Tuesday, September 26, 2017

Incoming: Full-Blown Miraculous Nerd

My mother has completed her task to get my apartment organized!

I still have some "homework" to do; mostly boxes of odds-and-ends that I need to sift through, re-organizing my bathroom now that I have a new storage location, getting decent bookshelves for all of our books, and a few storage totes that are temporarily in my library.

So, I'm not 100% done, but, with her help, I'm up to about 90% done, maybe even 95% done.

The place looks amazing! Check it out! Excuse the "grossness" of the "before" photos. I'm sure now you'll understand why I was so stressed and constantly complaining about having to clean instead of write:



After

Main Living Area: After
And now time for the shameless plug for her business. If you are even close to my "before" pictures, and are in the continental US, please check her business out for some help. She's also good at generic "downsizing" or packing for moving.


OK, well, now that I flooded this post with pictures and free advertising.....


I spent the whole week writing! Can you believe it!? The beauty of not having to clean every minute I'm home! Also the beauty of finding some "just us" nights at home. I love my friends, and I get depressed when I can't socialize, but I need some "me time" too, ya know?

Anyway, I didn't do as well as I did the last leg of the summer challenge; I only wrote 4300-some words this past week. However, I did write every day. Well, technically, I didn't write any narrative on Tuesday, but I wrote the blog post, so I still had "writing time" every day the past week. SEVEN DAYS IN A ROW! WHAT!?

Monday went back to an "I'm not writing anything" day, but I did punch out a couple more pages for the work orientation handbook, so... that still counts, right?

I'm still grinding away at my first-ever "Miraculous Ladybug" fanfic, and boy do I need to scrap about half of it!

I know, I know. It sounds discouraging, and it sounds like I'm discouraged. Neither are true, though. I'm excited that I'm writing so frequently. I'm excited that even with a few stall days, I've been able to more-or-less stick with this story for a solid month. I'm excited that I've evolved enough as a writer that I'm actually WILLING to scrap bits to try to improve my work.

Even earlier this year, I don't know if I could do that. Which is the main issue with Please, Let Me Explain. I just didn't know how to kill my little darlings. In this case, I don't mean harming - or literally killing - my characters. I mean looking over a paragraph, or two, or a whole page, and go "this is crap; let's try that again." I just couldn't slim it down to make it work better.

This fanfic, though? I have no problem dumping every last word I did the day before and trying again. I've done it about four times now. To prove my point, I had started this month with about 6300 words already written for this story. This month I have written exclusively for this fanfic, and I have written over 10,000 words as of Sunday night. Therefore, the grand total written thus far for my Miraculous story is 16,630 words. Yet, when I do a word count for the actual story - with all the "crap" bits removed and rewritten - my grand total is 13,891. That's 2700 words that I've written since I started this fanfic, and decided not to keep. I have NEVER done anything like that before!

Fear not, fellow writers who know better, for I did not just delete and re-wrote. I know that "crap" written still holds golden nuggets somewhere. You just have to go back and look it over again with a new perspective. Or, maybe I had a beautiful metaphor or turn of phrase that didn't work then, but will work in a future story. There's even the more painful idea of the writing actually being beautiful and some of the best work I've written, but it doesn't work a lick with the rest of the story.

No, dear reader, I know better as well. I've cut out the parts that just didn't work for me, and pasted them into their own individual word docs to maybe peruse later. I now have my first ever "scraps" folder to sift through should I ever need them.

I also started up a notebook for me to keep separate thoughts in: what I want to make sure is included in the final story, what needs to be added, what needs to be removed, plot holes I need to plug, bits I need to shorten, scenes I need to slow-down and expand upon. It even has notes from the show itself to make sure the continuity is accurate. The most fun bits, though, is that I've started notes for fan-theories as well that I might want to expand upon either in this story, or as plot bunnies for future stories.

I'm actually having fun with this editing process. Something I never thought I'd ever mutter. I mean, who ENJOYS editing their work!?

Even with all this heavy editing that I've already started, I know even more must be done. I have the makings of a good story, I know I do. I just don't think I came at it the right way. That's where the notebook comes in, to help me find the right angle. I'm still going to push through to the end of the existing story, to see what else shakes loose. However, I feel it will be a complete rewrite when I go back through and make it into a chaptered story.

The rough part is that I want to stop work on this fanfic by the end of the week in order to spend next month working on the Jungle Movie fanscript again. I also need to get started on my notes for the Varekai fan-novelization I want to do for NaNo. So, I might not even finish the current incarnation of this story until the end of the year. I may even have to wait until January to get back into writing more Miraculous, because I was supposed to have a cleaned up Devon/Trish battle for you folks that I completely forgot about with this current obsession! So I REALLY need to finish that up and post it before the year is out! Especially since I promised it would be done last month, and again for this month.

