Category: On Writing

On Fan Fiction, and an Announcment

Fan fiction has a strange place in the realm of ‘real writing’. To say that it isn’t real is like claiming remixing isn’t music or that what I do on at a club is called ‘dancing’. It is reader fantasy. It is the big “what if?” that we take after we have seen a movie or read a book that didn’t give all the answers we wanted.

I spent a good portion of time doing fan fiction of sorts. I was a part of the ‘hunter list’, which was an email list for White Wolf’s Hunter: the Reckoning. We posted stories about what our characters were doing, interacted through email and wrote. We wrote. At one point i was posted 1500 to 3000 words a day on this list.

And in that time I learned a lot about myself, about writing. I learned that I love an audience. I found the restrictions (and there were restrictions, this is a roll playing game with RULES after all) to almost be freeing. How do vampires work? Are there ghosts? Can my character survive a conflict with a werewolf? These things were answered. My job was to write the story inside of this box.

Admittedly this is different from the type of fan fiction where you deal both in the world and the characters that are there. I feel i’d have to turn in my geek card if I didn’t have an idea for a Star Wars novel, or a Star Trek serial. Now we are talking about not just the setting, but also the characters that belong to someone, or some-corporation. As a writer, how do you work under the confines of Han Solo, or Mickey Mouse, or Harry Potter? How do you work where there is already a canon, and you are, well, just dreaming?

Does it matter?

Fan fiction is beat up on as immature, or unprofessional, or what not. Is it? Sure, why not. Just as we draw things we see, or just as we sing songs during karaoke, we are still practicing art, even if it is with the greater help of someone else. It is a stepping stone, sometimes one that people stay on, but a step none-the-less. How many writers started out by saying “I wonder what happened afterwards…” and even if we didn’t write it down, those thoughts shaped into plots and characters, turning into afternoons with legos and transformers, or friends with swords and jungle gyms.

I found myself back in fan fiction recently. I started having dreams, vivid dreams that I would write down each morning of fantastic adventures across time. I was bemused at first, curious as time went on, and then it happened. I got the fever, the urge, and my figures found a keyboard and I started to write. Still the dreams came and still they fueled me.

Doctor Who is something I came to much later in my geekedness than I should admit to. Sure I’d heard of this dude with a long scarf, but it wasn’t until a few years ago I’d seen even one episode. SInce then I have consumed and consumed, wearing out my Netflix streaming with Tom Baker, Christopher Eccleston, and David Tennant.

Now I have these dreams, now I have these words, what should I do with them? I am not going to stop writing them. I had been in a lull, in a bind, this awkward place where the words just weren’t coming. Sure you force yourself, but those are the ones that get left behind I find. These words, these tales of a Doctor that showed up in my dreams were not forced. They just start as I place my hands on the keyboard.

So I am going to post them, episodically, of course, here. Not for fame or glory, but to share an adventure with some friends. I hope they are as much fun to read as they were to write.

Some Short Fiction

I saw this article on NPR about ‘hint fiction’

http://www.npr.org/2010/11/12/131276783/-hint-fiction-celebrates-the-extremely-short-story

Really, Really short stories. Reminded me of Necon books flash fiction (http://www.neconebooks.com/flash.htm) which I have submitted a few things to.

Long fiction has its own set of difficulties. Personally, I have been most successful with a standard short story length to work with, especially in the realm of horror. In horror where mood and atmosphere are so important it is easy for a long work to turn into more action/horror or mystery/horror.

Short, short fiction has a completely different set of issues. How do you convey plot, characterization or even setting in less than 100 words? How do you tell something in less than 140 characters? It is hard, and yet easy too. We already tell these stories to each other as we talk.

I have found it an interesting format to play with, and while none of my stories have been accepted at Necon Books yet, I thought I’d post them anyway. These are 100 words or less, so slightly longer than the ones in the NPR post.

Unbound

He knelt down in front of me, running the edge of the short curved blade over my cheek. The blade had been coated in rust, but a recent sharpening had created a silver edge.
“This is going to hurt,” he said, looking in my eyes.
“You have no idea,” I replied, the bindings on my left hand finally becoming loose enough to slip off.

Father Knows Best

My son stood in his underwear in the center of the dining room. He held a long kitchen knife in both hands near his face and was slowly running his tongue along it.
Crimson covered the blade, his face and body, and splotches could be seen throughout the room.
“How many times,” I started, in my stern father voice pointing one finger at him, “do I have to tell you? This is not what it means to ‘have a friend over for dinner’?”

Trick or Treat

Her high heals made a clicking sound that echoed off the buildings in the alleyway.
“Happy Halloween,” he said.
She turned.
“Are you following me?” She asked. He did not answer.
“Trick or treat,” he asked.
“Trick,” she said, smiling, pulling out a concealed blade and stabbing it deep into his ribcage.
“I was thinking treat,” he replied, grabbing her shoulders and sinking his fangs into her neck.

Life After the Word Processor, part two

Ok, so in that previous post I talked how I was dealing with storing information. Because let’s face it, even if I wasn’t a writer, there is a lot of it out there. And usually isn’t very well organized.

But what of these programs for writers? You’ve seen them in the stores: WRITE YOUR NOVEL NOW! and has some author you’ve never heard of saying that they’d not have been able to do anything without Program X.

Now why would I need program X, I’d always say, when I have a word processor? What could it do beyond, you know, typing?

Then I got an email from Mariner Software about Storymill, which is their program X. Since I have and like Mac Journal (using it now to write this entry!), I went and took a look. Now my thoughts were, what can this thing do that Mac Journal or NeoOffice can’t?

The short version is nothing. My word processor and some folders can do anything Storymill can do. My word processor and Mac Journal can do anything Storymill can do. Hell, text edit and some proper file names can do all of this. So why did I find myself drawn again and again to Storymill?

Presentation and packaging which has to be the software equivalent of “Location, Location, Location.”

Storymill provides a single user interface for writing of scenes, which are then grouped into chapters, of character bios, place descriptions, even outside research. All of these can be tagged, marked and labeled with ‘1st draft“, ”final draft“ etc.

This organization allows you to have all your information right there in front of you. ”Now what color was that dudes hair?“ We’ve been there before. You just click on the characters tab and find him and there he is. Scenes can be marked with who is in them, so you can at a glance see which characters are in which scene.

The scenes are then put into chapters. From there you can read through in the chapter the scenes. This makes moving scenes around easier. Decide you want to talk more about the good guys in the coffee shop before you show the bad guy again? just drag the scene order to how you want it.

There is a timeline feature which lets you tag scenes with a specific date and time. Then you can seem then laid out on the time line arranged by character storyline. This will help keep you from having a character in two places at once.

It even has a ‘progress’ meter. Say you have a daily goal of 1000 words, or writing for 20 minutes? You put that in, and the meter up top will let you know when you get to your goal.

My only wish is that it worked better with Mac Journal. I already start small ideas, even have written a short story or two in MJ. It would be nice if i could link say a research entry in Storymill with a journal entry in Mac Journal so it was updated from either program.

Is this better than NeoOffice? in the end it is all about how you work, how you use these things. In the end, the words on the screen are the important part, now how many bells your software has (well, unless you are writing software, but that is another post I suppose).

I can see myself using StoryMill to write and organize, but at the same time it falls into the previous entry’s issue with too many programs taking notes. In the end I still need to be properly organized with my information so that it can be found. (hence wishing it linked up with MJ)