2011: A Year in Fanworks
Jan. 19th, 2012 12:15 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
elrhiarhodanIn case you’re interested:
2011: 191 stories consuming 384,325 words, which is a monthly total of 32,027 and a daily word count of 1053. All in one fandom.
To compare, my 2010 Review.
This review is way late, for many reasons. During the last few weeks of the year, I was working on a variety of writing projects: some short fills for a gift meme I was running (and I’m still filling those, btw), and my Polyamory Big Bang story, which had been dragging out for several months. Even when that story was complete, I never seemed to be able to find the time to sit down and finish this. There was Fandom Snowflake, there was preparing for the Chicago Meetup, and of course, Real Life decided to KICK MY BUTT.
And when I did find the time to do this, I realized I had very divergent word count totals on two different spreadsheets I was maintaining. By divergent, I mean close to 35,000 words sat in the delta. Straightening that out took the better part of a week’s free time.
But things have calmed down quite a bit and I fixed all my numbers, all of my spreadsheets tie out beautifully, down to the word.
For 2011, I have included stories published on my journal from December 15, 2010 (the date I published my 2010 Year in Review) until December 31, 2011. It includes stories that were WIP/unpublished during 2010 (such as Chapter 1 of A Favor For Gloriana and about three-quarters of We Shall Come Home), and it doesn’t include any promptfest stories that were not published as standalones, or any works in progress, or any completed but unpublished works (such as my polyamory big bang fic).
That being said, my total for the year: 191 stories consuming 384,325 words, which is a monthly total of 32,027 and a daily word count of 1053. It breaks out as follows:
Part I - General Fic Writing
What surprised and still surprises you the most about writing fan fiction?
Last year – which was the first year I wrote fan fiction, I said that I was surprised how much fun it was. That is still true. But what also surprises me is the level of commitment I have given to it. Writing has become a craft, a skill that I want to hone and get better at. I want to be a good writer, not only a fan fic writer.
What is the best thing about writing fan fiction?
It’s still the friends. When I did my review last year, I had not yet taken the plunge and met any of my on-line friends in real life – that happened a week or so later. And it was game-changing. Right after Christmas, I met![[livejournal.com profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/external/lj-userinfo.gif)
jrosemary, who had been hounding me to complete We Shall Come Home (bad pun intended), and a few weeks later, rabidchild67, hoosierbitch and afiawri hooked up for the first great Chicago White Collar Mid-Winter Meetup. Things have been on a roll since.
Fandom and writing is my safe place, it comforts me when I’m lonely, cheers me up when I’m a sad little panda and gives me strength when nothing else can.
What did you create this year that you didn’t last year? (Fandom, pairings, genres, types of fanworks)
That’s a good question. Of course, the writing has continued nearly unabated, but I’ve branched out into different genres. Right around this time, I wrote my first piece of RPS – The Beauty of Love (as it was meant to be) forphotoash. And the RPS hasn’t really stopped. It’s only 4% of my annual output, but it’s also been a lot of fun to write and I write it fairly consistently. I know a lot of people don’t like and won’t read RPS/RPF, and I started out that way too. But I’m not really writing about real people – they are characters, highly fictionalized ones at that that just happen to share a name and a few personal attributes with a real person.
I’ve branched out in other areas. I’ve done a lot of episode tags, mostly because so much of White Collar Season 3 needed to be fixed. Including the end of Under the Radar, I’ve put down 12k just trying to get Neal to give up the treasure.
While I did have a tiny category for “Transformations” at the end of last year (with just two stories), that’s a genre that’s really blossomed. Not only does it include my epic We Shall Come Home, but there are some of my crackiest, most fun to write stories there too. I’ve given Vincent Adler tentacles (blame RC for that), turned Neal into a magical tree (RC’s to blame there, too), I’ve buried Garrett Fowler in the Burke’s backyard (blame Jeff Eastin for that one), and there are at least three other wingfics, too.
A lot of death fic this year. That shouldn’t surprise anyone. I’ve killed off Neal several times, (Out of Memory and Time, , Elizabeth twice (It Should Not Have Happened Like This and Warmth. But one time I tried to kill Peter off, I cried myself to sleep and vowed never to try that again. But as lugubrious as it may be, some of my strongest writing came in that category. And surprisingly, some of the best received stories were death fics – the suicide fic to be precise.
