Lya's scribbles

What I write shall go there. Small texts, usually answering to prompts. Very little fics but you can find me over on AO3 (@Lya_scribbles). I also reblog stuff about writing

[lyasscribbles]

An Archive of Our Own, a project of the Organization for Transformative Works

Chapters: 1/2 

Fandom: 山河令 | Word of Honor (TV 2021)

Rating: Teen And Up Audiences 

Relationships: Wen Kexing/Zhou Zishu 

Characters: Wen Kexing, Zhou Zishu 

Additional Tags: Canon Compliant, Canon Divergence, (for chapter 2), POV Zhou Zishu 

Word count : 2187 words

Series: Part 3 of The world is not important, what is important is finding wenzhou (Part 1 was the “calling your name three times in the sun” from episode 12 and part 2 was the scene on the clifftop in episode 32)

Summary:

“Please escort me… Please escort me back to have a look, will you?” For a few seconds, Zhou Zishu only stares at him. His unspoken lie hangs in the silence between them, dragging his heart even further down. He can feel his soul crumble and wither like paper to a flame. 

He fights for his face to remain neutral until he finds the strength to shift his hand to hold Lao Wen’s wrist gently, answering in a voice going hoarse at the edges from his throat constricting again.

“Ok. I’ll go with you.”

A written version exploring the feelings of the scene in episode 34, where Wen Kexing is drunk and happy because he thinks all his worries are gone; meanwhile Zhou Zishu has a countdown of mere days to live hanging above his head and is trying not to cry.

[lyasscribbles]

Chapter 2 is also up, now ! :)

With this chapter, the fic is now about 2800 words.

[creativepromptsforwriting]

How to become friends

Here a some ways on how your characters could become/could've become friends.

"School & Childhood" Friends

Sitting next to each other on the first day of class

Being assigned as lab/project partners

Having the same teacher and complaining together

Sharing school supplies

Being the only two people who don’t know anyone

Riding the same school bus

Getting seated alphabetically near each other every year

Being in detention together

Letting the other cheat off of them

One person defending the other from bullying

Meeting at recess or on the playground

Competing on the same academic team

Being roommates in college

Always sitting next to each other in the library

Staying up late talking in the dorms

Helping each other study before exams

Meeting during orientation week

"Family Connections" Friends

Their mothers/fathers being friends

Being cousins close in age

Growing up as neighbors

Family friends who vacation together

Parents arranging playdates

Siblings introducing them

One family helping another during hard times

Their families attending the same religious or community events

Becoming friends because their kids are friends

Meeting at weddings or family reunions

Dating each others' siblings

"Neighborhood & Everyday Life" Friends

Living in the same apartment building

Seeing each other walking dogs every day

Sharing a fence/backyard

Helping shovel snow or carry groceries

Meeting at a local park regularly

Frequenting the same café

Running into each other during morning commutes

One person helping after a car breakdown

Being regulars at the same store

Sharing a laundry room in their apartment building

"Work & Professional Life" Friends

Starting work on the same day

Complaining about the boss together

Working late on the same project

Covering shifts for each other

Sitting beside each other in the office

Traveling together for work

Bonding during training sessions

Accidentally getting trapped in endless meetings together

One mentoring the other

Quitting the same toxic workplace

"Shared Interests" Friends

Joining the same sports team

Playing in the same band

Meeting in an online game

Joining the same fandom

Taking the same art/music/dance classes

Going to the same gym

Meeting through cosplay or conventions

Attending book clubs

Participating in hobby communities

Posting in the same niche online forum

Volunteering for the same cause

Meeting in a run club

Following each other online

"Through Other Friends" Friends

“You two would get along”

Becoming the last two awake at a party

Mutual friends inviting both people repeatedly

Being added to the same group chat

Becoming friends after a breakup divides the friend group

One friend “adopting” the quieter person

Meeting through double dates

Their two friend groups mixing with each other when two people start dating

Becoming roommates through mutuals

"Random Coincidences" Friends

Missing the same train

Being stranded somewhere together

Wearing the same outfit or shirt

Reaching for the same book in a library

Accidentally texting the wrong number

Dancing next to each other at a concert

Sitting together in the airport during a delayed flight

Sitting next to each other on the train/plane

Getting stuck in an elevator with each other

Meeting on holiday together

One person dropping something and the other helping

Surviving an embarrassing moment together

Laughing at the same thing no one else noticed

"Funny & Unexpected Situation" Friends

Mistaken identity leading to conversation

Fighting first and later becoming close

One stealing the other’s seat

A shared hatred of the same person

Both pretending to understand something they don’t

Meeting because of a lost pet

Becoming friends after a minor car accident

One person overhearing the other say something unhinged and agreeing

Meeting through a heated conversation in a comment section

Accidentally attending the wrong event together

Competing against each other and gaining each other's respect

More: Friendship Masterpost (Prompts & Advice)

