aware of.

11. Have you ever had a fic translated?

Yes! How cool is that!? Love fandom translators and the amazing work they do <3

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

No. I don't think co-writing is a thing that I would enjoy. Trying to merge my writing style with someone else sounds stressful and also i think i might be too much of a control freak for that kind of collab.

13. What’s your all-time favorite ship?

Whatever my ship of the moment is!

14. What’s a WIP that you want to finish but don’t think you ever will?

I'm pleased that all my big recent wips have been finished! I've been working on a little "troubling rain is cursed" fic for a couple years now. it's only a few thousand words long so not sure it qualifies for wip status, but i would like to finish it so I can post it!

15. What are your writing strengths?

I think characterization and silly jokes.

16. What are your writing weaknesses?

Description. Despite my efforts I will never be one of those beautiful prose writers.

I think of my style as very "what you see is what you get" and I consider that to be both a strength and a weakness.

17. What are your thoughts on writing dialogue in other languages in a fic?

It's a hard no almost 100% of the time. And something I will likely use the back-button on.

18. What was the first fandom you wrote for?

My first posted fic was hetalia (germancest) and I had such a wonderful time in that fandom!

19. What’s a fandom/ship you haven’t written for yet but want to?

Still really want to try and wrangle my onmyoji ot3 ficlet thing.

20. What’s your favorite fic you’ve written

That question is cheating! But I'll go with my de-aged ywz fic because I never thought I could write a story over 10k words and I'm still very proud that I managed something nearly 70k!

Means of Transportation (The King's Avatar, yuhuang, de-aged ywz)

[wisteriagoesvroom]

dear wizzzz,

🧩 🪲 🦋

🧩 ⇢ what will make you click away from a fanfiction immediately?

ooh this is a good q cus it's equally about what would keep me there. (and please remember this answer is so subjective.)

i usually know within like 2 paragraphs if i'm invested enough in a story to continue, and honestly style or sharp prose can hard-carry a lot of that even if the plot isn't what i'd pick out right away. idk. i like watching what sandcastles writers can build with the tools and known characters are at their disposal! i also really like when a writer is so confident in their own style or take that they are just vibing in their own lane, regardless of what tropes are popular in any given tag. idk if that actually answers the question, but there you go

🦋 ⇢ share something that has been on your heart and mind lately 

we're getting a lot of new fans navigating fandom spaces for the first time, which is neat!! and cool!! and i think it's good to remember the etiquette in fandom spaces, which is: (i) don't like, don't read (ii) fic writers, artists and creators are doing this for free and not beholden to anyone's time except their own! (iii) at the same time, comments to let writers know what you thought of a work, or if you enjoyed it are always really appreciated :) (iv) in that same token specifically for art, do nawwwt repost people's art without permission and without attribution or the fandom sad frog will get you (i am the frog).

it's not anything that's happened to me specifically but i feel like i've seen it in flyby instances enough recently that it's worth saying... again...

beetle i will answer later cus someone asked the same!! <3

from

[anaalnathrakhs]

👄,🌷,🧑‍🏫,🎬 for the fic ask game :))))

ooooh thaat's a lot :DDD

👄 Your OTP are having their first kiss. What song do you imagine is playing?

oh god.... assuming my otp is marlee, cuz that what i put in the bingo game, as much as i'm a multishipper............... hmmm......

Tomorrow is the End of the World by Steel Panter

Mick would hate it but that's a plot I can definitely see happening. Plus the Steel Panther fic abt it is like, really good.

🌷What’s one of your fics that isn’t as popular, but you hold dear?

trick question none of my fics are popular

uhhh my least popular one is probably uhhh a Formula 51 het ficlet in french, which is. so unpredictable really. but i still like it i like the vibe i was going for in there.

but i didn't expect anyone to read it lmao so... probably Silky Sweet, because i thought it was really cute and it really does come from a place of love and massive author appeal, but crossdressing fics are divisive and it was INCREDIBLY ill-timed coming out the day after Mick's retirement announcement. so.

🧑‍🏫 i assume is 👩‍🎓 sorry if I'm wrong

👩‍🎓 Do you have an ‘official’ creative writing background such as a degree or previous experience publishing?

