end-of-year fanfic meme
Dec. 18th, 2024 03:08 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
queenluaWow, this sure was the year of "Lua writes every possible arrangement of Naesala Fireemblem," huh. What a GOOD year.
Anyway, here's a meme~
Total Number of Completed Stories: Four! The list:
I also had one incomplete story:
...plus, a few minifics that are Not Yet Publicly Viewable ehehe~
Total fanfiction word count: 176,872
Fandoms written in: Fire Emblem: Radiant Dawn and Ace Attorney. i am a simple and predictable creature
Looking back, did you write more fic than you thought you would this year, less, or about what you'd predicted? lmao, so much more. The Water at the Edge of All Things was supposed to be a 20-30k thing. it ended at... uh.... 100k more than that. so!
What's your own favorite story of the year? The Water at the Edge of All Things. (runner-up is "Territory")
Did you take any writing risks this year? I FINISHED A WHOLE NOVEL. not even a nanowriomo length one, like, a fuckin paperback epic fantasy length one. fuck yeah
Do you have any fanfic or profic goals for the new year?
Origfic:
There are three projects of various lengths: the steampunk Civil War thing, the Protestant Reformation thing, and the animist Kentuckian thing. Would be great to nail all three! would also settle for two! or a really killer implementation of just one!
(oh and I also have a couple short stories I should REALLY send out on submission lol)
Fanfic:
There's a cute lil Leanne & Reyson thingy I want to write, a weird Ike/Reyson thing I want to write, I'd like to finish the last two chapters of Wolves, and I want to FINALLY post the sadweird apollo/klavier apollo/simon fic. Outside of that, no specific plans! but fic brainworms can strike at anytime, I'm sure I'll get some lol i do also have two dead dove-y reysonfic ideas but those are Embarrassing To Discuss On Main lmao
My best story of this year: I personally think that TWatEoAT is stunning, so...
My most popular story of this year: TWatEoAT. (Admittedly I have been posting mostly in small fandoms this year! This one wouldn't have registered so much as a blip compared to e.g. my Three Houses stuff, lol. But I'm still happy it found its audience.)
Story of mine most under-appreciated by the universe, in my opinion: It's not that I'm disappointed or anything (I'm happy for any attention my fic gets!), but... my Apollo/Simon fics get a SHOCKING amount of love, even today, so I was a little surprised that the reaction to my Simon/Apollo/Athena thing was so much more muted. Suddenly people are less enthused just because Athena's in the mix? WOW god forbid women do anything etc :P
Most fun story to write: okay, writing "Bird in the Hand" was TREMENDOUS fun. i sure do love Naesala getting dunked on. and fluff can be fun if it's the right kind of fluff haha
Also, in TWatEoAT: all of Leanne's chapters (she was SUCH a blast once I got a hold of her voice), the ch4 fight scene, the first scene in the first Sanaki & Reyson chapter, and the last two scenes in the last Sanaki & Reyson chapter
Story with the single sexiest moment: lmao i like how my options here are:
Story that shifted my own perceptions of the characters: The Water at the Edge of All Things. I thought Leanne was so boring before I started writing that fic! 2023-me how could you be so LOST. so BLIND. she is the BEST
Hardest story to write: that kristoph/phoenix fill lmao. how do people write those two.
The Water at the Edge of All Things was a *marathon* but i rarely felt totally stuck or like what i was writing was actively bad... i guess there's some upsides to obsessing about fictional bird furries for like a decade
Most unintentionally telling: sure is funny that i had a massive existential/spiritual/whatever crisis in the dead middle of this year. sure would be pretty cringe if any of that showed up in the heron-woo-stuff in TWatEoAT, wouldn't it
Biggest Disappointment: that TWatEoAT had to end :( i wish i could've kept writing it forever lmao
What pairing/genre/fandom did you write that you would never have predicted in January? Naesala/Leanne was a big surprise! Even when I started writing Leanne for TWatEoAT, I still had some reservations about that ship—in canon, I do feel like she, hm, lets Naesala off a bit easy? kinda enables him too much? their vibes feel kind of comphet/compcanon-y?
But then I got bitten by brainworms and spat out a 12k romcom about them, SO. I Now Have No Choice But To Stan
Choice Lines
The Water at the Edge of All Things
It was VERY hard not to copypasta whole swaths of TWatEoAT in here, for the record.
But I had a lot of favorite choice bits in that story, including:
* the whole bit in Chapter 6 where "a man who, dying of thirst, mistakes saltwater for fresh and drinks it in deep" is mentioned (can't say more without spoilers!)