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[lyasscribbles]

An Archive of Our Own, a project of the Organization for Transformative Works

Chapters: 1/2 

Fandom: 山河令 | Word of Honor (TV 2021)

Rating: Teen And Up Audiences 

Relationships: Wen Kexing/Zhou Zishu 

Characters: Wen Kexing, Zhou Zishu 

Additional Tags: Canon Compliant, Canon Divergence, (for chapter 2), POV Zhou Zishu 

Word count : 2187 words

Series: Part 3 of The world is not important, what is important is finding wenzhou (Part 1 was the “calling your name three times in the sun” from episode 12 and part 2 was the scene on the clifftop in episode 32)

Summary:

“Please escort me… Please escort me back to have a look, will you?” For a few seconds, Zhou Zishu only stares at him. His unspoken lie hangs in the silence between them, dragging his heart even further down. He can feel his soul crumble and wither like paper to a flame. 

He fights for his face to remain neutral until he finds the strength to shift his hand to hold Lao Wen’s wrist gently, answering in a voice going hoarse at the edges from his throat constricting again.

“Ok. I’ll go with you.”

A written version exploring the feelings of the scene in episode 34, where Wen Kexing is drunk and happy because he thinks all his worries are gone; meanwhile Zhou Zishu has a countdown of mere days to live hanging above his head and is trying not to cry.

[bemusedlybespectacled]

kind of a side thought from a couple of my posts about writing but I think it deserves its own post, so here goes:

when you’re writing a conflict between two characters or factions of characters, you need to consider whether their disagreement over the premise or over the methods. put another way: do they disagree on the problem or the solution?

this is a genuinely tricky thing to identify, especially in very complex narratives, so let’s do some very simple examples.

the situation: pacifist nation X is about to be invaded by empire Y. the laws and cultural practices of the Xians make violence and death so abhorrent that even accidental death is as minimized as possible. the Ylings, on the other hand, are totally cool with straight up murder and think diplomacy is for wimps, but are also pragmatic enough that they won’t waste troops if they don’t need to. the king of X calls in his council and asks for their opinions.

character A: It is more noble to die for one’s beliefs than to live having broken them. We should allow the Ylings to invade us and if we die, we die. character B: If all life is sacred, then our lives are also sacred. We must fight back against the Ylings, even though that means we’d be committing violence.

A and B agree on premise but not solution: they both acknowledge that the Yling invasion is a bad thing that will lead to their deaths if unopposed and that the nonviolence code is important; what they disagree on is priorities and methods.

character C: We should invite them into our nation as honored guests. Maybe they’ll spare us or at least kill us more mercifully. character D: We should propose an alliance and intentional annexation in exchange for our lives. Being part of the Yling Empire is a pretty sweet deal, actually.

C and D agree on solution but not premise: they’re both okay with just letting the empire walk in and invade, but C thinks the invasion would be a bad thing and is just trying to minimize the damage, and D thinks it would be a good thing and wants to maximize the rewards.

character E: We should fight the Ylings and stay a sovereign nation; the nonviolence code is stupid and holding us back. character D: We shouldn’t fight the Ylings and try to be peacefully part of their empire instead; we’d be true to our code and reap the rewards of an alliance.

E and F disagree on both premise and solution.

Now, all possible permutations of this argument are fine. “Is this the best way to solve the problem?” and “What actually is the problem?” are both great sources of conflict. Captain America: The Winter Soldier’s entire plot is an argument over the methods to prevent death and crime, but everyone agrees that crime is bad; one of Zuko’s big character development moments is when he realizes that the problem with the world isn’t the other nations ungratefully rejecting the prosperity and unity offered by the Fire Nation, but that the Fire Nation routinely commits genocide in their quest to colonize the rest of the world.

The issue is when a disagreement over methods is treated like a disagreement over premise. The characters are positioned like one side’s entire worldview is correct and the other is wrong, but it turns out they actually disagree with what the other does rather than what the other believes.

A big giveaway that what you’re seeing is about methods and not underlying beliefs? If at any point it is said or implied that one character “goes too far.” “Too far” implies a point before that cutoff that the other characters or the reader would be okay with. You can’t go too far if going any distance in that direction is wrong. “Frollo in the Disney version of The Hunchback of Notre Dame goes too far when he tries to kill all the Romani in the city” implies that the problem isn’t racism in general, but mass murder specifically, and that if Frollo was only nonviolently racist, that would be fine!

