seryn

I've been sort of thinking about stuff. Not like intellectually, but shifting the ol' brain box out of idle.

One of my favorite things in life is that "Nailed it!" feeling. I don't write much because I know I can't consistently produce things that hit with that kind of accuracy. The ironic part is that writing like bread baking is something that succeeds more often the more often you do it. Bread baking works better in kitchens that have had a lot of bread baked in them. Some of it is the experience of the baker, but even a complete novice does a lot better in a serious baker's kitchen. A lot of that is that yeast floats ambiently in the air and the kinds of yeasts available in a baker's kitchen are more conducive to baking. I think if you never write, the authorial equivalent of yeast is not as well adapted to the task.
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Grr. I'm absolutely sure that there should be a ban on fanfic including my pet peeves. (I hate "pet peeves" as a description too. Because obviously the things that bother me are wrong and making them sound unimportant is not helpful.)

1) People should not have accidental babies they don't want and raise them themselves anyway while forcing the other responsible party to help. That's never going to work. At best everyone is merely content but knowing there was something better and they missed it. At worst it's going to be an inescapable situation with on-going abuse.

2) Fic that doesn't show the sex cannot show the childbirth scene in any more detail. If it squicks you to write the ooey-gooey kinds of sex scenes, then you cannot include graphic descriptions of placentas splatting or squeezing blood from the cord into the baby or ripped vaginal walls that require surgery. That's just ghastly and I'm sick of women who write this shit saying semen is gross and they don't want to mention it ever.

3) If you have to include blow-by-blow descriptions of childbirth that make it sound like it's one of the go-to methods at Guantanamo, I want to see there being some resentment. Someone should get blamed. And it shouldn't be the female character saying, "You are never going to touch me again." I don't like the association that all sex causes pregnancy or that women don't want sex when they don't want to get pregnant. That's not the point of being a woman. And it's not the point of a loving relationship. If the laboring character wants to scream, "I'm going to weld a condom onto your dick! You'll never get it off again!" That, I would find amusing.

4) Stories should always mention that the characters took precautions, even if it's not harped upon because otherwise it makes it sound like once you're a grown-up contraception magically happens. It's irresponsible and it's a bad plot device because we all know when you don't say something about the precautions, you're going to make the character pregnant.

5) As long as we're living in a fantasy world, why can't people have to do something deliberate to conceive instead of prevent?

Some funny things. John Scalzi and Wil Wheaton are having a contest to benefit some organization and people are supposed to write about this cartoon-ish caricature picture of them as an orc and a unicorn. 1) They're calling it a fanfiction contest. 2) It says, "No slash" in the instructions.

1) It's not fanfiction if you look at a picture and write your own story to go along with what you imagine unless the original work is part of a fandom. Scalzi and Wheaton are not fictional characters in a world owned by someone else. It is, Real Person Fiction if someone were to write about them by name, but I do not approve of RPF--- it's making shit up about real actual people and telling everyone.... that's libel for all normal people (only famous people are prohibited from complaining about that. If someone writes RPF about me and the yoga instructor or something... I can sue.)

1a) The picture they've proffered for inspiration looks like a Shrek ripoff. So the contest is already in violation of fandom rules--- someone (their chosen charity) is going to profit from creative works originally derived from copyrighted and restricted material.

2) No slash. Um. If you call it the John Scalzi/Wil Wheaton whatever contest, you've pretty much guaranteed that's what people are going to be thinking of. Convention says Harry/Draco is a story with a romantic pairing between Harry Potter and Draco Malfoy.

2a) Supposedly Scalzi issued a clarification that says they meant no explicit sex, not that there couldn't be slash. Scalzi clearly does not understand the conventions. It should have been, "No squick, no explicit sex, no non-con, no drug use, no illegal actions." Or "PG-13 rating, maximum." Or something which specified the warnings. Not all slash is explicit.

Given how idiotic they've been about this, I will suspend my boycott of RPF and my anti-preference for slash.

This week's episode of Chuck was great. I really liked it. What I liked most was that all the characters stopped being bitchy to each other. The writing was really tight too. A lot of recent episodes have been slovenly. Like they expected Superman could carry everyone then hired the Kent guy from Superman Returns.

I have this urge to write. I'm not sure what I would write or where I would start. Usually when I get a story, it jumps into my brain and does a touchdown dance. The hardest part is writing fast enough that what gets highlighted is what actually tells the story. I have written something by pushing it and it's mediocre at best--- I can see glimpses of what I wanted it to be, but unless you live in my head, you're not seeing the story shake its ass.
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As an aside to another conversation--- largely irrelevant so not cited-- I think one of the largest problems with our current culture is the mismatch between what people believe is a unique experience.

Think of the phrase, "Laugh and the world laughs with you, cry and you cry alone." Except it's not true. Humor isn't very universal. Even among peoples who share a language... there's a line in the movie Bottle Shock where Alan Rickman's character says, "You don't like me because you think I'm an arsehole, but I'm not. I'm British." Most Americans don't think the British have humor because they see Stephen Fry as a dramatic actor.

