tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-52562096231742952542024-02-20T11:09:22.222-08:00Fandom BouquetRose B. Fischerhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/13349494083118193417noreply@blogger.comBlogger86125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5256209623174295254.post-17106148497336505982013-12-05T10:00:00.000-08:002013-12-05T10:00:10.018-08:00100 Things I've Learned By Writing Fanfiction: #16: Why Are You Writing This Anyway<br />
My friend Jess has been stuck with her story for a while now. I'm hoping that by bringing our old RP characters into her plot, we can resolve some of the long-standing issues and get her unstuck. So far it's going pretty well, but the more we work on it , the more we realize that it's going to be a LONG, complicated project. (I'm doing my best not to transmit my "curse" and make it five times longer just by being present.)<br />
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As I was thinking about her project, I remembered my experiences with my own AU stories, and I remembered several people asking me how I maintained my interest in such long, difficult projects. They would say things like "I can't spend more than a month or two on any fanfiction before I get bored with it or get stuck or find something that interests me more. How do you keep going?"<br />
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Well, there isn't just one answer. The answer is different for every story. My writing process is somewhat different each time depending on the needs of the project. The one commonality I can point to right away is a question I've learned to ask myself: "Why are you writing this anyway?"<br />
Writing any kind of fiction well requires a lot of work. Regardless of your skill level as a writer, it takes a significant investment of time, energy, and attention to detail in order to develop characters, a workable plot, and to turn those things into an actual story instead of an idea floating around your mind. Writing a good canon fanfiction requires all those things plus an even greater attention to detail, because you have to be able to effectively voice characters you didn't create, remember the rules of their world, and enough about the continuity of the events in their lives to make your story believable within the context of the franchise your writing. Writing a good AU story ups the ante even more. I talked about some of the reasons for that in this post, called <a href="http://rosebfischer.wordpress.com/2013/06/03/100-things-i-learned-by-writing-fanfic-6-give-me-the-background/">Give Me the Background</a>. (That post also attempts to address the oft-asked "Why do you put so much work into a fanfiction anyway? Why not just write your own story?")<br />
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To put it simply, the skills that you use when you're writing an AU are the same ones that you use in any story, but you have a harder sell. You're taking something that your audience already loves and changing it in some fundamental way. That means your characters have to be believable and accessible in order for your audience to see what is changing and keep on loving them. Your plot has to be strong enough and well thought out enough to pull off your changes and bring the whole project to a satisfying conclusion. Most of all, you have to be able to balance your plot, your characters, your knowledge of your fandom, and something else that is usually less easy to define. Your story has to stay, at its core, something that feels like part of the franchise you're writing in. There's no one way to do that. There's no formula for success. I can't tell you in words what makes a story feel like Star Wars or Star Trek. I can't voice what it is that makes those franchises both magical to me but completely different from one another. I still know them when I see or read them.<br />
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You can have the coolest idea in the world for a story, but if you lose your audience, you're only telling it for yourself. That's okay. All stories are "for the author" to some degree. At some point in their creation, most of them also become "for the audience." There's nothing wrong with telling a story just for yourself. I have some that I write just for myself, that I have no intention of ever posting on the Internet or publishing in a book. The only thing is, those stories get less of my time and energy when I'm busy. Part of asking "Why?" is figuring out whether your story is for other people, because in doing so, you figure out how much of a priority the story is going to be. The biggest thing I've learned when it comes to writing about AUs is to ask myself why before I start.<br />
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I think "Why?" is a good question for any author to ask at various points in the writing process. It helps us to remember what it was that made this a story worth telling in the first place. It has been even more important to me while writing AU stories because I find them harder.<br />
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Sometimes — usually with "alternate history" stories — an AU gets started because something got the author's hackles up in the canon verse. Maybe their favorite character died or the show writers took a new, dissatisfying direction with the series plot. Maybe the show ended on a cliffhanger, but then it's debatable whether the story can really be termed an AU.<br />
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Sometimes the AU starts with a continuity hole, a dropped plot line, or a seemingly innocent "what if...?" that turns into a persistent, nagging, pain in the ass idea that won't go away. Sometimes, an AU is the only way to "fix" or "explain" obvious problems with the canon story. Sometimes, there is what I like to call the "accidental AU." An author starts working on a story while the franchise is still in production, it starts out perfectly compatible with canon, and then diverges from the on-screen plot as things go forward. That has happened to me with all but one of my Stargate SG-1 stories.<br />
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To me, the answer almost always boils down to "I love these characters and I want better for them." That's why my stories usually focus on dropped plot lines or on trying to bring about healthy growth and relationship choices for the characters without messing up the core themes and atmosphere of the franchise. That one gets tricky since most of my fandoms have messed up characters and settings that deal heavily with loss, grief, and trying to make a difference in spite of them.<br />
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I started writing a series ending for a kids' show from the 1980s, and I chose to make it an AU because the 80s were not a time when kids' shows paid much attention to their own internal continuity or even made sense. Making that story an AU was a way to help "explain" goofy things that would have annoyed me if I'd left them alone. I work on that one every now and then when I'm stuck or bored with my other projects. I've spent the last four or five years chewing on an idea for a Star Trek: The Next Generation AU that fixes or deals with my "pet" dropped storylines and continuity problems. I'm waiting for the right collaborator and enough time for that one. I guess those last two don't get high enough on my priority list because there's nothing I see as a glaring, painful problem for the characters. There are just annoyances. One series deserved an ending; the other deserved continuity and follow through. I think those things are important, but I know myself well enough to realize that they aren't what drives me to put one story at the head of the queue while another one goes on the back burner.<br />
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So, you can have very different reasons for writing every story that you write. All of them are valid, and none is better than any other. It's just important to have one, for have a handful. I've read (or I guess I should say stop reading) a lot of fanfiction where it seemed as though the author lost direction. When that happens, I usually lose interest, because I lose the sense that I can trust the author to get me to the journey's end. The few times I've finished the story like that, I usually felt like I wanted back the time I had wasted getting to the end.<br />
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My stories always pull fast ones on me. I've come to expect that by the time I'm finished, the story will have changed three or four times from the way I saw it at the beginning. It's easy to lose direction when this happens. Sometimes, I have to keep slogging through even though I don't know where it's going, but when and if I end up hopelessly lost, I come back to the question of "Why?" because if I can answer that one, I know there's a story somewhere that needs to be told.<br />
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Rose B. Fischerhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/13349494083118193417noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5256209623174295254.post-62848500048990762892013-11-11T11:23:00.000-08:002013-11-11T11:23:32.577-08:00100 Things I've Learned By Writing Fanfiction: #15: Defining AUThese posts will also be available on my new WordPress account:<br />
<a href="http://rosebfischer.wordpress.com/category/100-things/100-things-fanfiction/">http://rosebfischer.wordpress.com/category/100-things/100-things-fanfiction/</a><br />
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I've been trying to stay away from "definition" posts in this series because I think there are already plenty of fandom dictionaries and encyclopedias floating around the Internet. My problem is that I did a casual search on the term "alternate universe" before I started working on my upcoming posts, and there were a lot of confusing or conflicting definitions. I want to make sure that my readers are on the same page here. For the purposes of this blog series, I'm going to use the definitions that I've been familiar with since way back in the age of the dinosaurs when fanfiction was mostly published in print fanzines. They are not the only valid definitions. They're probably not even the best definitions. They're just the ones I use.<br />
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So. What is this thing called AU that I keep talking about?<br />
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AU is an abbreviation that stands for "Alternate Universe." Star Trek fans might be familiar with this concept mostly in terms of the Mirror Universe, which we see several times in different incarnations of the franchise starting with the TOS episode "Mirror, Mirror." The premise of the Mirror Universe is pretty simple: "an alternate reality where everything is socially, philosophically, and morally inverted. And Spock has an awesome goatee." The same people exist in roughly the same roles, but for some reason that isn't really explained, the United Federation of Planets is an Evil Empire. And Spock has an awesome goatee. (Yes, it bears repeating.) Star Trek and a number of other sci-fi franchises have also played around with the Many Worlds Interpretation (http://plato.stanford.edu/entries/qm-manyworlds/) to present episodes that deal with alternate history. The idea there is that for every major decision or event, each possible outcome manifests as a parallel universe or an alternate timeline.<br />
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Usually on those episodes, the goal is to restore the timeline or send all the people back to their proper universes. Fanfiction approaches things a little differently. The goal is usually not to have the different realities collide with each other but to present and explore one particular alternate possibility. While the goals of the fanfic writer are usually different from the goals of the television writer, we use the same mechanisms when we dream up our AUs. An AU is usually either an "alternate reality" like the Mirror Universe where the setting is changed in some way but the characters usually fill the same basic roles, or it's an "alternate history" where the setting is relatively stable, but events have unfolded differently, and characters may or may not be filling their canon roles.<br />
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So, for the purposes of this blog, AU means "Alternate Universe." It's an umbrella term that encompasses any story that creates a new "version" of the franchise universe where something is significantly different from how it is portrayed on screen or in authorized print.<br />
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"Alternate Reality" is a subtype that refers to a changed setting where the entire background is noticably different. In addition to Star Trek's Mirror Universe, I've seen alternate realities that take the characters and put them in high school when their canon counterparts are adults, or that change scifi technology to magic and dragons.<br />
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"Alternate History" is another subtype which refers to a stable setting and changed events. Like Qui-Gon not dying in his fight with Darth Maul or Jacob Carter not dying at the end of SG 1 season eight.<br />
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Alternate history stories usually exhibit some kind of ripple or butterfly effect as the initial change in canon events creates broader, more far-reaching changes down the road. Alternate histories tend to be the more common kind of AU fanfic, and when most people hear the term AU, this is the kind of story they expect.<br />
