My Writing Process for OatS

This week flew by quick! I'm not even entirely sure what I did. I was working, and the next thing I know it's Tuesday again!

Okay, I know what I was doing. I was lurking on Tumblr for the most part. I didn't even really have MUCH time online, even taking my time on Tumblr into consideration. I would find a post that I like, dump it in my Drafts folder to read fully, or comment on, or at least tag later. I have over 500 posts waiting in my drafts folder for me to find the time to properly go through them. Most of which are writing advice bits or writing prompts.

I really need to come up with a not-yet-used name for a writing blog on Tumblr - a writblr I think they're called... That way all the writing bits aren't buried among the massive pile of Miraculous Ladybug posts.

Anyway, speaking of ML, that's why I spent most of my limited free online time on Tumblr. First weekend of October we got two new episodes; two out of three for a three-part arc. The following weekend we got the third episode of that arc, along with another new episode. This past weekend the first part of the two-part season finale aired. This upcoming weekend that episode will re-air in English, as well as the second part; the season finale.

So we go from "This 26-episode season is taking the whole year to air" and "We have to wait a full month before the next episode!?" to six episodes in one month; mostly airing in sets of two.

The fandom on Tumblr is AAAAAAAACTIVE! It takes me nearly an hour to just sift through new posts that popped up every day.

It's a poor waste of time, but the fandom will die down soon, so I'm just trying to stay on top of it now. Especially because the more active you are in the fandom the more followers you get, and the more followers you have the larger a platform you have, and with the larger platform you have more potential readers.

I actually was discussing this fact with Hubby yesterday.

A couple of weeks ago I stated that one of the folks I follow on Tumblr - Buggachat - started posting her first ever multi-chaptered story.

Curiosity Wrote a Comic

The story went live October 6th. It already has four chapters posted - she posted two of them yesterday - and is a little shy of 12,000 words. As of this writing, there are 3489 hits, 449 kudos, 63 bookmarks, and 121 comments. Now, if Buggachat replied to any comments her replies would also be counted, so I don't know if all 121 comments are reader remarks, but still...

On the flipside, you have “Peeping Tomcat”. Kudos and hits are still trickling in, but since the story is complete and newer stories are always pouring in for this fandom, my story is getting kind of buried and forgotten. As of this writing, I have 7786 hits, 282 kudos, 43 bookmarks, and roughly 34 comments if I weed out my replies.

So... my story is done - at 17 chapters and over 84,000 words - and has been up since March; done since July 31st. Yet I barely have double the hits Buggachat has. Even with half the hits, she has twice the kudos, 20 more bookmarks, and at least double the comments.

I have to admit. That hurts. Especially when she's not known as a fanfic writer in the fandom. She wrote one one-shot, and this is her second go at writing fanfiction for the fandom. She mostly has snarky and/or amusing comments about the show on her Tumblr, and she draws. So she's active in the fandom, which gets her the followers, which leads to readers.

I mean, that's how it worked for me. I liked her snarky comments and fancomics, so I followed her. She posted she is writing her first multi-chaptered fanfic - which is her second ever fanfic overall - and I was all about reading it.

The platform works.

And I'm proud of her. The story really hooked me, and I gladly gobbled up both of her chapters yesterday within hours of her posting them. I have no ill-will against her. I wish her the best, and she deserves the comments, kudos, and bookmarking.

It just hurts that my story didn't get that love.

I mean. I LOVE the love I was shown. And I have to take into consideration that I got a LOT more love for my story over on Fanfiction.net than I did on AO3. Still....

Especially when I see Buggachat getting reviews like "I've never read a fic so in-character on this site before..." and "This is by far the best fanfic I've ever read..."

oof.

Granted, there's no proof that those reviewers even KNOW PT exists, let alone have it to compare to. Still, the fact that something that has be equally toted as "incredibly written" isn't getting nearly as much love?

Like I said: Oof.

I mean, most of my reviews seem to be "Why isn't this getting more love!?" so clearly those who reviewed really REALLY liked the story. So I can be proud of that. But... yeah... why isn't it getting more love? Why aren't more people saying "You need to check this story out"?

Is it because those who found it are, like me, not very renowned in the fandom, and so even if they do promote it - like Jowy's Pixie did on her blog last month - the vast majority of the fandom still doesn't see? Is it because I don't draw doodles that people can share; making me more popular in the fandom? Is it because I can't crank out a new story daily - or at least weekly - like other popular ML fanfiction writers? Is it because I just can't get my spotlight bright enough for others to see?

Is it because I wrote in first-person, and too many are conditioned to think fanfic writers can't write in first-person without the story being trash? The second they see the first-person they run for the hills?