* Naesala yelling at Reyson at the end of Chapter 8
* Chapter 9 (the Sanaki interlude, in its entirety)
* Leanne's "I tire of such talk" bit in Chapter 12
* Renzo confronting Naesala in Chapter 14
* And my all-time favorite scene is when Leanne sings the Rite in Chapter 15, but that's spoilers :P
Most those bits only draw their true power/coolness from context, though. Like, there's lovely language, but it feels bad quoting it out-of-context because, well... it's not nearly as good in a vacuum! Simply the nature of how longer fiction works, I suppose.
BUT, while I was rereading bits here and there, I did laugh aloud at this paragraph because it's just the most supremely "Lua is back on her bullshit" bit in the whole fic, stylistically speaking, for good and ill:
Territory
It's gotta be this one:
Bird in the Hand
I like this bit about the heron sibs:
And yeah that's about it. Happy goddamn New Year everybody, lol
Anyway, here's a meme~
Total Number of Completed Stories: Four! The list:
- The Water at the Edge of All Things (FE:RD, Reyson/Naesala, Leanne/Naesala, Reyson/Tibarn, everyone/misery, everyone/scheming)
- Territory (FE:RD, Zihark/Naesala)
- the scarlet halls of night (FE:RD, Naesala/Sanaki) yeah i anon!posted this one but c'mon it's p obviously me lol
- Bird in the Hand (FE:RD, Leanne/Naesala)
I also had one incomplete story:
- Wolves (Ace Attorney, Athena/Simon/Apollo) chapter 1 of 3 done
...plus, a few minifics that are Not Yet Publicly Viewable ehehe~
Total fanfiction word count: 176,872
Fandoms written in: Fire Emblem: Radiant Dawn and Ace Attorney. i am a simple and predictable creature
Looking back, did you write more fic than you thought you would this year, less, or about what you'd predicted? lmao, so much more. The Water at the Edge of All Things was supposed to be a 20-30k thing. it ended at... uh.... 100k more than that. so!
What's your own favorite story of the year? The Water at the Edge of All Things. (runner-up is "Territory")
Did you take any writing risks this year? I FINISHED A WHOLE NOVEL. not even a nanowriomo length one, like, a fuckin paperback epic fantasy length one. fuck yeah
Do you have any fanfic or profic goals for the new year?
Origfic:
There are three projects of various lengths: the steampunk Civil War thing, the Protestant Reformation thing, and the animist Kentuckian thing. Would be great to nail all three! would also settle for two! or a really killer implementation of just one!
(oh and I also have a couple short stories I should REALLY send out on submission lol)
Fanfic:
There's a cute lil Leanne & Reyson thingy I want to write, a weird Ike/Reyson thing I want to write, I'd like to finish the last two chapters of Wolves, and I want to FINALLY post the sadweird apollo/klavier apollo/simon fic. Outside of that, no specific plans! but fic brainworms can strike at anytime, I'm sure I'll get some lol i do also have two dead dove-y reysonfic ideas but those are Embarrassing To Discuss On Main lmao
My best story of this year: I personally think that TWatEoAT is stunning, so...
My most popular story of this year: TWatEoAT. (Admittedly I have been posting mostly in small fandoms this year! This one wouldn't have registered so much as a blip compared to e.g. my Three Houses stuff, lol. But I'm still happy it found its audience.)
Story of mine most under-appreciated by the universe, in my opinion: It's not that I'm disappointed or anything (I'm happy for any attention my fic gets!), but... my Apollo/Simon fics get a SHOCKING amount of love, even today, so I was a little surprised that the reaction to my Simon/Apollo/Athena thing was so much more muted. Suddenly people are less enthused just because Athena's in the mix? WOW god forbid women do anything etc :P
Most fun story to write: okay, writing "Bird in the Hand" was TREMENDOUS fun. i sure do love Naesala getting dunked on. and fluff can be fun if it's the right kind of fluff haha
Also, in TWatEoAT: all of Leanne's chapters (she was SUCH a blast once I got a hold of her voice), the ch4 fight scene, the first scene in the first Sanaki & Reyson chapter, and the last two scenes in the last Sanaki & Reyson chapter
Story with the single sexiest moment: lmao i like how my options here are:
- dubcon (blowjob)
- noncon
- technically consensual but bro is dissociating like fucking whoa
- dubcon (blackberry vine bondage)
- dubcon (heavy on the humiliation)
- dubcon (scarification)
- dubcon (extraordinarily ill-advised attempt to gain political favor)
- dubcon (this is why you shouldn't date your coworkers)
- wait, okay, the fuckin Leanne/Naesala fic may save me here. i mean that's two instances of "sudden loss of erection" plus one instance of "top drop due to Poor Communication." but it's all very consensual! that's something!
Story that shifted my own perceptions of the characters: The Water at the Edge of All Things. I thought Leanne was so boring before I started writing that fic! 2023-me how could you be so LOST. so BLIND. she is the BEST
Hardest story to write: that kristoph/phoenix fill lmao. how do people write those two.