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The concept of AU tends to be polarizing in fandom. I know people who love them and people who hate them. I don't think I've met anyone who doesn't have an opinion. I've been on both sides of the fence. I'm a Dune fan, and I love the concept of endless possibility, but I've seen a lot of sloppy AU. If you're reading my 100 Things series, you probably found it through my fanfiction, or at least you know that I write AU stories. This next section of the series is designed for either folks who have an idea for an AU but aren't sure they can pull it off or folks who enjoy AU stories and want to learn more about the process of creating them.Rose B. Fischerhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/13349494083118193417noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5256209623174295254.post-91896182846115447272013-10-31T20:51:00.005-07:002013-10-31T20:55:24.901-07:00Geez, Where Did This month Go???Wow. This month has gotten away from me. I've been thinking about my 100 Things series a lot, but I guess I didn't realize how quickly October was going. This month, I've had the unexpected pleasure of getting to help a close friend work on her project for NanoWrimo. You can read all about that <a href="https://wordsworldsdreams.wordpress.com/2013/10/09/nanowrimo-one-more-year/">here</a>.<br />
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My friend's project happens to be a Star Wars AU that she's been working on intermittently since shortly after I started my biggest and most intense fanfiction project, One Path, in 2007. Jessica and I were just chatting one night, and we realized that (1) her story really needed some solidly developed orginal characters, and (2) we happened to have the perfect ones to fit the theme and storylines of her project just sitting around our heads from a SW roleplay we did between 2005-2007. The only problem was that her story is set in the Old Republic Era, and their characters lived well after the Old Republic fell, sometime around 500 ABY. (Which, for anyone who isn't into Star Wars, would be 500 years after Star Wars: A New Hope.) So, we had a lot of adapting to do when it came to getting our characters into a much different time. In the Star Wars universe. I think we did pretty well. Other fans will have to be the judge, but I'm pretty excited.<br />
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I'm thrilled to see my friend writing again. She has been really struggling with her writing for several years now, and it's great to see her starting to enjoy it again. I'm happy to have a chance to work with her, and I'm happy to be able to give our old characters some new life and (hopefully) more satisfying outcomes this time around.<br />
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The process of working our characters into her plot has given me a lot to think about. Some of it relates directly to my section of the 100 Things series that relates to AUs. Others are just thoughts on writing fanfiction for fiction in general.<br />
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Posts I have coming are:<br />
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Defining AU<br />
Why Are You Writing This Anyway?<br />
Who Is This Mary Sue Chick Anyway?<br />
Mary Sue and Why We Love Her<br />
Mary Sue and Why We Hate Her<br />
Nobody Cares About Your Dumb OC<br />
Give Me A Good OC Any Day<br />
Pathos, Angst, and the "Worst Possible" Scenario<br />
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I am still writing these posts with Dragon NaturallySpeaking, so you can blame any weirdness on Dragon tracks I missed during cleanup.<br />
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Rose B. Fischerhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/13349494083118193417noreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5256209623174295254.post-74723422811517479472013-10-08T09:23:00.000-07:002013-10-08T09:36:37.291-07:00100 Things I Learned From Writing Fanfiction #14--Not Having a Beta Is Not the End of the World<br />
Most people who have been writing fanfiction for any length of time have a horror story or two about a bad beta. There's the person who just doesn't understand your work, who has very different views of the fandom and its characters than you do and consistently says, "bad characterization" when the real problem is vastly different interpretations of the character, or nitpicks at things so much that it makes the story no fun to write. There's the person whose grammar or other writing skills are at a lower level than yours, and so never finds anything to correct. I've had a few betas who just turned out to be so annoying or weird that I couldn't work with them (again, not naming names.) Most commonly, the problem with betas is finding one who will follow through and read your story — or just finding one at all. I spend more time posting beta inquiries or emailing beta requests than is probably healthy. I have a form letter that I wrote up so I could copy-paste and add the relevant details when I'm looking for a beta. That's how many times I have to look for a new one. I've even considered writing up a permanent beta request post that I can link people to. Most requests don't get a response, and of those that do, I would say one out of five people actually agrees and follows through to read the material I send them.<br />
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Some of that is probably because my stories are ridiculously long, and I don't really write in very many "cool" or popular fandoms. I use examples from my Stargate and Star Wars work when I write this blog series because those fandoms are more well-known, but neither one is enjoying the height of its popularity anymore. Most of the franchises that I write for have pretty small fan communities. My experience is not unique, though. A quick browse through forum threads or LiveJournal communities or even Tumblr posts related to fanfiction will show way more people looking for beta readers — begging for beta readers — then there are beta readers volunteering their services.<br />
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So, the odds are, if you're writing a story of any length, you're going to have to get multiple beta readers for different periods of time. If you're like me, there will be long stretches when you don't have a beta reader because the ones you had are busy or have other commitments. Having a beta reader is fantastic, and I recommend it whenever possible, but if you don't have one, here are some things you can try. (Disclaimer: most of these don't work overly well for me, but you may have different experiences with them. Try them out and see what works.)<br />
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Put each chapter aside for a week before you start to edit it. If you can't wait a week, put it aside for at least three days. This will help you get some distance from what you've written so that when you are editing it, you will be less likely to feel like you know what it says and end up reading what is supposed to be on the page instead of what's there.<br />
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Print out your draft and make your edits in pen or pencil first. This is a pain in the ass, and it takes longer than it would if you were editing on your computer, but it forces you to slow down and take a look at what is actually on the screen and/or on the page. Because your edits then need to be transcribed onto your computer, you have an added layer of proofreading that may help you catch errors you didn't see before. You also have more time to think about what's been written and decide if you need to make any changes to the story content itself.<br />
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Read the story out loud. As with printing it and doing your edits in pen or pencil, this may help you catch errors because your brain has to process more kinds of input.<br />
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Read the story from the end to the beginning. It won't make sense, and that's the point. This may force your brain to pick up errors that you would otherwise skip over.<br />
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If all else fails, try using Windows Narrator. (It's a utility installed on any Windows PC that will read back text portions of any open document. I'm not sure if there's a similar feature on Macintosh computers, but you may be able to find a free text-to-speech utility by searching online.) The computer voice is horrible, and it will make mistakes in pronunciation. It doesn't sound at all natural, but it will read the words that are actually on the page. This one has actually helped me, because I have to listen carefully to what it's saying and make sure the words are correct.<br />
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To open Windows narrator, click Start> Accessories> Ease of Access> Narrator.<br />
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<b><u>For Continuity Errors, Characterization, and Questions of Plausibility.</u></b><br />
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The best way I know to maintain continuity between chapters that were written over a long period of time is with lists and charts. I know, I know. That's a lot of work. It's a pain in the ass. I really wish that I had thought of doing it earlier, because even though it takes more initial work to set up, it would've saved me a lot of headaches. Here's what I do:<br />
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Make a list of all the major players in the story.<br />
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Make a separate list of all the major plot points and subplots in the story.<br />
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I keep these documents separate from my charts because they will change over time. I know that my plots will diverge from my outline, and subplots may or may not end up working the way I thought they would. Lists can serve as a quick reference guide that I can scan a lot more easily than I could scan a large chart, and I can update them with a lot less hassle if I'm in a hurry.<br />
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Then I make two different charts or spreadsheets. The first one has the major plot points listed across the top of the page. The characters names are listed on the left, and then the table cells cover what happens to them in connection with each plot point. (Some people like to use this format as an outline; I prefer to use it as a method of keeping track of what I've written.) The second chart lists the chapter numbers across the top of the page, and again, the characters names on the left. If you are good at keeping your chapters on track with your outline or what you think is going to happen, you can probably make this ahead of time. Since my stories take on a life of their own and my characters do things that I was not planning, I leave it blank and fill it in as I go.<br />
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Make sure that you leave time in your writing schedule to work on and update your charts as you go. Otherwise, they will become outdated and completely useless, not to mention overwhelming when you go to try to fix them. This is something you might want to do during that week between finishing your rough draft and editing what you've done.<br />
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For dealing with questions of plausibility and characterization, I found that the best thing to do is to ask someone what they think of a specific plot element, scenario, scene, or section of dialogue. Most fans are nice people. Even if they don't have time to beta read for you, they'll probably have time to answer one or two specific questions about your story and point out any problems or conflicts with canon.<br />
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Do you have any other ideas or suggestions? What have you found is the best way to get by without a beta reader if you have to?<br />
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Rose B. Fischerhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/13349494083118193417noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5256209623174295254.post-19310018967774689582013-10-08T09:19:00.001-07:002013-10-08T09:42:10.081-07:00100 Things I Learned From Writing Fanfiction #13--Every Good Fic Writer Needs Good A Beta<div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0in; mso-layout-grid-align: none; mso-pagination: none; text-autospace: none;">
"Beta" or "beta reader" is a fandom term for a person or group of people who will read your story and offer suggestions for improvement before you publish it. Beta readers are volunteer proofreaders, continuity checkers, sounding boards, and general critique providers. Not every beta reader excels at every part of that job description, and you may need one type of beta more than you need another.</div>
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It's hard to find a good beta. I've heard people say that they just don't have time to have their stories beta read. I've had betas flake out on me mid-story and disappear without a trace (In fact, I have a confession to make. Back in the early 2000s, I volunteered to beta read someone's AU, my computer died, and by the time I got a new one, I had lost that person's contact info and the Yahoo group that we met on was no longer in existence — so, to the girl whose story I flaked on, I'm very sorry and I hope that one day you found a beta reader who helped you out, because you had a really good premise and I liked the chapters that I saw.) I've also had beta readers who seem to find fault with every single thing I wrote and every word choice I made. There's a fine line between being a tough editor and being an asshole, and some people just don't know where that line is.</div>
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So, given all of that, why would I say that every good fic writer needs a good beta?</div>
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It's pretty simple. I've learned that no matter how good I think my grammar is, no matter how many times I read a chapter over, no matter how thorough I think I am in covering every plot hole and every eventuality in the story, I will make a mistake. For example, in my big Star Wars AU, Luke loses Anakin Skywalker's lightsaber — you know, the one that Ben Kenobi gave him and told him that his father wanted him to have it. He loses it in a duel, and Darth Vader is able to retrieve it, so it is in Vader's possession the next time the two of them meet. I wrote that second scene out of order, before I realized that Luke was going to lose the lightsaber, and I got so caught up in what I was writing that I completely forgot about it until a reader caught it, and by that time, the goof had been online for several months. Now, I was able to fix it just by changing a few lines, but a good beta reader would've caught it before the section ever went online. I can think of several authors — and I'm not naming names, because I think that would be mean — who come up with great ideas and obviously love their characters, but write stories that desperately need a second pair of eyes, not only for grammar and punctuation but for repetitive or pedantic narrative styles that hurt their work more than they're aware.</div>