Nope. I was teeeechnically published once as a kid, and I work/help out in the publishing house my dad works for (niche side hustle thing for bored academics, to be clear, I'm not in Hachette Inc. or something). It would be awesome to have some experience in some kind of short story journal or smth, but I'm nowhere near the level of discipline and method I'd need for that.

🎬One of your fics gets turned into a TV series. Which one is it and what network is it on?

PONYKLOK

Listen. I had fun trying to translate the cartoony style of both shows into prose. I don't think I perfectly nailed it, and it was hellish. It was also a blast and great practice. I was reading Pyramids by Terry Pratchett at the time, and it was a great inspiration and technical manual for writing visual gags. It was awesome dissecting what made these shows, which I love with all my heart, function the way they do, and work on mixing it together into a cohesive piece.

WHICH IS EXACTLY WHY, MUCH LIKE PINOCCHIO WANTS TO BE A REAL BOY, I WANT IT TO BE A REAL CARTOON

I want a stupid youtube fananimation of it like, yesterday. Twelve years ago. I need one stupid talented animator doing that as a hobby, and to watch it at age eleven to experience my brain matter being rewired. I wrote it because it was sorely missing from my life.

If it HAS to be TV, I want to see adult swim's take on it. That one drawing of Nathan Riding a G3 pony in Fanklok is EXACTLY the vibe I'd want. I love both shows and I think for me to like the crossover it'd need to come from a place of love for BOTH shows, not just the fun of shitting on a pony corpse bc we're on adult swim and we can say piss shit fuck, but yknow. Whatever. I want to trust that Brandon Small can understand the hilarious potential of treating the magic ponies with as much tact as the more serious plot elements of Metalocalypse.

thank you for askingggg <3333333

[punch-love]

B, E, J, R??? :)

B:  What was the first fandom you read fic in?  Which was the first you wrote fic for?

Pandora Hearts! I might have read something before that but I have a very clear image of me at the local library after my friend told me about fanfiction and clicking on the first explicit one I saw for the pairing I was interested in lol. I wrote a decently popular Warrior Cats fanfiction which was a co-project between me and my first beta. I wrote scripts and she would add prose to them. I eventually stopped writing it because people were uploading it to different fansites and I was overwhelmed by the response.

E: What character do you identify with most?  Is there a certain fic of yours that captures these qualities particularly well?

I always joke that I don't identify strongly with characters BUT recently, I have been "he's just like me..." about Hannibal Lector as I've watching through the series. I do identify heavily with how his mind works/how he experiences relationships. I don't know if I would ever write about him, necessarily, but after years of not having an answer to this question, he's probably the closet. I also identify with John Silver from Black Sails (who I also will never write about.)

I don't really write about characters I see myself in but I am in every character I write. I think I put the most of myself in letting time pass, love-punch, and dollar store sugar baby.

J: What’s your favorite fanfic trope?  Have you written it?

I do love me some mutual pining and I write about it in almost everything.

R: Which writers (fanfic or otherwise) do you consider the biggest influence on you and your writing?

I mean very literally @primewritessmut not only influences what I write about, but also encourages me to write things that I don't think I would have motivated myself through otherwise. I am also just in general inspired by their brain and what they like to write about - we're really on a mental tennis court tossing a gore soaked ball back and forth ad infinitum. They're a huge influence behind the latest dream sequence in spirit box as I wrote it with them in mind.

As for other influences...I am influenced more by stories than the people who wrote them, on average. I'm not an album person in any medium, so just because I like a book doesn't necessarily mean the author themselves are someone I try to emulate. I know I am influenced by what I read, and by an extent, the people who wrote them, but no one comes to mind as influencing how and why I write. I often say that my writing style is based primarily on what I DON'T like to read, so technically, any writer that made me bored, confused, or irritated has had a huge impact on the writer I am today.

[mitziholder]

I was catching the perfectionism vibes, it's shame if it hinders your progress. Your characters and style seem so cool so I wanted to probe. Comics really are a marathon to create. Losing steam is natural and maybe switching up your conception of your project can help. Not trying to pressure you in any way, just hoping to provide some food for thought.

