forever we try

I wrote two treats for multifandomdrabble  (both of them were single drabbles, so just 200 words all together) a few days ago and might try to go back and write some more. They're lots of great prompts floating around that exchange, and for whatever reason my energy to write and complete stories--and especially longer stories--has been at around 0.01% for the past couple weeks and especially the past couple days. I've got an idea for one longer fic that's been in the pipeline for a good while now, and even though I want to write it badly and I've tried to hack it around four separate times, nothing's quite gelling so far. The logical half of my brain knows that I should just let it rest and percolate a bit more, but the illogical half of my brain doesn't want to do that AT ALL, because what if I never finish it, or by the time I finish it the fandom's gone dead, or, or, or...but I'll try to calm down and focus on other things. Really.

Other Things:

I'm happy with my final grade for the summer class, season 3 of Stranger Things is only three days away (!!!), I've been reading--and finishing--a good number of books and short stories, so I should probably write up some reviews, my sister is coming home for a long weekend for July 4th, I've been listening to more musicals and enjoying all of them, and the weather's been hot but not atrociously hot, which is never a guarantee. The peaches on our tree out back also look like they're starting to ripen, and I'd like to try making something other than peach cobbler this year. Maybe poached peaches? Or peach pie? 

I spent most all of my free time last week writing 12kish words of Hades/Persephone babyfic and about killed my brain in the process--it's been a while since I wrote anything over 2,000-3,000 words and finals week is coming up FAST--but also I regret nothing because Hades/Persephone babyfic. I don't know if anyone has an undying need for the most dysfunctional couple ever to start procreating, but if you do...here it is. As always there are a whole bunch of things I'd fix if I had more time/knew how to, but overall I'm not completely ashamed of it, which is always a good thing. I just wish there was more kid/babyfic in the Hadestown fandom specifically, because I, for one, do have an undying need to see the most dysfunctional couple ever with babies, and writing your own fics is great but never quite the same as reading someone else's. 

So, yeah. I think I'm going through the worst of my Hadestown obsessive spiral right now, which isn't super ideal when it comes to the timing of final exams and papers but is at least a nice distraction. Also, we've just started to get more spring-like weather around here, so listening to the recording on repeat feels especially appropriate. :) The cyclical nature of the story--at least when it comes to the gods; Orpheus and Eurydice don't get the luxury of trying over and over and over again--makes me so hopeful and sad at the same time; so does the theme of art being both enough and absolutely not enough. I'm probably biased in her favor, anyway, but Eurydice doesn't make any choices that I probably wouldn't make if I were in the same situation, and the fact that she makes what seems to be the best choice at the time and ends up trapped in Hadestown for eternity...if it comes down to a choice between your true love and, y'know, having enough food to get you through the winter, I can't see all that many people deciding any differently than she did. That being said, I do love Orpheus. I love pretty much everyone, and there's no clear-cut villain in the story, even when it comes to Hades, and it makes the whole thing 100x better and 100x sadder.  

A couple entries ago I said I was burned out when it came to Stranger Things fic; since then I've written two new ST fics because...it's only when I completely give up on something that I find the inspiration to go at it again? Anyway, here's the latest, which involves a friendship I'd really, really love to see become canon in s3:

Title: i fought the law (and the law won)
Fandom: Stranger Things
Rating: General Audiences 
Relationships: Max Mayfield & Jim Hopper
Summary: “Hey, I’m not the one who said I had to be here.”(Or, Max and Hopper bond over one of the chief's favorite books.)


Seeing as they're two of my favorite characters--and the only two ST Funko Pop!s I own--it took me a ridiculously long time to come up with a story where Max and Hopper get to know each other a little better, or at least one that I liked. I think it mostly came down to me being a little nervous to write from either of their POVs; they both have pretty distinctive voices, and I didn't want to screw those voices up. 

But I do think these two could develop a FANTASTIC friendship; they both have similar styles of sarcastic, deadpan humor, and a love of reading (technically, we only really know of that being true in Hopper's case so far, but come on--you can't tell me that Max, who uses words like "presumptuous" in her everyday life, isn't a bookworm). Maybe s2 just spoiled me for unexpectedly awesome friendships and team-ups; Steve and Dustin was never one I would have predicted and loved to bits. And this would be a nice one to see come s3. 

(In other writing news, there's a reason I try not to reread most of my old fics, and the reason is I always stumble across some tiny-but-widespread "mistake" that bugs the heck out of me but that I'm also too lazy to go through and fix [and, in the case of some of my older stuff that's not getting much traffic anymore, there's no real reason to fix it, anyway]. This time around I was looking at one of my stories and noticed that I used the character's first name in a bunch of places where I could have just as easily substituted it for "he" and the whole thing wouldn't have sounded quite as repetitive. Which is something I'm sure someone reading the story for the first time wouldn't notice or care about, but it's still niggling at me. Ugh. Why is my brain like this?)