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My writing style has certainly changed since I began writing fanfiction, and I make no claim to be an expert. I don't always have a beta reader. I can't always find one, but I can say without a doubt that I can tell a clear difference in the quality of my work if I have a beta versus if I don't. I have a problem with reading what the page is supposed to say instead of what it says. (People usually suggest reading the material out loud or reading it backwards. I have tried both of those things for years and neither one of them is very effective for me, but you may have a different experience. Go ahead and try it if you can't find yourself a beta.) Even if the beta doesn't find very much or if all they're looking for is spelling, grammar, etc, they'll find something, and that will lead you to go back in and take a look at the story more closely. That is never a bad thing.</div>
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Lots of times we're just impatient to post. We get excited. We spent all this time and energy working on a chapter; we have something we think other fans will really like, and we want to share it RIGHT now. We may feel pressure because we know that we have readers waiting and asking for updates, especially if the story's been around for a while. No one ever died from waiting a week or two.</div>
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Sometimes we are uncomfortable showing our work before it's finished. Maybe we don't write in chronological order; maybe our rough drafts don't make very much sense, and by the time we put them together in a way that would make sense to another person, we figure a beta reader really isn't necessary. My experience has been that a good beta reader can help with all of these things (or in spite of them) and even if your story is fine without one, having one will make it that much better.</div>
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Rose B. Fischerhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/13349494083118193417noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5256209623174295254.post-65329998821077035232013-09-28T12:29:00.003-07:002013-09-28T12:29:57.786-07:00100 Things I Learned From Writing Fanfiction #12--It Will Grow.I've been working on a few of my projects by dictation while my arms try to heal. One of them is a fanfiction project that I started back in 2010 and then put on hold in 2011 so that could take a hiatus from fandom activities. Originally, it was planned as a 50,000 word piece and it has now grown to 40,000 words before I have even finished the first major plot arc. So that lends me to three different blog topics, first and foremost being <i>It Will Grow.</i> Following that, I'd like to talk about beta readers. My first post on that topic is going to be <i>Every Good Fic Writer Needs a Good Beta.</i> The second will be <i>Not Having a Beta Is Not the End of the World.</i> So let's get started.<br />
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There's something to be said for discipline. An effective writer knows how to paint the scene, evoke emotions, make a point, and provide information all in the fewest possible words. You might find that amusing coming from me, since my stories tend to run around the 600,000 word mark. Just imagine how long those stories would be if I didn't edit them, and if I gave in to every whim and idea that crossed my mind. If you've read the previous blogs in this series, you'll know that I don't, because the same principles and guidelines that I use when I am deciding which story to tell apply when I am choosing which ideas, words, and scenes will stay in the story.<br />
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All that said, one of the most wonderful things about fanfiction from a writer's point of view is that generally (unless you're writing for voluntary challenge in a fandom community) your story can be as long as it needs to be. You don't have to worry about making it fit some publisher's guidelines for content or for length. For some folks, that may not be that big of a deal. Perhaps you are the kind of writer who can tell a complete story in 2500 or 5000 words, and you've never thought about writing longer ones. I have learned, though, that once you start planning a story for more than a 5000 word one-shot, you need to plan for your story to be longer than you think it will be.<br />
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One of my biggest frustrations as an author is trying to budget my time for stories that become longer and more complicated than I think they're going to be. The further I go along, the more I can see the story evolve and become more than I intended it to be. That means it takes longer for me to write, and I have a hard time answering questions about when things will be done or how many chapters here will be in the end. One of my writer friends calls verbosity my superpower. Sometimes I agree with her. Other times, I call it my curse.<br />
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Whether it's a meta-human gift or a form of karmic retribution, what I have learned is this: plan for the story to be at least half again as long as you think it will be. Budget your time by that estimate and plan your outlines or whatever other pre-writing that you use to account for the story to be longer and more complex than you have in mind. If you like to plan by word count and you think your story will run about 10,000 words, then estimate 15,000 or even 20,000. If you like to plan by chapters and you think the story will run 10 chapters, then estimate 15 or 20. If you have no idea when you get started, and you're just hoping that you'll be able to finish the story in a month then plan for two months or even four months. That way, when you got your enormous rough draft that is way longer than you thought it would be, you don't have to stress yourself out over it. You can edit the 20,000 word document mercilessly until you end up with a story that you're satisfied with.<br />
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On the flip side of this, I have also learned that there is a balance between giving the story room to grow and maintaining your control as the author. You can <i>tell </i>a story with a lot fewer words than you think you need, but if you allow the story to grow first and then trim it, you'll save yourself a lot of headaches in the long run. Remember that you don't need to show every detail, and you don't need to tell every person's story in its entirety. Write what you need to and imply the rest. You can always tell side stories or write missing scenes after the fact. It's important keep your focus on the story that you were trying to tell in the first place, because that's the story that your readers clicked the link for.<br />
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Rose B. Fischerhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/13349494083118193417noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5256209623174295254.post-49578629492055829132013-09-07T18:15:00.002-07:002013-09-07T18:29:51.439-07:00It's About Time! (My Thoughts on Motive 1x11, Brute Force, and Disability on television.)<div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom: 0.0001pt;">
<span lang="EN">Back in mid July, I went to the doctor for the ongoing problems with my arms. She said I had tendinitis in both of them and that I should not type or do anything hobby related that required the use of my arms or hands. It was only supposed to have lasted for about three or four days, but I'm still having problems, and at this point, I am going to assume that RSI is going to be a problem for a while.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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Unlike the last time something happened to an arm, this affects both of them and makes it really hard to do any graphic work or to write. I decided to start using a text to speech program, and I've been working with it for a little over a month now. I'm getting pretty good at dictation, so I thought it was time to try a blog post. Took all night and most of the day, but here it is. <br />
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(If there are more typos than usual, you can blame the text-to-speech software.)<br />
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I've been following ABC's <i>Motive</i> since it began airing in February. I was intrigued by the premise: focusing a procedural drama on the connection between the killer and the victim and the events that led up to the murder instead of the police investigation/whodunit. I was also drawn to the idea of a female protagonist (Detective Angie Flynn) who was also a single mother and a small team of co-investigators, as opposed to a whole unit like in some of the larger ensembles that are still airing. Up until last night, I found the show interesting enough to keep watching, sometimes intriguing, but not really as exciting as I thought it had the potential to be.<br />
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I'm behind on the show. I have a habit of letting episodes build up. So last night I watched episode 1x11, <i>Brute Force</i>, and I was not only excited, but I was impressed. I wish I could say that I was excited about what the show was doing with a recurring cast member, but I am really impressed with Detective Flynn for the first time. I was excited about the episode's killer-of-the-week.<br />
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Spoilers after the jump.<br />
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The killer in <i>Brute Force</i> turned out to be the victim's brother. That's not particularly unusual, but what is unusual is the fact that this brother was a paraplegic. I think it's pretty cool that the writers of the show felt it was okay and plausible to portray a person with adisability as being capable of murder. What's beyond cool, what's really, really exciting, is the fact that this character was multidimensional and not a stereotype in any way. He was cold, calculating, greedy, manipulative, and arrogant, but I don't think he was without sympathy, and I believe he had a conscience, although it may have been warped and very small. By the end of the episode, I felt the same way about this character that I usually feel about Anakin Skywalker. I can understand why he did what he did. I could see his anger building in the flashbacks, and I could feel for him, because I could see places where he was genuinely wronged by the victim, but in the end, I am disgusted by him, and I think he absolutely needs to be in jail for the rest of his life.<br />
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It's very strange for me to be so disgusted by a character and yet so thrilled and excited that I was practically doing a chair dance when I realized that they weren't going to go the route of "accidental death/frightened-but-basically-good killer/let's let the poor, disabled guy off with a suspended sentence and community service." I actually said, out loud, "It's about time!"<br />
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I have a disability. I was born with it. I've also had unrelated, life changing health problems over the last five years, so I understand (to an extent) what it's like to have an acquired disability and have to learn to adjust to a whole new way of life. I don't talk about it on this blog, because it's never been relevant, but I'm mentioning it now because that might help you understand why I was so excited to see a character with a disability in an unsympathetic role that didn't center specifically on the fact that the guy used a wheelchair.<br />
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The guy had an acquired injury as a result of the gym accident, and the gym was owned by his brother (the victim). I almost groaned and turned the episode off when I realized that the wheelchair user was the killer, because I get really tired of seeing stories about paraplegics either harboring resentment or overcoming adversity or both.<br />
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There's nothing wrong with those stories. I have nothing against them, but they seem to be just about the only kind of story that gets any serious screen time when you have a main character with a disability. If there is a character with the congenital illness or something else that they were born with, the story usually revolves around how that character became an inspiration to everyone else. While I do know people who have lived through both of those realities, there are a lot of people like me who didn't have an "adjustment period" because we were born with our disabilities. Most of us are neither angry about that, embarrassed by our differences, feel inferior because of them, nor feel that our lives resemble an inspirational TV movie. I usually get fed up in 10 minutes and turn the show off anytime there is a character with a disability. I kept watching mostly because I was bored last night, but boy am I glad I did.<br />
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Joey, the killer, did harbor resentment over his injury, but it wasn't the main point of focus in the episode, and the problems between him and his brother Mark seemed to go back a lot further than that. It's implied that, if Joey hadn't broken his back, the tension between them would never have become as extreme as it did. The writers did a good job of making that believable, rather than maudlin or over-the-top in its level of angst. Joey is intelligent, physically capable, and a deeply tragic figure, but the way he tries to play a grieving victim and then throw his sister-in-law to the dogs makes him truly an asshole, rather than a misunderstood bad boy with a heart of gold.<br />
