Writing meme

[unfeathered]

Seen absolutely everywhere on my flist:

What would you say are the trademarks of my writing? What themes or quirks or turns of phrase have you noticed? What is it that makes a story by me -- well, a story by me?

This is going to be interesting... :-)

Comments

[fandom-me.livejournal.com]

It doesn't flinch - even when it would make me flinch. *G*

[unfeathered]

Thank you! And... what did you flinch at that I didn't?

[fandom-me.livejournal.com]

The first Jack/Master sex scene. I flinched SO HARD. (I have weird issues - I should go into them sometime, but they're bizarre and personal.)

[unfeathered]

Oh, yes, I remember now. I got all worried 'cos you said you were uncomfortable.

But if it's a personal thing for you and not for me, it makes sense that you would flinch and I wouldn't.

[fandom-me.livejournal.com]

I think most things that make people are uncomfortable are. Personal, I mean.

I flinch at cross-dressing, foodplay, sex toys and the word clit. It's not past trauma or anything, it's just me and my weird brain.

[unfeathered]

If by 'flinch' here we mean 'wouldn't want to write' rather than 'absolutely couldn't write even if the scene really, really demanded it', I'd say I flinch at cross-dressing and foodplay too. And humiliation, which I know you've mentioned before. And possibly the word clit, but more precisely sex with females (which I know you've written about before too) - I'll read it but I have no desire to write it.

I'm intrigued by you flinching at sex toys, though...

[fandom-me.livejournal.com]

Humiliation, too, yeah. I can not not not humiliate my characters. I especially can't have them get off on it. I. I've never written sex with females. I am uncomfortable with a lot of it. I think I can do it, though. >.>

Sex toys are something I associate with humliation. Don't ask me why - I just do.

[unfeathered]

Maybe this is why I like your writing so much (well, one reason) - because you don't like the same things I don't like!

Sex toys = humiliation, though. That's just weird! *g*

[fandom-me.livejournal.com]

VERY possible *G*

To be honest, it's not all sex toys. Those electric cuffs? OK! SOunding rod? All right. Gags or plugs? Bother me. I think it's sexually penetrated with an object, and that leads to objectification/depersonalization and that leads to humilation.

...I am *definitely* weird.

[unfeathered]

You're not weird. I can totally see what you mean. And tbh, plugs and dildos don't really do it for me either. I'd rather have someone using their fingers or their - you know - cock!

Yeah, actually. Jack and the plug... I think I squirmed just a tiny bit there too. Not enough to not write it. But... the rest of that scene turned me on (even though, yeah, bit of humiliation going on there). But the plug definitely didn't.

Gags... Not sure. So many variations. But I can see how that can tie in to humiliation again.

[fandom-me.livejournal.com]

Between you and me? I almost like fingers more than actual dick in whatever sex. There's something *really* intimate about it that gets to me. Go figure.

and yeah, that kind of thing I think is exactly what I was talking about, and gagging definitely depends. They also scare me, to be frank. I'm the real world BDSM girl. Gags come with dangers and I spend so much time wigging at that that I can't quite get past it.

[unfeathered]

Yeah, fingers are good because they're more... precise, I suppose.

The other thing about gags - for writing, anyway - is you then cut off a lot of the ways a character can express themselves - not just not being able to speak, but you can't see all their face either.

[fandom-me.livejournal.com]

Yep. Depends on the gag - again - a lot of them are more suggestive than actually restrictive, very few of them cut off sound, but. Just. No. It's such a real life hard line for me that I can't quite even cross it in fiction, unless I intend it to go really wrong.

[mad-jaks.livejournal.com]

I - *that's me* *those* are the things I flinch at...

although I have actually written food sex kinda - it took me ages - as a favour for a friend... I can see it as a sensuous thing and I can see its place in fiction just once you're doing anything past putting it your mouths/ licking it off fingers - *ick*

[fandom-me.livejournal.com]

That makes me feel so less bizarre - seriously, just incredibly.

And, that's exactly me, too!. I can see food as sensual, and I can see Jack LOVING Food, because he loves sex, but I can NOT write sex with food - not foreplay, not the licking off fingers, just eating it - SEX. It just. Icks me.

[unfeathered]

It's messy, that's my reason. I don't like mess.

[fandom-me.livejournal.com]

Messy and sticky and *AGAIN!* penetration in a sexual way with something not attached to the person doing the penetrator. Or it's just a gross messy barrier.

[mad-jaks.livejournal.com]

I have a feeling that's a lot to do with it for me too. It's like my thoughts on spanking being too loud: I can't write that either because my logic says everything stops when there's a loud noise :D

[fandom-me.livejournal.com]

Twack! Screech! Flail!

Kinda cuts into the mood, sometimes.

[mad-jaks.livejournal.com]

It *really* does and *that* (the cutting into the mood) is definitely why sex toys don't really work for me either (reading or writing) unless -& Master Plan's a good one for this - it is 'action off screen' as it were.

[fandom-me.livejournal.com]

There's also issues with repetitive action - a lot of sex toys and many kinks require that kind of thing. You get jarred out of the action and the character because it goes on and on and you have to *Really* watch the pacing and just. Yeah. Fix your POV and it's less an issue, but. IT's still difficult to do well.

And sex toys *Definitely* can cut into the intimacy of the POV.

[donutsweeper.livejournal.com]

ahh, You're the first person I read who wrote believeable slash, so that'll always be some part of what I think of your writing.

I tend to group you with becky, in the snapshot style of writing (I know this goes completely against The Master Plan, as well as Connection, etc... but who ever said I made sense?) Your pieces always have a powerful emotion tied to it. Loss. Love. Sheer blow-me-away hotness. That sort of thing.