Bad, LycoRogue! Bad, bad Lyco!


Even when I do finish the Miraculous fanfic - be it in December or January - I then have to sift through to find the true story, and the right POV to tell it in. Clean it up. I'm probably looking at March, maybe even April, by the time I'm done, if I really kick my butt in gear. I just couldn't wait that long before posting ANYTHING about this story.

Since the finished product may only barely resemble the one I'm currently writing, and since it will take me about six months before it is ready for the light of day, I decided to just take the plunge, and share a teaser.

I know, it's mean, and leaves people wondering for quite some time, but maybe it will also get people as excited about this as I am. I hope I don't get in trouble for posting a teaser on FanFiction.....

"Peeping Tomcat - Teaser"
On DeviantArt            On FanFiction

Want to know the best part? I blame being in Chat Noir's head for this, but the pun naturally showed up in his inner monologue, and I loved it enough to make it the title.

GUYS! I DID IT! I CAME UP WITH A TITLE! It was fairly easy, too! Wha!?

OK, I've become a MAJOR Miraculous nerd over the past two months, but if it's helping me improve THIS MUCH in my writing, I'll go with it.

"Hey, Arnold!" did the same thing for my writing. It brought me out of a six-year slump and got me excited to routinely write fiction again. THIS is what's so amazing about fan fiction! Shows, movies, games, and books with such rich characters and worlds that the audience just CRAVES more than can be presented, these are perfect springs for Muses to drink upon. Writing blossoms, as does artwork, and even acting.

I've been a bit obsessed with listening to dubs of fancomics the past week or two. Seeing the other stories and the beautiful artwork Miraculous has inspired floors me. And, while I'm loving the vast majority of the voice actors practicing their craft with these dubs, there is a couple in particular that kills me. Nearly every night Hubby looks at me weird as I'm laughing hard enough to cry at their bloopers.

Give them some love: Princess Sakura Serenity and her fiance Isamu Mamoru.
Love should also go to their main partner in crime RileyChase Fox.

Enough gushing about them, though. I have someone else to gush over: Omnibladestrike!

Yup! You read right! I actually flaked and forgot to share his second chapter a week or so ago, but he's up to chapter 3 of his new story! He's afraid that he hit a wall on where to go for chapter 4, but maybe some love will inspire him. Go! Check it out!

Ok, well, if I'm going to take a huge chunk out of this story before I have to shelve it, I should get started on that! Catch you guys next week.

Tuesday, September 19, 2017

All the Reveal Stories!

It's.... been a trying week. I only managed 1800 words last week; only two writing days. I squeezed in a short burst before writing group, although I didn't end up reading anything. I then finished put-off errands on Wednesday, followed by a mad-dash on Thursday to try to clean my apartment at least a LITTLE before my mother's arrival.

She came up Friday, and we spent it going over her business. Saturday was a long, and I mean LONG, day organizing my dining room/secondary room. We have a few more last-minute things to do to finish, but it's mostly dropping off trash and donations. I should have it done by the end of today, so I'll be sure to post pictures next week. Anyway, after putting in my eight-plus hours of near-straight work, I finished the night trying to get more than 600 words in for the week.

Where I'm at, Adrien is wrestling with his feelings: does he love Marinette for Marinette, or does he only have feelings for Ladybug that spills over to Marinette? If he only has feelings for Marinette because she's Ladybug, does that mean he doesn't truly have feelings for Ladybug after all? The poor kid is so confused, but I couldn't get into the right mindset. Thankfully, a song that played at work gave me the spark of inspiration I needed.
Because of "Crush" by David Archuleta, I was able to knock out almost 1200 words before I had to call it quits Saturday night. It was a nice mini-spurt of writing, but I wasn't able to get any more in on Sunday.

While I was at work yesterday I did take some downtime to write some more, just to avoid all of these zero days piling up on me. I didn't continue telling the story, and I didn't really add all that much to the parts that I already wrote. All-in-all, my writing at work wasn't even 400 words, but it still was something. It wasn't a zero.

What I did accomplish was the start of editing the first half of the story. I decided that will be my goal while at work. It takes a little less effort, so it's easier to jump in and out of the process, depending on when I'm needed. It also really helps, as editing tends to be, because it allots me time to clean up some of the paragraphs that were clunky when I originally wrote them during the summer challenge; leaving my out-of-work writing time available for continuing the story. I'm also adding a bit more depth with these edits, now that I know this story needs it. I'm probably going to go over the story yet again to slow the pace further in order to add even more meat to the tale, and then break it into chapters.