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He fools the investigating officers at first because he's very good at playing a grieving brother, and because they aren't inclined to suspect a paraplegic to be capable of overpowering a former Olympic boxer. Eventually, the trail of evidence begins to lead back to him, and Detective Flynn is initially the only person who takes him seriously as a suspect. I have a new kind of respect for her as a police officer not because she was willing to accept the idea that Joey could have done it, but because she was able to treat him just like any other suspect and didn't bat an eyelash when she realized where the evidence was leading. Disability was completely irrelevant to her.<br />
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The murder scene itself was plausible, and looks like it was carefully staged. My only two nitpicks are:<br />
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(1) I think it was too easy for Joey to remove the wheelchair's armrest from the position he was in on the floor. The heavy titanium ones like that wheelchair had usually have release buttons on both ends that have to be held down at the same time. The whole armrest has to be either twisted or pulled upward, and while I'm sure that's possible from outside the chair, that wouldn't have been the position that Joey was used to doing it from. As angry as he was in that scene, it should've taken even longer. Have you ever tried to open a childproof cap when you're pissed off? It takes even more effort because your emotions are short-circuiting your problem-solving skills and your manual dexterity. I think Mark should've had enough time to try to fight or get away.<br />
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(2) I don't understand why there wasn't more physical evidence that would've pointed to Joey at the beginning. There's a scene early on where Detective Vega comes into the gym and sees Joey cleaning up the blood on the floor after the CSI teams leave the area. With the amount of blood that I saw, I think there really should have been more hard evidence that pointed to Joey. It would've taken him time to get his wheelchair off its side and transfer back in from the floor. The floor was wood, and would've been slippery near the body. It's certainly possible that Joey could've gotten back into his chair and cleaned up before calling the police, but I think it should've taken a lot longer and been a lot more messy than it seems to have been.<br />
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In context, those are minor problems. Most crime procedurals probably don't worry too much about whether their murders are going to hold up to a lot of critical examination. The important — awesome — thing is that I just saw a TV show say something I've been saying for years: people with disabilities are individuals capable of the same range of emotions and behaviors, good and bad, as anyone else. There are assholes who have disabilities, and there are decent, ordinary people who have disabilities. Our lives are not all fit for INSP network dramas. We can do anything we want. We should never be counted out because we don't look like we're physically capable, and if we do something wrong, we should get the same punishment as anyone else.Rose B. Fischerhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/13349494083118193417noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5256209623174295254.post-54766255366294975632013-07-08T08:01:00.000-07:002013-07-08T08:01:08.249-07:00100 Things I Learned From Writing Fanfiction: #11: There Are Big Old Jerks Out ThereEdit: Somehow had this scheduled to post next month instead of last week. I guess I don't have to write anything new yet! :P<br />
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As a counterpoint to my last post about <a href="http://fandombouquet.blogspot.com/2013/06/100-things-ive-learned-by-writing.html">awesome people</a>, I feel I should point out there are also a lot of jerks out there. I don't know whether it's because the internet gives people the illusion of anonymity or if it's just that there are jerks everywhere, but you will meet them.<br />
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I won't name anyone this time because I don't want the post to be about who did what to whom and when. Anyone who gets involved in a fandom will meet up with jerks. Sometimes they're forum moderators who're on a power trip. Sometimes they're just dumb people who are so rabidly involved in their fandom or their particular sub-group of fans that they forget how to respectfully disagree. Sometimes they're just idiots who think that hobby related activity (especially online) means you get to suspend the rules of common courtesy and etiquette.<br />
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I don't like Joss Whedon's body of work. I know, jaws have hit the floor all over the internet now. I have nothing against the man; I just <i>don't like </i>most of his stuff. The only exception is the movie Titan AE. I don't like the new Battlestar Galactica either--although I did at first. I've been personally attacked by members of those fandoms because I said I didn't like the shows. (I have plenty of friends who're into Buffy or Firefly or BSG, so I'm <i>not </i>singling out those fandoms. I'm just talking about my experiences.)<br />
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I've also met people who seemed to have no interest in reading (or watching) my work except to leave nasty comments. (Which is entirely different than leaving constructive negative feedback) Most of those are anonymous but not all.<br />
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The most hurtful experiences I've had in fandom have been with people I considered friends. I've had people suddenly turn on me for something I wrote in a story or said in a fan community that they didn't like. There have been people who "got bored" or left a fandom for some other reason and seem to have decided that my friendship wasn't important anymore.<br />
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What I've learned is that you need a thick skin to be involved in fandom, and an even thicker one if you plan to create fanfiction or fanart of any kind. It's great fun, and <i>most </i>of the people you'll encounter are wonderful, but you have to be prepared for the occasional jerks. Try not to take their actions personally, and try to avoid engaging an argument wherever you can.Rose B. Fischerhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/13349494083118193417noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5256209623174295254.post-42759550235836011092013-07-01T06:04:00.000-07:002013-07-01T06:04:10.184-07:00Kindle Worlds Announces Licensed FanfictionA few days ago, Amazon announced <a href="http://www.amazon.com/gp/feature.html/ref=amb_link_378663902_1?ie=UTF8&docId=1001197421&pf_rd_m=ATVPDKIKX0DER&pf_rd_s=merchandised-search-leftnav&pf_rd_r=D0BA0C5C46AE4234BAEF&pf_rd_t=101&pf_rd_p=1575866342&pf_rd_i=6118587011">Kindle Worlds</a>, a publishing platform for fanfiction authors. The way it seems to work is that Amazon acquires licenses from the franchise owners and then gets a portion of profits for each sale. There are only a handful of franchises on board for this, but Amazon promises more to come.<br />
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I have mixed feelings about it. On the one hand, Kindle Worlds has the potential to prove something I've been saying for years: that fanfiction is not just the province of people who lack the creativity to write their own stories, and it<i> </i>has <i>positive </i>effects on media franchises which allow it rather than the commonly held misconception that it somehow equates with "stealing" an author's work and the profits to which the author is entitled. (Whoo, long sentence.) On the other other hand, Kindle Worlds raises the question of what exactly constitutes fanfiction. I think fanfiction is something that fans have always done out of love and enjoyment. If it becomes about profit and marketing, does it cease to be fanfiction and become a hybrid--some kind of free marketing tool for already bloated media franchises? I'm not sure. <br />
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I am going to keep an eye on this. I don't know if Amazon will be able to get enough franchises on board with this, but I admit--I would at least try it out if they had a license for anything I already enjoy. Tell me what you think.Rose B. Fischerhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/13349494083118193417noreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5256209623174295254.post-767036429996058132013-06-23T15:22:00.002-07:002013-06-23T15:22:18.501-07:00100 Things I've Learned By Writing Fanfiction #10: There Are Awesome People Out ThereThis post was the very first idea I came up in the 100 Things Fanfiction series. It's probably going to consist of a bunch of shout-outs to my friends, but that's okay. My friends are the awesome people who inspired it.<br /><br />Writing fanfiction (and generally being involved in fandom) has allowed me to meet several people that I count among my closet friends. Some of them write fanfic, some don't. Usually, we've struck up friendships when they started commenting on one of my stories, although I think a couple of them were on a message board with me about 8 years ago.<br />
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<a href="http://aruna7.keyofx.org/">Aruna7 </a>and I met when I commented on one of her SG-1 fanvids (which I would link to but I don't think is online anymore. Little did I know that one innocent comment would lead to multiple ongoing collaborations and a friendship that (I hope) will be lifelong.<br />
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<a href="http://lhinneill.livejournal.com/">Lhinneill</a>, <a href="http://cha_aka.livejournal.com/">Cha_aka</a>, and I have roleplayed together, read and helped one another with our stories, and generally shared our lives for almost as long as I can remember. They're the first people I share anything I write with (except for One Path.) and the first people I think of when I'm stuck in a story.<br />
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<a href="http://polgarawolf.livejournal.com/">Polgarawolf </a>and I met through her comments on One Path, and since then we've probably exchanged enough commentary on <i>Dune, Star Wars, </i>and various other franchises to fill multiple books of analysis and criticism. She's been my sounding board through a lot of story-related problems, and my fridge is full of snarky magnets she's sent me as gifts.<br />
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There are other people I've gotten to know on a more limited basis through my fic writing, but who's input and insightful comments on my stories have been invaluable to me. <a href="http://teddibear.livejournal.com/">Teddibear</a>, <a href="http://nrgbunny.livejournal.com/">Nrgbunny</a> and <a href="http://www.fanfiction.net/u/1092927/phantom-jedi1">Phantom-Jedi1</a> all stuck with me through epic-length stories, caught mistakes that even my betas missed, and inspired me to keep going when I might have given up. I can't mention everyone; the post would start to read like one of those genealogy lists from the book of Genesis.<br />
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What I've learned is that fan art means more when you can share it with others. Doing so will lead you to meet and make friends with people you might otherwise have never met.<br />
<br />Rose B. Fischerhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/13349494083118193417noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5256209623174295254.post-32606764404855394502013-06-13T15:16:00.000-07:002013-06-13T15:20:31.109-07:00100 Things I Learned By Writing Fanfiction #9: Finish Your Damn Story Before You Put It On The InternetSuppose you are reading book. You're about a third of the way in, just when it's getting good. Suddenly, you turn the page, and there's nothing. Just a blank white space. You turn the page again and see something like this:<br />
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<b>Sorry, I got stuck. I'm not interested in these characters anymore, so I gave up and moved on to something else.</b><br />
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You keep flipping, hoping that it's a bad joke, but it isn't. All the other pages are blank.<br />
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How mad would you be at that author?<br />
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Why should your fanfic readers be less mad at you for abandoning your unfinished story?<br />
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Now suppose you pick up another book, get about halfway through, and you see another note. This one says:<br />
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<b>I realized I made a mistake. I'm starting over from chapter 4. Here's what's different.</b><br />
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How confused would you be? How likely would you be to actually finish the book instead of just putting it down?<br />
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Do you think your fanfiction readers would be less confused?<br />
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Generally, I post my fanfics a chapter or two at a time as I write them, and I often write out of order, so that I have chunks of material from different time periods that need to be connected to one another. I'm the<i> last person </i>to tell you that you should complete a whole manuscript before you post anything.<br />
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So then what exactly do I mean when I say "finish your story before you put it on the internet?"<br />
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<a name='more'></a>Everybody's writing process is different. Some people write detailed outlines. Some people use notecards. Some people just sit down and write and see what happens. Whatever method you use, there has to be a point where you decide whether the story is going to work and whether it's worth the effort of finishing.<br />
