Year in Fic 2008: Discussion Questions
Jan. 1st, 2009 09:15 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
alixtiiOkay, first things first: there were large parts of 2008 where I wasn't even on the internet (I mean, my connection was fine, other things just got in the way). With that fact out of the way, let's answer the questions.
What pairing/genre/fandom did you write that you would never have predicted in January 2007?
I'm thinking Yuletide doesn't count (and after all, I've written musical theatre fic before, so it's not all that surprising), so I'm going to say that I never in a million years thought I would write Logan/Veronica before I got my Catchallthon request and produced The Art of the Possible.
My favorite story this year (of my own): Tiens, Voilà Dix Sous, pour la Salle-de-Bains, another Buffy/Darla season 6 AU. What I like about this fic is the way I grounded it in the materiality of Buffy's and Darla's lives (and they both are definitely material girls): the clothing, the food, the hygenic supplies and cosmetics. I feel like I let the story happen a little more slowly with lots of little details, instead of going for a grand gesture, and in this story that was the right choice.
My best story this year: This is always a tough call, because a) it's difficult to apply quasi-objective aesthetic standards to fanfic, and b) subjectively, I always tend to think the last thing I wrote is the best (unless I think it's awful). But I'm going to go with The Art of the Possible, because it is evocative of a milieu and is sexy on the one hand and has an actual character arc which is sort of plotty on the other. A lot of times I think I either render a moment really well but am vague about context or have a really cool plot but rush through it. "The Art of the Possible" strikes a nice balance between the two, I think.
Most fun story: WGA vs. Zombies. Joss Whedon and Summer Glau take on a devastation of zombies. Enough said?
Sexiest story: Homework Helper. Philosophical debate sex between two geeky girls. You don't get hotter than that.
Story with single sexiest moment: By Her Side. Sex in the reference section.
Kinkiest story: Sibling Revelries. Telepathic threesome sibcest with bondage and dirty talk. Close second: Towards Zero. Also a 'cesty threesome (this time with father/daughter), with ghost!Lilly being voyeuristic. Third place: Le Retour à la Mère. More 'cest.
Sweetest story: A lot of people seem to think The Change You Want to See, the shortest of my Yuletide treats, is pretty sweet. But I think so is Please Have Snow and Mistletoe, a Dawn/Vi piece set during the holidays.
Most horrific story: http://community.livejournal.com/remixredux08/60558.html#cutid1. Veronica summons D'Hoffryn and makes a wish, a bloodbath ensues, and now there's two of ghost!Lilly.
Story with the best premise: I'd say Tiens, Voilà Dix Sous, pour la Salle-de-Bains, but I said the same about Not With a Bang, But a Whimper, and it's the same exact premise, albeit executed differently: Buffy/Darla season 6 AU with Darla taking on some part of Spike's role. So I'm going to say Left Behind, which takes advantage of the Master's Paradox Machine in series 3 to have Reinette be pregnant with the Doctor's child, travel through time, and meet Lucy Saxon. (I really need to write a sequel to that.)
Best Use of Language: There's nothing particularly fancy this year: no Drusilla POV, no Anne Catherick POV, no Moriarty POV--the only non-American POV character is Reinette in Left Behind, and even her voice isn't particularly beautiful. We do have a Prudence Pingleton POV in Saints and Sinners, though.
"My issues, let me show you them": The three 'cest fics.
Most unintentionally revealing story: The story which seems to say the most about me without my being sure what that is would probably be Galatea. Besides the obvious stepcest angle, it draws on ideas about John/Cameron that I don't think I've completely thought through yet. Or possibly my Pretty Lights fic (who will be able to guess which one I wrote?).
"Holy crap, that's wrong, even for you" story: Le Retour à la Mère. They're eleven.
Story that shifted my perception of the characters: The Eyes of Love. It actually made me think about Kit and Carlos for the first time.
Favorite OC: To the best of my recollection, I haven't created any new OC's this year.
