Veldeia's dreamwidth

So, I finally made a dreamwidth journal! I'm not planning on being particularly active here, so if you want to catch me, you might have better luck at tumblr or #cap-im chat, but feel free to friend me here too. :)

Now that the project of moving old fic over here and redoing the layout is done and over with, I'm off to work on more fic. Yay. Except that, well, not.

First of all, there's my tardis_bigbang fic. It's due in less than two weeks, and I've failed to find more than one beta for it - and having one person read it and say that it's OK wasn't enough to convince me that it doesn't suck. Especially since I asked four (4) people to beta it, and only one of them ever returned to me after saying that they can do it. I'm sure they have good reasons, but still... Grr. I hate looking for betas. It's always so incredibly difficult. btsxbeta, how I miss you! :( Too bad you don't do Doctor Who.

Secondly, I've got a Torchwood fic sitting around which I've outlined ages ago. I'd like to get to writing it one day, but at the moment, I've got far more inspiration for writing DW stuff, and since this would be an all-Torchwood fic with focus on Jack/Ianto and Owen, well... I don't know if it'll ever happen.

Thirdly, there's the sequel to Hollow World. I've been doing a rather ridiculous amount of background planning for it. I'd like it to be clearly different from HW, and a slightly more "intelligent" story - less predictable, with a more complicated plot. Unfortunately, the current outline has far too much talk and politics and not nearly enough action/adventure (let alone hurt/comfort) in it, which means that it seems boring to me. Blah. I'm afraid it's going to be Iron & Irony / Irony & Irony II all over again, where the first fic is cool, and the second is just trying too much. I started writing the story, anyway. Will probably have to finish several chapters before I can decide whether it's going to work and whether I'm going to actually start posting it.

/end fic-writing angsty whine.

Unlike before Christmas, I haven't made a dramatic, angsty "I'm not writing anymore" post. That means that, even though I haven't been posting, I haven't stopped writing! Yay. But what I'm writing, well, that's a whole other question. I guess I mentioned it somewhere that I've got ideas for more Bioses-stories, and I do, but I'm not writing those. To be honest, I don't know if I ever will.

What am I writing, then? Last week, on a whim, I went and dug up "Prehistoric Puzzle", my (forever?) unfinished Stargate SG-1 fic, part 3 of my SG-1 meets dinosaurs-trilogy. I actually wrote a new chapter for the fic. I would so love to finish it some day. The fact that it's unfinished really, really bugs me. But then again, I haven't written more of it after that one chapter. I've got an outline for the fic, I know what's going to happen, but I still don't know if I'll ever finish it, especially since it's hard to find the motivation to write something that I doubt anyone would be interested in reading anymore.

But forget about prehistoric SG-1 - after watching Torchwood, I naturally went on to watch Doctor Who, since I hadn't watched it before - I'm sort-of doing things backwards, yes, I know. Of course, I totally fell in love with it, too. Oh, yes. Actually, the 10th Doctor is probably my biggest fictional crush since Tony Stark. <3 <3 I'm obsessed and addicted and all that, now. Oh, dear. So, instead of writing one word of the all-Torchwood fic that I outlined weeks ago, I started writing a Doctor Who/Torchwood thing. Already done 4000 words, and this is a fic I'm pretty intent on finishing. So, watch out. One of these days, I may start posting time-traveling silliness!

(Oh, dear, how I need Doctor Who userpics. Stupid basic account 6 pic limit. Grr.)

Now that Iron & Irony: Second Encounters is posted in its entirety, I'm going to make an official announcement of sorts, to those few who might be interested: I'm retiring from writing fanfic for now. There are many reasons for this. For one, I haven't got a whole lot of inspiration to write these days, partly due to the drop in activity in the fandom in general. A more important reason is that I'm incredibly busy these days. I've got so much study-related writing to do that I simply haven't got the time or the energy for fanfic. This is the way my writing's always been. I get obsessed and write a lot for several months, and then, for one reason or the other, the inspiration and urge to write just fade away, only to be found again at some completely unexpected moment.

So, I'm probably not going to write any fic anytime in the near future. I might, if I suddenly get a huge attack of the plotbunnies/inspiration/whatever, but it's unlikely. So, I guess this is goodbye, of sorts. Gah, I'm feeling nostalgic and sad now. :( Of course, I'm not really going anywhere. I'll be lurking around and following my flist. But anyway, once more, thanks to all the friends I've made while writing in the Iron Man fandom, it's been a blast! You're all wonderful. <3

So, I run into this "rec" for Malt & Mockery, which comments that it's a "decent fic" but that both Tony and House are out of character in it. What happens? Naturally, because of this one sentence at some completely random website I'm now once again worried to death that I can't keep my characters in character. I actually agree with that opinion: they ARE sort of OOC in that fic, though it was a more-or-less conscious choice - I wrote them as attracted to each other from the get-go, which is something that would definitely not happen if they were entirely IC. Anyway, now I feel like I should just take down the fic in question.

Since I'm currently working on a story that has both Tony and House (but supposedly more in character), this sort of a blow to my nonexistent self-esteem is not a good thing. Why do I always have to freak out so completely because of stuff like this? I mean, one word of criticism and I just fall apart. Gah. I've got six chapters done now. More than half of the story. Around 20 000 words. Maybe I'll finish it some day. Maybe someone will like it. Or not. Grrrrr.

Ugh, some useless pointless ranting and venting ahead, for a change, because I've been in a stupid mood for days.

I have recently come to confess myself something: I'm too serious about my fic now. Way too serious. And I'm disappointed in myself because of this. Unfortunately, this is something that happens to me with every single hobby: at first, I'm just overjoyed at how cool and nice it is, but then, sometime later, I get serious, and then it's no longer fun, it's all frowny-faced.