How do you feel about comics as a medium? You mentioned you mostly "skim" comics for inspiration and love Wimmen's Comix but is it a medium you feel very connected to in general and for your story idea?

I've seen multiple webcomic artists unfortunately struggle with the labor needed for drawing panels and incorporating prose along with art and regular comic panels to maintain progress. If you are more into writing than drawing, maybe incorporating prose along with comics/art is an option you'd be interested in. Don't have the best examples but thinking of Homestuck's long script-format convos that follow panels. And for a comic that later incorporated prose, the webcomic Paranatural went from all comic panels to mixing prose and art. I'll be honest that I stopped reading Paranatural as a teen before the shift so I can't speak to its writing/art quality.

“skimming” was a little disingenuous. I have read a lot of comics, but very rarely have I felt that they fully utilized the affordances of the medium. the reasons for this vary; comics are plagued by many issues deriving from the fact that they were, at one point, both extremely popular and cheap (low-brow) - kneecapped by the CCA and warped into something stupid and trivial for children. even today, that perception remains. I would say the majority of people aren’t capable of recognizing comics as a mature medium. lots of comic writers have a chip on their shoulder about this… particularly Alan Moore.

I bring him up because Watchmen was one of the first pieces of media that really opened my eyes as to what comics were capable of as a graphic medium; people regularly recognize the visual artistry of film, the (often) invisible work done in blocking, cinematography, effects, and editing that makes movies feel like art. comics should be art. every frame should be a painting. panels should fit together into a larger picture composed with thought and care. Dan Gibbons did so - with regard not only for how panels fit next to each other but also for how they fit within the page and the page within the chapter and so on… rich with detail, of equal weight to the dialogue in conveying narrative and thematic meaning. it amazed me because of how little the art actually matters in so many comics, only there by obligation (because without art it would no longer be a comic). why is this? I don’t know. profit? but you see it in indie comics, too. that part confuses me. why would you make something if you don’t want it to be good? what’s the point?

anyway, I found that the story I wanted to tell would not fit within the bounds of a stage play. it has continually resisted (with some notoriety on this blog) my attempts to fit it into prose. the dialogue is what moves it, and with my sort of shaky aptitude for art and love of the medium’s potential, I felt that making it a comic was the natural choice. I don’t particularly enjoy the process of drawing, but without art I felt something was missing - a void that couldn’t be filled by anything else. I never wanted it to give the impression that the art was done by rote, incidental/inconsequential, a pure and thoughtless representation of the dialogue… but that is sort of what it has to be at this point. I wish that integrating the visual half came more naturally to me, but I’ve accepted that it’s a skill I’m going to have to hone with much practice. it’s something I’ve struggled with quite a bit as someone who is borderline aphantasic. very little of the art that I make comes directly from my brain. it is not intuitive to me at all. I am so reliant on references, have no imagination, am very rarely struck with the idea for a bit of visual humor or detail that adds meaning rather than merely visualizing the existing script - the words. I am obsessed with words, clearly. meaning and rhythm and punctuation. I’m a word person. I want to be an art person. I want so baaaadly for my work to be good. I try so hard.

I’m often tempted to throw in the towel and admit that my brain doesn’t work that way - that I’m aiming too high, stubbornly set on something I can never really have - not to an extent that I’m satisfied with. but if I gave in to that feeling, I would never finish anything. I feel like once I am done with my classes and my living situation is more stable, I’ll be sort of okay - or at least more consistent - when it comes to the art stuff... worst-case scenario, I cave and go the homestuck route (which is not something I thought I’d ever say). I don’t know. we’ll have to see. once this semester is over...😮‍💨

[tkwrites]

If I have put too many prompts from the ask the writer post than feel free to skip some aha 🥰

A, B, H, J, V, Y

Hope you are doing well, know that I am still often coming back to re read about Quinn and Sarahs universe as a way to de stress, feel all the feelings or just to procrastinate 😂💕

Thankyou to your beautiful brain and abilities to create such a series with such fluff, spice and so many little details and emotions that others may skip. I appreciate how much thought goes into all your scenes x

Oh, thank you so much. What a sweet, thoughtful compliment! I always like those little details in other people's work, so I try to include them in mine. I'm so glad you enjoy them!