Favorite portrayals of: Veronica in The Art of the Possible; Amanda in The Eyes of Love; Cameron in Galatea.
Favorite opening lines: Either "After Sophie and Esme died, we knew we would never trust boys again," from Sibling Revelries, or "Mary Lennox was twelve years old when she arrived at Misselthwaite, and Neville could not see past the familiar brown eyes looking out from a black dress" from The Life of a Flower.
Favorite closing lines: From Le Retour à la Mère: "Naked skin against naked skin, they press against each other in the darkness, each girl's heart beating against her sister's breast, coupled, as they must have been once before, long ago and forgotten, in their mother's womb." How could I not go there?
Other favorite lines:
Favorite philosophical statement I've written this year:
Hardest/Easiest story to write: Think of all the stories that didn't get written this year.
Story I didn't write but will at some point, I swear: Everything I answered for this questionlast year two years ago, verbatim.
What story do you want to have written?
Most underappreciated/overappreciated by the universe, in my opinion: I'm shocked how many comments The Change You Want to See has gotten, especially compared to my other Yuletide fics this year. I'm wondering if it's not because it's so brief and quickly written, rather than despite it. The Art of the Possible got a lot of comments, but no one actually on my flist seemed to read it, which I have to admit sort of puzzled me.
Biggest Disappointment: Again, all the fics that didn't get written.
Biggest surprise: Sibling Revelries. It and Le Retour à la Mère just sort of exploded onto my notebook one night, right after I had notebooked an essay on why twincest was so impossibly difficult to write.
Most "OHMIGOD HEY *I* WROTE THAT" fanon-turned-canon moment:
Looking back, did you write more fic than you thought you would this year, less, or about what you'd predicted? The months I wrote nothing at all equal the months I wrote something. There's no contest here.
Did you take any writing risks this year? (See above for unexpected pairings, etc.)
A story I want remembered: Towards Zero. Because as Ari says, "fandom is a funny place where a lesbian and a straight man spend the weekend before New Year's writing each other explicit incestuous threesome porn. Elizabeth's verdict is that we are cute."
This year's theme and the story that demonstrates it most:
What pairing/genre/fandom did you write that you would never have predicted in January 2007?
I'm thinking Yuletide doesn't count (and after all, I've written musical theatre fic before, so it's not all that surprising), so I'm going to say that I never in a million years thought I would write Logan/Veronica before I got my Catchallthon request and produced The Art of the Possible.
My favorite story this year (of my own): Tiens, Voilà Dix Sous, pour la Salle-de-Bains, another Buffy/Darla season 6 AU. What I like about this fic is the way I grounded it in the materiality of Buffy's and Darla's lives (and they both are definitely material girls): the clothing, the food, the hygenic supplies and cosmetics. I feel like I let the story happen a little more slowly with lots of little details, instead of going for a grand gesture, and in this story that was the right choice.
My best story this year: This is always a tough call, because a) it's difficult to apply quasi-objective aesthetic standards to fanfic, and b) subjectively, I always tend to think the last thing I wrote is the best (unless I think it's awful). But I'm going to go with The Art of the Possible, because it is evocative of a milieu and is sexy on the one hand and has an actual character arc which is sort of plotty on the other. A lot of times I think I either render a moment really well but am vague about context or have a really cool plot but rush through it. "The Art of the Possible" strikes a nice balance between the two, I think.
Most fun story: WGA vs. Zombies. Joss Whedon and Summer Glau take on a devastation of zombies. Enough said?
Sexiest story: Homework Helper. Philosophical debate sex between two geeky girls. You don't get hotter than that.
Story with single sexiest moment: By Her Side. Sex in the reference section.
Kinkiest story: Sibling Revelries. Telepathic threesome sibcest with bondage and dirty talk. Close second: Towards Zero. Also a 'cesty threesome (this time with father/daughter), with ghost!Lilly being voyeuristic. Third place: Le Retour à la Mère. More 'cest.