I wish I could get the word out there. Based on my reviews, my story could be quite the hit... if only people could find it.

I joked with Hubby that I should just send messages to the more popular members of the fandom asking them to read and let me know what they think. I just can't work up the courage to do so though. I feel so awkward being like "Hey, I think you might like my story. Could you give it a read and let me know what you think?" It feels rude to be like "here's my 84,000-word story; go read it!"

Maybe if they were like "I'm bored and need to find something to read; send me a link to your fanfic" I'd be all over that! If someone ASKS I will gladly say "please read mine," but to go in cold? Unsolicited? Eh.....

Hacker Girl Facebook sticker
by Birdman, Inc.

It's also a bit depressing to know that your former college roommate is now a published author, another one of your college friends has her first round of edits back for her manuscript, and a third friend of yours has her first manuscript completed. Add in one of the members of our writing group finally finished his manuscript? And I feel like I'm the only one that doesn't have an original idea.

All of my energies have been focused on writing these novel-length fanfics. And they aren't even really the kind of vague-AU fanfics like a lot of people write; the kind that can easily be tweaked into original, publishable works. These will always and forever be passion projects used for experience and given to the public for free.... a public that doesn't seem to even know these stories exist...

So... please excuse my writing funk right now. I'm trying to get past it.

I'll try to focus on being proud of my friends and their writing accomplishments, because I know how hard it is to get that manuscript done. I know that it's an amazing feeling when you hit that last word of a story that's been brewing for forever, and I would never want to taint that. I'll try to just enjoy the stories I'm reading - because we're all colleagues, not competition - and ignore the stats attached. I'll try to remember how much my story is loved by those who HAVE found it. I'll try to focus on how proud DFL seems to be of me. How she is constantly asking if I've talked to the rest of our writing group about the milestones I've hit with PT: the great reviews; the consistent posting schedule; completing a novel-length story, including edits; the fanart I've received; Pixie's lengthy review on her blog; etc.

So... yeah... WRITING!!!!!

X All the Y meme
Originally created by Allie Brosh
for her blog Hyperbole and a Half

Okay, so I didn't really do much WRITING per se this week. What I mostly did was edit the scenes I've already written, as well as go through my outlining notes to try to tweak based on how my plan has changed.

And when I say notes... um... I mean NOOOOOOTES.

Technically, this isn't even ALL of my notes...

This story has kind of been forming in multiple different ways since no one way seems to be working. Back in August, I started off trying to use the Snowflake Outline method created by Randy Ingermanson. It sort of worked, but it definitely is better suited for original works. As is the "Ready. Set. Novel!" workbook.

I then gave myself a refresher course on the Three-Act format. Considering "One and the Same" sort of has two parallel stories going on that converge just before the climax, I figured writing out each story using the 3-act format would work.

It... kinda did???? I got hung up a bit though.

So I tried to break down the 3-act formula a bit more: asking questions and then trying to answer them. That... didn't really work any better....

That was when I switched over to the notecards method I used to write PT, but I didn't get very far there either, so I tried going back to the 3-act formula. I created worksheets for myself and filled them out.

Well, this past week I went back and filled in some of the remaining blanks - and there's still some I need to figure out - as well as scribble a heck of a lot of notes/changes to my original view of the story.

So. Many. Marginal. Notes....

The third act got pretty dark this past week when I jotted down my notes. Even so far as to have Ladybug force Chat Noir to give up being a superhero. I'm not sure I'm going to keep that in, but it's nice to know how far I'm willing to push the angst....

Anyway, since most of the scenes I've been writing have been through Adrien's POV, and I wanted a sort of even split between him and Marinette, I figured "maybe I should alternate chapters; how would that look?"

I scribbled out the first four chapters - the part of the novel I know the structure of pretty solidly - and I'm still working on tweaks of even THAT.

I should probably go back to writing in
pencil instead of scribbling things out in pen.

Before I even finished writing "Peeping Tomcat" I had attempted to write out the basic outline of OatS, using the Snowflake Method, and leaning heavily on my original idea of this story being a sort of retelling of "You've Got Mail." This past week I took that original outline to task....

I think my task this week is to solidify my outline so I'm ready to start NaNo in A LITTLE MORE THAN A WEEK! Speaking of... who else is joining me in November?

My biggest hurdle I think is trying to fit in more Marinette chapters since this story is SUPPOSED to be largely about her. For whatever reason though, while I can easily get into Adrien's head and write his POV, I'm having the darnedest time getting inside Marinette's head. Which is suuuuper weird since she's the main POV character in the show. If anything, she should be the easiest one to write, which is probably why so many fanfic writers keep their story in her POV.

