Fanfic thoughts
Jun. 25th, 2012 01:42 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
selenayI feel fairly certain that my astonishment every morning when I wake up and actually go to work means something. Not necessarily something good.
Happy Monday! It is foggy here and they're back to doing loud buildy things on the path they've been constructing outside my office since early May. They appear to be resorting to digging parts of it up (again) to prolong the work.
I'm trying to work out a cunning plan to escape without Mum on Saturday. I need some stuff from the mall and I may try for a fourth Avengers viewing. Mostly, I just need some time that is Mum-free and not work time. The trick will be persuading mother that I am able to leave the house on my own. So far, every time I think that I'm going to get out without her, she finds a reason to go with me. Why yes, I am resenting my hairdresser's appointment on Saturday (which is usually me time) becoming a double date with Mum.
It's not that I don't enjoy spending time with Mum, I'm just used to having a bit more time to myself than I'm currently getting. At the moment, the only time I get is the twenty minute drive to and from work. Even that is only happening a couple of times a week because she borrows the car and hence drives me to and from work on Mondays, Fridays and sometimes Thursdays. I'm not really a chatty person in the morning. There is never a time when Mum is not chatty. The drive to work with her is...not fun.
If I could get her involved in an evening activity to get her out of the house sometimes, that would be great. Sadly, all the things she does are daytime things so she can spend her evenings with me. She also does all her shopping/errands etc. during the day in the week and yet still likes to accompany me when I try to get out at the weekend to do such things. It's starting to drive me nutty. I just want some time when nobody wants anything from me and nobody is talking at me!
My mood this weekend was terrible, dark and broody and grouchy. The whole overwhelmed by mother thing was definitely a contributing factor. The fact that I'm flaring the UC still and I suspect that I may be getting slightly anemic is probably not helping. Nor is my tendency not to sleep when I'm stressed.
It's going to get easier when I get used this, right? She'll calm down and let me out on my own some day, right?
During my weekly Skype with![[livejournal.com profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/external/lj-userinfo.gif)
historyterry yesterday we were trying to figure out why fanfic is often way more appealing than novels.
I have to admit, I have no conclusions on it. There are times when I go weeks (months) without touching fanfic and then there are times when I read way more fanfic than books.
My standards when it comes to fic have changed over the years: I'm less tolerant of basic writing idiocy than I used to be. If the first couple of pages of a fic are littered with basic punctuation problems and poor spelling or incorrect words, I will turn back even if the basic premise sounds interesting. Yesterday's "Oh god, delete!" fic included random apostrophes and some very unfortunate word substitutions.
Ridged <> rigid. Thankfully it was in the context of rigid/ridged arms rather than ridged anything way more unfortunate, but still. It threw me out and then I couldn't get back to it, which is good because I was already irritated at the OOC-ness. Yes, it's an AU. No, you still need to try with the characterisation. If Clint is sounding like Thor, there is a big problem.
I'm not expecting Tolstoy, but I like to think that I have standards :-D
Anyway, the why is fanfic more fun than novels at times question is confusing. Partially I think it's because we get the chance to return to spend more time with familiar, favourite characters. Most of us don't read fanfic for fandoms we know nothing about, after all.
Getting to see new ideas and interpretations of those characters is also a part of it. There is a lot of fic out there that is written as part of a conversation or reaction to the canon that is a different way to discuss that stuff and I love it.
Wish-fulfilment is a lot of it, I suspect. We know that certain things will never happen in canon - most of us don't even want them to - but it's still a lot of fun to read about them. Yes, I suspect that this is a big part of the popularity of the pornier end of fanfic :-D
In some fandoms, I'm far more interested in the non-main characters in my fanfic. I adore Harry Potter and his friends to pieces. My fanfic tastes, though, run more to characters like Sirius and Remus because they're great characters who only get a small amount of book time.
As much as a short fic is fun, I'm a huge fan of the long, novel-length fics and I can never quite put my finger on why. It's partially that I get to spend more time with a particular set-up. That's not completely it, though, and I'm not sure that I'll ever figure it out completely.
Right now, I'm in a "read all the Avengers" fic kind of place after over a year of barely reading any fic. It's the shiny new fandom stage of fic reading. I'm definitely in a "fic is more fun than books" place and I have no idea why, except maybe it's because all my current books are deeply serious and intense and fic...doesn't have to be.
In conclusion, I have no conclusion :-)
Happy Monday! It is foggy here and they're back to doing loud buildy things on the path they've been constructing outside my office since early May. They appear to be resorting to digging parts of it up (again) to prolong the work.
I'm trying to work out a cunning plan to escape without Mum on Saturday. I need some stuff from the mall and I may try for a fourth Avengers viewing. Mostly, I just need some time that is Mum-free and not work time. The trick will be persuading mother that I am able to leave the house on my own. So far, every time I think that I'm going to get out without her, she finds a reason to go with me. Why yes, I am resenting my hairdresser's appointment on Saturday (which is usually me time) becoming a double date with Mum.
It's not that I don't enjoy spending time with Mum, I'm just used to having a bit more time to myself than I'm currently getting. At the moment, the only time I get is the twenty minute drive to and from work. Even that is only happening a couple of times a week because she borrows the car and hence drives me to and from work on Mondays, Fridays and sometimes Thursdays. I'm not really a chatty person in the morning. There is never a time when Mum is not chatty. The drive to work with her is...not fun.