Sweetest story: A lot of people seem to think The Change You Want to See, the shortest of my Yuletide treats, is pretty sweet. But I think so is Please Have Snow and Mistletoe, a Dawn/Vi piece set during the holidays.
Most horrific story: http://community.livejournal.com/remixredux08/60558.html#cutid1. Veronica summons D'Hoffryn and makes a wish, a bloodbath ensues, and now there's two of ghost!Lilly.
Story with the best premise: I'd say Tiens, Voilà Dix Sous, pour la Salle-de-Bains, but I said the same about Not With a Bang, But a Whimper, and it's the same exact premise, albeit executed differently: Buffy/Darla season 6 AU with Darla taking on some part of Spike's role. So I'm going to say Left Behind, which takes advantage of the Master's Paradox Machine in series 3 to have Reinette be pregnant with the Doctor's child, travel through time, and meet Lucy Saxon. (I really need to write a sequel to that.)
Best Use of Language: There's nothing particularly fancy this year: no Drusilla POV, no Anne Catherick POV, no Moriarty POV--the only non-American POV character is Reinette in Left Behind, and even her voice isn't particularly beautiful. We do have a Prudence Pingleton POV in Saints and Sinners, though.
"My issues, let me show you them": The three 'cest fics.
Most unintentionally revealing story: The story which seems to say the most about me without my being sure what that is would probably be Galatea. Besides the obvious stepcest angle, it draws on ideas about John/Cameron that I don't think I've completely thought through yet. Or possibly my Pretty Lights fic (who will be able to guess which one I wrote?).
"Holy crap, that's wrong, even for you" story: Le Retour à la Mère. They're eleven.
Story that shifted my perception of the characters: The Eyes of Love. It actually made me think about Kit and Carlos for the first time.
Favorite OC: To the best of my recollection, I haven't created any new OC's this year.
Favorite portrayals of: Veronica in The Art of the Possible; Amanda in The Eyes of Love; Cameron in Galatea.
Favorite opening lines: Either "After Sophie and Esme died, we knew we would never trust boys again," from Sibling Revelries, or "Mary Lennox was twelve years old when she arrived at Misselthwaite, and Neville could not see past the familiar brown eyes looking out from a black dress" from The Life of a Flower.
Favorite closing lines: From Le Retour à la Mère: "Naked skin against naked skin, they press against each other in the darkness, each girl's heart beating against her sister's breast, coupled, as they must have been once before, long ago and forgotten, in their mother's womb." How could I not go there?
Other favorite lines:
Favorite philosophical statement I've written this year:
Hardest/Easiest story to write: Think of all the stories that didn't get written this year.
Story I didn't write but will at some point, I swear: Everything I answered for this question
What story do you want to have written?
Most underappreciated/overappreciated by the universe, in my opinion: I'm shocked how many comments The Change You Want to See has gotten, especially compared to my other Yuletide fics this year. I'm wondering if it's not because it's so brief and quickly written, rather than despite it. The Art of the Possible got a lot of comments, but no one actually on my flist seemed to read it, which I have to admit sort of puzzled me.
Biggest Disappointment: Again, all the fics that didn't get written.
Biggest surprise: Sibling Revelries. It and Le Retour à la Mère just sort of exploded onto my notebook one night, right after I had notebooked an essay on why twincest was so impossibly difficult to write.
Most "OHMIGOD HEY *I* WROTE THAT" fanon-turned-canon moment:
Looking back, did you write more fic than you thought you would this year, less, or about what you'd predicted? The months I wrote nothing at all equal the months I wrote something. There's no contest here.
Did you take any writing risks this year? (See above for unexpected pairings, etc.)
A story I want remembered: Towards Zero. Because as Ari says, "fandom is a funny place where a lesbian and a straight man spend the weekend before New Year's writing each other explicit incestuous threesome porn. Elizabeth's verdict is that we are cute."
This year's theme and the story that demonstrates it most: