LadySilver's Fanfic

30 – Do you have a favorite fic you've written? What makes it your favorite? And don't forget to give us a link!

I was sitting at dinner once with my mom, sister, and sister-in-law--SIL was still mostly new to the family, so she didn't yet understand the rules of how we relate to each other--and I made a comment about one of my nieces being my favorite. SIL blew a gasket about how that was a completely inappropriate comment. Then my mom calmly informed me that I was her favorite while my sister nodded indulgently. A few minutes later, I got up to go the bathroom and my mom re-identified my sister as her favorite. The rule in my family, established since the days when I went from being an only child to being a sibling, is that the favorite is the one who is (or most recently was) the physically closest to the person doing the labeling.

That's how I feel about my stories. The one I've re-read the most recently is my favorite. There are parts in all of them that I like, even if it's only a single line, and I can't think of any that I like in their entirety, all the time--which is why I'm always tinkering with stories--but if I've bothered to re-read it, it's become my favorite for the moment.

So, the child I'm sitting closest to today is this one:

Gettin' On - Teen Wolf - 686 words - Sometimes you need to be someone else to get by. - Sheriff & Stiles gen.

I wrote this for the "genre" challenge on fan_flashworks as an exploration of grief and how people might deal with it. Unfortunately, I seem to be the only one who reads the story that way, based on the comments. Still, I really like what I was able to accomplish in only a few hundred words, plus I'm fond of the interpretation of the prompt.

What do you think? Do you have a favorite?

28 – Have you ever collaborated with anyone else, whether writing together, or having an artist work on a piece about your fic?

During Fandom Round 1, I participated in several Wars and Round Robins and shared universes with other writers. Inasmuch as those are collaborative art experiences, then the answer to this question is yes. As my name either didn't go on a lot of what was produced or my contribution could be viewed as stand-alone, there's no record (that I know of) of what I collaborated on.

Fandom Round Two has been much less collaborative. For my second Big Bang experience, I got a manip to go with my story. I'm...not sure the artist read the story, because the manip is only related in that it shows two of the three characters who had significant parts. I've also written a story for someone based on her art, as well as traded projects with her: I wrote her a story and she drew me an unrelated picture. Aside from that, I've not collaborated with anyone, though I would very much like to.

26 – What is the oddest (or funnest) thing you've had to research for a fic?

Not sure. I live in a state of constant research, so it's a fine line about whether I looked something up for a fic or wrote a fic because I'd learned something cool.

Things I've learned about while being a fic writer:

-1920s female jazz singers (bestill my heart, Sophie Tucker.)
-werewolf origin myths
-Southern hemisphere star positions
-swords (duh!)
-high school sports tournament regulations
-regulations for the storage of corpses
-the history of beer
-the medicinal usages of mercury throughout the ages

24 – Betaing – How many betas do you like to use to make sure there aren't any major flaws in your fic? Do you have a Beta horror story or dream story?

Both my use of betas at all and the extent of that use depend highly on what my story is being written for. If it's a bingo fill or something for fan_flashworks or comment-fic, I probably won't use a beta at all. I may not even mention the story to any of my regular betas. I'm always open to concrit on those works, but I'm going to deal with that after I get the credit for the fill and not before. If I'm writing for a fest or exchange, I try to have at least one beta. The only problem there is that...I really, really suck at deadlines. I don't often allow myself the time to get a proper beta read on stories. That said, I've probably been working very closely with at least one person for the duration of the story development and writing. I've had as many as five people help me out on stories in some capacity including, as mentioned previously, everyone in my family who understands fanfic including the kid, the spouse, my mom, and my nieces.

I don't think I have a beta horror story. All of my beta stories are my dream story because I've taught them pretty well to not let me get away with the crap I keep trying to get away with. Wait, there's a story. I had written, what I thought was, chapter 3 of "The Thickness of Blood" and sent it off to my beta for a SPaG check. Her primary note on returning the story was that the main character's actions weren't believable from the motivations I'd provided. So, rather than posting a chapter, I ended up having to rewrite the entire thing--and it really was a rewrite of the entire thing. Then, when I sent the revised chapter back to my beta, she came back with more notes that required a substantial rewrite. That was a great experience. The new chapter was so much better than the first attempt.

22 – Have you ever participated in a fest or a Big Bang? If so, write about your favorite experience in relation to one. If not, are there any you've thought about doing? And if not, why not?

Nope, never.

Oh, wait.

I did my first fest in 2011 and haven't looked back. These days, I do between 10-15 fests/exchanges a year.