I'm also struggling with when and why Chat Noir confesses fully about spying on Marinette and finding out she's Ladybug. I think I have it locked in as the Main Culmination at the and of Act II; jettisoning the plot in a different direction for Act III. That way the third act is about Chat Noir trying to regain Marinette/Ladybug's trust, as well as Adrien trying to discretely handle damage control for his superhero persona. However, I had the Big Confession happen when CN again asks for the superheroes to reveal themselves. The catalyst of him asking is seeing Ladybug be hesitant about her date with Adrien, because she has feelings for Chat Noir. After the argument, LB decides she can't handle this right now, and zips over to her date.

Originally, when this reveal was the climax of the story, Marinette gets to her date with Adrien, only to admit that she really does love Chat Noir just as much. Her confession gives Adrien the confidence to transform into CN in front of Marinette, and everything ends happily ever after.

Buuuuut.... did Marinette forgive Chat Noir too quickly after he betrayed her trust? What about their conversation made Adrien realize that she did want to know who Chat Noir is after all? Now that I have to fill the third act with ways for CN to earn her trust again, what would the catalyst of the reveal-ask be? Would LB still be debating if she should go on her date? Would Marinette and Adrien be dating throughout the third act?

Knives from the Scott Pilgrim comic books
by Bryan Lee O'Malley

I think I made this whole thing more complicated for myself.... All I can say is that I'm glad this is such a passion project for me - and that I feel I owe it to the few really devoted fans I have - because if I let the above heartbreak of barely being found dictate anything, I'd stop.

Or at least I'd focus on writing simple one-shots. That way I'm a more active member of the fandom that actually ADDS to the fandom, instead of what I'm doing now which is just reblogging with added commentary. Being more active in ADDING content to the fandom would be the main way to get that larger reader base. It would be the way to go.

Buuuut nope. I have to come up with complicated plots to 80,000+ word novel-length fanfics.

Sometimes being a writer for the love of writing sucks.


Alternatively, I also used this week to finish reading "Leather and Lies." I actually finished it on Thursday. I was having one of those "no good; everything sucks" kind of days. So I squirreled away in my bedroom with just five chapters left to go and blew through them.

Celeste Straub certainly knows how to write an intense third act, that's for sure. I totally get why people stayed up all night to finish the story. You can check out my Amazon review here. I also really need to get around to posting my review on GoodReads as well....

Anyway, one more book crossed off my reading challenge. I've also started another of Jowy's Pixie's stories, which is 256,502 words and 45 chapters long!

Hacker Girl Facebook sticker
by Birdman, Inc.

You can read it too here: Destiny's Dance

I think I might be bumping "Atlas Shrugged" off my reading list in favor for this story for this year. I MIIIGHT get to AS next year....

I also still need to figure out what to use for that final reading slot. I mean, I have read a LOT of fanfics this year, all of which are either one-shots - such as the two Pixie posted - or on-going stories, such as "Under Lock and Key", "When Duty and Desire Meet", "Curiosity Wrote a Comic", "And the Name for Your Order is?", "Mr. Lucky and the Cat", and "Immortal Bond" - which, unfortunately hit a writing snag for Pixie, so she's starting it over again.

So, word count wise, I think I hit my quota, but it would be nice to have a completed story title to put in that last slot. Anyone have any suggestions?

In the meantime, I'm back to working on my story and trying to shut out the demons trying to tell me I'm not "good enough" simply because my story hasn't been found.

Screw those demons! I'm writing "One and the Same" anyway! And I'm also figuring out a one-shot that I can write and post for this month's new story quota.

I hope to have a link for you guys next week. Until then, take care.

Productively Writing Nothing

Ever had one of those weeks where you worked your butt off and still managed to accomplish nothing? Yup. That was me.

I told you last week how I was working fairly diligently on populating Ashitar for the Sunday D&D session, as well as building more of its history. Well, Friday I spent the better part of TEN. FLIPPIN'. HOURS. working on this project. I did some research before work. I did some more during my lunch break. Some more while waiting for Hubby to get out of work. And I kept going from the moment I got home until I nearly passed out on the couch. I didn't even realize I wasn't getting anywhere or missing out on more productive things, such as actual writing or at least cleaning the apartment.

I had stumbled upon the D&D Wiki page on town-building - which I would have gone to first if I had thought about it existing - and just set up camp. I went through all the charts and percentages and algorithms on this insanely-long page. I set up spreadsheet charts with their own algorithms built so all I have to do is input the population next time. And what did I accomplish with all of this?