Like, you know the joke about the guy who offers a woman a million dollars to sleep with him, then ten dollars after she accepts the million dollar offer, and when she’s offended and says she’s “not that kind of woman,” he says, “Oh, we agreed you were that kind of woman, now we’re just haggling over price”? If your characters are arguing about the best way to solve a problem, they have already agreed about the existence and nature of the problem. Now they’re just haggling over price.

Again: that kind of storyline is okay if you actually do want to discuss extremism v. moderation of the same basic principle. It’s okay for two characters to argue over the best way to free all of their country’s slaves. It’s also okay for two characters to discuss the best way of practicing slavery, if you want to show how ingrained it is in society or how even the character you think is a moderate is still evil or something. What doesn’t work is if your intention is to say how awful slavery is, but then the entire conflict is over the treatment of slaves rather than whether slavery is okay.

tl;dr: setting up the conflict as one over premise and then having all the action be a fight over methods undermines your story; at best it’s just confusing, at worst it turns your characters into hypocrites.

[astriiformes]

Something I have been thinking about lately is. So I like whump. I am one of many people who enjoys reading about bad things happening to my favorite fictional characters, as the long and storied history of fandom will attest. We love it when people get hurt.

But one thing I also love, that I feel like I don't see very often in whump fic, is people writing about the recovery process, the unglamorous, difficult, after-the-fact details of having sustained serious injuries and living to tell the tale. Sometimes there will be a brief scene at the end of the fic where we are assured that, yes, the character made it to the hospital and survived, and is now surrounded by concerned friends-- particularly when the story veers more into hurt/comfort territory--but that's not really what I'm talking about. What I want is stories where the treatment and recovery are front and center, the medical details are realistic and the injuries are treated with the appropriate gravity, where the process is long and hard and has pitfalls and obstacles and above all takes time.

I think a large part of my desire for fics where the recovery is more centered than the actual moment of "hurt" stems from being aromantic and asexual and preferring gen stories, but still craving moments of intimacy in fiction and thus looking for it in less conventional places. Caretaking--or being taken care of--can be great sources of intimacy in stories where sex is off the table, for one reason or another. Needless to say, it's been an obvious lacuna. People do still write it, but not as often as I'd like to see, and that's always struck me as strange.

On the other hand, my wife has never been as into whump as me. She never hated it, but didn't seek it out or write it very often and had to be in the right mood for it (and to some degree still does). But lately she's been getting much more into exploring it in her writing because it offers her an opportunity to write characters experiencing similar things to her as she's dealt with the challenges of becoming disabled and largely housebound and reliant on me for certain caretaking tasks. And as a result we've sort of gravitated towards some similar kinds of stories, where recovery and caretaking are just as if not more important than fucking that character up in the first place.

Anyway. It's lead me to think more actively about that gap I've noticed as a life-long whump reader, where the recovery doesn't really matter and the stories are mostly just about the moment of "hurt" and maybe a dramatic rescue at the end. And I won't pretend it's all ableism, but I really do think that some of the reason fandom is allergic to writing true, messy, real caretaking and recovery is rooted in liking the aesthetics of disability (the angst! the drama!) without really caring much about the reality of it. It's the same reason action heroes get knocked unconscious all the time without concussions, why sci-fi and fantasy prosthetics so often seamlessly replace lost limbs, and why everyone in fiction eventually recovers from injuries and illness (except for when they die). There's no room for the unglamorous in-between, where someone ends up permanently affected by what happened to them and where "hurt" has life-long consequences.

I guess that's all to say--I wish fandom were as enthusiastic about the disability narrative potential in whump. Even in instances where people do make incredible recoveries from horrible injuries (which I've seen firsthand with friends!), a brush with serious injury is at the very least a brush with short-term disability, and more likely than not will have effects for the rest of someone's life. That can be interesting, and even intimate if you want it to be, too.

So yes, please do fuck that character up--it's a cornerstone of fandom for a reason. But consider, maybe, telling the sort of story where what happens afterwards matters, too.