Let’s talk about Long Fic. Last year, I wrote 159 stories and 265,810 words. Only one of those stories was longer than 8K – “Between the Darkness and the Dawn” which weighed in at 33K. This year, I have had no trouble with the long form. Ten stories were over 10k, and half of those were over 20K.
And then there are the picspams:
Freeballin’
Magic Mike Meets White Collar – Neal & Peter Stripper’verse – Parts 1 – 5, plus the very brief New Year’s greeting picspam
The Holiday Party
Clinton and Neal have a Heart to Heart (exclusive content for White Collar Fixation)
This coming year, I hope to finally learn how to vid.
Looking back, did you write more fic than you thought you would this year, less, or about what you'd predicted?
Even though I wrote a metric ass-ton of fic this year, for some reason, I thought my wordcount would be higher. For some reason, in my head, I thought I wrote more than 400,000 (give or take).
And yet, I have this mishegas about how much I did write. (And for the non-Yiddish speakers, mishegas means “craziness in the head”). And it is – I’m actually embarrassed and rather ashamed at the volume. When people call me prolific, I want to cry and hide in a closet and just never write anything anymore . I wonder if people hate me, think I spam the comms (which is kind of why I don’t like to post on the comms anymore, its rather shameful to have the most frequently used author tag on![[livejournal.com profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/external/lj-community.gif)
whitecollarfic.
I mean, I hold down a very responsible, full-time job. I have a life and friends. I do things other than write fic. And yet my average word count is 1053 words per day. I know I shouldn’t be ashamed or embarrassed, but I am. This isn’t false modesty, seriously. It’s a fucking mishegas.
Part II – Specific Stories
What pairing/genre/fandom did you write that you would never have predicted in January?
On to more important questions!
Probably my oddest pairing, one I never expected to write would have to be Moz/Jones.
This started out as a ficlet for MMOM, and not something I planned. I had a self-generated list of prompts, and the one for the day was “Bite.” There were a bunch of us writing for MMOM, and we sort of decided that this particular day would be dedicated to Clinton Jones. I had the story started, and all of a sudden, Mozzie walks into the room, and three hundred words later, I got Unexpectedly Perfect, where Moz and Jones have a relationship of convenience.jrosemary was so taken with this pairing and the situation, that she asked me to expand it. No Good Deed is sort of the backstory to the ficlet . Will I write more Moz/Jones…maybe?
What's your own favorite story of the year?
This is a tough one, I am particularly fond of a bunch of different for different reasons. Since this is my wrap up, I’m not going to limit myself to one, why should I?
Overall, the story I come back to the most frequently is Someone You Might Have Been. I know there are people who have problems with a story that uses a simple misunderstanding as the basis for a long separation, but for me, it worked. And works well enough that I find myself reading this for inspiration on a regular basis. It has all the elements – pain, mistrust, self-hatred, hurt/comfort, friendship, and finally redemption.
A close second is Happily Ever After Isn’t For Guys Like Us. I had fun playing with Mozzie’s backstory, making it into a real casefic. I was rather surprised at how well it came out.
From a pure crack standpoint, I have to nominate Down In The Willow Garden. All I am going to say about this is that Jeff Eastin should not post tweets where fic writers can find them.
Oddly enough, We Shall Come Home is not one of my favorites. Not because I don’t like it, but because I’ve been living with it for over a year. I need some distance before I truly love it, I think.
Did you take any writing risks this year?
Yes, in terms of subject matter. I really pushed the A/Us. January 2011 started off with my tip of the hat to Company Man, and had Peter nearly rape Neal. If it wasn’t forjrosemary, I probably would have abandoned It Should Not Have Happened Like This in shame. The same month, I was prompted by coffeethyme4me for a sexy teacher-student fic, and Rubbing Elbows With The Moon (please teach me) ended up becoming a coming out of the closet story that is still begging for a sequel.
The A/Us just kept rolling along. There was We Shall Come Home, Gloriana, Orchestration, the Leaving Me In Silence (the Rocker El’verse) and Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell/Don’t Ask, Don’t Care.
In total, Alternative Universe Stories (which I define as stories that either place the canon characters in completely different universes, or turn canon events upside down), accounted for nearly a third of my writing in 2011.