I know how much of the population is male vs female. How many are able-bodied adults vs children, elderly, and infirm. I know how many are elderly, and how many of THEM are male vs female. I know how many are infirm, and again the sex-split within that category. I know how many children are boys, and how many are girls. I know how many are teens, which is only 13-15 in the D&D world since you reach adulthood at fifteen. I know how many children are 3-13, and how many are toddlers or infants. I know how many are any given race between human, elf, half-elf, halfling, dwarf, gnome, and half-orc. I also know the professions found in Ashitar, and the breakdown of how many of each profession there are.

Do I know anything of any significance? Like the names of the important players in the town? The layout of Ashitar? The names of the Assassin's Guild or Thieve's Den? The names of the pubs they hang out in? Any "quest givers" for the party? Nope. Not a clue. At least, not when I was done "working" on Friday.

A whole lot of studying, planning, and work focusing on entirely the wrong things. That's me!

I don't recall why, but Saturday was also a bust. So here it is, Sunday. Everyone was coming over to play, and I have nothing to work with. I got done with yet another overnight shift close to two hours before my husband would be done, and so I sat in the break room and just worked. I doodled out a VERY rough city map. I scribbled down every possible Quest Thread that I could think of. I came up with rumors that would be going throughout the place. I was on fire! I felt accomplished when Hubby showed up in the break room to let me know he was done.

I was even more amazed when I found out that he got his work done about an hour early, and I had accomplished all of that in around 45minutes! Whoo! I guess first thing in the morning IS my prime creativity time. I miss having my Sunday Insomnia writing sessions.

Unfortunately, it ended up being all for naught. My main quest giver felt her world crumbling around her and acted with emotion instead of thought. She meant no harm, but it put a couple player-characters on the defensive. Which lead them to irritate her since she interpreted their defensiveness as disrespect. So now Hubby and Quarthix's characters believe the human baroness racist against all non-humans - Hubby's an elf and Quarthix is a dwarf - and wish to have little to nothing to do with her. Meanwhile, she doesn't want to be in the same room with these disrespecting people. The likelihood that I can get the three of them together for her to offer a paid quest seems difficult, and so that has been my challenge this week: find a way to get them to all play nice.

Well, on top of that challenge already, Hubby's character convinced another to be a bit naughty, to say the least. See, our friend Goob has a bard for a character, which means he has a lot of Charisma that he can use for, say... bluffing someone. Hubby's character reminded Goob's character that the Baroness said that she wanted them out of her sight, and that she "didn't care where they went, as long as it wasn't in the same room as her." He used this wording to convince the bard that this would mean she wouldn't mind them checking out the mansion's coffer.

Goob's character used his bluff to convince the simple town guard sent to escort them that he should give them a tour of the mansion first; starting at the mansion's coffer.

In reality, I should have just said, "The guard knows better. You cannot bluff him about this." However, I'm new to DMing, I was tired from working the overnight and not napping before game started, and so I just rolled to see if the guard believed the bard. Alas, he not only believed him, he thought it was an order from the Baroness. He faithfully lead the party down to the coffer, where Hubby's character skillfully thieved two out of the three jewels resting in the safe. Again, I should have been like "NO!" but....

So, not only do I have to smooth things over between the Baroness and the party so they can get their main quest-line from her, but I have to make everyone too stupid to realize that the jewels magically disappeared from the coffer about the same time these strange people - who were already disrespectful, in the Baroness' eyes - were in the mansion. Oh yeah, and Hubby cleaved one of his stolen goods, a black pearl, in half in order to set them into the eye sockets of the black dragon skull he is turning into a helm for Quarthix's dwarf. So, naturally, either the dwarf never sets foot in Ashitar again - which sucks since I was planning on having it be the party's home-base for at least another six quests or so - or he can't wear his helm anywhere near town for fear of someone recognizing the black pearl. Hubby claims it will be fine because it will look like TWO black pearls, when only one was stolen. Still..... It's bad enough Quarthix kept some of the Baron's rings when they found him dead in a dungeon. He was smart enough to take those off before seeing the man's widow, but to hide those AND the black pearl dragon helm? I don't know how to convince Quarthix to have his character stay at Ashitar; aside from going "I'm the DM and I say you have to stay here!"

Hacker Girl Facebook sticker
by Birdman, Inc.

So, yeah, it's been a fun week trying to figure all of THAT out. So it didn't really leave me much extra time to, ya know, WRITE.

Which was interesting come this past Tuesday when I went to my writing group. Not really anyone had anything to read, which was even more awkward. When I joined the group back at the end of October, I met a woman who had managed to not only finish writing a 50,000 word book during NaNo, but she polished and published it as well. She and her husband both had medical issues that kept them from working, and so they were both "retired". Apparently, when I met her in October they were in the final stages of selling their house and moving into an RV instead. I then didn't see her again until this past Tuesday because she and her husband were spending the winter traveling the US; visiting family across the country and taking in historical sights.