For now, though, I'm just working on getting the main body of the story fleshed out. I'll chapter it later, once I have the first draft fully written.

While at work, I'm also cleaning up characterization. There have already been a few paragraphs scrapped and rewritten so Adrien and Marinette stay more in-character. I'll have to find time for another rewatch to solidify that I have them written right. That's the main issue of watching all these fancomic dubs: I'm being flooded by how others interpret the characters and the character's voices; which is overshadowing the canonical portrayals.

On the plus side, though, I'm really picking up on a lot of patterns that the fandom has thought of in regards to the Big Reveal of Chat Noir and Ladybug's true identities. There are some that I love and want to try to include - such as Adrien's confusion about his feelings, since us fans believes he has started to have a crush on Marinette anyway - as well as some I know I want to avoid - such as Marinette freaking out that Chat Noir is disappointed that she's Ladybug because she feels that she's a loser.

I kind of want to do something similar to "You've Got Mail" I think. Adrien will use Marinette's crush on him to convince her how great Chat Noir is so that she falls for the "true" version of him. I'm not 100% sold on this idea, and I still have to get past Adrien's shock over who Ladybug is, but it could be fun.

On the flipside, while messing with Adrien's head over his crush for Marinette is fun, the "You've Got Mail" thing works better if Marinette knew first. Mainly because Marinette already likes the civilian form, so him showing her he's Chat Noir by powering up, and her giving the iconic "I hoped it was you" line just seems odd and reversed. Meanwhile, since Adrien has been actively looking for Ladybug, having her de-power to her civilian form is a lot more analogous of the anonymity of a pen pal being revealed when meeting in person for the first time. "I hoped it was you" works so much better when the mask is REMOVED instead of added.

On the other hand, I also really liked the reveal in "Lois and Clark: The New Adventures of Superman." Spoilers for anyone who hasn't watched the series, but wants to: skip to the next paragraph if you want to avoid them. Anyway, Lois volunteers to let Superman flash-freeze her so she appears dead, under the assumption that Superman could then use his heat vision to revive her once the villain is thwarted. Lois is dating Clark at this point, so when Superman lovingly brushes her cheek before freezing her Lois recognizes it as the same move Clark does all the time. Then, when Superman revives her Lois hears his voice and recognizes it as Clark before she opens her eyes and realizes it's Superman.

I kind of want to do something like that. Marinette and Ladybug are so similar to each other that the personality Marinette showcases as Ladybug seems to be the main thing throwing the world off; kind of like original Superman with his glasses. Clark is too meek to possibly be Superman, which, along with something "covering his eyes," is his only real "mask" to hide who he really is. This is nearly an exact parallel for Marinette and Ladybug. Therefore, I kind of like the idea of something traumatic triggering Adrien "hearing" Marinette when Ladybug talks, and then realizing who she is.

On the flipside, Adrien changes up his personality, his hair shags into a mildly different style, and he does change up his vocal inflections a touch as well - a trick both superheros do unintentionally, I'm sure, but it CAN be enough to also fool people. Between the two of them, Adrien to Chat Noir is a much more drastic change, and so I could see how it would be harder for Marinette to figure out who he is. Plus, it's a lot easier to believe there are multiple teen males with shaggy blonde hair, since Adrien's eyes are also changed completely green to match the cat-look. It's a lot harder to rationalize that in Paris there are tons of teen girls wearing their black-hair in pigtails, while also having blue eyes. So, this might get us back to the original "You've Got Mail" situation of Chat Noir using his Adrien half to convince Marinette to love both sides of him.

I might have to write multiple Reveal fanfics and see which one the fans prefer.


Thanks to a college friend, I'm now part of a fanfiction group on Facebook, so I might have to see if any of them are into Miraculous. It is an 18+ group, but who knows? Maybe some wholesome child's cartoon fanfiction is just the palate cleanser they need.

Either way, with the second season coming out in November, I might have the readers regardless. I just hope they don't actually do a Big Reveal scene this upcoming season, because there's no way I'll have any of these stories done before November, and it's more fun to write these fanfics when it's still a mystery as to how the show will do it.

I mean, after how "Lois and Clark" did their reveal, it just seemed too perfect to mess with it. It wouldn't be fun to rewrite that story. It's much like the "Hey, Arnold!" fanscript I want to try to finish before November; it's a race to get my own vision out before the canonical version is revealed.

Who knows, though? I might win the race!