[marypsue]

#as the wife in question: EXTREMELY REAL!!! #there are just so many interesting angles with long-term recovery and disability narratives #the intimacy and the vulnerability #the power dynamics—good or bad #needing to be cared for is hugely vulnerable and many people struggle intensely with that #that's a really rich vein to explore! #there's the question of physical caretaking—how long does the character need to stay in the hospital? do they have the resources for that? #is it even a setting/location that HAS hospitals? #who looks after them once they've been discharged? how does this change their dynamic? do they welcome the help or are they afraid of it? #who supports them financially while they recover? who brings them food? who makes sure their pets get taken care of? #and how do they feel about losing functionality; even if it's temporary but especially if it's permanent? #do they still feel like themselves? do they wonder if surviving was worth it? do they get angry about things they can no longer do? #what does their disability grief look like? what does their loved ones' secondhand disability grief look like? #there is so much you can do with these stories! (via @scribefindegil)

[lyasscribbles]

Chapters:  2/2 

Fandom: 山河令 | Word of Honor (TV 2021)

Rating:  Teen And Up Audiences 

Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings

Word count : 6215 words

Relationships: Wen Kexing/Zhou Zishu 

Additional Tags: Canon Compliant, WoH episode 32, Slight canon-divergence for the bonus in chapter 2 

Series: Part 2 of The world is not important, what is important is finding wenzhou

Summary: 

He steps forward until he’s so close their faces are almost touching. Their gazes lock and it’s as if the world has suddenly decided to go quiet.(...) Holding his breath, on edge, Wen Kexing waits for his A-Xu to say something, anything, because he himself has lost all his words. But A-Xu just looks at him. A smile spreads on his lips. 

“Save your breath.” 

Nothing more than these three quiet words, because, really, what else could possibly be needed?

That scene on the clifftop from episode 32, written from both Wen Kexing and Zhou Zishu’s point of view, trying to decipher what they might be thinking or feeling. It’s the entire scene. Plus two scenes from afterward with Zhou Zishu.

[queenofattolia]

“For example: A writer sets out to write science fiction but isn’t familiar with the genre, hasn’t read what’s been written. This is a fairly common situation, because science fiction is known to sell well but, as a subliterary genre, is not supposed to be worth study—what’s to learn? It doesn’t occur to the novice that a genre is a genre because it has a field and focus of its own; its appropriate and particular tools, rules, and techniques for handling the material; its traditions; and its experienced, appreciative readers—that it is, in fact, a literature. Ignoring all this, our novice is just about to reinvent the wheel, the space ship, the space alien, and the mad scientist, with cries of innocent wonder. The cries will not be echoed by the readers. Readers familiar with that genre have met the space ship, the alien, and the mad scientist before. They know more about them than the writer does. In the same way, critics who set out to talk about a fantasy novel without having read any fantasy since they were eight, and in ignorance of the history and extensive theory of fantasy literature, will make fools of themselves because they don’t know how to read the book. They have no contextual information to tell them what its tradition is, where it’s coming from, what it’s trying to do, what it does. This was liberally proved when the first Harry Potter book came out and a lot of literary reviewers ran around shrieking about the incredible originality of the book. This originality was an artifact of the reviewers’ blank ignorance of its genres (children’s fantasy and the British boarding-school story), plus the fact that they hadn’t read a fantasy since they were eight. It was pitiful. It was like watching some TV gourmet chef eat a piece of buttered toast and squeal, ‘But this is delicious! Unheard of! Where has it been all my life?’”

— Ursula K. Le Guin, Genre: A Word Only a Frenchman Could Love

[dduane]

Hi Diane, hope you’re doing well! I was wondering if you had any advice for writing characters undergoing change/realizing some of their core beliefs are wrong?

I’m mostly struggling with how to make it feel natural when I have something like “Character X goes through Event Y and realizes Thing Z” in the outline, which feels a lot more formulaic than organic

This is a very smart question to be asking, and you're to be commended for making your way to it. 🙂

...There are a number of ways to calibrate the style and nature of this kind of shift, strongly depending on what kind of character you're dealing with. For example:

Are they self-examining (much)? or,

Are they generally oblivious to what's going on inside them unless prompted to notice it by someone else? (Ideally someone they're positively emotionally invested in, though it can be interesting if it's someone they hate.) Or,

Are they the kind of person who refuses to accept anything unless the seemingly-uncaring Universe itself clocks them over the head with it?

Each of those analyses (even in cursory form) is going to suggest what you need to do to that character to, uh, get their attention. 😏

Putting in a break here, because this will go on for a bit. Caution: contains Carl Jung, Ursula Le Guin, David Gerrold, and Kylo Ren.

...Anyway. Once you've decided how to get your character to notice that change is in the air, you need to determine what their likely reaction will be, and what kind of effect the realization will have on their behavior and on the people around them. The more they are inclined to resist the change, the longer it's going to take on the page to get them there. (And this is not necessarily a bad thing.)