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If you're going to post a story to the internet, you should have <i>enough </i>finished that you know where the story is going. Know the major points, including the ending, and have at least a rough idea of how you're going to get there. There's no way to work out all the kinks. Stories change as they're written. Things happen along the way. If you're not sure where the story is going or you have any doubts that you can finish it, then hold off on posting it online. <br />
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As I've alluded to before, one of the biggest differences between publishing fanfiction and publishing original stories is the relationship between the author and the audience. Fanfic authors get to interact with their readers directly, sometimes for months or years and even develop friendships with them. Everyone involved in a fandom is there for fun, to share their appreciation and love for a franchise with other fans. Some fic writers seem to think those things give them an "out" when it comes to leaving stories unfinished. After all, no money is being made; fanfiction is supposed to be for fun, and "real" authors don't have instantaneous feedback from their audience. So, what's the big deal about abandoning a story, right?<br />
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I think the opposite is true. When you're doing something for pure love of doing it and you've built up an audience who's interested in your story, you're also promising your audience that you care enough to finish what you start, no matter how long it takes. In addition, your promising your audience that you know what story you're trying to tell. That means you've put in enough pre-writing to work out the biggest goofs and potential problems.<br />
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I value audience feedback from chapter to chapter. It doesn't necessarily change what I write, but it helps me make sure the story is still on track, and it's a motivator for the times when I get stuck or feel like I just don't want to continue. So I choose to post as I write.<br />
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In order to make that work, I have some personal rules:<br />
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1. If I post something online, I am committed to finishing it. <br />
2. Once I post something, there is no "going back" or taking it out.<br />
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That means I only post after I've done my "homework" and outlined everything as much as I reasonably can, and if something needs to be changed as I go, the changes should happen in material I <i>haven't </i>posted yet, not in re-writes or edits of material that's already online.<br />
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It's not a perfect system. Sometimes it means I spend a long time between updates and readers get cranky. (Sorry, you guys.) Sometimes--especially with longer stories--it means I read something later and say "I wish I'd done that differently." This is where the "fanfiction is for fun" argument is actually valid. I am a perfectionist. I try to write everything to the best of my ability and I <i>hate </i>making mistakes. Several years ago, I realized that if fanfiction was going to stay a part of my life, I had to find a way to write it without being impossibly hard on myself.<br />
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That said, I am <i>still </i>learning the "finish your stuff" lesson. I took a long break (about two years) from fandom activities because I needed to get my migraines under control. I came back to several unfinished stories that I can't figure out what to do with.<br />
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My perspective on them has changed, my collaborators/resource people have moved on with their lives, and for one of them I can't find any notes. Those stories are what inspired this post, because I owe it to myself and my readers to finish what I started. <br />
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I'm not suggesting that you follow my rules. What I am suggesting is that you find some that work for you and stick with them, because nobody wants to read an unfinished story.<br />
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<a href="http://fandombouquet.blogspot.com/2012/05/100-things-ive-learned-by-writing.html">Masterlist</a>|<a href="http://fandombouquet.blogspot.com/2012/08/100-things-i-learned-by-writing.html">Index</a>Rose B. Fischerhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/13349494083118193417noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5256209623174295254.post-85852671297627551482013-06-10T14:21:00.002-07:002013-06-23T17:34:39.188-07:00100 Things I Learned by Writing Fanfiction # 8: Somebody Will Always Know More Than YouAruna7 knows more about Star Wars than I do. She probably knows more about Star Wars than any other person I've met, and she may know more about Star Wars than George Lucas on any given day. When I first started writing Star Wars fanfiction, I was uncomfortable because I wasn't as well-versed in the GFFA as I would have liked. I did as much research as I conceivably could, and then I started writing, relying on my friend to help me fill in details and check my characterization.<br />
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There are other fandoms where I feel (or have felt) more confident. Stargate SG-1 is a good example. (I know, I keep coming back to those two fandoms, but that's because I've spent most of my fanfic writing time in them.) I'm sad to say I've forgotten a lot of my detailed knowledge of the canon now. It's been about five years since I stopped writing SG-1 regularly, and my memory is fuzzy.<br />
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Even before that though, there were people in the SG-1 fandom who knew things I didn't. It was great to have them around, but sometimes it presented challenges. Fans get nitpicky. Star Trek fans are known for being especially bad about this. People can be rude, and you will find individuals who have nothing better to do than knock your story because you forgot a detail or made a choice they didn't like. They forget the time when they were new to the franchise and didn't know things either. Sometimes I ran into people who <i>thought </i>they knew something and knocked my story unfairly.<br />
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So, what I've learned is to do my homework until I'm comfortable, then just go for it. You'll never really know "enough" about a franchise--and you'll probably forget things anyway. You'll continue to learn more as you go. Fanfiction should be a labor of love, not a trivia contest. If you let yourself be intimidated or put off by what you don't know, you'll cheat yourself and anyone who might have enjoyed your story anyway.Rose B. Fischerhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/13349494083118193417noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5256209623174295254.post-57662019810492253942013-06-10T13:14:00.003-07:002013-06-10T13:14:51.936-07:00Fic Rec: SleepwalkerIt's been several years since I've read a really good fanfiction in any fandom. I found one this weekend and I was both relieved and excited because I was starting to feel alone as someone who enjoys well-thought out, character centered stories that <i>feel </i>like the world in the source material and keep the characters true to the way the franchise portrays them. <br />
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Alphalover has clearly put a lot of time, effort, and love into her Masters of the Universe story <a href="http://www.fanfiction.net/s/7129615/1/Sleepwalker">Sleepwalker</a>. I'm enjoying it greatly, so if you're an 80s child who loved He-Man and She-Ra, check it out and tell me what you think.Rose B. Fischerhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/13349494083118193417noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5256209623174295254.post-79310029071523573462013-06-10T07:48:00.000-07:002013-06-10T13:18:37.963-07:00100 Things I Learned By Writing Fanfiction #7-Nobody Knows EverythingI know a lot about <i>Stargate: SG-1</i>. It's my favorite television show ever. Even so, it took me a long time to feel like I was capable of writing fanfiction for SG-1. I didn't feel like I had enough of the characters' life stories or understood enough about the Goa'uld or 'gate technology. If you don't watch Stargate and have no idea what I'm referring to, then substitute details from your own favorite franchise.<br />
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Can you write in the characters' voices and <i>hear </i>them the way they sound on the screen?<br />
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Can you remember details of their lives or the things they've said about "how stuff works?"<br />
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No?<br />
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Well, neither can I--at least not perfectly. Neither can a TV's show's writers or the script writers for sequels. (Look at the Highlander film franchise and its huge continuity problems for an a movie-related example.)<br />
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I first got involved in the Stargate fandom around 2005. I met people who were <i>way </i>more knowledgeable about the show than I was, and when I started thinking about writing fanfiction, I asked a lot of questions. I was probably annoying. That's okay, because it made my stories better.<br />
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There were times, though, when I found that nobody <i>knew </i>what the answer was--or there were so many different answers circulating the fandom that I might as well just pick the one I liked best or make up my own and run with it. <br />
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You'll eventually get flack for that. Somebody will come along and leave a review to tell you what you got wrong. It may even be someone you know--someone you normally go to when you have questions. That's one of the things that makes transformative writing different from most other kinds. The audience gets to interact with the source material <i>and </i>with the new stories that are being created around it. <br />
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So am I saying that fanfic authors should just make up whatever they feel like? Not at all, but here's what I've learned from all the questions I asked:<br />
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Sometimes the answers you need just aren't available in canon. If nobody seems to know for sure, pick something, make up as much detail as you need to, and go with it. Just make sure that what you decide on is plausible, and stick with it. Also, don't obsess too much about the things you don't know. Fill in as much detail as you need to and leave the rest alone. In most cases, nobody else knows either, and fanfiction is supposed to be fun.<br />
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<a href="http://fandombouquet.blogspot.com/2012/08/100-things-i-learned-by-writing.html">Index</a>| <a href="http://fandombouquet.blogspot.com/2012/05/100-things-ive-learned-by-writing.html">Masterlist</a>Rose B. Fischerhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/13349494083118193417noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5256209623174295254.post-66501481229967698792013-06-03T18:44:00.000-07:002013-06-10T17:24:01.257-07:00100 Things I Learned By Writing Fanfic #6: Give Me The BackgroundI just want to start out by saying that the "me" in the title is "me, the reader of your story." I'm using myself as an example because I've been reading fanfiction for a long time, and there are some things that will consistently turn me off.<br />
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One of the biggest objections I hear about fanfiction is that fanfic authors ought to just make up their own stories. In some cases, I agree. I have a post planned in this series called [When It's Better As Original Fiction]. It's about a story of mine that started as fanfiction and, over time, became so divergent from its source material that I decided to make it an original novel instead. In most cases, I think the problem is that authors need to give their audience a familiar place to start, and then take the audience <i>along</i> with the characters as they experience events that change them. I see a lot of fic where the author just<i> announces </i>in the description or the author's notes that HUGE changes have occurred in the background or that the canon characters are somehow different-- "OOC"-- with no explanation as to what changed everything around.<br />
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You may think that's "innovative" and "different." You'll probably find an audience who likes what you're doing too. You'll absolutely lose me though. There are some things (like one or two specific events) that you can just <i>say </i>are different and go forward, but if you've made drastic changes to a lot of things and people are behaving in weird, unusual ways, I'll feel cheated and stop reading. Here's why.<br />
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When I go in search of fanfiction, what I'm looking for is a new story about a familiar place and familiar people. I want to feel like I'm <i>in that universe </i>again, interacting with the characters and settings that I've come to love.<br />
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So, you think it would be cool to cross Star Wars with Stargate: SG-1. So do I. So, you think the relationship between Pad<span style="font-family: inherit;">m</span><span style="line-height: 115%;"><span style="font-family: inherit;">é</span></span> Amidala and Anakin Skywalker is unhealthy and implausible. So do I. That doesn't mean I can just click on an established relationship story about Padm<span style="line-height: 18.399999618530273px;">é</span> and another character and find it believable because the author declares it to be. Nor can I click on poorly conceived crossover story and accept that two franchises with vastly different settings, written to exist in different time periods, with characters who can't possibly know each other, have come into contact by some vague accident involving the Stargate or Force-related time travel, and <i>believe</i> what I'm reading.<br />