Thanks to the massive hard work my mother put in over the weekend, I now have my library back, so I have my writing hide-away again. I also have much easier access to my journals for all my notes. On top of that, I can now get to the binders I have set up for Gyateara's world creation, and the outline for What Is Truly Meant To Be. So I might be able to get back to working on each of those starting in January, after the projects I already have planned are completed.

It is WORLDS easier to find what I need, and know where everything should go, after my mother re-arranged and re-organized this place, which also means I SHOULD need to dedicate less time in cleaning every week. Want to guess what I might do with that new free time? Anyone guess more writing? Okay, maybe some video game playing again.... but mainly MORE WRITING AVAILABILITY!

2017 may have been a slow-start/sucky year, but 2018 already is shaping up to be promising. It's always the even years....

Tuesday, September 12, 2017

Get Even the Trash on Paper

We all know what this means for my writing, right?

It will go straight into the toilet....
Hacker Girl Facebook Sticker
by Birdman Inc
It already started this week. Sorta. Thursdays, Sundays, and Mondays are all going to be trash writing days, because I'm going to more-or-less go straight from work to watching a football game. I thought that maybe I'd put in my headphones and write while the game is on in the background; peeking every once in a while to keep on top of what's going on, but who am I kidding?

My writing and any nutritional eating just fall off a cliff the first week of football season, and it takes me a little while for them to heal and return strong.

I did try my darnedest to push myself to write the rest of the week, though. Didn't always work, and I didn't write nearly as much on the days I did write, but it's better than no writing.
My mantra this week.
You can always edit later. You don't have a story if it stays in your head, though. I mean, you DO, but what if you lose it? What if you wait to find the perfect words the first go and never find them? What if you need the whole story first before you can find the perfect words?

Just write. Get that story out of your head. Go from there. It may be a painful read through when you're done, but no one but you has to do that read. Then you polish until you're excited to share it.

Anyway, back to this week. I was coming off an awesome high. I had plowed through nearly 7000 words in one week, I wrote six out of the seven days of the week, and I wrote over 1000 words nearly every writing session.

Without the added drive of the challenges, though, I kind of went back into "research mode"... kinda.

OK, I spent the week more-or-less watching dubs of Miraculous fancomics on YouTube. I wanted to see how others dealt with the "big reveal" vs "one knows about the other, but both don't" and other such tricky plots. Mainly because I was stuck as to what everyone's reaction would be.

The last 1284 words I wrote in a desperate sprint to finish the Summer Challenge weren't terrible, but they weren't exactly good either. I saved them all in a separate document in case I want to revisit the feelings there, but then started over with that whole scene. It went in a semi-different direction that stayed more with Adrien than my original version did. I'm still not 100% happy with it, but it's better. It still needs more tweaking, but I think I just really need to lengthen this whole story into chapters. I feel like the story is getting way long, but moving at a breakneck pace at the same time.

Well, as I tripped my way through this scene in an attempt to move back into the ones that more-or-less wrote themselves, I managed a whopping 1347 words for the week. Whooo.....

I feel like I wrote more. I feel like I did something aside from this blog last Tuesday, but I forgot to log the words, and with all the editing I've been doing with my story, I couldn't confirm nor deny that I had advanced it at all on Tuesday.

I know for a fact that I wrote on Wednesday, Friday, and Saturday... so there's that at least. Each session was under 1000 words, and nearly all three were less than 800 words. Still, I hid myself away, determined to write, and I did, at least for a little bit. I may not be excited by the scene I'm writing - which doesn't bode well for people reading it - but I'm at least getting it on paper. I'm pushing through.

I'm pretty positive that this month will just be a bunch of bouncing back and forth between working my way through this fanfic and redoing the fight scene for the STILL untitled Trish/Devon showdown story.

To help me out with the latter, I actually ordered a couple of things. Meet Body Kun and Body Chan.

They're flimsier plastic than I expected; aren't as easy to pose as I'd like; the stands fall apart easily, so you have to have a gentle touch; switching out the multiple different hands is harder than depicted due to the wrist joint moving abruptly while trying to snap on the hand you want; I had to pop Body Chan's shoulder back into socket when I first opened her up from the packaging; I couldn't find a proper hand to keep the pencil accessory from slipping to the table as soon as I let go; and I can't seem to get them to stand on their own like the pictures on the website suggests. All that being said, they are well articulated, have multiple hands to choose from, and you can do a fair amount with those stands, which double as storage for the accessories.

