check in, day 9

[lilly_c]

How's the fic coming along today?

Poll #10411 day 9

Open to: Registered Users, detailed results viewable to: All, participants: 9

View Respondents

Today was

View Answers

Great
0 (0.0%)

Good
3 (33.3%)

Not so good
5 (55.6%)

Awful
1 (11.1%)

Waht did you do?

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Wrote
5 (62.5%)

Edited
1 (12.5%)

Researched
1 (12.5%)

Sent to beta
0 (0.0%)

Outlined
2 (25.0%)

Planned
3 (37.5%)

Something else
2 (25.0%)

Had a cheeky break
2 (25.0%)

Discusion: When you're struggling with something in your fic what do you to get past it? Do you keep writing and hope for the best? Do something else and go back to later?

Comments

[linaewen]

I managed to get some new words written this morning, thankfully. I hope to make some more progress before the day is over, too! I'm not sure of my word count, but it was probably something to the tune of 600 words. Not much in the grand scheme of things, but the way life has been going lately, time to write even 100 words is awesome! :-D

When I struggle with something in my fic, I usually leave a blank space for it, or put something vaguely like what I want to say in brackets, and then come back to it. If it's more than just a lack of words or a description I need, then I usually will go off and do some research until I find what I need to move forward. Usually my struggling is just to find the right words, so if I leave space for it and move on, I can usually come back later and I realize what I was trying to say!

[wintergrey]

I usually outline, or I write dialogue from future scenes and see what's going on between the characters.

Right now I'm glimpsing how frickin' much I bit off with this project and I'm totally intimidated. However, I plan to soldier on. I don't even know if anyone reads this fandom, but that's not really the point for me. :)

[roane]

Oh, do I ever hear you on the 'oh god what did I sign on for' thing. I've had moments wondering if my WIP is a bigger story than I'm able to tell. :P

[wintergrey]

I'm writing a fic that parallels a three act video game with six secondary characters (aside from my two POV characters) and at least half again that many recurring minor characters that took me over 60 hours to play through. FORESIGHT NOT INCLUDED.

Ugh, deleted and reposted, trying to train myself not to answer from the wrong account. BAD EVITH. NO COOKIE.

[crowdog66]

*hands you a flamethrower to cut through the Intimidation Jungle* Just keep putting one foot in front of the other, word after word, sentence after sentence. That's the way to get 'er done, even if it's a 100k-word project! :)

Do you have a projected length for this story? And what fandom is it in?

[0jack]

Thanks. <3 The fandom is Dragon Age (2, to be specific). As I said to Roane below, I really didn't think twice about the scope of the story I was paralleling, because it's largely about a romance that happens outside the main story. (And couldn't happen in the main story because, hey, we don't pair up siblings in polite society.)

I'd be happy to come in around 100k, I think I will if I'm judicious about what events from the main plot I include and what I have happen off screen. I'm trying to decide how to handle major events that would be a novel unto themselves if I included them. The longest single thing I've ever done was parallel/continuation of a relatively-short-running RP campaign and that came in at 250k. I probably averaged 5k/week on it to get it done, because I think I wrote it mostly over the course of a year. I have to remember that I don't have deadlines and editors for my fanfic so I can actually breathe. With fanfic, you really do get to just plod along, don't you? I love that.

[crowdog66]

Not a fandom I'm at all familiar with, but a Google search turned up some lovely visuals. I can see why a writer would be drawn into it!

Re: siblings pairing off... heh, oddly enough I'm dealing with a similar problem in the Lethe!verse, where a brother and sister (or at least, they're pretty sure they're brother and sister) have a habit of sharing bedmates they mutually find attractive. They're not in a romantic relationship; they just like sharing a good romp between the sheets with a handsome fellow from time to time. And if that kind of incest is problematic, writing an all-out romance must be... oh my, I don't envy you the task in front of you. Will their relationship be open, and how will the society at large react?

I wish I could help you with the "how much to tell of canon events" issue, but I'm coming up absolutely blank. Of course, if it tells a good story I'd say plunge in and swim around for however many tens of thousands of words it takes to recount the canon... but I'm not the one who'll be typing out all those words. :)

And re: plodding along... that's both a blessing and a curse, don't you find? On the one hand, no cattle prods being applied. On the other hand, that can make things drag out. Too bad there aren't "fic coaches" you can hire, the way some people hire life coaches or exercise coaches, to keep things on track..

[wintergrey]

Yeah, it's tricky to tackle, balancing that they know it's wrong with being deeply attached to one another. There are complicating and mitigating factors coming down the pipe, including involuntary separation and the female MC marrying someone else (which will end disastrously because it does in canon). So that's part of what makes it so interesting. Actually, I will babble about this in my own journal for a bit...

You know, my dream is to work as an artist's coach? *g* I would love to open a B&B retreat for writers and artists to come park themselves and I'd make sure they were fed and exercised while they finished their work. :)

[roane]

Today hasn't been bad. Still slogging my way through Chapter 5 of my WIP, but I think I see a light at the end of the tunnel. Maybe.

Well, I'm struggling now, so this is relevant for me! The good thing is, I've learned to write out of order, so if I'm stuck on one scene, I can jump on to another one. And often, by the time I've worked my way around everything, when I go back to the bit I was stuck on, my subconscious has usually worked something out for me. But if all else fails, I type. And it sucks. But it's a foundation to build on, you know? That's kind of where I am right now. Typing and sucking. :)

[crowdog66]

Writing out of order is a really important skill, I think, because sometimes what happens in a totally different scene will shed light on the scene you're having difficulty with.

And yay subconscious! I rely on mine an awful lot. :) (And typing and sucking is a lot better than not typing at all. As they say in NaNoWriMo, "before you can edit your crap into something worthwhile, you've got to have crap to edit!")

[crowdog66]

Today I wrote and posted two Lethe!verse background/plotting pieces, one concerning the Throne intelligences of the Domains and one concerning how many verses of "The Merry Whores of Ibin" Megabyte reveals he knows when he turns mortal and Bob cunningly gets him drunk.

If something in a fic is giving me a lot of trouble I try ignoring it for a while and letting my Writing Machine chug away at it subconsciously; nine times out of ten that solves the problem within a few days. If I'm really stuck after that point I sit down and start hacking away at the issue with a machete, writing it over and over again until what I've got at least half makes sense -- and then I move on to the next bit or do something else for a while, then come back to it and polish it until I can stand to look at it. On very rare occasions I petition one of my friends to beta for me and give me the benefit of a second pair of eyes, but I try not to burden them with that too often.

[bay_alexison]

Day 9 is yesterday, but I'll still check in, LOL. Had been researching more and then talked to Beta A through Skype over some questions I have concerning her comments. After that did some last minute edits before sending my FMA Big Bang story to Beta B, which I expect by Sunday/Monday.

It depends. Sometimes I'll just whatever comes to mind and will edit the scene later, write out of order, or focus on a different story.