Jung's Stricture—as some call it—can usefully be applied to this problem. The Stricture can be summed up as "What you resist not only persists, but will grow in size." (...At some point or another I remember saying that Kylo Ren was the poster boy for this problem, and with the benefit of hindsight, I think that assessment holds up.*) So the harder your character pushes back against the realization and internalization of Thing Z, the harder it (rightly) should keep impacting them until they make the choice to deal with it. This pushback will allow them time to process Event Y, while other plot-related stuff is going on around them.

Part of what will determine the character's resistance is what the stakes are if they change (or don't), and how high. (Here my old friend David Gerrold's recommendation comes in handy: find the always-vital answer to the question "Who does it hurt?" And what complications are caused by the pain.) The character may very well roll over without too much resistance in the case of a low-stakes change. But you can easily make a case that life-or-death stuff typically will be resisted quite hard if accepting it also means that the character has to admit that they've been wrong about something. The wronger they are, and the more people have to find out about it, the stiffer the resistance. ...And this can be good, because this resistance causes Drama, and Drama is Good. 🙂 (As long as it's realistic Drama, and doesn't slow the plot down too much.)

...Then there's the question of how to realistically structure the working-through of the character's acceptance in the narrative (or non-acceptance: that way can lie tragedy, which is just fine if it's what you're after). If the issue is a sufficiently painful one, you might want to consider pushing them through a tailored variant of the classic Kubler-Ross stages of grief. (Always understanding—as has been accepted for a while now—that the well-known "basic" versions of the K-R stages are merely shorthand for a process that happens in many different ways, and at different speeds, for different people... and that the order of the stages doesn't necessarily go this way.)

So first, maybe, the character will deny (more or less vehemently) that there needs to be a change at all. Then, when circumstances prove otherwise, they get pissed off about it. Then they start "bargaining" with themselves, trying to rationalize finding ways to feel better about what can't otherwise be changed. Then deep sorrow begins to creep up on them (lasting as long as is realistic or useful for them). And finally they find their way through to acceptance of the way things are going to have to be—sometimes pushed into this by plot events that might otherwise have had no great effect on them.

You can shuffle the stages around in whatever way seems most appropriate to suit your character's individual needs... always, again, looking for ways to maximize the drama within the broader plot. There doesn't necessarily need to be a whole lot of flashy physical action accompanying this process. Quite intense stuff can go on strictly confined to the insides of someone's head.

...If the change that's in the air isn't necessarily a bad one, or leading to pain: I remember running into someone's suggestion a while back that there might as likely be stages of joy as of grief. (Not to be confused with the "stages or kinds of happiness" stuff that's to be found here and there online. Joy is not happiness: it's far more potent stuff, and far less predictable or controllable [as Le Guin says somewhere or other].) So—in this mode—you would invert, or subvert, the recognized "grief structure" somewhat.

It makes a certain sense to keep denial as a first stage: "No, no way, this is wish fulfillment, this is too good to be true...", and the character pushing back from whatever's in that first stage of handling the new realization: initially rejecting it. Then the first green shoots of hope, but kept silent and unshared, for fear everything's going to come undone if they say anything. Then uncertainty: "this is really happening... what do I do about it?" After that, the first tentative or daring moves toward accepting the new reality... of finding a way to incorporate it into the new ground of being. And finally: joy, letting oneself be part of it, making it real at last.

...Now all these various dynamics and sets of factors obviously can't be made to work out in isolation. All of them are going to have to be weighed against one another and adjusted in terms of timing and the larger structure of the plot (and other characters' working-through schedules...). Your goal is to set things up so that when the Thing Z explosion of realization or whatever goes off—however long it takes—it happens at the right time, in the right place, to drive the plot correctly forward. If it has no effect on the surroundings, but only on the character, it won't get the job done... and no one will be satisfied: not the characters as an ensemble, not you, and not your readers.

This is essentially a structural and logistics issue. You get to figure out when and where to make this sequence of events initiate, execute, and complete. It can't be too soon in the work: it can't be too late. It can't be right on top of the events that will bring your work to a close, or your readership is likely to come after you with pitchforks (and complain about the whole business feeling badly structured, or contrived). Emplace your character's working through and climactic business correctly, though, and the work as a whole will feel thoroughly done when it's done. (Even, mysteriously, if it's a cliffhanger. Correct completion is powerful stuff.)