This evening I turned in the new hire paperwork for my summer job, so hopefully that will be starting up soon. I'm also (*goes to check*) exactly 431 pages into The Stand, and I think I've found one of my favorite characters. I was spoiled for the basic plot of the book quite a while before I started reading, so I know basically nothing ends up turning out well for Nadine Cross, but boy, do I love her already. The whole tragic destiny bit is probably part of it, but  so far she's both very compassionate and very calculating; tragic destiny aside, she's one of the survivors I'd most like to team up with, and feel safest with. Larry Underwood's a close second, even if I have a sneaking suspicion that that might have more to do with the fact that Stephen King fancasts him as Bruce Springsteen... 

More specifically, it's great to have finally finished something; another girl!Peter GOTG fic is up and posted on AO3. Honestly, I'm mostly glad that I finally did manage to finish something again--life has been so crazy that for the past month or so pretty much nothing writing-related that I wanted to get done got done. That includes journaling, so I'll try to get back to updating regularishly in the next couple of days, or at least by the end of the semester. (Only three more weeks!) 

Smooshing two together again!

Day 9:

In your own space, post a rec for at least three fanworks that you have created. It can be your favorite fanworks that you've created, or fanworks you feel no one ever saw, or fanworks you say would define you as a creator. 

Went with three that define me as a creator. Kind of.  I think these stories all give a pretty good idea of what I tend to go for when I'm writing fic. So, in a word, tons of gen-y found family feels, and a smidge of shippy angst. 

Mommy's All Right, Daddy's All Right (GOTG): If I'm remembering it right (and I'm probably not) I started this fic the night I got home from seeing GOTG Vol. 2 for the first time. I have a HUGE soft spot for genderbent AUs, and the idea of a tiny girl Peter growing up scrappy and a little broken on a ship full of Ravagers just grabbed hold of me and wouldn't let go. The main focus of the fic, obviously, is her relationship with Yondu. I loved thinking about how that dynamic might change with a Petra Jean versus a Peter Jason, but the funny thing is that, at the end of the day, the key parts of it (Pete's hatred of the way Yondu raised her, and Yondu's inability to communicate his love in any way anyone would consider healthy) didn't change all that much. Reading back over this story is a weird experience; there're things I would have definitely changed if I'd written it even a month or two later, but I do love it all the same.  

Every Night You Stay (Stranger Things): A quick and messy fic set in the aftermath of the last episode of S2. Like the girl!Peter fic, this one has a huge focus on found family and I loved getting the chance to write dialogue for so many different characters at once. It's also a bit of an Outsider POV fic (since the entire thing is told from Nancy's perspective and she's observing how everyone else handles the trauma as well as her own feelings about it), and I love me a good Outsider POV story. 

you know i can't just let you be (The Punisher): In general, I write more purely gen stuff than purely shippy stuff, but this story was my first completed attempt at a pairing I happen to love with all my heart and soul. I'm including it here for the angsty argument that ends with bed-sharing (otherwise known as my absolute favorite romance trope. Ever.)

Day 10:

In your own space, share your love for a trope, cliché, kink, motif, or theme. (Or a few!) Tell us what makes it work for you, and why it appeals to you so much. Talk about what you like to see in fanworks featuring that theme most. Feel free to include recs and examples! 

Found family. Found family all the way. 

I don't know exactly why this trope gets me as much as it does, but I've loved it since I was old enough to start reading stories on my own (and probably even before then). There's just something about the idea of a band of scrappy and imperfect people drawn together (bonus points if they're reluctantly drawn together!) into their own scrappy and imperfect version of what a family means that gets me. Every time. Maybe it's because I like angst and family drama, and found families tend to have both in abundance. Going deeper, though, I guess I could say it's because the found family trope is a wonderful way to explore how complicated, loving relationships can grow between the most unlikely pairs of people. The ones you'd never, in a million years, assume would get along. And that's my very, very favorite thing. 

I'd include recs, but about 95% of the stories (both original and fic) that I read feature some kind of found family, so it would be a long list. Off the top of my head, though, books by Ursula K. Le Guin, S.E. Hinton, Diana Wynne Jones, and Melina Marchetta are pretty often gold mines for this trope, sholio  writes wonderful found family fics (especially in the GOTG and Stranger Things fandoms), and two 2017 movies that (in my opinion, anyway) fit the trope to a T were GOTG Vol. 2 and Logan. 