All-in-all, I'd give these guys a 7 out of 10. Not worth the $89.99 they are originally listed as, and may not even be worth the $39.99 they're currently on sale for as of this writing. However, they are worth the $45 package deal I got for them, I think. For nothing else, they're probably worth that much due to the accessories included. Whatever their value, I don't know how good they'll be for actual posing references for artists, but they should be posable enough for my purposes: visually "watching" fight scenes play out so they seem more realistic. We'll see if it helps.

Sadly, the one member of my local writing group who really pointed out my flaws is now studying abroad, so I probably won't see her again for a year or more. Maybe I can still convince her to give it a read-over via Google Docs or something.

On top of the new narrative projects I've got going on this month, I'm now on week three or four - I think - of a major work project. I'm apparently in charge of writing an orientation handbook for my job.

Technically, it wasn't an official order. It was more of the owner of the company asking my manager if I would mind writing one in between the other projects I have to take care of at work. I feel so over my head, and yet again I'm following the mantra of
I'm up to something like 40pgs - including the cover page, index, and about 10 pgs of appendices - and I'm just now getting to the meat of the handbook. I have everything else related to the job described and explained, but now I have to figure out what bits of sales itself I need to include.
Bun Facebook Sticker
by David Lanham
As of right now I'm dumping everything I can think of onto the page so I make sure I don't forget anything. I'll condense later. Might even gain some faith in potential future co-workers and assume they have some common sense. We'll see.

Either way, it's a tedious job that I kind of dread doing. I don't write non-fiction. I'm terrible at knowing what people need to know and what is overkill. I mean, even without the appendices and intro pages, it's still something like 25pgs of information, and I'm not done yet! Help!

At least I have my fiction writing to escape to over lunch breaks. As well as the book I picked for September's Book of the Month for the 2017 Reading Books Like A Boss challenge. Years ago for a birthday gift, my one friend got me the book "The Legend of Zelda and Philosophy: I Link Therefore I Am" edited by Luke Cuddy. I haven't made it to the meat 'n' potatoes of the book, so I can't really say one way or the other what my thoughts are, but it's at least interesting thus far. I did get pulled out at one point because the author of a particular segment wrongly, and repetitively, called Link's home island in "The Wind Waker" Outcast Island instead of Outset Island. It made me wonder how much they really played the game before trying to philosophize, but aside from that....

I'm going to use it for the "outside comfort zone" category because I almost exclusively read fiction. The last time I read non-fiction that isn't a writing related was in college. Plus, I'm not enough of a "thinker" to really get into philosophy, but it's about Zelda, and I do have an open mind, or at least try to, so I'm intrigued. I'll keep you posted, and I hope this also gets me back on track for finishing up the year with all 12 books for the challenge read. I already know I have more than that read as well, between the mangas, fanfictions, and novels that don't fall into any of the categories.

Oh, and I might be going back to "Ready, Set, Novel!" soon to try to figure out my Varekai fannovelization. I even have a fancy new orange notebook to jot my thoughts down in. I blame my first job out of college, but I equate blue, orange, and white to Icarus: blue for the sky, orange for the sun, and white for the wings. But also because of our mascot: a blue-skinned ginger Icarus with attached angel-like wings so he wouldn't fall.
Logo designed by our then art director Julie Fox Moyer
Icarus design and commercial animation by Thomas Pollock
So I have three projects! Four if you count the work one.... Five if I find the time to finish the "Hey, Arnold!" fanscript of "The Jungle Movie" with ChibiSunnie before the official movie airs in November!

Um... I might be overdoing it with the WIPs....
Tanuki Facebook Sticker
by Yanare Ku
Mom is also coming back up at the end of this week to tackle two more of my chaotic rooms. I may have an organized apartment yet! It will also mean I might not get much writing done this weekend, or the start of next week. We'll see.

I did just state last week that I seem to do well with my writing when my time is limited. We'll see if I strike oil again.

Tuesday, September 5, 2017

Knowing Your Characters: Better Writing Through Empathy

I DID IT! Barely. I squeaked by, but I did it. I completed my Summer Challenge goal. The last 1284 words I wrote are probably completely nonsensical because I was literally passing out as I was writing them, but I did it. I pushed!

As I've mentioned a few times on this blog, Quarthix's wedding to The Captain happened on Sunday, so it was a busy week, a jam packed weekend, and a full Sunday. We did get home from the wedding at about 7:30 though, so I was excited to have time to write. But I was sore and tired, so I just slumped on the couch and snuggled the husband for a while. And then a while longer. And then it was about 10pm and I was like “Shoot! I still have 1200 words to write before going to bed!”

Now, let's take this back a step.