But that begs the question, is the act of writing alternative universes necessarily something that could or should be considered risky?
My qualitatively best story of this year (and why):
I think Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell/Don’t Ask, Don’t Care is my best story, but then I think Happily Ever After Isn’t For Guys Like Us is my best story. And then I think Rapprochement is. And I’m torn. Of those three, I have to say Happily Ever After… is the winner.
My most popular story of this year:
A little throwaway fic, Such Happy Little Clouds a/k/a the “Bob Ross” fic was one of the most popular. I don’t know why people love this…but I am happy that they do. But the story with the most feedback is Someone You Might Have Been, which has only two more feedback than End of My Heart’s Endeavour, the sequel to Stepping Out Into Oblivion
My riskiest story of this year (and why):
Hard to say. Turning Peter and Neal into dogs and making it angst was a risk. The Neal Deathfic, Stepping Out Into Oblivion was a risk, but overall, the two riskiest stories were Rubbing Elbows With The Moon (please teach me) (an underage sexual encounter) and Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell/Don’t Ask, Don’t Care, which discussed the ramifications of the lifting of the despised military policy.
Story of mine most under-appreciated by the universe, in my opinion:
Collectively, I’d have to say my porn. It used to be that I’d get tons of feedback for the smut, but the White Collar community doesn’t seem particularly interested in that anymore. I wrote a particularly hot piece of femmeslash, My Secret Garden and six people left feedback. And the Peter/Neal PWP Against A Wall, Hard got almost no feedback at all – the person I wrote it for and my two dear friends,jrosemary and rabidchild67 were the only other people who read it. Has the gen community completely taken over the White Collar fandom?
But outside of porn, I am tempted to say that Leaving Me In Silence (The Rocker El’verse) was the least appreciated. BUT, it was first published as comment fic on a promptfest, so it wasn’t really a fresh story. And it’s also heavily flawed, too. shrugs
Most fun story to write:
Serious, the entire month of MMOM was a lot of fun. I’d sit down at my desk, look at the prompt and in fifteen minutes, pound out a short piece of smut. I didn’t feel like I was coasting on any of the stories – each one was different. Each one stood alone.
Story with the single sexiest moment:
Hmm, easy. That has to be the frotting scenes in These Are The Words I Never Said, which ranks up there with 2010’s Take A Seat, Mr. Caffrey.
Most "holy crap, that's wrong, even for you" story:
Clearly, Down In The Willow Garden. Satchmo unearths Garrett Fowler from the Burkes’ backyard and interrupts Peter when he is working Neal over with a riding crop. It’s more fucked up than A Creature Feature.
What story left you scratching your head, wondering how this happened:
Not Quite Cappuccino In the Clouds. Yes, I deliberately started out to write tentacle fic. I had no idea that Moz was going to turn out to be a dragon.
Story that shifted my own perceptions of the characters:
Happily Ever After Isn’t For Guys Like Us. Written in the early autumn, about two months after Countdown aired, I was still very angry at Moz, and this story gave me the chance to let go of my anger, to resettle myself with the character that I had always felt closest to. It also gave me a chance to make things right for Moz.
Hardest story to write:
The relationships in Even the Stars Are Not Safe in Heaven were difficult to pin down. I am a P/E/N ‘shipper (or at least Peter/Neal) and I really did not want to make this a gen story. But it had to be friendship, at least when the story ended. Otherwise, it would have stank of magical healing cock. Kudos torabidchild67 and jrosemary for talking me out of making this one a love story.
Biggest disappointment:
I’d have to say the inability to write only one chapter of Vampire World in 2011. But the good news is that I have figured out my problems and if I can devote the time, I will finish it.
Biggest surprise:
Probably the positive reception a lot of my OCs received. There was much love given to Eduardo Montoya in We Shall Come Home – Chapter 9.
And then there were the Army Brats in My Charade (is the event of the season). So much so, that they are getting their own series.
Most unintentionally telling story:
I think Someone You Might Have Been. Not going to say anything more.
What, if any story, feels important to you, and why:
Easy – it’s Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell/Don’t Ask, Don’t Care. It was probably the first time I overtly set out to make a political event the driving part of a story. And I even wrote a meta to go along with it.