[unfeathered]

Wow, thank you! *huge grin*

And that is just completely weird to group me with Becky, because we're so different - but I guess since I've known her I have been trying out the short stuff a lot more, and using her stuff as a way of learning how to do short stuff, so I suppose it makes a sort of sense!

But long is very much my normal way of doing things.

Oh, and the last couple of lines of your comment have completely blown me away, so if I'm even more incoherent now, it's your fault!

[donutsweeper.livejournal.com]

That kind of blame I can live with.

[smithy161.livejournal.com]

An ability to take the reader out of their computer chair, out of their living room, and have them standing there in the story with the characters. I've been reading (slowly) 'Master Plan', and I keep having to remind myself I'm not on board the Valiant, standing just behind the Master's shoulder.

There's also the tendency for your stories to point something out to me that is (and this is totally a compliment) so very true to everything I get from canon. I tend to nod and say 'oh, absolutely' when reading your fic.

[unfeathered]

I like this meme! It's very good for bolstering confidence! :-)

That - about being on the Valiant etc. - is exactly how I am when I write. I'm there, I am standing just behind the Master (or whoever), I'm seeing it and hearing it and feeling it (though usually forgetting to touch and taste it) and, yeah. That's so cool to read that it works like that for the reader too.

And that it feels so right is a wonderful compliment. :-)

[http://users.livejournal.com/_medley_/]

I'm going to steal from Smithy a little and say that yes, I can't read your work without being RIGHT THERE. The immediacy of it, the detail...I'm very impressed by that. Also, with "Master Plan," the way everything the Master does makes sense to *him,* it's self-evident to *him,* even when it's batshit (*g*) -- you convey that very convincingly.

[unfeathered]

Thank you! That's... Wow.

I'm so chuffed that that all comes through. It really makes it feel worth it.

I mean, obviously, I'm pleased with what I've written too, otherwise I wouldn't post it, but to find out that other people are getting so much from it is... a little overwhelming.

[morgynleri]

As has been said, there's the sense of being there, but since I tend not to read stuff if it doesn't give me that escape of being not in the real world, that isn't as distinctive in my reading.

The visual nature of it is really nice, and the auditory, though I do miss the tactile (probably because I'm a relatively tactile person!). It's like watching the episodes; I still have the sense of escapism, and its like I'm watching it on my TV, with a live feed from a camera that no one notices.

Getting into the mind of the character is what I notice most. You get into their thoughts, their motivations, and it's a thrill to see that so... intimately, even when it's third person.

[unfeathered]

It's so cool that everyone is saying this. I wasn't quite sure what to expect from this meme, but this is way beyond whatever it was! It's just so great that what I feel I'm writing is actually what people are reading! And even more so than I realised.

Your comment about a camera that no-one notices is fantastic!

The motivations thing is something I got from Becky going on and on about it - and I've now got to the point where I actually know why something isn't working - it's because I haven't got the characters' motivations sorted out in my own head.

I'm grinning madly from all your compliments! :-)

(And I'm sorry I haven't got back to Brit-picking your stuff yet. Things have been made around here - and in my brain - recently, but as soon as I get a lull I will have another go!)

[morgynleri]

*offers chocolate-chip cookies*

Motivations are what I usually refer to as "getting into a character's head", so I know about not getting them right. Particularly with one character, and I'm not going to get started, because a page of rant on Dumbledore being an impossible old git of a muse really isn't what I want to do right now.

Heh. Good to make someone happy. Makes my day better.

No worries about delays in the Brit-picking. I've currently been pounced upon by a different muse with original stuff. Well, a couple. One in the same universe as Max and Vain, the other the titular character of another universe. And Gideon has his own set of oddities... fortunately, not accent. History, though, I suspect I shall have entirely too much fun with.

[unfeathered]

Just come back to answer this after two days of in-depth conversations with my beta trying to get my head round S1 Jack - the first time I've ever really had trouble getting into someone's head, and I so didn't expect it to be JAck! I thought I'd have trouble with Rose and Nine, but they were fine. It's just Jack, because he's so very complicated and there's so much we don't know - and I've basically had to re-write my entire Rose and Jack fic because of that. And of course it's going to be so much better, but it threw me a little, because - as you said above - getting into characters' heads and motivations normally comes really easily to me!

Ah well... It wouldn't be art if we didn't have to suffer for it occasionally... *g*

[morgynleri]

I have trouble when I'm trying to write Rose, which may be why I'm just as happy doing Nine before he meets Rose, or AU Nine where he doesn't meet Rose... though the dynamics between him and Jack will be different without Rose... especially with the addition of, say, Vain, into the mix.

Which means the motivations change, and... *sighs* And my writing partner for that story vanished, which leaves the fun of Jack, Nine and Vain at the Apollo 11 launch hanging. Fortunately, well before I posted any of it. I might have to try and revamp it slightly, and write it all m'self... which isn't as much fun for something like that, 'cause it's all light-hearted and snark, not drama with hints of humour and angst both wound up in it.

[mad-jaks.livejournal.com]

I is a slavedriver yes?

[unfeathered]

Are you spying on me??? *g*

You're a very good slavedriver. I like to be challenged! :-)

[mad-jaks.livejournal.com]

No I-
Was looking to see if I'd actually commented on the original question andskimming through what people had already said - That's ALL honest *g*

[unfeathered]

Oh, all right, then - I'll let you off.

And no, you didn't actually answer the question! *g*

(Cool icon btw!)

[mad-jaks.livejournal.com]

I had a feeling I hadn't... I'll come back to it though ;)

[laurab1.livejournal.com]

The sheer glee in the Master's voice. And re what medley said, that's typical evil overlord villian behaviour, and very well done.

[unfeathered]

Thank you! I never thought I'd be able to write a villain like this, especially a rather silly one, so it's wonderful to hear how well it works for people!