Expect Lockwood and Co, the Rookie and general Catholic posting. Savoirfaire on AO3. I have a podcast and many WIPs that I’m not working on. Call me Mai.
A while ago I made a post asking for advice as a Christian fic writer, and I wanted to give back some of the few things I’ve learned now that I’ve finished something myself:
Fic writing is an act of listening and thus of love. You get to call attention to small details, go looking for the underlying philosophy of the thing the way people do when they write essays; and then, like essay-writers, you get to elaborate and question and resist and make connections to the world outside the story you’re starting from.
Writing fics takes humility, of a sort that essay-writing doesn’t require. On the base level you’re meeting the original story where it is — in the world of story — not from up above, as literary critic. You are taking the story’s substance from a thing that already exists. You are freely admitting (or ought to be!) that it isn’t yours, that it rests on the things that came before. In a sense this is true of all our stories; they derive from the created world, what Tolkien called “sub-creation.” But here you are engaging in a sort of “sub-sub-creation” if one may coin the word.
I used to wonder, why write a second derivative if you could write a first? Isn’t original intrinsically better? What original is, is intrinsically different. Original is a wider conversation; fanfiction is a targeted conversation. The thing to keep in mind is that what is of eternal significance is people’s selves — their hearts, minds, souls, bodies. Stories matter as far as they impact these selves, whether readers’ or writers’.
If fanfic readers, as others have said, tend to be exhausted, then fanfic writing is an opportunity to minister to exhausted people. (Which we know Jesus cares deeply about, with his call to “all you who are weary and heavy laden.”) We have the unique honor and privilege of such an audience, one which wants the guide rails of a known world/characters/etc. but also wants something new; and we have the new wine of the Gospel. Whether that comes through in the writing itself, or in our conversations with readers or writers, the opportunities are there.
I have heard it said that the best way to encourage Christian themes in one’s writing is to not think about them and let them come naturally; which I think is partly true, but if you can’t help thinking about things (as I can’t), it’s not necessarily bad to do things intentionally either. What I think matters is the sort of intent. Fiction, including fanfic, is best at showing a story; people say to not worry about writing “Christianly” because they are advising you to avoid showing a set of answers instead. If you set out to write something that will show a story — letting people be wrong, as God lets you be wrong; working out some thinking of your own on the topic that you chose; finding things that will encourage yourself on your own journey with God — then if nothing else you will have all the work that God will do in you from exercising that patient form of love he so often uses, from going through Scripture in ways you hadn’t seen coming, from considering his ways and how they might be shown in a world that was not of your forming.
Kipps: definitely has an amazing singing voice, always fights Lockwood for the lead role and ends up supporting/secondary lead - i’m seeing him as Javert, as Gleb, as Davey, etc. he has an extensive vocal health routine he does every single rehearsal in front of everyone.
Lockwood: can sing—not as well as Kipps, but his charisma, acting chops, and chemistry with literally everyone earn him the lead role almost every time. He’s a true drama king - the only person the director has to tell to pull back onstage. Also will be at every rehearsal even if he’s deathly ill.
Lucy: the stage manager who ended up getting a lead role. to this day she’s not sure how it happened - she’s pretty sure she didn’t even audition. she’d rather be bossing people around and making things go smoothly, although she IS talented. the kind of girl who performs her song and then gets offstage as fast as possible (while Lockwood milks every second and she’s having to drag him off)
Holly: singing, costumes, hair, choreography - is there anything Holly can’t do? unofficially the director because she wants it done just so (and she’s wildly effective), while the director thinks they’re still in control. Tech Week Mom - she brings healthy snacks for everyone
Flo: shockingly good, a triple threat who almost always plays the villain or lead. Her voice is powerful, her acting incredible. She missed half the rehearsals but knows every second of the show, will whisper your lines to you onstage if you forget.
George: enjoys it, far too likely to get distracted with odd jobs around the theater and miss parts of rehearsal. everyone plays a game of “where is george” because you never know what he could be doing at any given moment. Tech Week Dad (brings the actually GOOD snacks)
Lockwood and Co. at a bar is hilarious to me. Lockwood is ignoring like 4 interested women to get a first hand lesson on how to bartend. Lucy is hiding in the corner on her umpteenth drink trying not to laugh at pet decapitated head bullying everyone in their vicinity. George is critiquing their shitty bar food and heckling Lockwood. Kipps is drunk and absolutely breaking it Down on the dance floor. He will not remember it but the entire bar will. Holly is on her second champagne glass boring three people to death while ranting about a filing system because she’s too tipsy to realize no one cares. I love them.
Finished my inks and thumbnails for the week! So of course I sat back down at my desk and drew a design for Lucy Carlyle from Lockwood and Co. because I have a note of my phone with like four comic ideas to do once I’m less busy, so I need to figure out my designs!
like genuinely the cultural baggage around fanfiction will have people saying the most absurd stuff. what prompted that last post is i was watching a video about publishing fanfiction and they quoted an author saying 'no-one but me is allowed to interpret my characters'
and im like hey. hey. look me in the eye and say that again. what the fuck do you mean no-one's allowed to interpret your characters? your characters get re-interpreted anytime a new person reads your got damn book. everyone is interpreting your characters all the time. what are you talking about.
One of my favorite things about working with very young children is that because
a) young children tend to do a lot of copying the behaviors around them, and
b) most of the people hanging around them are taking care of kids (them)
a lot of little kids REALLY want to take care of slightly littler kids. Today a toddler barely over a year old kissed a baby a couple months younger than him, tried to wipe his nose, and tried to feed him a toy apple. A couple kids older than Him then started trying to put him in a toy shopping cart to take him shopping. There's a 3yo who always tries to steal the babies' milk bottles to feed them. A 4yo tried to give a baby his own bottle once. A toddler too young to know any words yet will shush me if any of the little babies are laying down to sleep.
Obviously we can't allow most of that but it always kills me 😭 their age is the standard and anyone younger than them is Actually a baby
Found myself wanting to say that "consuming text is easy and passive, unlike video which requires active effort to watch" and then realized this is the opposite of what basically every other human being would say.
I tell a woman with a 9 to 5 office job about the slightly niche speculative fiction novel I just finished and she goes "Oh, that's...interesting. I hadn't heard of that."
I tell a grungy chick I met at a dive bar about the same book and she kinda scoffs and goes "Okay" like I said my favorite show is Sesame Street
My grandma is bringing her friend to the party and the friend just told me about how they left the house with the oven on yesterday while they were baking one of the pies, she was worried about the oven not because of fire but because of potential fire damage, and she said "I'm not afraid of fire- well, I'm not afraid of anything really, because I'm stupid!" 😭
Got gently teased by the guy searching my bag at the airport because of the number of books in there. At least he didn’t open the compartment with the catechism of the Catholic Church in it