...Also, here's an extra mechanism to think about (should you feel so inclined). If you can find the right spot in which to emplace this kind of interaction, there can be a certain satisfaction in having two characters' "resolution arcs" initially seriously interfering with one another, until without warning they blow up in each other's faces and inadvertently (or purposefully) push each other over the edge into the territory on the far side of their individual—or joint—problems. (And then, regardless of the positivity of the results, they can still be slightly pissed off with each other. Drama!) 😂

Anyway. Assuming that POV issues allow, what remains is to let your character's working-through of a specific thorny issue (or issues) take place over a few chapters at least... slotting the whole business in among other characters' business, so that not only they, but your reader, have time to process what's happening. Finding that time—or creating the illusion of it as the narrative flows—is something you'll start sorting out in your "zero draft", and will have time to fine-tune as you continue work thereafter.

Anyway. I hope all this has put some useful ideas in your head. Thanks for asking!

*(Oh yeah: it was in this posting over at Out of Ambit. It's such a shame that the Psychology Today article removed Kylo from their post's original header. He was perfect for that.) 😏

[mikkeneko]

Thanks for reading! or, A Fanfic Author's Guide To Keeping The Conversation Going

I'm going to start off with a fair amount of introduction here, but this guide is mostly aimed at other writers, who are presumably not put off by long block of texts.

Why write this guide? Mostly because no one else has (that I've seen) (yet.) I've seen no end of guides to writing, and a fair amount on the topic 'how to leave a comment,' but I have yet to see one aimed at replying to reader comments.

Why should we take advice from you? Well, I've been a fanfic author in fan spaces for twentysomethingplus years, and through that time I've seen pretty much every configuration of positive and negative interactions between fans, fan authors, and fan readers that you can imagine. Mostly through trial and error in that time I've worked out my own system of when and how to respond to readers in a way that will make them feel welcomed and encourage them to come back. You can try my methods, or you can develop your own, whatever suits you! But if you've been looking for ways to deepen that connection, and find yourself at a loss, maybe these suggestions will help you.

Why bother to reply to reader comments at all? Because we fanfic authors are (with some exceptions) of the opinion that we're here for community and conversation! A fanfic by itself stands alone; a reader, commenting, has started a conversation. That puts the ball back in our court if we want to keep that conversation going and foster those warm social connections!

Also, it's been my twentysomethingplus years of experience that if you reply to comments, people comment more.

OK, well, I've either convinced you or I haven't. So let's get into some broad principles.

Principle 1: Don't be afraid of repeating yourself.

I've seen this comment repeated a few times: "I feel stupid saying the same thing over and over again, but I don't know what else to say!" Don't worry about that! You are replying to each reader as an individual; they aren't actually part of a hive mind. Very few readers are going to read the entire comment section, and the ones who do are usually dedicated fans who are not here to criticize you! If you get twenty comments that are all some variation on "great story," then don't hesitate to reply twenty times with "glad you liked it!"

(Personally, I have "Thanks for reading!" hotkeyed.)

Along the same line, you can repeat longer responses between commenters if it's relevant -- if more than one reader has asked a similar question, feel free to copy-paste your response from an earlier comment thread rather than typing it all out again. Nobody is plagiarism-checking here.

Principle 2: Match the specificity of the reader's comment.

If all a reader has to say is "great chapter" or "more kudos" or a line of emojis, then a simple thank you is all that's required. If they have more to say, then maybe you have more to say in reply. If they comment on a character's behavior, you can give your own thoughts on blorbo's behavior. If they liked some passage particularly, you can say that you are proud of that passage. If they wail and cry over a sad part, you can offer tissues; if they post a string of LOL's, you can crack another joke. If they went into a mini-essay about blorbo's motivation and how this ties into the canon, then you are being given a blank check to gush about the same! And if they ask a question, then it's probably a good idea to answer it -- even if the answer is "you know what, I didn't even think about that" or "you'll find out later. :)"

(Personally, my stance is that suspense is only for the sake of the reader's enjoyment; if a reader asks a question that would be a spoiler for a later development, I will assume they don't care about suspense and usually answer them truthfully. Your own personal philosophy may vary.)

You gotta manage your own time and spoons but in my opinion, even short comments are worth replying to. It is still an indication that someone engaged with your story and wanted to reach out.

Principle 3: Stay positive.

This is just a principle I keep for as many fannish interactions as possible, really, but the comment sections of your fanfic are not a good place to get into arguments. If a comment is positive, match it with positivity. If a comment mixes positive comments with some kind of cold takes or bummers, you can reply to the positive parts and just ignore the rest. And if a comment is downright nasty, don't get drawn in; it's your AO3-given right as an author to delete or freeze it and go on with your life.

Principle 4: So long as you both want to be here, you can both be here.