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In the SG-1 crossover example, the problem is physics. <i>A long time ago in a galaxy far, far away</i> means just what it says. It's not enough for me to read a note at the top of the story and see that a 'gate accident sent so-and-so hurtling through time and space to wind up in the middle of the GFFA. I need to see the 'gate accident. I need to know something about what was being done to the 'gate that could have caused a malfunction on that magnitude. I'm not a physicist. I know very little about any branch of science that could contribute to the existence of a controlled artificial wormhole. I <i>do </i>know what the established canon of the Stargate franchise says about the way the 'gates function and the limitations they have.<br />
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In the second example about Star Wars, I know who
Pad<span style="font-family: inherit;">m</span><span style="line-height: 18px;">é</span> is. I've seen her develop as a person through three films. I think she makes some horrible choices in those films, but if those choices are going to be different in your story, I need to know why. The choices that characters make change who they are. The choices they make are also <i>changed</i> by who they are and changed by the events around them. <br />
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In both examples, the storylines encompassed by the franchises I'm reading about are going to change. The plots, the responses and developments of other characters, the outcomes, are going to be different in some way. The nature of fanfiction makes it transformative. When we write in another person's world, we are going to change things. All fanfiction is to some degree an "alternate universe" or "alternate reality," even if the author is expressly writing in canon events and with canon pairings. Otherwise it's just a novelization.<br />
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Fanfiction is also affected by the subjective nature of art. My interpretation of
Pad<span style="font-family: inherit;">m</span><span style="line-height: 18px;">é</span> Amidala may be vastly different from someone else's. My "explanations" and "insights" into her behaviors in the film saga are my opinions. My reasoning for the way in which certain events might have occurred differently (or for how certain events might have occurred "off screen") are not necessarily going to be apparent my audience.<br />
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I learned this the hard way when I wrote a story called <i>Taking The Long Way. </i>In it, I didn't do a good job of explaining an important aspect of the plot that made perfect sense in my head. I thought it would be "common sense," but there were multiple readers who commented to either ask me about it or to assume I had goofed. My mistake weakened the effectiveness of the story for my readers. (<a href="http://fandombouquet.blogspot.com/2013/05/100-things-i-learned-by-writing.html#more">Leave It Online</a> talks some about why I let the story stand even though I knew I could take it down and try to fix it.)<br />
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Fan culture is centered around the concept of mutual enjoyment of a franchise. Sometimes I write fanfiction because I just want to write it for myself, but most of the time my fanfiction is meant to be shared with others. An effective piece of fanfiction is one that allows the audience to return to a place they've been before, interact with old friends, and maybe take a new journey with them.<br />
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I've written fanfiction for more than 20 years. I've been involved in a number of fandoms, and I've "lurked" in more of them than I can even count. I haven't met anyone over the age of 14 who has recommended to me or listed in their favorites a story that essentially takes the characters and settings, mangles them beyond recognition, and leaves all the names, events, and recognizable objects the same. It's fine to change things around, but please start the story at a point before everything changes. <br />
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<i>Why don't I just write my own story?</i><br />
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Well, I do. And I <i>would </i>if my only reason for writing the story was that I thought it would be cool to mix 'gate technology and dualistic mysticism or something. I wouldn't use lightsabers or Obi-Wan Kenobi or Jack O'Neill if I did that. I wouldn't rip my plot straight out of someone else's show or movie, either.<br />
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On the other hand, if I had some <i>reason </i>that I thought Obi-Wan Kenobi and Jack O'Neill would benefit from meeting each other, and I had an interesting story about what happened when they met, I might try it. The deciding factor would be whether I could tell that story in such a way that it still "felt" like Star Wars and like Stargate at the same time. If I could, it would be a pretty darn awesome story. If I couldn't, I would be disappointing myself and anyone else who came looking to read about O'Neill and Kenobi.<br />
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I have a lot of plot bunnies that never get past the "wouldn't it be cool" stage. The ones that do are the ones that resonate with me as both a fan and an author. Take Pad<span style="font-family: inherit;">m</span><span style="line-height: 18px;">é as an example. I <i>care </i>about </span>her as a character.<span style="line-height: 18px;"> I want her to make healthier decisions. I am also a Star Wars fan. I can't tell a story about </span>Pad<span style="font-family: inherit;">m</span><span style="line-height: 18px;">é at the expense of the elements that mean the most to me as a fan of Star Wars. The spirit of the story has to be true to the franchise. The background of my story--which includes everything from the characters' pasts to the scientific, procedural, or magical rules that govern the franchise--has to be plausible within the established canon. If I want something to change, I have to be able to trace that change for my audience.</span><br />
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<span style="line-height: 18px;">That's what I mean when I say "give me the background." There are some things in fanfiction that you don't need to explain. There are some things in ANY story that you can leave to the imagination of the audience. Character development, relationship development, and anything that bends or changes the underlying rules of the franchise don't belong "off screen."</span><br />
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<span style="line-height: 18px;">It's great that you have a vision in your mind of what it would look like to put Jack O'Neill and Obi-Wan in the same story (or Harry Potter and Dean Winchester or the Tenth Doctor or whoever.) As a reader, I need to understand how the characters GET to where you want them to be, and I need to <i>see </i>it happen in order to understand who your characters are going to become. </span><br />
<span style="line-height: 18px;"><br /></span><span style="line-height: 18px;">It's a lot of work to write fanfiction that way, and that's why I don't pick up every idea. I get about four chapters into most of the "AU" or crossover stories that I try to read because I don't feel like I understand what's changing and I don't feel like I'm connecting with the characters. </span><br />
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<span style="line-height: 18px;">I expect that some people are going to read this post and think, "Why would you put that much work into writing someone else's world or characters?" The only answer I can give is that if a fanfiction idea gets that far out of the "wouldn't it be cool" stage, it's because there is something I love so much about the place and it's characters that if I <i>don't </i>tell the story, I'm going to feel cheated, and I'm going to feel like I cheated the other fans who would've liked to read it.</span><br />
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<span style="line-height: 18px;">Fanfiction is a fantastic way to express your enjoyment of a franchise and to share that with like-minded people that you might otherwise never get to know. It's a great way to explore possibilities and develop your talents as an author. Just don't forget to tell the whole story. Start at the beginning, with the important change in your characters' lives, and go forward from there. It may take longer, but it will be a better journey for everyone involved.</span><br />
<span style="line-height: 18px;"><br /></span><span style="line-height: 18px;"><a href="http://fandombouquet.blogspot.com/2012/05/100-things-ive-learned-by-writing.html" style="line-height: normal;">Masterlist</a><span style="line-height: normal;"> </span><span style="line-height: normal;">| </span><a href="http://fandombouquet.blogspot.com/2012/08/100-things-i-learned-by-writing.html" style="line-height: normal;">Index</a></span>Rose B. Fischerhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/13349494083118193417noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5256209623174295254.post-84342928760451691142013-05-27T18:46:00.000-07:002013-05-27T18:46:00.034-07:00100 Things I Learned By Writing Fanfiction # 5: You Will Lose ThingsI just came across a comment that someone left me <a href="http://fandombouquet.blogspot.com/2010/07/beauty-and-beast-fandom-listing.html#comment-form"> here</a> about a story that she had written and lost. I wish I could help, because I know this pain well, and there's nothing less satisfying than trying to reproduce something you wrote that you don't have anymore. It seldom works. If you manage to get something worthwhile, you're lucky. You'll probably still feel a hollowness in your gut because it's not <i>really </i>what you want your readers to see. It's just the best you can do the second time around.<br />
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I have a confession to make. I'm cheating. I got the idea for this post because I saw Auctavia's comment right after I realized that the original post I'd written for this week was gone. That one, entitled <i>Finish Your Damn Story Before You Put It On The Internet</i> will be posted as soon as I can re-write it (and get it to be as awesome as it was before...almost.)<br />
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I do have fanfiction-related experience with the topic, though. I have two epic length Knight Rider fanfictions that have never been posted. One is called <i>A Knight To Remember, </i>and it was a crossover with Lynda Carter's Wonder Woman. (I know what you're thinking. Just reserve your judgment about the plausibility of that crossover for now. I'll be dealing with implausible crossovers and how to avoid them next week.) I did several months of research for that story, because the plot involved several tie-ins to the World War II era through Devon Miles. I read scripts for both shows, did historical research, and looked at old uniforms. I put a lot of work into that story before I even decided to write it. <br />
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The other story changed titles frequently, but I always thought of it as <i>Temporal Knights</i>. I think that was a TV show, so I didn't use the title. <i>Not-Temporal Knights</i> was a speculative piece about a character accidentally being moved through time in such a way that Stevie Mason (Knight) didn't die. The character then ended up back in her "present" and found a whole different world. I'm surprised that I got very far with that one, because I typically don't like time travel, but the question that I wanted to raise in that story was "Which 'reality' is the one that deserves preservation?" So many times on TV shows, I see a character accidentally alter the past and then spend the rest of the episode trying to rectify things, and I wanted to do something different.<br />
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I had about a hundred pages of <i>Not-Temporal Knights</i>. I had maybe forty pages of prose for <i>A Knight To Remember</i>, plus all the research and plot notes. My computer died. I remember enough that the stories will never really leave me, but not enough to re-construct the plots and make them convincing.<br />
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Now, I'm not going to advise anyone to make multiple back-ups of a story. If you care about what you're writing, you'll do that anyway. What I'm going to tell you is that you <i>will</i> lose things anyway. I had CD backups, floppy disk backups (because this was back in the dinosaur age before there was such a thing as thumb drive), hard copies, and I had sent the stories to a friend who kept them on a school server for me. I lost them anyway. It happens. And it sucks.<br />
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It's part of writing. There's no way around it. You might be able to re-create what you wrote before, but my advice is to just start over. If you've got the characters and enough of an idea to work with, take them, start the story from scratch, and come up with something different. Don't try to make it into the thing you've lost. It's gone. This another lesson in letting go of our stories and our egos. If you don't have enough to work with, or you just can't get the story to come back together, know that you're not alone. In my experience, when that happens, the story just sinks back into the author's subconscious. It'll come out again, some time when you're not even looking for it. It'll probably be in bits and pieces: a character here, a set of thematic elements there, a plot sequence that suddenly gels together in a completely different work. It may even take you a while to recognize the bits of your old story for what they are, but eventually, you'll catch them winking at you from inside something else. Don't watch for it, though. The more you watch, the less your subconscious will do. <br />