Part III - Looking Forward
Is there any story you'd like to rewrite?
I think I’d like to start from scratch with Rocker!El. Because it the first few parts were written as a series of flash fics without the intention of ending it where it ended, it broadcasts a very mixed message. Even after editing it, there are still some problems.
How will new canon change your writing?
All I can say is thank goodness for new canon. It’s been over five months, and I am stuck with either writing stories that tag to the end of Countdown, or are set very far into the future (post-anklet). The way that Checkmate ended, I think I can actually write present-day OT3 again.
Do you have any fanfic or profic goals for the new year?
No profic goals. Have no interest in writing profic.
Fanfic goals? Maybe write something other than White Collar? Or not.
Hmmm, finish Vampire World, finish the Criminal Minds Crossover, finish a few more chapters on Orchestration. Write more Danger’verse. Finish the dozens of WIPs I’ve started, including Stripper Neal (aka the Harlequin Romance with Penises).
And in line with my mishegas: Write less, write better stuff, write stuff that people like and will enjoy and recommend to other people to read. Alternative, take more risks, climb out of the rut, the safe zone, write more, write what I want to write. Don’t give a damn about other people and being an author who’s recommended for other people.
Yes, I am crazy in the head. None of this should really matter, should it?
And to wrap this teal deer up, will the following people please take a bow:
jrosemary, who puts up with way too much shit from me.
rabidchild67, who is my enabler in chief.
coffeethyme4me, who has been my rock and my guide through some very difficult times.
elainasaunt, who has been a stalwart ally, filled with common sense and an unparalleled hunger for my fic.
And of course, all of my readers, who feed me back. You make so much of this possible.
FIN
2011: 191 stories consuming 384,325 words, which is a monthly total of 32,027 and a daily word count of 1053. All in one fandom.
To compare, my 2010 Review.
This review is way late, for many reasons. During the last few weeks of the year, I was working on a variety of writing projects: some short fills for a gift meme I was running (and I’m still filling those, btw), and my Polyamory Big Bang story, which had been dragging out for several months. Even when that story was complete, I never seemed to be able to find the time to sit down and finish this. There was Fandom Snowflake, there was preparing for the Chicago Meetup, and of course, Real Life decided to KICK MY BUTT.
And when I did find the time to do this, I realized I had very divergent word count totals on two different spreadsheets I was maintaining. By divergent, I mean close to 35,000 words sat in the delta. Straightening that out took the better part of a week’s free time.
But things have calmed down quite a bit and I fixed all my numbers, all of my spreadsheets tie out beautifully, down to the word.
For 2011, I have included stories published on my journal from December 15, 2010 (the date I published my 2010 Year in Review) until December 31, 2011. It includes stories that were WIP/unpublished during 2010 (such as Chapter 1 of A Favor For Gloriana and about three-quarters of We Shall Come Home), and it doesn’t include any promptfest stories that were not published as standalones, or any works in progress, or any completed but unpublished works (such as my polyamory big bang fic).
That being said, my total for the year: 191 stories consuming 384,325 words, which is a monthly total of 32,027 and a daily word count of 1053. It breaks out as follows:
Series | Wordcount | Stories |
Paladin | 7500 | 6 |
Episode Tags* | 40700 | 9 |
Vinegar Hill Continuum | 27450 | 6 |
Misc. Stories | 33100 | 15 |
Death Fic | 21600 | 5 |
Porn | 36650 | 50 |
Transformations | 70125 | 8 |
Gloriana* | 11000 | 2 |
Ficlets | 11500 | 24 |
Danger’verse | 12450 | 40 |
Orchestration* | 1400 | 1 |
RPF/RPS* | 15550 | 13 |
Longfic (doesn’t include WSCH) | 81000 | 5 |
Vampire World | 2800 | 1 |
WC100 | 1500 | 5 |
Sentence Fest* | 10000 | 1 |
*New category for 2011
Compared to last year’s raw numbers (265,810), I’m up by 120K, but you really can’t compare calendar year totals, since I didn’t start writing fic until early March, 2010. Drilling down, my monthly (10 months) total for 2010 was 26,581 and my daily total (a 300 day period) was 886. So, production was definitely up.
And now for the real mental masturbation, the epic self-wanking, I present The Year In Fandom, 2011 Edition.
