Year in Review
Jan. 1st, 2011 01:32 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
shah_of_blahToday is my third LJ anniversary! Happy anniversary to me. And happy new year to all of my flisters! Last night, I was in this bar and the bathroom walls were covered in graffiti. All sorts of messages, but my favorite was easily this one: "I am a leaf on the wind. Watch how I soar." Someone had also written "RIP Wash" next to it, and another Browncoat had written some of the lyrics to "The Hero of Canton." It was one of those little instances that made me happy to be a nerd.
Anyway, onto the year in fic.
February
Drive
April
Remix: What Happens in the Conference Room
May
Lift Me Up
June
With the Tide
The Breath Between (1-4)
September
Drabbles: Fall and Wax Wings
October
Lessons
Avow and Affirm (random little not-a-drabble)
November
Snow Day
Drink in the Dawn
December
Save the Last Dance
Total: 12 fics, including random drabble-y things. One remix, three crossovers, one multi-chapter fic. Three as-yet-unwritten WIPs. Approximately 26,300 words.
My favorite story: “The Breath Between”, hands down. The others just don’t really compare. I spent months on this fic. There were tears. And there was joy too, lots of joy. Oddly enough, the only other one that really compares might be the drabble “Icarus.” I just really liked that little drabble. Opposite ends of the spectrum there.
My best story: Again, I have to say “The Breath Between.” I always think these two questions are odd because my answers tend to be the same. It wouldn’t be my favorite if I didn’t think it was the best.
Story most under-appreciated by the universe: "Drink in the Dawn." I understand why it wouldn’t have a large audience—it’s a crossover, and the DW character (Jackie) isn’t one that tends to draw people. It’s hardly an exciting fic. There’s no Doctor, no TARDIS, just Kara and Jackie in a bar. They don’t even have particularly significant interactions. But I liked the idea (and challenge!) of drawing a connection between two characters who are so different.
Most fun story: “What Happens in the Conference Room,” most likely. I regretted not signing up for the remix challenge, so I was very happy to jump in as a pinch-hitter! And then da_angel729 posted this hilarious story, and I just had to run with it.
Sexiest story: "The Breath Between" is the only one that actually has sex in it (not explicit, but they are doing it you know). In a weird way, though, I think Lift Me Up is kind of sexy. In a we’re-so-tired-and-hungry-and-frakked-up kind of way. Which maybe isn’t that sexy.
Hardest story to write: Um…The Breath Between? A lot of them were tricky for different reasons though. I actually scrapped a draft of “With the Tide” and started over, which is something that I rarely do with fanfiction. It was hard to find a voice and a tone for that one. “Drink in the Dawn” was hard because, as I said before, Kara and Jackie don’t really go together. I never would have thought to write about the two of them. Lastly, the pilots_presents fic was really hard just because it was finals and I had so much other writing to do and I didn’t really know what I was doing until the last minute.
Favorite title to a story: “The Breath Between.” Somewhere I have a list of titles that I was thinking about, but when I settled on that one it felt really good. I enjoyed knowing the title as I was writing too because that gave me the freedom to really draw it into the story with various uses of “breath” and “between.” Maybe not subtle, but I enjoyed really trying to write meaning into the story on a very word-by-word level, and the title helped crystallize that.
Technique/style I’ve done well: Urghhh I don’t know.
Something I’d like to work on in the future: Every year I say plot. It’s not a strong point. I did work on it this year with TBB, but it’s still a weakness.
Stories I am currently (more or less) working on: My eternally unfinished plotfic which I haven’t worked on in months. A crazy crossover with BSG/DW/Firefly/Chuck that I started early in the year, and a BSG/Firefly crossover that I started over a year ago and haven’t worked on in ages either.
Did I write more/less than I thought I would? Maybe less, or about as expected. Every year I seem to write fewer stories than the year before. Whoops. I didn’t write very many stories in the early months because I was working on my pilotsbigbang, and then I don’t know what I was doing all summer. Not writing, evidently. In the fall, I wasn’t expecting to write much fanfiction and I didn’t, as all of my writerly time and energy has gone towards original fiction.
Did I take any writing risks this year? Sure I did! TBB was a bit outside my comfort zone, in that it has an actual plot. With the Tide meant writing a new fandom and a new character (Sayid). Drink in the Dawn had a bit of the same risk--I'm more comfortable with DW than Lost, but trying to find common ground between Jackie Tyler and Kara Thrace was not easy.
Do I have any goals for the new year? I would like to at least begin posting one of my WIPs. Any one. We'll see.
Favorite line(s):
This passage from TBB is one of my favorites, although I do cringe a bit because after posting the story I noticed an internal contradiction with this and an earlier scene. But maybe you guys didn't notice!
The problem is when he wakes in the dark and feels her sleeping beside him. He feels her warmth, feels her breath, and imagines he can feel her heart beating. But in the dark, it’s easier to doubt, easier to remember her voice, aching and desperate, crying let me go. In this moment, he wants to reach out and touch her, wrap his arms around her; he thinks he wants this more than he has ever wanted anything.