Since she had made her triumphant return the previous Saturday, not many of us had seen her yet. We spent most of the evening asking her about her trip, and how she's coming along with her next story. Seems the "next story" that she was trying to get published back in October was now "three stories ago". Well then.

To be fair, she IS retired and had really nothing better to do while on the road for hours on end, so I guess I really shouldn't compare. Plus, if she was able to keep that NaNo pace of write for a month, and then spend the next month polishing, it's believable that she was able to crank out three more over the winter. Still. It's hard for me to not compare. To not be dumbfounded by her productivity. To not be proud of her, but still a bit envious that she's so successful while I can't even figure out what ONE story I want to make into a manuscript.

Anyway, we all gushed over her, which apparently was making her a bit uncomfortable, and so she kept trying to redirect us back to why we were there: writing. What were WE up to while she was gone? Well, DFL and Keaton confirmed that they were very slowly chugging along on their respective stories; the same ones that this woman already knew about. Red then informed the woman about the story she's been working on since our one writing prompt in November: the woman off her meds and planning a homicidal bender. She then read the latest section to us. It had a really nice twist. We talked about her story for a bit; her concerns versus what we thought was really good about it. Once we all seemed to have said what we wanted to, we moved on to a relatively new member.

She had made an appearance once before at the start of the year. Since she knew the new gentleman that had joined in March, I assumed she too had shown up at least once in those two meetings I missed. Making this her third or fourth group meeting.

When she first attended a few months back, she commented about how she wrote clinical papers for a living, and so writing anything creative was a challenge for her. Well, this week she talked about this great 6hr retreat she went on last Saturday, and how she was planning on doing the same thing every Saturday for the near-future. Whatever it was that went on in that zen-like retreat atmosphere must have worked its charms, because what this woman read was beautiful. She had such great imagery, and such a simple but powerful tale. We went on for a little bit about her work. How she was improving, what phrases really struck us, how the story made us feel, so on and so forth.

Then came my turn. I confessed that I was world-building this past month. I then explained to the woman who went before me what I meant by world-building. Once the mini-lesson was concluded, I brought up Welcome to Ashitar to read to them. While there were many discussions with the other works read, the only reactions I received when I was done were "Wow, that was very detailed" from the woman who wasn't sure what world-building was, and "Ashitar and Boar's Tusk Inn remind me of Bree and The Prancing Pony from Lord of the Rings, and that's a good thing." I took both as encouraging remarks, but not really much to build off of, and not the "keep going" energy that the other two writers got.

Not really sure what my take-away will be from this week's meeting.

Finally, it is April, which would normally mean:

Originally an event sponsored by the Office of Letters and Light
The people who run National Novel Writing Month

I've contacted ChibiSunnie. She's going through her notes, and I'm going through the script we have so far for our fan interpretation of the "Hey, Arnold! Jungle Movie". Boy, is it rough.

I've been lamenting lately that for me practice never seems to make perfect. The more I try to make a dish, the more often I seem to burn it. I play video games and strategy games more and more, and seem to get worse at them. As if "beginner's luck" is the only chance I have at winning, or at least not dying endlessly. I've been crocheting for over a decade, and yet my crafts seem to be looking worse instead of better. And then there's my writing. I never seem to see an improvement.

Then I look back at this script, and think that maybe everything in that last paragraph is just in my head!

Kind of makes me scared, though, to know that about four years ago I thought this was good writing. That I showed skills. That I could really go places with my writing. Only to look back on it now and go "Holy Hand Grenades! Did *I* write this!?" No wonder I never won contests, or get much of a fan-base.

It's encouraging to know that I AM improving, but at the same time, it's discouraging to realize that I really am not as good as I think I am. What about now? Am I still crap now, but just don't realize it yet? Is this why everyone else in our group gets a full discussion going about her work, but I just get a couple quick comments before moving on?

I'm in my head again, I know, but it would be nice to know if either I do have a future in writing, or if I still have a LOOOOOONG way to go before I'm good enough to get a decent reader fanbase.

I look at some writings my friends post. They fancy themselves fantastic writers, and I just sort of facepalm. Then I wonder if it's the same for me. Do I make others facepalm when they read my works? Do they silently go "Oh, honey, no. Just, no..." as well? Or am I being too hard on myself? Getting too far into my own head? Do I really have the potential I always thought I had?

I guess those are the things all authors ponder at some point. The real challenge, is either finding the answers, or not caring what those answers are.