Yesterday Google's fall equinox doodle warmed me to the bottom of my Beatrix-Potter-loving, Brambly-Hedge-obsessed heart. Too bad the weather around here hasn't changed since August. It is supposed to cool down a little some time next week (or is it the week after next week?), though, so there's that. 

Today I also headed over to the library for the first time since classes started. Checked out The Likeness by Tana French and Into the Wilderness by Sara Donati; realistically I might not have the time to finish either of them but I'd like to at least give The Likeness my best shot. It's one of the two Dublin Murder Squad books that I haven't read yet, and the one with the strangest (in the best way) plot. Plus, I've been dying for some non-assigned reading since Monday. Fourth week of the semester is when things start to get seriously stressful--I did sneak some writing in, anyway, but I've fallen totally off the wagon when it comes to reading.

Speaking of writing, I'm going to do my level best to finish the latest Pete fic this weekend. I've got...maybe four or so pages to go? Not completely sure, but I'm down to the final stretch and everyone's been so sweet and patient and I just need to get this thing done. And then move on to the story. Even if I don't finish it, I'd like to at least get the bulk of the last major scene done so I'll only have a few loose ends to tie up come Monday. 

The only other even slightly interesting thing I did this week was baking London Fog shortbread. I used this recipe and bypassed a couple steps (didn't bother chilling the cookies once I'd cut them out) but they turned out very good. I'm not a huge fan of Earl Gray on its own, but I love it in shortbread. So I spent Friday evening baking shortbread, then eating shortbread in front of Call the Midwife with my sister. Not a bad way to start the weekend. 

And, last but not least, we finally have a trailer for The Punisher! I'm trying to stay a little skeptical, just so I won't build it up to some impossible ideal, especially when it comes to Frank and Karen...but I'm so, so excited. I hope this ends up being good. I really do. 

Last week I started working on an original short story, and yesterday I quit working on it. Not that what I'd written was bad--they're a few parts that I happen to like a lot--but there just wasn't enough there to keep it going. Spark, heart, whatever you want to call it. For that reason I'm not upset that I abandoned it...I'm more upset with myself, because I know why I tried to write something I didn't even want to write in the first place: as much as I love writing fanfic, I never feel like it's enough. I really wish I did.
( Whining ahead. )
Welp, this turned out to be less "Thoughts on Unfinished Things" and more "Thoughts on My All-Consuming Anxiety", which I'm sure will be an uplifting and compelling read. Ugh. But it's out of my head now, at least for a little while, and that can only be a good thing.

Whew! Sorry about my last few posts--they've been lackluster, mostly because I feel lackluster, or at least drained. Wrapping up the big bang fic is eating up all my motivation and inspiration, but I've finally cleared the minimum word count and things are starting to wind down towards an ending. Parts of this fic I love. Other parts I'm not wild over. But it's the longest thing I've written in years, and I still can't quite believe that I'm about to finish it. There's a quote--okay, calling it a "quote" is pretty strong; I think it's actually something Georgia from My Favorite Murder said--anyway, there's a line about how perfection isn't the point, but making things--even imperfect things--is. That's how I feel about this fic. Will it be perfect? Not even close. But who cares? It'll be there. 

Yeah, I'm a little emotional over this. Also really, really ready for it to be done. 

I've been making an effort to read more in order to combat the whole drained-of-any-extra-inspiration feeling. Just started Leviathan Wakes, the first book in The Expanse series. I'm up to chapter eight, and even though no single character has especially grabbed me yet, the worldbuilding's fantastic and I'm excited by the hints of deeper creepiness to come. Nonfiction-wise, I'm well into another Ann Rule book (Small Sacrifices). With both these books, I feel like I'm gulping down the main story without savoring (or even absorbing) most of the details. Oh, well. I can always reread, and at least I am reading; whenever I get deep into a fic I tend to forget to read enough. And then wonder why my all my inspiration is suddenly gone. 

(Also, Pacific Rim: Tales From Year Zero has been sitting on my desk's bookshelf since Christmas and somehow I've barely cracked the cover. This needs to change. Soon.)

So. One of my newest (and, let's be honest, only) writing goals is to write 500 words of the Defenders Big Bang fic every day until it's finished. And so far that's been working pretty well. I have two weeks to go before the deadline, and only about 3,000 words until I clear the minimum wordcount (10,000 words). Depending on a routine instead of inspiration has helped me get back on track with this thing, and having a specific goal in mind helps me sit down and get it done without wasting time. Okay, I still do waste time. But maybe not as much time as I usually do. I should probably definitely try this with my other projects. It's one of those stupidly simple strategies that I should have thought of ages before now--which is probably why I never did. Oh well. I'm doing it now, and it's been a huge help.