And now for the real mental masturbation, the epic self-wanking, I present The Year In Fandom, 2011 Edition.
Part I - General Fic Writing
What surprised and still surprises you the most about writing fan fiction?
Last year – which was the first year I wrote fan fiction, I said that I was surprised how much fun it was. That is still true. But what also surprises me is the level of commitment I have given to it. Writing has become a craft, a skill that I want to hone and get better at. I want to be a good writer, not only a fan fic writer.
What is the best thing about writing fan fiction?
It’s still the friends. When I did my review last year, I had not yet taken the plunge and met any of my on-line friends in real life – that happened a week or so later. And it was game-changing. Right after Christmas, I met
jrosemary, who had been hounding me to complete We Shall Come Home (bad pun intended), and a few weeks later, rabidchild67, hoosierbitch and afiawri hooked up for the first great Chicago White Collar Mid-Winter Meetup. Things have been on a roll since.Fandom and writing is my safe place, it comforts me when I’m lonely, cheers me up when I’m a sad little panda and gives me strength when nothing else can.
What did you create this year that you didn’t last year? (Fandom, pairings, genres, types of fanworks)
That’s a good question. Of course, the writing has continued nearly unabated, but I’ve branched out into different genres. Right around this time, I wrote my first piece of RPS – The Beauty of Love (as it was meant to be) for
photoash. And the RPS hasn’t really stopped. It’s only 4% of my annual output, but it’s also been a lot of fun to write and I write it fairly consistently. I know a lot of people don’t like and won’t read RPS/RPF, and I started out that way too. But I’m not really writing about real people – they are characters, highly fictionalized ones at that that just happen to share a name and a few personal attributes with a real person.I’ve branched out in other areas. I’ve done a lot of episode tags, mostly because so much of White Collar Season 3 needed to be fixed. Including the end of Under the Radar, I’ve put down 12k just trying to get Neal to give up the treasure.
While I did have a tiny category for “Transformations” at the end of last year (with just two stories), that’s a genre that’s really blossomed. Not only does it include my epic We Shall Come Home, but there are some of my crackiest, most fun to write stories there too. I’ve given Vincent Adler tentacles (blame RC for that), turned Neal into a magical tree (RC’s to blame there, too), I’ve buried Garrett Fowler in the Burke’s backyard (blame Jeff Eastin for that one), and there are at least three other wingfics, too.
A lot of death fic this year. That shouldn’t surprise anyone. I’ve killed off Neal several times, (Out of Memory and Time, , Elizabeth twice (It Should Not Have Happened Like This and Warmth. But one time I tried to kill Peter off, I cried myself to sleep and vowed never to try that again. But as lugubrious as it may be, some of my strongest writing came in that category. And surprisingly, some of the best received stories were death fics – the suicide fic to be precise.
Let’s talk about Long Fic. Last year, I wrote 159 stories and 265,810 words. Only one of those stories was longer than 8K – “Between the Darkness and the Dawn” which weighed in at 33K. This year, I have had no trouble with the long form. Ten stories were over 10k, and half of those were over 20K.
And then there are the picspams:
Freeballin’
Magic Mike Meets White Collar – Neal & Peter Stripper’verse – Parts 1 – 5, plus the very brief New Year’s greeting picspam
The Holiday Party
Clinton and Neal have a Heart to Heart (exclusive content for White Collar Fixation)
This coming year, I hope to finally learn how to vid.
Looking back, did you write more fic than you thought you would this year, less, or about what you'd predicted?
Even though I wrote a metric ass-ton of fic this year, for some reason, I thought my wordcount would be higher. For some reason, in my head, I thought I wrote more than 400,000 (give or take).
And yet, I have this mishegas about how much I did write. (And for the non-Yiddish speakers, mishegas means “craziness in the head”). And it is – I’m actually embarrassed and rather ashamed at the volume. When people call me prolific, I want to cry and hide in a closet and just never write anything anymore . I wonder if people hate me, think I spam the comms (which is kind of why I don’t like to post on the comms anymore, its rather shameful to have the most frequently used author tag on
whitecollarfic. I mean, I hold down a very responsible, full-time job. I have a life and friends. I do things other than write fic. And yet my average word count is 1053 words per day. I know I shouldn’t be ashamed or embarrassed, but I am. This isn’t false modesty, seriously. It’s a fucking mishegas.