I definitely know I've seen, and lived, variations on 'I let the comments pile up unanswered and now it's been months! I'd be mortified to respond to them now!' I won't say it's never ever too late to reply, but I will say that as long as you the writer and they the reader are both active in the same fandom, it's still appropriate to reply. That may be days, weeks, even months after the comment was left. Maybe not years. Case by case.

Also, if it's a chaptered fic, the best time to reply to the comments on the last chapter is right before you post a new chapter -- what better time to remind readers that your story exists? :)

Principle 5: Remember the regulars.

If the same readers regularly comment on chapters or on multiple stories, remember their names and icons and try to get to know them! A regular reader has made an investment in you; it's worth making an investment in them. With regulars, you get the privilege of being a little more informal with them -- you can let down the customer-service level of positivity and vent a few complaints about how much of a fight this chapter gave you, or crack off-color jokes, or the like.

Regulars who leave only very brief comments are still worth cultivating. The more you reply, the more likely it is that they will return and, over time, they may open up to more interaction. I had one regular who commented with a single emoji on every single chapter over the course of several stories and then, on the second to last chapter of my last fic in the fandom, left a long comment about how much my work meant to them.

----

Well, that's all I can think of for now -- but feel free to ask questions, or add your own two cents on in a reblog!

[mikkeneko]

the notes on this one are too chummy. somebody reblog this with some really icecold takes

[fanworkspermissionstatement]

[Image description: The title, "Fanworks Permission Statement Builder," and black line-drawing-style pictures of a hand holding a pencil and of a microphone with a pop filter, over a background of crumpled paper. End ID.] (credit to @rystonlentil for the image ID)

Hey fanworks creators!

Excited about the idea of someone creating something based on your fan creation (like podfics, fanart, translations, etc)? On the other hand, do you not want people creating stuff based off your fanworks and don't want to have to turn them down? Or do you have a more nuanced idea of what you are and aren't comfortable with people doing based on your fan creations? Don't particularly care one way or the other about what people create based on your stuff?

SPEND JUST A FEW MINUTES TO QUICKLY GENERATE A FANWORKS PERMISSION STATEMENT LETTING PEOPLE KNOW YOUR PREFERENCES!!!

What is a fanworks permission statement?

A fanworks permission statement (also known as a blanket permission statement or transformative works permission statement) is very simple: it's something you post in a publically-visible place (usually your AO3 profile) that tells other fan creators what you are and aren't okay with in terms of other people making fanworks based off your stuff. It can be as simple as a sentence or two, or as complicated as you want to communicate your preferences clearly.

Who should have a permission statement?

A permission statement is for anyone that creates fanworks! Yes, even if you don't think anyone would ever want to create something based off your fanworks. You never know! It's not egotistical to post a permission statement, it's HELPFUL. Yes, even if you don't want people making something based off your works. It means no one has to reach out to ask you, they can know your preferences right away.

Is it only for fanfic writers?

Absolutely not! It's great for fan creators of ALL kinds to have a fanworks permission statement! Fanartists, someone might want to use your fanart as inspiration for a fanfic or create fanart inspired by your work in a different medium! Podficcers, other people creating in an audible medium might want to insert clips of your podfics into their work, or copy the way you did certain effects! Fanbinders, you might inspire an artist with the way you do your binding! This is really for everyone, because fandom is infinitely creative and who knows how another fan creator might be inspired by your work!

What do I even say in a permission statement?

That's exactly why we built the Fanworks Permission Statement Builder! So you don't have to think about what to say or how to say it. Just spend a few minutes answering questions about your preferences that cover many of the common things people might want to specify, and you'll have a permission statement ready to copy-and-paste into your AO3 profile, or to edit to your heart's content!

Why use the Fanworks Permission Statement Builder?

Don't want to come up with a permission statement on your own? Not sure what should even go into a permission statement? Want someone to at least give you a starting place that you can edit to better reflect your preferences? Want someone to just hand you a ready-to-use permission statement that you can paste into your profile? Spend just a few minutes answering some questions about your preferences, and you'll have a permission statement ready to use or edit!

[fanworkspermissionstatement]

Reblogging for an update--now with new FAQ and image ID!

[lyasscribbles]

Chapters: 2/2 Fandom: 山河令 | Word of Honor (TV 2021) Rating:  Teen And Up Audiences  Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply  Relationships: Wen Kexing/Zhou Zishu Characters: Wen Kexing, Zhou Zishu 

Word Count :  2320 words Additional Tags:  Canon Compliant, episode 12, It's very sweet they're mostly putting everything else aside in that scene 

Summary:

"A-Xu" "Lao Wen" Just me trying to write that extended scene in episode 12 where Wen Kexing and Zhou Zishu share wine and enjoy the sun. I tried the scene from each of their POV in turn.