This got quite long, so I've added a read more so it doesn't overtake your feed.

A: Of the fanfic you’ve written, which is your favorite and why?

The one I love most is Second Nature. It has the prettiest prose and conveys everything I wanted it to.

I can't believe you're here. is a very close second. That one took forever and then all of a sudden snapped into place. I love the way it turned out - that it's so emotional, smutty, and soft at the same time.

B:  What was the first fandom you read fic in?  Which was the first you wrote fic for?

Harry Potter and Harry Potter. Lupin was my favorite character to read and write about.

H: How would you describe your writing style?

I would say charter driven and emotional. Also, I try not to let it take itself too seriously.

J:  What’s your favorite fanfic trope?  Have you written it?

I don't know that I have a favorite. I'm mostly on the hunt for good writing or interesting stories.

V: Are there certain comments you’ve received on your stories that have stuck with you?

Yes. Of course.

I go back and read comments on fics I've posted quite often. It brings so much sunshine to my day to read that people like my work enough to write it out. Anytime I get a comment from someone who tells me they connected emotionally to my characters and/or story, or that they get some comfort from them, I find myself beaming.

Comments give me so much motivation to continue writing.

Y: What are your thoughts on your personal satisfaction with something you’ve written vs. the popularity of your stories?  Do you tend to be most satisfied with your most popular stories?  

Hm. This is hard. I like almost everything I write. I wouldn't put it up if I didn't (which is also why it takes so long for me to finish anything).

Some of this is just the nature of Tumblr, but my non-smutty fics don't get as much engagement when I feel they're just as good, if not better, than some of the smutty ones.

[aelaer]

I'm probably clogging your inbox with this but, ✨💘🎈 for the ask game? :))

Never clogging! I wouldn't do the ask game stuff if I didn't enjoy replying to it :)

✨ What's a fic you've posted you wish you could breathe life into again and have people talking about it? (or simply a fic you wish got more credit)

I've bemoaned in the past about how IronStrange fics get significantly more views/kudos compared to gen fics with the same characters, and that's the same story for my fics. The two fics marked "IronStrange" are at the top of my kudos/hits list (with the two crossovers rounding up the top 4), and I used to be a little bitter about that. I accept it better these days, though I do think folks who enjoy IronStrange should also toss more bones to writers who use the Stephen Strange & Tony Stark tag alone, and should rec gen fics in those collections, even if it's a separate category.

But because of this trend, it means that the work I'm most proud of, my Earth-197320 series, gets a lot less traffic than my IronStrange pieces. At this point, though, I am happy that there are still some out there who read gen fic. It'd be super awesome if it was more of a 50/50 split with Stephen fans, but that I have anything resembling an audience does make me luckier than some newer writers because the MCU is not as popular as it was in 2019, when I published a significant amount of my work and got my name out there. (I myself haven't read fanfic since February, so I need to get back into it. Part of why I haven't is that trying to find new gen fic starring Stephen is so difficult and discouraging).

💘 Is there any posted fic you want to rework/re-edit/re-write?

Yes, but not in the MCU! I have a large collection of ollllld one-shots that I did as a teenager surrounding book!Aragorn from LOTR. They're still up on older archives, but rewriting them would be fun. I did a couple that are up on AO3, but my LOTR muse simply hasn't returned. And there are fics I'd like to get done for the MCU first.

🎈 Describe your style as a writer; is it fixed? Does it change?

This is a pretty difficult question if you really think about it. I ended up going down a rabbit hole and read this fascinating article about creative writing and style and tried to see where I fit into it.

I know I don't follow all the rules of concise writing, especially with use of adverbs, because I think "said wryly" is a justified use of an adverb if it can be read as straight-forward *or* wry. I'm not sure what an editor would do with my work if I presented it to them, but considering that Ready Player One and 50 Shades of Grey's terrible prose was published without issue, I'm not too fussed about my use of adverbs.