Part II – Specific Stories
What pairing/genre/fandom did you write that you would never have predicted in January?
On to more important questions!
Probably my oddest pairing, one I never expected to write would have to be Moz/Jones.
This started out as a ficlet for MMOM, and not something I planned. I had a self-generated list of prompts, and the one for the day was “Bite.” There were a bunch of us writing for MMOM, and we sort of decided that this particular day would be dedicated to Clinton Jones. I had the story started, and all of a sudden, Mozzie walks into the room, and three hundred words later, I got Unexpectedly Perfect, where Moz and Jones have a relationship of convenience.
jrosemary was so taken with this pairing and the situation, that she asked me to expand it. No Good Deed is sort of the backstory to the ficlet . Will I write more Moz/Jones…maybe?What's your own favorite story of the year?
This is a tough one, I am particularly fond of a bunch of different for different reasons. Since this is my wrap up, I’m not going to limit myself to one, why should I?
Overall, the story I come back to the most frequently is Someone You Might Have Been. I know there are people who have problems with a story that uses a simple misunderstanding as the basis for a long separation, but for me, it worked. And works well enough that I find myself reading this for inspiration on a regular basis. It has all the elements – pain, mistrust, self-hatred, hurt/comfort, friendship, and finally redemption.
A close second is Happily Ever After Isn’t For Guys Like Us. I had fun playing with Mozzie’s backstory, making it into a real casefic. I was rather surprised at how well it came out.
From a pure crack standpoint, I have to nominate Down In The Willow Garden. All I am going to say about this is that Jeff Eastin should not post tweets where fic writers can find them.
Oddly enough, We Shall Come Home is not one of my favorites. Not because I don’t like it, but because I’ve been living with it for over a year. I need some distance before I truly love it, I think.
Did you take any writing risks this year?
Yes, in terms of subject matter. I really pushed the A/Us. January 2011 started off with my tip of the hat to Company Man, and had Peter nearly rape Neal. If it wasn’t for
jrosemary, I probably would have abandoned It Should Not Have Happened Like This in shame. The same month, I was prompted by coffeethyme4me for a sexy teacher-student fic, and Rubbing Elbows With The Moon (please teach me) ended up becoming a coming out of the closet story that is still begging for a sequel.The A/Us just kept rolling along. There was We Shall Come Home, Gloriana, Orchestration, the Leaving Me In Silence (the Rocker El’verse) and Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell/Don’t Ask, Don’t Care.
In total, Alternative Universe Stories (which I define as stories that either place the canon characters in completely different universes, or turn canon events upside down), accounted for nearly a third of my writing in 2011.
But that begs the question, is the act of writing alternative universes necessarily something that could or should be considered risky?
My qualitatively best story of this year (and why):
I think Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell/Don’t Ask, Don’t Care is my best story, but then I think Happily Ever After Isn’t For Guys Like Us is my best story. And then I think Rapprochement is. And I’m torn. Of those three, I have to say Happily Ever After… is the winner.
My most popular story of this year:
A little throwaway fic, Such Happy Little Clouds a/k/a the “Bob Ross” fic was one of the most popular. I don’t know why people love this…but I am happy that they do. But the story with the most feedback is Someone You Might Have Been, which has only two more feedback than End of My Heart’s Endeavour, the sequel to Stepping Out Into Oblivion
My riskiest story of this year (and why):
Hard to say. Turning Peter and Neal into dogs and making it angst was a risk. The Neal Deathfic, Stepping Out Into Oblivion was a risk, but overall, the two riskiest stories were Rubbing Elbows With The Moon (please teach me) (an underage sexual encounter) and Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell/Don’t Ask, Don’t Care, which discussed the ramifications of the lifting of the despised military policy.