I've only done two Big Bangs, both of which were very early in my Fandom Round 2 days. The first was "The Measure of Ourselves," which was supposed to be for the first Teen Wolf Big Bang, until the Bang fizzled out and disappeared, and which is part of why the story also fizzled out. The second was "Zero Point," which was for the Werewolf Big Bang. I gave some thought to throwing in with the most recent round of the Teen Wolf BB, but htbthomas talked me out of it.

My favorite experience was during the 2013 Yuletide when htbthomas finagled her assignment to get assigned to me, then wrote me a story for My Secret Identity. And she didn't just write me any story--she wrote very nearly the exact story I'd spent twenty years wanting in that fandom and hadn't been able to write for myself. It was absolutely brilliant.

20 –Do you ever get bunnied from other people's stories or art in the same fandom?

'Bunny' as a verb? I don't think I'm prepared to cope with that.

Of course I get inspired by other people's works. I've been negatively inspired by seeing people write a character or scenario a certain way and becoming so pissed that I wanted to see if I could do it better. (Turns out, I couldn't). I've been positively inspired by seeing art that I felt needed the rest of the story. I've been inspired by ideas that are dropped into stories and then never developed, perhaps because the author wasn't even aware of them. That's one of the great things about fanfic: where it can be an active conversation in how we see the characters and concepts of the show. When that conversation doesn't exist, I don't see much purpose to being in the fandom.

18 – Where do you get the most inspiration for your fics (aka "bunnies") from?

Exchange letters, mostly. Bingo squares are another good source. There are very few stories I've written that I generated the idea for myself. Sometimes I wonder if I even can come up with my own ideas, not that I'm in a hurry to try. It's so much more satisfying to write a story someone else wants to see.

16 – Summaries – Do you like them or hate them? How do you come up with them, if you use them?

Ah, summaries. I remember a time in the world of fanfic when summaries were innovative and, I believed, completely superfluous. We were all going to read every story, so why waste the time on writing blurbs for their content? (I also remember when fanfiction.net was started and how I believed it was completely redundant, since every fandom already had its own archive. ::sighs::). My opinion did come around after I started to grasp that fanfic was neither a fixed nor a finite resource.

I like summaries. For the most part, I think they're fairly easy to write--though that doesn't stop me from agonizing over the exact wording. I try to do an original overview of the major themes or plot beats of every story, and I try to limit that overview to one sentence, with, I'm sure, varying levels of success. It's a lot like writing a thesis sentence for an essay: Identify what the story is about and, preferably, put it in declarative form.

When I'm reading, summaries that ask questions tend to put me off the story since the questions rarely seem to invite participation: "Main characters from the canon have gotten in over their heads. Will they survive?" Um ... yes. They will. (Unless the story is tagged for major character death, in which case I'm not interested). Question answered, I have no reason to read the story. Since it would make me a hypocrite to ask questions of my readers that I'm not willing to engage with as a reader, I always aim for the declarative.

When all else fails, there's also the pull-quote. I've done pull-quotes on a handful of occasions, one of which was because a sentence from the story did seem to perfectly sum up the whole story. Overall, pull-quotes feel a little cheap to me, so I don't tend to use them.

The biggest problem I have with summaries is finding the line between being intriguing and dispensing spoilers. There's a huge part of me that still feels that any info about the story up-front is a spoiler, and that the summary should be worded to conceal everything. This is stupid, yet is still the biggest block between me and a decent summary. I'm continually having to remind myself that stating "this thing happens" is not the same thing as stating "and these were the consequences."

14 – Ratings – how high are you comfortable with going? Have you ever written higher? If you're comfortable with NC-17, have you ever been shocked by finding that the story you're writing is G-rated instead?

I tend to default to stories in the PG or PG-13 range, as differentiated only by the amount of swearing my characters may do, though I have written everything (I think). That said, I am really uncomfortable writing R-rated or higher stories. I've taken on the task because I believe it's important for writers to venture outside of their comfort zones and because I wanted to try to learn how to write something different than what I know. For all that I don't think my efforts at adult ratings are the best stories I've ever written, they are my best efforts, so they'll remain out there.

8 – Do you write OCs? And if so, what do you do to make certain they're not Mary Sues, and if not, explain your thoughts on Ocs.

Absolutely. I have no problem with including OCs in stories. Very often they're dead, because someone has to be the victim of whatever crime my character are solving. The thing about OCs is that they should serve a function in the story that the canon characters can't. If their role in a story is to do what a canon character can do only better, they're coasting into Mary Sue territory. If they also possess attributes that aren't feasible within the canon, then they've probably crossed the line. The trick to writing OCs who aren't Mary Sues is to keep them grounded in the canon and to make sure their stories don't overshadow the canon characters'.