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With all that said, though, I would like to close by asking readers to take a look at the comment I linked at the top of the post. If anyone can help Auctavia, I'd greatly appreciate it.<br />
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<a href="http://fandombouquet.blogspot.com/2012/05/100-things-ive-learned-by-writing.html">Masterlist</a> | <a href="http://fandombouquet.blogspot.com/2012/08/100-things-i-learned-by-writing.html">Index</a>Rose B. Fischerhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/13349494083118193417noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5256209623174295254.post-10480774187693111742013-05-20T06:09:00.000-07:002013-05-20T06:09:00.156-07:00Confession # 8: I Used To Be Terrified of Darth VaderSo, I don't like Anakin. I love Darth Vader. And I used to be terrified of Darth Vader <i>all at the same time? </i>Yes. Well, technically no, I suppose. I didn't know anything about Anakin for most of my life. I already loved and was terrified by Darth Vader long before the Prequels came out. Never let it be said that I am an uncomplicated woman.<br />
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I had a recurring nightmare about Vader for years. It began in my early childhood, after I saw Star Wars, and it continued well into my adult life. In the dream, Luke and Leia had been captured and were being held on a spaceship. I think it was supposed to be Vader's flagship, <i>Executor, </i>but I'm not sure since <i>Executor </i>appeared in <i>The Empire Strikes Back, </i>and the ship in my dream looked more like <i>Tantive IV</i>, the one where Leia was boarded and captured in the original film.<br />
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Anyway, I snuck on board the ship and was trying to rescue the twins, but Vader knew I was there and found me. The bulk of the dream consisted of me running through the white hallways with Vader chasing me. Eventually he would draw his lightsaber and close in. There were sometimes more details, depending on whether or not I made it to the twins. If I did, there were some lines of dialogue, but only Vader did the talking, and the only other sounds in the whole dream were his breather (getting closer) and the <i>snap-hiss </i>of his lightsaber.<br />
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I didn't stop having that dream until around 2008, when I was deep in the heart of a Vader related project with <a href="http://aruna7.keyofx.org/">Aruna7.</a><br />
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<br />Rose B. Fischerhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/13349494083118193417noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5256209623174295254.post-46976466987700235252013-05-13T10:00:00.002-07:002013-05-13T10:00:41.094-07:00Short Personal UpdateI've re-injured my arm. It's doing all right, but I've gone back several steps in terms of my ability to type. The 8 Confessions series is finished--I wrote up the last one a couple of weeks ago. I've got a few posts in the 100 Things I Learned From Writing Fanfiction series and some informative/tutorial content on my other blog that I've been working on here and there. I'll get those up in the coming weeks. After that, it will depend on how my arm is doing. Let's hope it's not another 4 month ordeal.Rose B. Fischerhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/13349494083118193417noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5256209623174295254.post-59070899675314766082013-05-13T05:32:00.000-07:002013-05-13T05:32:00.862-07:00Confession #7-I Love Darth VaderEarlier in this series, I wrote at length about how much I dislike Anakin Skywalker. It should follow then that I hate Darth Vader, but I don't. I was afraid of him for a long time (I'll talk more about that next week) and I always thought he was horrible to Princess Leia, but he intrigued me. His dialogue with Obi-Wan in <i>A New Hope </i>showed me someone who was, for all his apparent strength, still trying to prove that he was better than his old teacher. His interactions with Luke showed me someone who was capable of acting with honor--in a bizarre, twisted way. So, I came to like Darth Vader a whole lot by the time he died. I just wish that Anakin Skywalker had lived up to Vader's potential. <br />
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I learned to love him a whole lot more by writing about him. I'll (hopefully) be talking about that again when I return to my <a href="http://fandombouquet.blogspot.com/2012/08/100-things-i-learned-by-writing.html">100 Things I Learned From Writing Fanfiction</a> later this year. Granted, the things I wrote about in my fanfiction were based on my own inferences and observations, so, maybe I love my own ideas of Vader's character a little more than the person we see on the screen but I'd like to think that I learned a little something about the Dark Lord from all the time I spent exploring that character.Rose B. Fischerhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/13349494083118193417noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5256209623174295254.post-16795951915464450432013-05-06T18:21:00.000-07:002013-05-06T18:21:00.394-07:00Confession # 6-I Wanted to Marry Lando CalrissianThis is going to be a short post in comparison to most of the others in the series. There really isn't a deep confession here. Remember that I was a little girl when I first watched Star Wars.<br />
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I think I shipped Han and Leia before I knew what "shipping" a couple meant. The term most likely hadn't been invented yet. Either way, I knew that Han and Leia were going to get married someday. I never liked Luke, so even though I thought it would be awesome to be Princess Leia's sister, there was no way I could marry <i>him. </i><br />
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Somehow, it occurred to me that I could marry Lando. Lando was pretty awesome. He was charming, funny, a little bit dangerous and prone to getting into trouble. He probably needed to have a wife to keep him in line. If I married him, I could have all kinds of adventures, and I'd probably get to hang out with Han and Leia all the time! So, there you have it.<br />
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...I feel the need to mention that I also wanted to marry Michael Knight, Danny Williams from the original Hawaii 5-0 and James T. Kirk. I guess I was going to be a polygamist.Rose B. Fischerhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/13349494083118193417noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5256209623174295254.post-63047663270786707232013-04-29T09:51:00.000-07:002013-04-29T11:19:39.390-07:00Confession # 5 I despise the Anakin/Padmé relationship, but I once shipped it.My first exposure to Star Wars was as a young kid watching the Original Trilogy. By the time I saw <i>Return of the Jedi</i>, I had my own ideas about Anakin Skywalker and his then nameless wife. I'm sure that I'm not the only one.<br />
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I knew something horrible must have happened to Anakin, but I was under the impression that his marriage was a public event and that his wife was someone Obi-Wan took care of for some time after Anakin fell to the Dark Side. On top of that, I just don't <i>like </i>unbalanced relationships, and I think "secret romance" is just about the cheapest plot device going.<br />
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So, okay. I admit, I was predisposed to be uneasy with the direction things were heading in <i>Attack of the Clones, </i>but because it was Star Wars, I was prepared to let go of the story in my head and keep an open mind about the one unfolding on the screen<i>.</i><br />
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I like Padmé. A lot. Up until that ridiculous kissing scene in the Lake Country, I thought she was just about the perfect mother for Princess Leia. My problem is not that she decided to take up with Anakin; it's that I never saw her fall for him. I never saw a build up, and there was never any <i>reason </i>for them to be together. Padmé was much more an authority figure or a replacement mother than she ever was a lover to Anakin. So, when she abruptly decided that she wasn't going to resist his advances <i>at all</i>, I went "...What? Couldn't you say 'no' to him once?"<br />
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Maybe there just wasn't enough screen time for that. Maybe we're supposed to believe that the Force drew the two of them together so powerfully that she couldn't muster the will to act with honor. Maybe she was just too tired of having to be a grown-up all the time. I'd believe that one if the film had spent any time talking about her feelings, but it doesn't. So, we have no idea what she was thinking, and we know that Anakin wasn't thinking at all.<br />
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The Lake Country scenes are very lovely, and the actors make a nice looking couple on screen, but there was never a real reason for Anakin and Padmé to be together. That's just not the kind of relationship I want to spend my time watching. I want to see people who know why they are together, who have things in common, who talk and listen to one another as equals. I don't see any of that in the so-called romance presented to us by the Prequel Trilogy. I see an obsessed adolescent and a lonely young woman who grew up too fast and grabbed the first thing that came along. That's probably what I'm supposed to see--but it was a bad choice. <br />
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Now the whole mythology of Star Wars hangs on a relationship that was meaningless to begin with. WHY? Sure, it was going to have a tragic ending. We knew that going in. I think the tragedy would have had a lot more impact if the relationship had meant something. It <i>is </i>possible to write mature, compelling relationships where everything isn't okay and things don't end in sunshine and rainbows. There was <i>war </i>about to begin. There are a half dozen equally tragic but much more satisfying roads the story could have taken.<br />
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So, I watched the wedding scene at the end of AotC with a sick feeling in my stomach, not because the shadow of Darth Vader was already falling, but because I wanted there to be a <i>reason </i>beyond pretty visuals for me to care about the end of this romance. Then I told myself that I'd have to support it anyway, because Star Wars had always been about the twins to me, and we couldn't get the twins without their parents.<br />
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Gradually, I changed my mind and decided that I simply couldn't enjoy anything about the relationship and there was no point in trying to support it. I lost a lot of my ability to enjoy Star Wars after that. Eventually, I met <a href="http://aruna7.keyofx.org/">Aruna7</a> and I think our friendship is a big part of what ultimately renewed my love of Star Wars and gave me a lot of new paths to explore in the fandom--but that's another blog series altogether.<br />
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Next week we'll go with something lighter, and I'll explain why I once wanted to marry Lando Calrissian.Rose B. Fischerhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/13349494083118193417noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5256209623174295254.post-68704683265154690742013-04-22T10:08:00.000-07:002013-04-22T10:08:19.956-07:00Confession #4: I think the Sith were actually less disturbed than the Old Jedi.I think the Sith are terribly misguided. Their philosophy is flawed to a frightening extent, and their actions in the Star Wars franchise run the gamut from reprehensible to horrifying. Emperor Palpatine is clearly sociopathic. So, how can I say that I think they're less disturbed than the Jedi of the Old Republic? I'll point you back to last week's post on the Old Order and let you decide for yourself.<br />
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I see the Sith as the other side of the same coin or the other end of the same Force-using spectrum that the Jedi are on. Both groups take their philosophies on the Force to an unhealthy extreme, (which is why the Force needed to be brought back into balance, but that's another series altogether) and they use opposite but complimentary methods to achieve basically the same level of mystical power through it.<br />
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The Sith pay a huge price for their adherence to the Dark Side. Obsession, greed, and anger slowly rob them of most of the things they value. I always thought it was the Dark Side that turned Emperor Palpatine's face into a squished up peanut butter and jelly sandwich too, but apparently that was Mace Windu's doing.<br />
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We're supposed to think that the Jedi, who take the longer, more difficult path in their study of the Light Side, are rewarded in the end. I will agree that the Jedi are noble and selfless. Those things can be their own reward. I still don't think the Old Order Jedi were so much better off than their Sith counterparts.<br />
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I don't know much about the early history of the Jedi Order. What we have comes from comics, video games, and novels, and there's a great deal of disagreement among fans as to how much of that material can be considered canon. One of the few things in the EU that I like is the older version of the <a href="http://starwars.wikia.com/wiki/Jedi_Code">Jedi Code</a>, because it seems much more balanced in its way of dealing with emotion and its potential to pull someone to the Dark Side. Even though I like it, it doesn't hold the same level of significance to me as what we can see in the films. <br />
