I finished the much-referred-to fanfic. It ended up at 4000 words, the first 3900 of which flooded out of my hand basically without my direct participation. I love it when writing is like that.

If you're curious, you can read it here. (Is Fullmetal Alchemist movieverse, Ed/Alfons Heiderich.) Fanfic is just about the only fruit of my writing labors I feel OK posting in public. I've never been quite clear on where teh internets stands in relation to published vs. not and first printing rights and all, so I figure better safe than sorry.

Now I have to try to pick my next writing obsession before one picks me. :-) I'd like to work on the magician story, but given that it also features a character named Edward who's blond, in his early 20s, a college student, metaphysically far from home, AND missing a brother, there's a slight chance I might become confused.

Everything I know about 20th century history, I learned from anime

{Xpost from LJ}

The fic that has eat my brain, she 3200 words now and has keep me up til 5 AM twice. Also, I now am expert on Oktoberfest. Srsly, Jeopardy, have me on with Weimar Republic category. I be kick its ass.

Once upon a time, was a drabble. *hysterical laughter*

It's more than twice as long as any other fic I've ever posted.

This is actually great, because I love the thing, and now I know that I can do this - perform superhuman feats of sleep deprivation in service to writing. If I can hit this zone with original stuff, I'll be published in no time.

The lameness stops here!

I hope.

About 1000 words this week, on the crazy crossover. I'm happy with it - it's starting to take shape. More importantly, I wrote a little every day. Now I just need to write a little more every day.

I'm all about the FMA fic lately. I've got the cracktastic crossover (I keep calling it that though it's not really that crack-fueled, just something I've never seen done), the romantic comedy, and the dirty dirty smut. :)

I wish I knew how very fast writers do it. Do they never get stuck? Do they always know what happens next? I've known several people who write very fast and only produce crap, but I also know people who write good stuff at blazing speed. Sometimes I think they just happily write or type away without a care in the world, but I guess they probably worry that they're going too fast and might write better if they slowed down. The ink is always greener on the other side of the page, and all that.

BIC, week...um...purple

Because I'm lame.

About 950 words this week, but 130 or so go to the sequel to something I haven't finished yet, and the other 720 were dirty, dirty fanfic.

Still, they were pretty good words.

BIC results, week 1

BIC = "Butt In Chair" (tm Uncle Jim on AbsoluteWrite), i.e. put it there and write, every day, no matter what. Though for me it's actually Butt On Couch, since I write my first drafts longhand. This is apparently weird, but it's how I've always done it.

Anyway, I started applying it more seriously last week, and wrote 1633 words. Not as much as I'd hoped, but better than what I'd been getting with my old "write as inspiration strikes" method.

Stephen King and plotting

I'm not a huge fan of Stephen King, and I think this is mostly because I haven't yet gotten around to reading those books of his that would most suit my taste. But he is very good at what he does, and On Writing is one of my favorite books. One thing he says in it made me rethink my preconceptions and my approach to my own work.

He never plots.

For me, finding out that someone I consider a plot-heavy writer doesn't actually plot was a minor revelation. It made me feel like I had permission not to do it either, which was lovely, because I'm one of those "figure it out as you go along and hope it all connects" writers. My inspiration doesn't usually come to me as an idea; it comes in the form of a character in a situation.

The problem I'm having now is that a story involving time travel kind of has to be plotted out, or else you'll lose track of things. I think my characters can't really change that much about what has happened. Changing history takes a light touch, and you really have to know what you're doing. It's like trying to alter a tapestry that's already woven - you can fix detail work, but you can't redo major sections. (I know, tired comparison, but it makes sense.) If someone goes back in time to do something, it has always happened that way, whether or not anyone realizes it in the original timeline. And, like in Prisoner of Azkaban, you have to be able to go back and see that it has always happened that way.

Gah. I know my subconscious is working on this story, because last night I dreamed that Ewan MacGregor was playing Calvin in the movie version. (That's not how I picture Cal, but it does kinda work.) I just hope my subconscious actually tells me what it has figured out instead of skipping ahead to the red carpet. :)

Days late, dollars short

The Crapometer is closed, and yet I can't stop writing hooks. Here are two for the price of one:

(This is a paranormal romance that Silhouette probably wouldn't touch with a ten-foot pole, and it's called Desert Magic.)

It took Lexie Ryan years of archaeological detective work to find the lost city of Khansbarak.

Turns out that was the easy part.

As the excavation begins, Lexie and her team have to deal with sandstorms, equipment mysteriously going missing, and mass hallucinations. Lexie also has to deal with Kaveh Feroz, an observer from the local government who is attractive and charming, but has a knack for being in the wrong place at the wrong time.

Then Kaveh reveals that he isn't human at all but an ifrit, a spirit whose life is bound to the city's well-being. If the dig continues, he will die. Lexie has to chose between the find of a lifetime and the man she has fallen in love with.

***

(No title yet. True to form, until I have a real title, I am calling it something entirely goofy just to make myself laugh. It's currently known as "The Coed, The King, The Magician, and His Lover.")

Beth has a perfectly nice boyfriend; she's not supposed to fall in love.

Then again, deposed 15th-century kings are not supposed to turn up at modern-day liberal arts colleges.

Edward knows who wanted him out of the way. What he can't figure out is why his uncle and the corrupt court magician wanted him so far out of the way that they sent him over six centuries into the future. More importantly, he doesn't know who wants him and Beth dead in the present day.

When Beth and Edward turn to Calvin Mathiesen, the world's most famous (and most inept) magician, for help, the three of them discover a plot to thwart the proper course of history and take magic out of human hands entirely. Can they make things right before it's too late?