I really enjoy deep dives into the character's psyche, but I always write from a limited POV of usually one or two characters, so we get a limited view of the psyche in general, at least in one chapter. I'm not terribly fond of the omnipotent POV and only wrote it in a comedy, which used it quite well.

I will say it can change depending on the needs of the story, at least a bit. For instance, I usually have a limited third person POV, but I have written in first person and I've written third person omnipotent. I have some description to help set a scene, but scenery is not my forte and it's something I actively have to put my brain power towards to get it done. My most descriptive piece by far was the one from Sherlock's POV due to his very observant mind, and that was a pretty challenging piece.

The narrative of telling the story is a huge part of my writing, but I like to see character growth throughout it, if possible. It depends on the length of the piece.

I think that's enough rambling on this subject, hah.

[fetabathwater]

BTW!!! what did Ms. Lamb first sing about and how :3cc

before or after the break up LOL or at the audition..........

when she was first starting out with seven it was just like. (and i say this with no judgement bc lol me tho) real deviantart type poetry fuck this shit i wanna just sleep and emulating a lot of other stuff around. stupidly long titles like FOB and kind of mashing things together and learning that yeah rhyming works 99% of the time and sucks to be you, jen, you gotta cut those sentences down to have flow. lots of trying to headbang while singing and sucking at it because she hadn't figured that shit out yet. but it was like stupid fun? not just singing in the shower at the top of her lungs or thinking this might be cool but not doing it. very experimental and emo and teenage but fun.

when the band like took off together w/ seven she definitely got a lil more shameless and started incorporating a lot of recent. discoveries into her songs, especially pre-dating seven. she judges UW for not being as poetic tbh. she can sing about sex and make it sexy, okay??? just ask her??? their lyrics are so gauche compared to hers. during this besides all that she definitely got more into a rhythm and style, not all purple prose but more flow and connection with story elements. but not all things written and sung got like 'finalised' by the group, they had a good spread of themes and story. some stuff she just sang to herself. also, some more political works started moving in, plus more personal ones especially about her parents LOL. her first show was recorded and when her grandparents requested seeing it, it was like the first time her parents were home as well in ages. she played it and was more annoyed at the lack of reaction or dismissive attitude more than anything. bluetooth speakered it everywhere to make a point.

post break up it was just like. pulling teeth to get her to write anything so she did end up flicking back through a lot of half assed abandoned works and cut out the duet parts, simplified or frankensteined them into something that remotely worked. so many love songs tho. even the ones that arent love songs are love songs. lots of blood sweat and tears went into her trying to sing as well. there is more stuff on the cutting room floor than released from the band, and lots of it are fragments of ideas or wishful thinking and also probably toooooo intimate for her to want to share but she kind of embraced that so that she could keep a pretty solid front of “this did not affect me emotionally. do not ask me anything or say a number near me however”. for the most part ppl seem to believe it but like. at the same time some ppl should know better,,, smh

and at the audition, well. singing one of their most popular love songs was a very ironic experience for her when she saw sev in the crowd. she's done a lot to not want the ground to swallow her whole but maaaaaaaannnnnnnn like. the irony was not lost on her.

[fragilelovelythings]

😅 and 🎉 for the emoji asks?

😅 What's a story or scene you've created that you're a smidge embarrassed exists?

As I generally opt for being blatantly honest, I have to say that after printing my current ongoing fic, 'Eunuch Besties' (Succession) I felt the oh-so-called cringe while reading it. Most of the fic felt pretty weird and I think it happened about my insecurities. I had never written something (prose, narrative) in English before, and my inner critic got to relish in aspects of my writing that maybe, I hadn't seen before. I know this sounds like an apology, and maybe it is to myself. I have been since July so excited about the fact of actually writing fanfics again that I omitted its quality. I mean, I had the plot for the story and I went full-board with it. So, because of that, I barely have gone back to it to reflect on its content and my writing style. I just kept writing, happily to feel ideas flowing and giving form to a story that I hadn't yet read before. I am a very enthusiastic fanfic reader, been for years, so I just vomited most of the chapters crossing my fingers and hoping for the best.