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What I know for sure is that Prequel Era Jedi believed that they could (and should) divorce themselves from their own strong emotions. That any emotion they felt had to be acknowledged and then "let go of," no matter what it was going to lead them to the Dark Side. They were not allowed to have families or strong ties to their places of origin. Even strong friendships could be frowned upon by the Jedi Council if someone rubbed them the wrong way. While these Jedi often preached self-control, their doctrine indicated extreme self-denial, compartmentalization of emotions, and poor self-concepts that contributed strongly to the creation of Darth Tyranus and Darth Vader. The Sith are not in any way healthy, but at least the Sith recognize that emotion is not the enemy.<br />
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The Jedi were not bad people. They did a lot of good in the Old Republic, and I have a great deal of respect for certain individual Jedi Knights. I can't think of a single Sith Lord that I can say the same thing about. If I had to choose which philosophy was healthier, though, I would choose the Sith Code over the Jedi code any day.<br />
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There's not a very wide margin of difference to me between the Prequel era Jedi Order and the Sith in terms extremist views or emotional health. The Jedi simply had a brand of extremism that was socially accepted. They didn't go around killing and maiming innocent people, and they weren't bent on ruling the galaxy. They just sat quietly in their temple becoming less and less connected to the galaxy. The Sith called a lot more attention to their psychological problems. <br />
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And since I'm on the subject of emotional disturbance and calling attention to one's psychological problems, I'd like to invite you back next week to read my views on the Anakin/Padmé relationship.<br />
<br />Rose B. Fischerhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/13349494083118193417noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5256209623174295254.post-18026911314524363272013-04-18T11:50:00.000-07:002013-04-18T11:50:27.786-07:00The Birth of Rose B. Fischer<br />
Okay, this is kind of a personal post. I'm placing it on both of my blogs and any other place I spend time on the internet.<br />
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<a name='more'></a>I've thought about writing this for a while now, but I wasn't sure how much to say or if it was even necessary. I decided to do it because I've already gotten some questions from people who know me from Livejournal or other websites. (Or even my own family members.)<br />
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I am a survivor of domestic violence. I spend a considerable amount of time doing things online. I chose the name "Rose B. Fischer" as a pseudonym several years ago because it's become very easy to track people on the internet, and I didn't want to use a name that my ex-husband might stumble on one day and recognize. The name Rose has significance in my family, and so do the other initials, but not in a way that my ex husband was ever aware of. I'm proud to blog under it and plan to publish books under it eventually.<br />
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I rarely ever post identifying information or details about my personal life online, but there are some folks who know me by nicknames that don't sound <i>anything </i>like Rose. I don't want to misrepresent myself or appear duplicitous in any way. This is also why you will not see photographs of me associated with the blogs or any social media sites you may be on. If you want to know anything else about this, you can email me or send me a private message.<br />
Rose B. Fischerhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/13349494083118193417noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5256209623174295254.post-31672431401432432372013-04-15T09:09:00.000-07:002013-04-15T16:00:10.738-07:00Confession # 3: I think the Old Jedi Order was run by emotionally disturbed morons.<br />
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I know there are a lot of fans out there who think the Jedi are awesome. You know, they run around in robes and wave big shiny swords with blades made of light. They have cool mental powers, and they make a <i>lot </i>of mystic-sounding noise<i> </i>about peace, balance, and trusting their feelings.<br />
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A closer look at the Old Order Jedi we've seen in the Star Wars films shows a group of people who don't <i>know </i>anything about their own feelings beyond a vague kind of intuition that they get when the Force tugs them in one direction or another. These people live very long lives, and anything we know about their backgrounds indicates that they've spent a great deal of that time involved in social or military conflicts. So they know very little about external peace, but are expected to maintain a constant sense of inner peace. The dichotomy leaves most of them pretty unbalanced and badly equipped to have relationships of any kind.<br />
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On paper, the tenets of the Old Jedi Order look great.<br />
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<li>Respect all life, no matter what form it takes.</li>
<li>Avoid aggressive behavior and don't act in anger.</li>
<li>Use your special powers responsibly and not for your own gain.</li>
<li>Practice self control and don't be ruled by your feelings or desires.</li>
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Somewhere along the way, though, everything got turned around. In the Prequel films, we see a Jedi Order run by beings who think all personal attachments are a bad thing. For most people, ties to home, family, and friends are positive influences and motivators. They're not <i>automatically </i>things that lead to obsession and destructive outbursts. The Jedi were so paranoid about falling to the Dark Side that they let that fear be a controlling factor in any doctrine or policy they adopted.<br />
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I think the attachment rule was more of a plot contrivance than anything else. It's used when screenwriters or EU novelists need it and ignored or written around (even in Prequel Era material) when it's inconvenient. It's impossible to write a story without characters who, in some way or other, form attachments. Each author is pretty much left to decide for him or herself whether those relationships are going to throw up red flags based on the attachment rule. Some older EU novels that were written before the Prequel films have had their backstory elements retconned in an attempt to make them fit the now-established film canon, but usually this ends up convoluted and stupid-sounding too.<br />
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Whether the rule was a plot device or not, if we take it seriously at all, we have to look at what it says about the Jedi who believed in and (at least nominally) enforced it. I understand the idea that extreme and unhealthy attachments often cause serious collateral damage, and I know that the Prequel Era films were intentionally written to deal with this issue, but the Jedi should have been able to differentiate between healthy and unhealthy attachments. Instead of trying to make that differentiation, they made a sweeping policy that almost always plays a strong role in any story dealing with the fall of an Old Order Jedi to the Dark Side. I'd like to know how the Jedi Council--which was supposed to have been made up of the wisest beings in the Order--managed to go so long without making a connection.<br />
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There's a lot more I could say here, but I think I've made the main point. I don't want to turn this into a dissertation. Next week, I'll talk a bit about the Sith Order and why I think they were actually less disturbed than the Jedi.Rose B. Fischerhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/13349494083118193417noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5256209623174295254.post-88410247809551381062013-04-08T09:10:00.000-07:002013-04-08T09:14:11.276-07:00Confession #2-I Don't Like Anakin Skywalker EitherThis one went longer than I planned. I guess that's what happens when I try to write something a paragraph at a time over the course of a week.<br />
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I tried very hard to like Anakin. He had a lot to recommend him. Obi-Wan Kenobi--who is tied with Princess Leia as my favorite Star Wars character--gave him high praise in <i>Star Wars: A New Hope. </i>He tells Luke that Anakin was "the best star fighter pilot in the galaxy, a cunning warrior...and he was a good friend." <br />
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You don't get much better than that in a culture that is so much informed by social and military conflict. (Sure, the Republic stood for over a thousand generations with the Jedi as it's "guardians of peace of justice," but the series isn't called <i>Star Wars </i>because the characters argued about who was going to win on Galactic Idol.) Watching <i>A New Hope </i>for the first time, I read Ben Kenobi as someone who had spent most of his life on a battlefield. Given what the Star Wars franchise now has to say about Obi-Wan's history, I wasn't that far off.<br />
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So, when I sat down to watch <i>The Phantom Menace, </i>I was more than willing to keep an open mind about this boy who grew up to be Darth Vader. I saw a sweet, earnest kid who had a really rough life. The problem was, the movie just about hit me over the head with how darling he was supposed to be, and his assertion that he was going to marry Padmé was just over the top in its creepiness.<br />
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I realize it was <i>supposed to be creepy. </i>Good foreshadowing just doesn't scream "HEY, LOOK! IT'S FORESHADOWING!"<br />
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So, I guess my problem with young Anakin is mostly a problem with the script-writing in <i>The Phantom Menace.</i><br />
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Older Anakin doesn't need the bad writing in the Prequel films to make me dislike him. Like Luke, he's whiny, cocky, and self-absorbed. He has good qualities (loyalty and the earnest desire to do the right thing) but he consistently makes the most <i>asinine </i>decisions possible, and his temper tantrum over the fact that he was put on the Jedi Council but not made a Jedi Master is, to me, far too childish for a person who's supposed to have seen and lived through as much as he has in his short life. Luke, at least, had the excuse of a sheltered upbringing to explain why he was such a brat. The main explanation I can come up with for Anakin is fear and insecurity.<br />
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I have sympathy for him. In fact, I probably have <i>more </i>sympathy for Anakin than I do for Luke. Anakin's childhood was not pleasant, and the only source of stability or security he had was his mother. He was effectively cut off from her by the Jedi Order, but the Jedi never provided him with any kind of solid support or security in her place. He was rejected for training by the Jedi Council, then Qui-Gon, who was supposed to be his guardian, went and got himself killed. That left Anakin with only Obi-Wan to care for him, and he was never really sure that Obi-Wan wanted him around. Yoda and the rest of the Council did not approve of his training as a Jedi. From watching the films, I had inferred that Anakin grew up in a constant state of worry about his place in the Jedi Order and felt a great deal of pressure to prove himself. Qui-Gon called him "the Chosen One," but nobody else seemed to want him around very much.n. The EU novels I've read support that characterization as well, so anywhere you look, you see a character who had a lot of reason to be insecure.<br />
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Anakin was badly manipulated by Chancellor Palpatine, and he was consistently let down (even lied to) by the Jedi Council. He suffered extreme sleep deprivation for years due to nightmares and Force visions. Even mild sleep deprivation can cause paranoia, and the movies do a good job of demonstrating that he was unstable to begin with. So, in that sense, his fall to the Dark Side is understandable, but I think it could have been a lot better-- a lot <i>more</i>-- than <i>Revenge of the Sith </i>made it. The best way to do that would have been to make Anakin a better character.<br />
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I know that the Prequel films and the story of Anakin's life were not supposed to be happy. They were intentionally written to deal with themes of fear, obsession, and betrayal. My complaint here is not that Anakin fell to the Dark Side or that he made bad choices. I generally like flawed characters who make mistakes and have the capacity to do bad things a lot better than I like the kind who can do no wrong. My complaint is simply that Anakin was never likable enough to make his struggle compelling.<br />
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He's a character that I would point to as an example of why giving a character a tragic past and mental problems does not automatically make the character sympathetic or interesting.<br />
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I have another post planned later in the series about the relationship between Skywalker and Amidala, so I'll leave off here with one final thought. I love Star Wars. If I didn't love it, I wouldn't have tried so darn hard to like Anakin. So agree with me or disagree, but please don't take these articles as a knock against the franchise. I only bother blogging about the things I love.<br />
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Stop by next week to hear why I think the Old Jedi were run by emotionally disturbed morons (if you haven't been convinced simply by the contribution they made to Anakin's fall and the creation of Darth Vader.)Rose B. Fischerhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/13349494083118193417noreply@blogger.com3