Plus one alternate ending to the scene because I can

[elle-thereafter]

These are important things I have learned about writing fiction. I know these things, but sometimes I need a reminder. So I am writing them here, both as a reminder for myself, and as a reminder for all those who, like me, sometimes forget.

Characters must make choices.

Characters should often make bad choices before they make good choices.

Character choices should drive the vast majority of the plot. Characters reacting to having random stuff thrown at them is far less interesting than characters reacting to the stuff they've thrown after it's ricocheted around and comes bouncing back toward them.

If a character refuses to make a choice, there better be consequences for that too, and you better have a damn clear way of showing those consequences to the reader and the character.

Nearly every time I'm struggling with writing something, taking a step back and thinking about these 4 things usually helps get me unstuck.

[thebookbutterfly]

I love it when fan fiction writers are like: “ah shit, this was meant to be one part but I started writing it and now it has to be three”. Like the fanfic is happening to them and not being created by them.

[lyasscribbles]

I really enjoyed dipping my toes back into fic writing when I (re)wrote that scene in episode 12 where wenzhou call each other's names three times.

So I'm thinking about doing the same with some other scenes from the show that I really like. Problem is, I can't decide which to do next and I need your help to decide!

(More explanations as to which scenes each of the answers corresponds to below the poll and the cut)

Which WoH scene should I write a fic about next?

"A-Xu ! I got them alllll drunk tonight! I'm so happy ~~"

"You're still brushing me off with your fake actions"/"They're not fake"

*gayest silent stare that could possibly pass censorship.* "Save your words"

Another scene you'd want me to try ?

Voting ended onMar 8

"A-Xu! I got them allll drunk tonight! I'm so happy ~~" is this drunk WKX scene from episode 34 :

"You're still brushing me off with your fake actions."/*puppy eyes* "They're not fake they're real." is this drunk wkx one from episode 17 :

And they silent gay stare is that scene in episode 32 :

(For this one I still haven't decided if I'm going to go for the words they said or the ones that were mouthed and then dubbed over)

I would also love to do the scene where WKX gives ZZS his hairpin but I'm unsure as to how to manage that so this one will wait.

[glorious-spoon]

honestly i think the selling point of romance for me (and where it usually fails to land) is 'can i imagine these people sharing an in-joke'

like, are they in cahoots. can they laugh together. do they have a similar enough or at least complementary enough outlook that they can connect over something being funny (even if it's funny in a fucked up way! sometimes those are the best in-jokes!)

that's not necessarily true love in and of itself, but it does feel like an essential component to me

[lyasscribbles]

sending one over here as well (: please tell me about "La moitié d’une malédiction" for the wip ask game <3

Oh dear. This one is a fic for the Inuyasha story. Or rather, for its sequel I refuse to even name. As I stated in the post for the game, I gave this one up. It's a fic fuelled by pure frustration and anger which doesn't make it surprising that, once the anger was vented, I lost the drive to finish it. Why was I so angry? Inuyasha is a story dear to me for several reasons (let's be honest, it's mostly nostalgia) despite its glaring flaws and some stuff I would hate if I read it now. But its sequel made so little sense (I gave up after S1) both in characters and plot, that I got angry and wanted to prove to myself (and a friend) that if I thought about it for 10 minutes I could come up with very similar plot points in a way that made much, much more sense. And I did, I still have the outline. So yeah, that fic was doomed to never be finished.

[starcut-sand]

When I was in college, my Creative Nonfiction professor would regularly have us do something she called "hotspotting" (she didn't know that this was already a term tbc) with our rough drafts. Basically, hotspotting is when you look at your draft and pick out your favorite sentence, or one of your favorite sentences--one that you're really proud of--and write it down in a blank sheet in a notebook. Not a new document, a physical notebook. (You are not allowed to use technology for hotspotting.) And then you set a timer for however long--like maybe ten to twenty minutes--and you elaborate. You treat that one sentence as if it's the opening sentence to a new draft, and you write from there, until the timer is up.

It sounds like a gimmick, but honestly, some of my best writing in that class came from hotspotting. Usually, the sentence you consider the "best" is the one that really gets to the heart of something you're trying to convey. In a rough draft, it tends to be that you're fumbling around a bit before you really hit on the heart of things. So with hotspotting, you're starting from a less fumbly place, which means you're able to dig into your subject in a much deeper and more precise way. It makes you feel like a surgeon, a little bit.

So I do recommend trying it, even just for fun, even if you think the rough draft you have is already good. You might surprise yourself with what you come up with! :)