The Water at the Edge of All Things was a *marathon* but i rarely felt totally stuck or like what i was writing was actively bad... i guess there's some upsides to obsessing about fictional bird furries for like a decade
Most unintentionally telling: sure is funny that i had a massive existential/spiritual/whatever crisis in the dead middle of this year. sure would be pretty cringe if any of that showed up in the heron-woo-stuff in TWatEoAT, wouldn't it
Biggest Disappointment: that TWatEoAT had to end :( i wish i could've kept writing it forever lmao
What pairing/genre/fandom did you write that you would never have predicted in January? Naesala/Leanne was a big surprise! Even when I started writing Leanne for TWatEoAT, I still had some reservations about that ship—in canon, I do feel like she, hm, lets Naesala off a bit easy? kinda enables him too much? their vibes feel kind of comphet/compcanon-y?
But then I got bitten by brainworms and spat out a 12k romcom about them, SO. I Now Have No Choice But To Stan
Choice Lines
The Water at the Edge of All Things
It was VERY hard not to copypasta whole swaths of TWatEoAT in here, for the record.
But I had a lot of favorite choice bits in that story, including:
* the whole bit in Chapter 6 where "a man who, dying of thirst, mistakes saltwater for fresh and drinks it in deep" is mentioned (can't say more without spoilers!)
* Naesala yelling at Reyson at the end of Chapter 8
* Chapter 9 (the Sanaki interlude, in its entirety)
* Leanne's "I tire of such talk" bit in Chapter 12
* Renzo confronting Naesala in Chapter 14
* And my all-time favorite scene is when Leanne sings the Rite in Chapter 15, but that's spoilers :P
Most those bits only draw their true power/coolness from context, though. Like, there's lovely language, but it feels bad quoting it out-of-context because, well... it's not nearly as good in a vacuum! Simply the nature of how longer fiction works, I suppose.
BUT, while I was rereading bits here and there, I did laugh aloud at this paragraph because it's just the most supremely "Lua is back on her bullshit" bit in the whole fic, stylistically speaking, for good and ill:
[Sanaki] didn't care for puzzles but she cared for this, this intemperate creature who softened his eyes to look at her as one of his own. Who wore his feelings boldly, too boldly, in a way Sephiran never had. Which made him, she thought, more trustworthy, even with the lies. Maybe Reyson would try to end the world too; maybe he'd prove as faithless as Sephiran. But at least she knew he wouldn't be able to hide his plans for an instant.Also: I personally enjoyed how this Naesala PoV bit in Chapter 1...
Naesala even saw a few ravens and hawks chatting together, at the far end of the fire-circle, which twisted something strange in his gut—if this was politics then Tibarn had won tonight. Dictated a peace on his terms, not Naesala's. Even mercy was a show of power, understood rightly....gets a callback all the way in Chapter 15, from Leanne's PoV:
"But you can't just let them get away with things—"
"It is not letting him get away. It is mercy," Leanne said, voice firm. "Which is power, too."
Territory
It's gotta be this one:
[Sanaki] does have other ministers. But none of them are Sephiran, so. She doesn't make use of them.
And Naesala can't speak for her, not the way a minister could. He's fine as an attendant, a babysitter, an advisor and a jester. He's fine for draping over her shoulders like some expensive set of furs.
But he's not beorc, and not Begnion, so. He can't speak for her.
Bird in the Hand
I like this bit about the heron sibs:
Leanne's silent for a long while. Not the way Reyson tends to lapse into silence, all stony judgment. She's silent like a stream at the base of a canyon—slowly working its way through all that rock.
And yeah that's about it. Happy goddamn New Year everybody, lol
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Date: 2024-12-18 11:24 pm (UTC)honestly, your word count for the year is SO HIGH. i love that for you so much.
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Date: 2024-12-18 11:41 pm (UTC)it sure was a lot of words (after a year with basically 0 words oh my lol)
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Date: 2024-12-19 12:23 am (UTC)ah lua i'm so proud of you. i know that's so *dweeby* to say so plainly but i *am* and not just because it's our favorite shared fandom, it's just so cool to see you chainsawing through FUN EMOTIONALLY COMPELLING WORDS and improving your craft and being so on board with your interpretation of these dears, while also showing some crazy cool scenes that have us yelling like alabama fans at the referee and it rules. :D
(that leanne with the Rite scene still hits so hard, i think about that one all the time comparatively ngl.)
no subject
Date: 2024-12-19 04:54 am (UTC)(also lol @ the alabama reference. also hey wtf when did oregon get the #1 ranked football team in the country??? did the PNW figure out how to do A Single College Sport??? do i need to start stanning lmao)
<3 thank youuuuu frfr