Story of mine most under-appreciated by the universe, in my opinion:
Collectively, I’d have to say my porn. It used to be that I’d get tons of feedback for the smut, but the White Collar community doesn’t seem particularly interested in that anymore. I wrote a particularly hot piece of femmeslash, My Secret Garden and six people left feedback. And the Peter/Neal PWP Against A Wall, Hard got almost no feedback at all – the person I wrote it for and my two dear friends,
jrosemary and rabidchild67 were the only other people who read it. Has the gen community completely taken over the White Collar fandom?But outside of porn, I am tempted to say that Leaving Me In Silence (The Rocker El’verse) was the least appreciated. BUT, it was first published as comment fic on a promptfest, so it wasn’t really a fresh story. And it’s also heavily flawed, too. shrugs
Most fun story to write:
Serious, the entire month of MMOM was a lot of fun. I’d sit down at my desk, look at the prompt and in fifteen minutes, pound out a short piece of smut. I didn’t feel like I was coasting on any of the stories – each one was different. Each one stood alone.
Story with the single sexiest moment:
Hmm, easy. That has to be the frotting scenes in These Are The Words I Never Said, which ranks up there with 2010’s Take A Seat, Mr. Caffrey.
Most "holy crap, that's wrong, even for you" story:
Clearly, Down In The Willow Garden. Satchmo unearths Garrett Fowler from the Burkes’ backyard and interrupts Peter when he is working Neal over with a riding crop. It’s more fucked up than A Creature Feature.
What story left you scratching your head, wondering how this happened:
Not Quite Cappuccino In the Clouds. Yes, I deliberately started out to write tentacle fic. I had no idea that Moz was going to turn out to be a dragon.
Story that shifted my own perceptions of the characters:
Happily Ever After Isn’t For Guys Like Us. Written in the early autumn, about two months after Countdown aired, I was still very angry at Moz, and this story gave me the chance to let go of my anger, to resettle myself with the character that I had always felt closest to. It also gave me a chance to make things right for Moz.
Hardest story to write:
The relationships in Even the Stars Are Not Safe in Heaven were difficult to pin down. I am a P/E/N ‘shipper (or at least Peter/Neal) and I really did not want to make this a gen story. But it had to be friendship, at least when the story ended. Otherwise, it would have stank of magical healing cock. Kudos to
rabidchild67 and jrosemary for talking me out of making this one a love story.Biggest disappointment:
I’d have to say the inability to write only one chapter of Vampire World in 2011. But the good news is that I have figured out my problems and if I can devote the time, I will finish it.
Biggest surprise:
Probably the positive reception a lot of my OCs received. There was much love given to Eduardo Montoya in We Shall Come Home – Chapter 9.
And then there were the Army Brats in My Charade (is the event of the season). So much so, that they are getting their own series.
Most unintentionally telling story:
I think Someone You Might Have Been. Not going to say anything more.
What, if any story, feels important to you, and why:
Easy – it’s Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell/Don’t Ask, Don’t Care. It was probably the first time I overtly set out to make a political event the driving part of a story. And I even wrote a meta to go along with it.
Part III - Looking Forward
Is there any story you'd like to rewrite?
I think I’d like to start from scratch with Rocker!El. Because it the first few parts were written as a series of flash fics without the intention of ending it where it ended, it broadcasts a very mixed message. Even after editing it, there are still some problems.
How will new canon change your writing?
All I can say is thank goodness for new canon. It’s been over five months, and I am stuck with either writing stories that tag to the end of Countdown, or are set very far into the future (post-anklet). The way that Checkmate ended, I think I can actually write present-day OT3 again.
Do you have any fanfic or profic goals for the new year?
No profic goals. Have no interest in writing profic.
Fanfic goals? Maybe write something other than White Collar? Or not.
Hmmm, finish Vampire World, finish the Criminal Minds Crossover, finish a few more chapters on Orchestration. Write more Danger’verse. Finish the dozens of WIPs I’ve started, including Stripper Neal (aka the Harlequin Romance with Penises).
And in line with my mishegas: Write less, write better stuff, write stuff that people like and will enjoy and recommend to other people to read. Alternative, take more risks, climb out of the rut, the safe zone, write more, write what I want to write. Don’t give a damn about other people and being an author who’s recommended for other people.
Yes, I am crazy in the head. None of this should really matter, should it?
And to wrap this teal deer up, will the following people please take a bow:
jrosemary, who puts up with way too much shit from me.rabidchild67, who is my enabler in chief.coffeethyme4me, who has been my rock and my guide through some very difficult times. elainasaunt, who has been a stalwart ally, filled with common sense and an unparalleled hunger for my fic. And of course, all of my readers, who feed me back. You make so much of this possible.
