Author Interview - marswithghosts
We’re going to continue our series of interviews with fandom authors with this conversation with Check, Please! author @marswithghosts. We were really excited to chat with this author, who has written several popular fics in this month’s featured fandom!
Check out marswithghost’s fic on AO3 here!(http://archiveofourown.org/users/marswithghosts/pseuds/marswithghosts)
How did you first get into fandom? What was your first fandom?
I didn’t realize I was in a fandom until I was maybe fourteen or so? Fifteen? Because I think my first fandom was probably Animorphs when I was 8-10, then I got into Harry Potter, anime in high school (Gundam Wing, my love), then probably Supernatural and then Check, Please!. I sort of fell into everything by accident, just about! I’ve always had a huge imagination for things, and I’ve always wanted to be more involved with the media I consume. So I think that’s probably how I got into it. I started thinking, “What if this were to happen? Or this? Why isn’t this in the book? I want to read it.” And then I would just write it for myself at first. I didn’t start posting any of my fic until I was on fanfiction.net in early high school. Don’t go looking for it—it’s pretty…awful…
Other than writing fic, do you participate in any other fandom activities such as drawing fan art, podfic, gif making, meta, cosplaying, etc?
I legitimately have no other skills besides writing, to be honest with you. I enjoy everything from everyone else, but I am not a big contributor to fandom besides the writing itself! I have lots of friends who have cosplayed, drawn great art, made gifs, and their meta is so complex and interesting…but that ain’t me.
What inspired you to start writing fic?
I’ve always been a writer, ever since I was in about first grade. I enjoyed writing, I liked exploring my imagination, and I didn’t realize that what I was writing at first was fan fiction. When I wrote about myself being an Animorph, I never knew that was any different from any other kind of writing. It was only when I got into Harry Potter and Gundam Wing that I discovered fanfiction.net and started realizing that “fanfiction” is when characters belong to someone else but the words and the story are totally mine. This is always what got me interested in Alternate Universes—damn near everything I write is AU, and I probably enjoy writing AUs the most.
What is your favorite thing you have written so far?
Sheesh, this is a hard one. Honestly? Totally honestly? Probably A Little Bit Closer in Check, Please! fandom. It’s the longest thing I’ve ever written in my life, and so much of it is really *mine*. It made me realize, hey—I actually *can* do a novel if I really want to. And so I am now working on an original novel.
What is your favorite fic by someone else?
There are a lot of them—too many to even comprehend at this point, honestly. My actual real-life fiancée is @annundriel (Ed. note: Annundriel on AO3), and I’ve always enjoyed her writing from way back in our Supernatural days. I think she has a really poetic way with words and imagery while staying very genuine and honest to the source material. I think that’s a really impressive feat that I’ve never been able to get the hang of…which is why I just make AUs :)
How did you get into Check Please?
This is actually embarrassing. I didn’t want to read the comic at all. But annundriel started reading it and gushed about it so much and showed me all these things that made absolutely no sense (there’s a character whose actually named Shitty?), but then I finally read it…and I fell in love with it…and she started writing fic and I loved her fic…and then I went on AO3 and found more fic…and then I wrote my own fic…and here I am a year later.
What pairings do you like to read in this fandom? What pairings do you like to write? Do you read gen fic?
My favorite pairings are Zimbits, Dex/Nursey, and—I have to admit this—Kent/Javier Martinez (my OC) (Ed. note: The fic is if this isn’t nice, i don’t know what is). I also like Kent/Tater as well! I’ll read just about anything if I like the writing, though, so I’m more willing to branch out now than I used to be even six months ago. As far as writing…I prefer Zimbits and Kent/Tater, Kent/Javier. I like doing Dex/Nursey, but still struggle with those characterizations; the others feel most natural to me. For gen fic: I would totally read gen fic, but I’m more inclined toward the ships. If it’s recommended to me by someone I trust, I’ll read anything.
What's your favorite fic trope?
Lord, there are so many. Fake dating, accidentally falling in love, tol and smol, etc. I also love coffee shop AUs, any customer service AUs (where’s the call center AU? oh right, that’s a WIP I’ve got…) Can you tell how I feel about AUs.
Do you ever get writer's block? What do you do to combat it?
I get writer’s block all the time. And with my anxiety, I also get panic attacks for sometimes no reason. When I get writer’s block, it’s intense. I have a lot of negative feels of worthlessness and self-doubt. When I was in grad school for my MFA, I kind of couldn’t afford to have writer’s block, since I had deadlines and workshops and my grades were at stake. Lately what I’ve tried to do is impose deadlines on myself—for example, I knew with my Kent/OMC story I wanted to post it for the very beginning of 2017. So I basically told myself “Okay, you’re going to get this done because you can,” and I went from there. Now what I do is I try to write by hand. I have several fancy notebooks and I’m currently obsessed with fountain pens and inks, so handwriting is enjoyable and soothing. It makes me want to put ink on the page so I can watch the pretty colors. This helps my anxiety a lot because I don’t feel quite as pressured as I do when I’m sitting at my computer and staring at a blank page. I’m so long-winded with my stories, even the short ones, that computer writing gets daunting really fast.
Do you have any recs for us to share with our readers?
— Because I’ve been so focused on my own writing, taking control of my mental health (and my physical health in general—yay for great employer health coverage), and playing video games (who’s ready for Mass Effect Andromeda?), I haven’t been reading as much fic lately. But I do have a list I’d done here: http://marswithghosts.tumblr.com/post/146909969360/wahs-into-ur-inbox-do-you-have-any-fanfic-recs And I super hard stand by those fics as well! So good. This fandom is tremendously talented and funny and brightening. I’m pleased to be a part of it.
We want to thank @marswithghosts again for such detailed and thoughtful answers to all our questions. One thing we love about this interview series is finding the similarities in how people tend to “find” fandom, while also getting unique perspectives about what fandom represents to each individual person. We hope you all enjoyed this perspective as much as we did.