Last week I noted the irony that as soon as I acknowledge that Mondays are my “writing wash” day I ended up writing on a Monday. Well, I fell back into “Mondays are a wash” yesterday, but we'll ignore that for a moment. The reason I brought up the irony of me writing last Monday, aside from further proof that irony follows me everywhere, was that it was the start of one of the most productive weeks outside of NaNo that I've had.

I wrote on Monday. I made sure to get at least 200 words down on Tuesday before my writing group, in order to state that I DID write a narrative that day. I then wrote 1100 words on Wednesday. And then 1300 words on Thursday. And then 1400 words on Friday! I just kept increasing! I just kept writing in more and more of a fury the further into my fanfic I got. I didn't even know where I was going with it. I sat down, scared that I had no direction, and then the story unfolded for me. It's been a little while since I tried on my fanfic writer hat, and I'm glad it still fits.

I wrote every day of the work week. Every day! I wrote for five days out of the seven Monday-through-Sunday week. I surpassed my 5000 words per week goal. I didn't manage to write at least 1000 words per session – stupid Tuesday – but I did manage to write more than enough the other days of the week to make up for it. I was done. I completed my week's challenge. I even surpassed it by about 600 words. I could check in Friday morning to say I completed the week.

Then I saw my overall word count. I was 1275 words from hitting my overall challenge goal of 22,000 words by the end of the 6-week challenge.

“It should be easy,” I thought when I set up my goal. “It's not even a half-NaNo, and I have an extra fortnight to do it in.”

HA! Here I was, now at the end of the six weeks, with nearly an extra 1300 words that needed to be written. It was now 10pm on Sunday. I managed my goal for the week. Do I bother trying to play the catch-up game?

Darn right I do! I set a word goal for myself, and 1275 words is so tauntingly close. I could do that in one writing session. I've proved that week that I could do it in one writing session. I've been in the zone with this story. I could do this.

I kissed the husband. I hid in my bedroom. I made a grave mistake.

I started off halfway decently, but I wasn't really sure where I wanted to go with the story at this point. So what, though? The other scenes and writing sessions started the same way, and, as I mentioned, they all turned out fairly decent. The story just unfolds and surprises even me. I trusted that the story would just keep blossoming on its own.

Besides, I knew more-or-less where I wanted to go with the scene. I wanted to talk about the relationship between the two kwamis – guardian creatures that give the main characters their powers – but I also knew that Plagg would not be the type to openly talk about it. I had to break him so he'd confess to Adrien, but what would he confess? A lot of fan headcanon - shorthanded as Fannon - seems to have the two kwamis, who unofficially represent Yin and Yang, as not only partners, but lovers. I loved this thought and how heartbreaking of an idea that was, considering how infrequently they could interact with each other. However, it just doesn't seem in Plagg's character. He is constantly mocking Adrien about love, keeps pointing out how it's more lucrative to love objects, such as cheese, and doesn't seem to care about Adrien's desire to find out who Ladybug is. If Plagg was in love with Tikki, you'd think he'd be full-throttle on-board with finding Ladybug, because that would mean Plagg could see Tikki again.

Granted, Plagg could also be filling the void left by the realization that he'd rarely ever see his love. He could be displacing his love for Tikki; which would then totally explain his near obsession with Camembert, if that's actually all his love for Tikki that he can't show otherwise it would hurt him too much. His mocking Adrien might also be because the kid can't go five minutes without pining for his love, while Plagg and Tikki might go centuries without interacting with each other. He might also be bitter about their fate as kwamis, and want to spit in Love's face because his life's purpose keeps him from his love.

There could be a lot of complex thoughts and emotions put upon Plagg if you keep to the fannon theory of Plagg and Tikki being lovers. I'd love to explore it, too! So much depth could be added to this otherwise lackadaisical character.

The snaffu is Tikki herself, though. She's bubbly, wise, and seems to help Marinette with her love of Adrien; trying to convince Marinette to confess and helps her find ways to do so. Tikki seems a strong believer of love, but also doesn't seem to care to look for Plagg. She doesn't seem embittered by separation. She doesn't seem lost or lonely. She only seemed sorrowful when thinking about the other Ladybugs she has empowered over the centuries. She was even the one to stress to Marinette the importance that no one should know about the kwamis or who Ladybug and Chat Noir are, even each other. Why? If Plagg is her lover, why wouldn't Tikki want to let Marinette know that it's okay to let Chat Noir know who Ladybug is? If she did that, it would mean Tikki and Plagg could be with each other whenever Adrien and Marinette were together outside of their superhero personas.