Now, I recently got a dear friend of mine, who is also a linguistic expert and an avid reader to check on it, and she said it felt like a draft. And maybe it is. Again, I am still in awe of myself for being able to write anything, considering that I wrote like a possessed in my teen years and then well, I stopped when I began my undergraduate and postgraduate studies. I am now in my thirties and decided to just do whatever I wanted in terms of my life and my artistic aspirations. 'Eunuch Besties' is now on chapter 9, and I've written 50, 724 words (wtf) aiming to end this story by chapter 10 and actually realizing I'm far from putting a pin to it.

There are scenes of course that felt odd to me, dialogues even, and the struggle to find the characters' voices and make them feel in character is something that I have felt more than once embarrassed on its outcome.

I've got two other fics (Loki) which came when I was around chapter 7 I think on 'Eunuch Besties', and those two other fics feel pretty different. Perhaps after practicing, with 'Be my once in a Lifetime' and 'Built yourself a Myth' I feel more confident about how I'm writing.

So maybe yes, I am a smidge embarrassed about my first fic, but I love it deeply because is the one that has been giving me so much happiness that I do not want to stop writing it. 🎉 What leads you to consider a fic a success?

Reflecting on what leads me to consider a fic a success, I'd say I have mixed opinions/feelings about it. On one hand, the count of hits on AO3 does tell you about how many times, probably, the story is being read. So for example, on my Lokius fic 'Be my once in a lifetime' the hit count is 5,074, and is the fic I usually receive more kudos every now and then. But, does that really make me think it's successful? I'm not sure. The same fic has 261 Kudos which, again, are the likes on A03. I get why it's a 'popular' fic and I actually wrote it during Loki's fandom at its peak. I just wanted to contribute and indulge myself from a block on my Succession' one as well as write a smutty PWP. And it worked.

Then the whole deal on comments is for me another different story. I find it hard to get comments on my 3 published fics and this does worry me about the quality of my writing. But, after reading about this insecurity from other writers, I have to remember that not every person feels confident enough to just say 'Hi! I like this fic!' and that's alright. I got a comment like that on chapter 8 from an anon daring for the first time on leaving a comment and sharing with me how much he/she/they adore my work. This fellow reader said that even RE READS my fic. So here, I do believe lies success. Engaging with a fic, with a story that becomes sth that you decide to go back at again and wait for its updates, god, I think it's when you've actually created sth others find solace/fun/distraction/happiness/entertainment in that said fic is success.

Thank you so much for asking these questions :') I loved providing answers to them.

[cyanyways]

This post exactly encapsulates my issue with this style of “tumblr prose” it just reads like someone trying to write with the gravity and magnitude of someone like a Cormac McCarthy, HP Lovecraft, and gothic authors of the 18-1900s without really understanding what makes them so good. Yeah more then anything it’s just made to be quick slides, moments to he viewed in isolation and looked at as “profound” without really saying much of substance. And credit where it’s due some of the individual sentences are at the least- interesting. But looking at it as a whole, a work of art, it comes off disjointed and confusing.

This stuff takes the aesthetics and the diction of these specific styles, long words and slow sentences. Paragraphs built with all the grandiose of something like the Sistine chapel. But just ends up appropriating them without actually seeming like it has much appreciation or reverence for this style and it’s importance. It really does come off like someone just trying to make something that sounds and looks profound and meaningful rather then a genuine contribution to the medium and landscape.

Nothing against the person specifically, it’s clearly made by a younger person trying to find their footing and that’s fine. But I’ve also seen it replicated by artists with significantly more experience and talent. It seems like a handicap, requiring you to repeat the same sentences over and over again just with different phrasing. I get why it’s so popular but it feels like the imagine dragons or unholy of writing. Trying to sound as large and as important as dramatic as it can while really only going in circles and saying the same, basic thing and trying to replicate styles that aren’t built for the quick gasps and reactions that it seems like these people who do this kinda stuff are going for. Styles that are a lot more long and have so much more buildup to moments and writing like this

Idk, long post but it’s a thing that’s been on my mind.