But he doesn’t reach out. He doesn’t reach out because here, in the dark, the fear that his hand will meet only empty air is crippling, so crippling that he can only choke down his sobs and gasp voicelessly so that she doesn’t wake. His open eyes see little in the dark, so he closes them. The afterimage of colors bursting and fading is bright, too bright, but it’s not of light and it’s not something he can blink away.
Anyway, onto the year in fic.
February
Drive
April
Remix: What Happens in the Conference Room
May
Lift Me Up
June
With the Tide
The Breath Between (1-4)
September
Drabbles: Fall and Wax Wings
October
Lessons
Avow and Affirm (random little not-a-drabble)
November
Snow Day
Drink in the Dawn
December
Save the Last Dance
Total: 12 fics, including random drabble-y things. One remix, three crossovers, one multi-chapter fic. Three as-yet-unwritten WIPs. Approximately 26,300 words.
My favorite story: “The Breath Between”, hands down. The others just don’t really compare. I spent months on this fic. There were tears. And there was joy too, lots of joy. Oddly enough, the only other one that really compares might be the drabble “Icarus.” I just really liked that little drabble. Opposite ends of the spectrum there.
My best story: Again, I have to say “The Breath Between.” I always think these two questions are odd because my answers tend to be the same. It wouldn’t be my favorite if I didn’t think it was the best.
Story most under-appreciated by the universe: "Drink in the Dawn." I understand why it wouldn’t have a large audience—it’s a crossover, and the DW character (Jackie) isn’t one that tends to draw people. It’s hardly an exciting fic. There’s no Doctor, no TARDIS, just Kara and Jackie in a bar. They don’t even have particularly significant interactions. But I liked the idea (and challenge!) of drawing a connection between two characters who are so different.
Most fun story: “What Happens in the Conference Room,” most likely. I regretted not signing up for the remix challenge, so I was very happy to jump in as a pinch-hitter! And then da_angel729 posted this hilarious story, and I just had to run with it.
Sexiest story: "The Breath Between" is the only one that actually has sex in it (not explicit, but they are doing it you know). In a weird way, though, I think Lift Me Up is kind of sexy. In a we’re-so-tired-and-hungry-and-frakked-up kind of way. Which maybe isn’t that sexy.
Hardest story to write: Um…The Breath Between? A lot of them were tricky for different reasons though. I actually scrapped a draft of “With the Tide” and started over, which is something that I rarely do with fanfiction. It was hard to find a voice and a tone for that one. “Drink in the Dawn” was hard because, as I said before, Kara and Jackie don’t really go together. I never would have thought to write about the two of them. Lastly, the pilots_presents fic was really hard just because it was finals and I had so much other writing to do and I didn’t really know what I was doing until the last minute.
Favorite title to a story: “The Breath Between.” Somewhere I have a list of titles that I was thinking about, but when I settled on that one it felt really good. I enjoyed knowing the title as I was writing too because that gave me the freedom to really draw it into the story with various uses of “breath” and “between.” Maybe not subtle, but I enjoyed really trying to write meaning into the story on a very word-by-word level, and the title helped crystallize that.
Technique/style I’ve done well: Urghhh I don’t know.
Something I’d like to work on in the future: Every year I say plot. It’s not a strong point. I did work on it this year with TBB, but it’s still a weakness.
Stories I am currently (more or less) working on: My eternally unfinished plotfic which I haven’t worked on in months. A crazy crossover with BSG/DW/Firefly/Chuck that I started early in the year, and a BSG/Firefly crossover that I started over a year ago and haven’t worked on in ages either.
Did I write more/less than I thought I would? Maybe less, or about as expected. Every year I seem to write fewer stories than the year before. Whoops. I didn’t write very many stories in the early months because I was working on my pilotsbigbang, and then I don’t know what I was doing all summer. Not writing, evidently. In the fall, I wasn’t expecting to write much fanfiction and I didn’t, as all of my writerly time and energy has gone towards original fiction.
Did I take any writing risks this year? Sure I did! TBB was a bit outside my comfort zone, in that it has an actual plot. With the Tide meant writing a new fandom and a new character (Sayid). Drink in the Dawn had a bit of the same risk--I'm more comfortable with DW than Lost, but trying to find common ground between Jackie Tyler and Kara Thrace was not easy.
Do I have any goals for the new year? I would like to at least begin posting one of my WIPs. Any one. We'll see.
Favorite line(s):
This passage from TBB is one of my favorites, although I do cringe a bit because after posting the story I noticed an internal contradiction with this and an earlier scene. But maybe you guys didn't notice!
The problem is when he wakes in the dark and feels her sleeping beside him. He feels her warmth, feels her breath, and imagines he can feel her heart beating. But in the dark, it’s easier to doubt, easier to remember her voice, aching and desperate, crying let me go. In this moment, he wants to reach out and touch her, wrap his arms around her; he thinks he wants this more than he has ever wanted anything.
But he doesn’t reach out. He doesn’t reach out because here, in the dark, the fear that his hand will meet only empty air is crippling, so crippling that he can only choke down his sobs and gasp voicelessly so that she doesn’t wake. His open eyes see little in the dark, so he closes them. The afterimage of colors bursting and fading is bright, too bright, but it’s not of light and it’s not something he can blink away.