I'm sure one could argue that Tikki's reasoning is because Tikki knows how much Chat Noir loves Ladybug, and doesn't want to break the guy's heart since Marinette only has feelings for Adrien. One could also argue that Tikki knows that Chat Noir is Adrien and wants to make sure the model loves Marinette for Marinette, and not for her Ladybug persona. One could argue that the more mature Tikki understands the bitter fate of her and Plagg being starcrossed lovers, and has accepted it. She knows that the two of them will find each other eventually, but is alright not pushing it. They have a priority of powering up their Chosen, and keeping the world safe from villains. The emotions of the kwamis are secondary.

Again, a lot of depth, emotion, and complexity if I wanted to keep these two within the fannon of “lovers.” I don't know if I want to, though, at least for this story. It may deter from the Adrien/Marinette love story if I brought the complexity of Plagg/Tikki to light.

Also, as bittersweet as it is to think of Plagg and Tikki yearning for each other right alongside Adrien and Marinette, unknowingly, pining for the other, the characterization presented of these two kwamis makes me think of a different dynamic: Siblings.

It still sort of has that pang of separation, especially if they are “twins,” as it were. Think of your siblings, if you have any. Under most circumstances, even if you are polar opposite personalities, and you don't get along all that well, you still love and miss each other if you go a long time not seeing each other. You may even joke about how your sibling no longer exists if you haven't had much contact in a while. You may even live your life as if you didn't have said sibling. Yet, the moment you see that sibling, it all goes away. Love comes back. You realize how much you missed them.

I think THAT is Tikki and Plagg. They are content in knowing that the other exists and is fine – showcased by Ladybug and Chat Noir existing – but don't feel a true need to track down their sibling. At the same time, though, seeing the other will fill them with a sense of love and relief, I'd wager. There would be a warm reunion, or a longing for one, if one spotted the other.

I may change my mind in other fanfics, or when more is revealed during the next season, but for the current fanfic I'm writing, I'm pretty sure I'm going with they're “twins,” or, at least, as “twins” as two cosmic beings can be...

We'll ignore the Wonder Twins...
Although it would be equally fun to picture Ronoxym as Plagg
and myself as Tikki! XD
Besides, if I stuck with them being "twins" it might keep me from running into a possible roadblock: would Marinette and/or Adrien think that their "love" was little more than the influence of Tikki and Plagg's love for each other? It would take forever to try to "prove" to the teens that their love is their own, and not them somehow acting out the love that Tikki and Plagg can't ever really showcase to the other.

Siblings just makes everything a lot less complicated, and it works well with what we've been presented thus far in the show. I could even see one being exasperated with the other because of how polar-opposite they are to each other, and yet it works.

So, I ran with the sibling idea. I went back a little to make sure Plagg's reaction was appropriate for a twin vs a long-lost lover. I may have to tweak some more, but it seems to work.

I still had the "how to make Plagg confess this, though" question.

I had no direction, and I was getting exhausted. It was late, I was tired, I hid the only place I could with my writing nest in the library buried under..... well.... we'll just leave it at "buried"....

Putting a sleepy person in bed with the gentle heat of a laptop is not the best idea, though.

I started drifting. My mind was jumbled. I would start a sentence, lose where I was going with it, and tag on the ending of a completely different sentence. I would have to stop every three sentences or so, re-read what I wrote, try to remember where I wanted to go with it, rewrite, and then try another couple of sentences before I had to stop and rewrite so it was comprehensible.

I dozed. I woke up. I strained to stare at the computer with no luck at translating the weird squiggles into coherent thought. I attempted to edit. I dozed again. I stood up. I stretched. My back hurt. I laid back down again. I dozed once more. I put on upbeat music. I smacked my cheeks. I still dozed again. I wrote. I checked my word count. I was still about 600 words behind.

I had written about half of what I needed to in order to "win" the summer challenge I put on myself. I could barely see the screen. It was almost 11. I knew I should have called it quits, but if 1275 was tauntingly close to meeting my goal, what was 600 words? I could do that in a single page if I wanted to! I was so close. I had about an hour, close to eight if I had gone to the actual deadline of noon on a Monday, London-time. I could do this.

I typed. I fell asleep. I woke up. I typed some more. I stopped and reread. I wondered what I had just read. I reread again. I still couldn't follow where my sleep-addled brain was trying to lead me. I reread one last time. I deleted everything. I rewrote. I was awake enough to write a handful of coherent sentences before my lids locked closed. I dozed. I woke. I went through the whole five-minute-long process again. And again. And again. And again. At 11:15ish, I checked my word count again: 200 left.

I was close enough. I could close my laptop, wake up early, and punch it out in a couple minutes.