Back in June I wrote about my writing that "I'm just having fun, and if someone likes it, that's just a wonderful side-effect." I don't think I can say that anymore. Yes, I still write because I like fic and I think writing is fun, but I also spend a lot of time wondering what people will think about it, and once it's posted, I keep checking my mail neurotically to see if I've had any comments. Naturally, if there aren't any, I'm quick to interpret it as proof that the fic sucked. I'm convinced that Wit and Whiskey was a failure, because it only got comments from two people, one of them being my beta. Not to mention how I freak out if I get any comments that are even borderline negative.

What wouldn't I do to get back the feeling that this is just fun and it doesn't matter what others think! I'm afraid that sooner or later, my perfectionism will get the better of me and I'll just quit writing because I feel I'm not good enough - and I don't want that to happen, because I love writing. :(

Whew. The thing I've been fearing the most ever since I started posting my fanfic on the net actually happened: an RL friend found my fic. I can only blame myself, since I HAD been dropping plenty of hints that could be used to track me down, because I thought that if they really, really wanted to read my stuff, they should be able to. Nevertheless, I sort of freaked out when I first learned about this, but then it became clear that it really wasn't such a bad thing. Incredibly enough, the friend in question understands hurt/comfort, which is the most embarrassing thing to me about my fic (aside from the recent weird pairings), and the main reason I want to keep it anonymous. It turns out this friend actually likes my fic! Yay!

So, now I've got a friend with whom I can talk about my fic IRL, which is incredible, slightly disturbing, but really nice, too. I do hope that this whole thing isn't going to affect my fic writing in any way. So far it doesn't look like it has, haven't run into a writer's block or anything. Instead, I've just had a new idea. Don't know if it'll end up becoming a story. Anyway, I'm about halfway done with a Tony/Jarvis (sort of) story, and I've every intention of finishing it and posting it (if my lovely beta thinks it's all right). :)

"Are you a book lover? A TV freak? A movie aficionado? Put your mind to the test, and list some of your favorite fictional characters - one for each letter of the alphabet."

A - Aeryn Sun, Farscape
B - Bilbo Baggins, The Hobbit/Lord of the Rings
C - Cutter, Elfquest (comics)
D - Daniel Jackson, Stargate SG-1
E - Emergency Medical Hologram (AKA Doctor), Star Trek: Voyager
F - Frodo Baggins, Lord of the Rings
G - Gregory House, MD, House MD
H - Hiro Nakamura, Heroes
I - Ian Malcolm, Jurassic Park
J - Jack O'Neill, Stargate SG-1
K - Kosh Naranek, Babylon 5
L - Lestat de Lioncourt, Anne Rice: the Vampire Chronicles
M - Marcus Cole, Babylon 5
N - Nightcrawler/Kurt Wagner, X-Men
O - Odo, Star Trek: Deep Space Nine
P - Pepper Potts, Iron Man
Q - Q, Star Trek: The Next Generation
R - Raistlin Majere, Weis & Hickman: Dragonlance
S - Severus Snape, Rowling: Harry Potter series
T - Tony Stark, Iron Man
U - Uhura, Star Trek, the original series
V - Valérian, spatio-temporal agent, Valérian & Laureline (comics)
W - Wolverine/Logan, X-Men
X - Xena, Xena: Warrior Princess
Y - Yoda, Star Wars
Z - Zaphod Beeblebrox, Adams: The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy

I spent most of my day at work thinking about these. :P For some letters, there were too many to pick from (J could've been John Crichton, John Sheridan, James Wilson...), for others, I had trouble coming up with anyone at all (U, X and Y very particularly difficult).

Ugh. After I've just finished a story as long and time-taking as Iron & Irony, what happens? Naturally, I have another fic idea. This one, as ideas go, is completely cracked, but I think I've managed to turn it into a semi-serious story anyway. I can't write stuff that's just pure parody. I'm much too angsty and serious for that. So, I spent most of the night writing fic, again. And I wake up too early and open my laptop and here it is, waiting, and I just have to tweak it some more. Come on, tell me this isn't an addiction. It is. But at least it has less side-effects than smoking or drinking or something like that. I'll post the first chapter soon, I think.

Since I've got no RL friends to talk to about my fic (because I don't talk to them about my fic), I could babble about it a bit more here, just in case someone accidentally reads this. It's funny, the relationship I have with my fic. On one hand, I'm proud of every finished story and love them all, they're my babies, and if someone criticizes them too harshly, I become very defensive. On the other, I'm completely prepared to say that they're all just crap, pointless, badly written and stupid, and on some level, I'm just ashamed of the stuff. Mostly because it's always hurt/comfort, always about characters getting hurt, which I think is plain weird. And because half the time I look at it, I keep finding typos and staring at the grammar, at one preposition here or there and knowing that they can't be right, because even though my English isn't horrible, it's not native either, and there are mistakes, I can't help that. Though if I wasn't ESL, I guess I'd never get anything written and posted. I'm a complete perfectionist IRL. When writing fic, I can use my non-native English as an excuse to myself: "it doesn't have to be perfect, because it's not your first language. You can make mistakes, it's OK, it's impressive enough that you can write this stuff at all."

So, what I'm trying to say is, I've got a very mixed attitude towards the stuff I write. Sometimes it's annoying. Right now, though, I'm on such a writing spree that I don't think all that much. I just write and have fun, because that's why I write. I'm not trying to create pieces of art. I'm not even trying to create entertainment. I'm just having fun, and if someone likes it, that's just a wonderful side-effect. :)