If I could get her involved in an evening activity to get her out of the house sometimes, that would be great. Sadly, all the things she does are daytime things so she can spend her evenings with me. She also does all her shopping/errands etc. during the day in the week and yet still likes to accompany me when I try to get out at the weekend to do such things. It's starting to drive me nutty. I just want some time when nobody wants anything from me and nobody is talking at me!
My mood this weekend was terrible, dark and broody and grouchy. The whole overwhelmed by mother thing was definitely a contributing factor. The fact that I'm flaring the UC still and I suspect that I may be getting slightly anemic is probably not helping. Nor is my tendency not to sleep when I'm stressed.
It's going to get easier when I get used this, right? She'll calm down and let me out on my own some day, right?
During my weekly Skype with
historyterry yesterday we were trying to figure out why fanfic is often way more appealing than novels.I have to admit, I have no conclusions on it. There are times when I go weeks (months) without touching fanfic and then there are times when I read way more fanfic than books.
My standards when it comes to fic have changed over the years: I'm less tolerant of basic writing idiocy than I used to be. If the first couple of pages of a fic are littered with basic punctuation problems and poor spelling or incorrect words, I will turn back even if the basic premise sounds interesting. Yesterday's "Oh god, delete!" fic included random apostrophes and some very unfortunate word substitutions.
Ridged <> rigid. Thankfully it was in the context of rigid/ridged arms rather than ridged anything way more unfortunate, but still. It threw me out and then I couldn't get back to it, which is good because I was already irritated at the OOC-ness. Yes, it's an AU. No, you still need to try with the characterisation. If Clint is sounding like Thor, there is a big problem.
I'm not expecting Tolstoy, but I like to think that I have standards :-D
Anyway, the why is fanfic more fun than novels at times question is confusing. Partially I think it's because we get the chance to return to spend more time with familiar, favourite characters. Most of us don't read fanfic for fandoms we know nothing about, after all.
Getting to see new ideas and interpretations of those characters is also a part of it. There is a lot of fic out there that is written as part of a conversation or reaction to the canon that is a different way to discuss that stuff and I love it.
Wish-fulfilment is a lot of it, I suspect. We know that certain things will never happen in canon - most of us don't even want them to - but it's still a lot of fun to read about them. Yes, I suspect that this is a big part of the popularity of the pornier end of fanfic :-D
In some fandoms, I'm far more interested in the non-main characters in my fanfic. I adore Harry Potter and his friends to pieces. My fanfic tastes, though, run more to characters like Sirius and Remus because they're great characters who only get a small amount of book time.
As much as a short fic is fun, I'm a huge fan of the long, novel-length fics and I can never quite put my finger on why. It's partially that I get to spend more time with a particular set-up. That's not completely it, though, and I'm not sure that I'll ever figure it out completely.
Right now, I'm in a "read all the Avengers" fic kind of place after over a year of barely reading any fic. It's the shiny new fandom stage of fic reading. I'm definitely in a "fic is more fun than books" place and I have no idea why, except maybe it's because all my current books are deeply serious and intense and fic...doesn't have to be.
In conclusion, I have no conclusion :-)
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Ridged Arms: From Loofahing Around
Date: 2012-06-25 05:22 pm (UTC)Bad fanfics are all alike, but every good fanfic has its own way of being good?
Re: Ridged Arms: From Loofahing Around
Date: 2012-06-25 11:29 pm (UTC)I am seriously so glad that the arms were ridged in that fic. It was slash. I couldn't face the thought of continuing and find other...er...inappropriately ridged things.
no subject
Date: 2012-06-26 03:42 pm (UTC)Last night while driving home I was thinking about why I wrote some Doctor Who fic during Ten's run and haven't the slightest urge now that we have Eleventy -- it's directly tied to my recurring outrage at how RTD handled the franchise and general satisfaction with Moffat's handling of the show. That tension between the show we got and the show we wished for -- there were gaps to fill or outright fix-its. And, yes, HP is one of those fandoms that gives us a tasty world with far more to fill in than JKR had time to do -- lots to explore and embellish. Some of my favorite HP fics were definitely doing things like giving backstory or delving into incidental characters -- or, yes, playing the AU game and seeing how the story might have played out given this or that change.
I'd say a lot of times it depends on what you're in the mood for -- fanfic gives you more of the characters you were enjoying spending time with, when you're out of canon. Last time I did a Temeraire read-through, when I finished the most recent book I hit AO3 and started trawling for fic, because I was still in the mood for those dragons. I suspect once I buy the eARC for the new Vorkosigan-verse book, I'm going to turn around and start going through my backlog of Vorkosigan fic (though I might do a reread of the entire canon series first). Right now, Avengers are who you're in the mood for, and you're not getting access to the comics fast enough to fill all your reading time.
no subject
Date: 2012-06-25 08:14 pm (UTC)I like novel-length fanfic because you get to spend more time in that universe with those characters.
I'm less tolerant of basic writing idiocy these days too. I think it's partly because I've learnt how to write better so I can see the mistakes more. And also because I can think of better written things I've read in the past.
no subject
Date: 2012-06-25 10:32 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2012-06-26 07:02 am (UTC)Like you, I do love my children, but there comes a point, especially when you're the kind of person who likes some solitude.
Basically, I'm feeling your pain on that one! I'm currently looking for a monastery I can go on a weekend retreat to. My friend Laura has said she'd have them for the weekend, or at least one of them.
I do have wistful thoughts of joining a closed order sometimes...