No! I was close. I was going to do it! I felt wide awake now anyway. I got a sentence or two in and dozed. I woke up, wrote a few more sentences. Dozed. Edited. Wrote. Dozed. Wrote. Edited. Dozed. It was now 11:30. I still had about 100 words left!

I tried again: 40 words left. Once more: 20. One last time. I could barely see my screen. I was more-or-less typing with my eyes closed. It was six minutes to midnight. I checked my word count. I was at 1284 words. My grand total was 22,009 words within 6 weeks. I had surpassed what I wanted to write! I had done it!

I wrote for six out of seven days. I wrote seven out of eight days! I wrote 22 out of 42 days! I wrote at least half the time throughout the challenge.

I managed to write 12,974 words in two weeks, when it took me nearly the entirety of July to write 10,000 words!

Am I the only one excited about this? I mean, I know it's small peanuts compared to professional novelists, but that's still pretty cool, right?

Celebrate the small victories, people! It keeps you happy, appreciative, motivated, and well-grounded.

In contrast to that thought, I read Icarus' Descent to the writing group on Tuesday. I think I got a couple of people intrigued with the Cirque de Soliel show "Varekai" as I talked more about the whole story I was planning on working on for NaNo. We also chatted about the Icarus myth itself for a little while.

As for the story I read? I received such good reviews. There were small tweak suggestions here and there, and without first meeting The Guide, Icarus' description of the man was a bit confusing, but I hope that gets ironed out once I put more chapters before this one.

One of the things that people seemed to like the most was how Icarus felt like he literally fell through the stages of grief.

I have a bit of a confession to make, one I probably shouldn't. I should probably let people think I'm some genius, but the odd thing is, I didn't do the stages of grief thing intentionally. I didn't break it down and try to find an image to represent Icarus shifting from one stage to the next. I just pictured what it would be like to be Icarus as he plummeted from the sky; knowing there was no saving him. I didn't think he'd be terrified the whole fall. I didn't think he'd die - or in this case, fall into Varekai - still pleading with the gods to spare him. I just pictured him accepting his fate, and the natural progression from terror to acceptance just lines up with the stages of grief. Probably why they are in the order they're in.

No. I didn't think much about the actual stages. I didn't analyze anything. I just used my empathy to put myself in Icarus' skin, and wrote exactly what he felt. I channeled my character the same way I always do, and he legitimately went through the stages. It made the whole thing feel real, probably because, for him, it was. And if it was for him, it was for me, which then brings it full-circle back to being real for the reader, or... listener, in the case of us reading it aloud to the writing group.

It's the same way I've been working on my fanfic. I go in not really knowing what is going to happen next. I just try to keep Adrien and Plagg in character, and follow what they naturally do. It's real to them, therefore real to me, which translates as real in the story.

It's a strange phenomenon, perhaps. I don't know how many writers truly are "pantsers" to the degree of "channeling" the characters as they tell their story. I may be part of a fifty-fifty split. I may be in the majority, which is why stories feel real and draw people into their world. I may be a minority, which is why there are even more stories that fall flat because there isn't enough empathy for the reader to care. I could be a rare breed, and all other authors do have to put the time and thought into the empathy that draws people in. Regardless, it works, and I'm going to ride the wave.

Now, last week I did talk about a story that is right on the fence-post with the empathy issue. For me, "Atlas Shrugged" has a great character in Dagny, and another great character in Hank. There's an interesting character in Francisco, but he's more intrigue than empathetic. There's also a potentially interesting character in Eddie, but he's not utilized nearly as much as you'd expect as the first person introduced in the novel. I want to know so much more about these four characters, which is why I want to keep reading. Yet, the overall plot just feels so bogged down that it's almost painful for me to push through the bog of words in order to get past the plot and to the actual story involving Dagny, Hank, and Francisco.

I do want to finish the story. I do. It's a classic. There are pop-culture references. My father-in-law loves it. The characters call for me to finish their tale. I- I just can't this year. It's taking too long.

So I officially gave up on "Atlas Shrugged" until 2018. I'll just have "finish this darn novel" as my 2018 challenge!

Which means I need a new book for this month, and possibly a shorter one so I could get another story in as well. Especially since I can't get the Miraculous fanfic I read last month to fit any of the book categories listed in the challenge.

I still haven't picked a replacement book, but I have been going through the thick "Legend of Zelda: Ocarina of Time" manga to still get my reading in each day. That counts, right? No. Not towards the challenge. It does count as general reading just as much as the fanfic did though....

Well, this post is late enough as it is, and pretty hardy, so I just want to say one last congratulations to The Captain and her First Mate. Enjoy your honeymoon, Quarthix and Wifey.