Here I Am

when I can provide y'all with one of these fun surveys of love--I mean, who doesn't want to know more about me?

( a survey stolen from sdlucly )

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Now I'm off to do god knows what--probably some work that I keep avoiding like the plague.

stolen from ladybug218 because I'm bored and still have fifteen minutes left of my workday.

( put behind a tag because it's a survey and it's probably boring to some...or most...or whatever... )

I saw this in musesfool LJ and decided to steal it away and use it for my own evil procrastinator purposes.

{insert evil cackles}

1. Do you write your fics sequentially, or do you often find that you are writing the end first, and coming back to write a beginning later?

Usually, I write sequentially…unless I find myself having a hard time with a part and pretty much know the rest of the story ahead of time. Then I might skip ahead, but usually I start at the beginning and allow my characters to decide where we go for the most part.

2. Do you like to write one story to completion before beginning another, or do you have several stories in progress at any given time?

heh, heh, heh. If you’ve ever read anything of mine, you know the answer to that. I used to only undertake one story at a time and I was saner for it…but lately I’ve taken interest in more than one fandom, so I have a few projects up in the air.

3. What do you do to get past writer's block?

Look at the above answer. Most of those other fiction pieces stem from writer’s block on one. For instance, right now I’ve been trying to wade through a horrible case of the wb’s so I’ve been writing ficlets and taking requests to sort of help me break through the inspiration brick wall.

4. What inspires you for your fics?

To create the storyline? I don’t know that there is one thing in particular. A lot of times it’s something in Canon that’s left unanswered for and I want to create some sort of response. Sometimes it’s a song. And sometimes it’s just there—this idea.

5. What absolutely kills your ability to write?

There are a few things. A) my quest for perfectionism. I find myself editing excessively before I even finish a chapter to the point that nothing else gets accomplished. I’ve been working hard on this one area, but still, it cripples me. B) Insecurities. Every writer has them, I think. I always worry that each piece I write is terrible to the point that the readers would cry tears of blood upon seeing it. C) Stress. If too much is going on in my real life, it can either create a need for me to write something (usually terribly angsty) or depletes any interest in it whatsoever. D) Laziness. I’ll admit it. Sometimes I have these ideas, but I’m simply too lazy to do anything with it.

6. Do you plan your fics from beginning to end, or do you allow for some independent growth? If you do, how do you deal with any changes that arise in your story as you write it? If you don't, how do you bring the story to the conclusion you want?

I have the general concept in mind when I undertake a longer story/novel-length piece. I don’t have everything planned out though because I find that once I get going and allow myself to get invested in my characters, they have a tendency to take over for me. That sounds terribly (my new favorite adverb, I think) pretentious of me, but I find that I’m a schizophrenic writer who listens to the voices in her head.

7. What time of day/place is most conducive to fic writing and idea gathering?

I don't have specific times for writing on weekends and I can write pretty much anywhere/anytime (though I don't gaurantee quality at that point). I'm not a morning person for the most part, so I tend to avoid doing much in the wee hours of dawn.

Preferred method would be notebooks. One day someone will stumble into my house and think, “This girl is the Emily Dickinson of fanfiction.” (not for quality of course, but sheer quantity of notebooks all over the damn place that I never get rid of) I usually handwrite a lot of stuff out and then my first revisions occur when I move it from paper to the computer.

8. Do you tend to write certain characters, or do you try to push yourself to branch out into new voices? Why?

Well…as I posted earlier today, I’ve come to realize I tend to create lead protagonists who all suffer with daddy issues, but I digress. Yes, I have a tendency to make my lead characters somewhat (okay, maybe a lot) sarcastic because that’s the way I am. I do attempt to branch out from that. Reinventions was an attempt on my part to write a very different lead female character than I had in the past, one extremely different from me. I like to think I succeeded without creating too much of a caricature of a romantic sort of girl.

9. Do you like to stay within certain limits in you writing (like POV or tenses), or do you like to experiment? What is the most experimental piece of writing that you have done, and was it successful?

It’s an in between sort of thing for me. I’m much more willing to use fanfiction to experiment with style and different things than my regular works. I have no trouble switching around with POV’s, though I am most comfortable with 1st POV.

Most of my experimental stuff tends not to get posted for the world to see—it’s more an exercise for myself, to try to cull something out of what I started with, if that makes any sense. I think the most experimental fanfiction piece that I wrote and posted was It’s A Lance World After All. That was born out of one line that kept sticking in my head: ”He cured cancer and failed out of school.”

10. What was the most difficult story for you to write, and why?

I’m still writing one of them. It’s A New Journey, better known as my Maria-Roswell story. It’s very dark and relies heavily on description (actually, this began as one of those pieces where I was trying to work out my own demons with description/setting)—it’s also based on a plotline that would be considered campy if I allowed it to rule the story. The plotline is more just the catalyst to get my characters where they need to go, but it’s one of those must-tread-carefully pieces.

The other one was Oops I Hit Your Baby One More Time, the third installment in the Stalker Trilogy. This one was hard just because it was over-the-top insanity that required me to remember how to bring the funny (I think, overall, I managed to do it though there are parts that are quite the opposite of funny to me).

11. What determines your plots? In other words, do you like to write about issues, or to add them into the plot in some way? Or do you like pure character development? Smut? Or is it random development?

I love something that can work in all those things above, something that can deal with issues of some sort that we all grapple with while pushing the characters forward and having them gain some understanding. In fandom though, I have to say it’s all about the characters for me. It’s about getting inside their heads and finding out what makes them tick, the why more than the how.

12. What are you doing currently to challenge yourself?

Let’s see.

Original wise: I am in the process of edits on a new screenplay and working with my writing advisor on my novel.

Fandom wise: I’ve been doing ficlets and prompts to keep me writing and I am working on new chapters of the longer stories (though at a snail’s pace, I admit).

My main goal is always to write for at least an hour a day. Uninterrupted writing time—I attempt to use it for original work, but that doesn’t always happen.

Steph has started an "I hate Frankie McCauley" club. I think I'm flattered. To know that one of my characters has caused such an impact on her that she's forming a club. That said, I also worry that Frankie is a bit two-dimensional, which he probably is at this point because of how the story is told and how we don't really understand his motivations beyond winning...don't get me wrong. Frankie is not a sweet guy. It's not in his nature, but I don't see him as inherently evil either...and I envision him to be quite hot. But that's just me.

As for the next update of Trouble In My Head...I've got an engagement party and film class this weekend, so the update might not be until next week, but we'll see. It depends on if I get a flow going or choose to go see The Punisher like I originally intended.

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( Another fic survey meme of fun )

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Okay, I need some sleep. or caffeine. I should probably inject it right into my veins since I'm at work and they might look unkindly on snoozing at my desk.