Now remember how it felt to be a teenager. No one else had ever had a bad breakup like yours. No one else had ever lost a pet like yours. No one else has ever been misunderstood like you are. Everything bad that happens to you hurts so much that it must be unique. And yet... when someone dies we send sympathy cards because we're all expected to have personal experience from which to sympathize. I don't think there are people who haven't had a bad breakup or lost someone special... and I seriously suspect that everyone is still misunderstood, it's just that once you get to be an adult you're not expected to be a clone of everyone else and differences are tolerated.

We act like tragedy is unique, but it's not. That's why so much literature has its basis in tragedy. It's universal. Everyone gets it. It's easy to make an emotional connection with a remote reader if you kill off a beloved character. A durable emotional connection over time is what makes something "literature".

No one even tries to have a sustainable emotional connection via joy. So the height of our literary culture settles for mediocrity.

There's a poll on Dear Author (the blog) asking if grammatical/spelling errors are a serious problem to you the reader.

They are largely talking about true typographical errors, not the kind where the author can't bloody type, but the ones introduced by the printing process--- which is still the case, they still typeset even in this era, and apparently they do so by OCRing the manuscript. That's fucking ridiculous and a stupid method that obviously needs to be addressed with better software linkage.

But I hate errors in published work. What's the difference between fanfic and published work? From here, published work costs a significant amount of money and is much more inconvenient to obtain and often impossible to comment upon therefore the author never hears back about what does and doesn't work for you the reader.

I am somewhat tolerant of mild errors in fanfic. I'm irritated, of course, but free is free. Even so, persistent errors and a refusal to address those mistakes will get me to stop reading anything by an author, especially the ones who say the story is more important than arbitrary grammatical rules. You can't ignore the medium entirely without leaving the impression that your oil painting is a kindergartner's crayon drawing.

When I have paid $9 for a paperback and there are continuity issues, character issues (like a woman who says she never eats vegetables and orders a salad on a date without any explanation), I blame the publisher for letting an untested author off the leash. When there are grammatical and spelling and typographical errors, I truly wonder what I am paying for.

I have some expectations that a professional publishing house will actually do their jobs. That means actual editing, oversight, and getting a handle on the caveats of their process. If they're not going to be professional about it, then I don't see why I should pay them full price.

I just read something interesting by Jennifer Crusie.
http://www.arghink.com/2006/09/25/confessions-of-a-reformed-quote-whore/

I hate those quotes on book covers used to sell books. All of them. If I find a quote I agree with, then I can sort of understand it, but some of my favorite authors read particular sub-genres I find unappealing. (Which is the polite phrasing of, "You read that? It's pure crap.") But I've always known that Steven King doesn't read 500 books in a year, so after the 10th book someone's got their name tagging a quote on, I know that's not someone's who is recommending the book.

Probably most authors don't read the things they're quoting for.

The post (linked above) says authors want to help each other out. I understand that since it's hard to get an agent without an established author vouching for your completed book. It's hard to get a publishing contract without an inside pathway. It's hard to get your foot in the door anywhere if you're not a social git whose extroversion swamps any intellectual accomplishments you might have. So basically authors' first loyalties are to themselves, their family, their story, their editor, their publisher, their agents, other authors, the industry supporting them, people who can get them inside the bubble....... it's not until somewhere just above frog spit that readers even register with authors.

To quote for a book without reading it is to lie to readers.

I have assumed, for a very long time, that all of the quotes were lies. I try, whenever I see an author's name quoted recommending the book, to not buy that author's books. Really.

This is quadruply true whenever a book has no summary on the back and just quotes. Like Sunshine by Robin McKinley. About half that book was decent-ish, but the other half is a completely different book that is unrelated and incoherent. EVERY SINGLE PERSON who is quoted as loving that book is WRONG. It's not just that I didn't like Sunshine, it's that no one could have liked it. It should not have been published without someone reading the whole thing through and realizing it was half of a book and the rest sounded like a cold medicine induced delusion. Sunshine doesn't have a summary anywhere, probably because the author forgot what the book was about and then wrote that. The front cover has 5 quotes, the back cover is all filled with quotes. They even had to put in extra pages before the story to fit all the quotes.

I never put up Yelp reviews. I don't write reviews of Amazon items. Simply put, if I cannot say anything negative, then they are telling me what to say and I think they should write the comment themselves and leave me out of it. Publishers aren't going to include quotes unless they're wholly positive. So they might as well not bother having someone read it, they'll just write the quote themselves and ask someone famous to tie their name to it.

I figure with that kind of situation, no matter whose name is tied to it, anyone who is quoted on the book is lying. Chances are they didn't read the book. Chances are they didn't even write the quote their name is on. So whenever I see an author's name quoted as liking a book, I think that author is someone who doesn't give a shit about their own reputation or the quality and truth of their words. If an author is known to not care what they say, why would I read their books?

If an author is quoted on the front of a book recommending it. I might still buy the book, but I haven't read a single thing in 2 years which was worth staking a professional reputation upon, except the brand new book I read when it was new, The Warded Man, which did not have any quotes. I am holding every quote against the person whose name is tagging it.

If you quote for a book you haven't read, you have no interest in the quality of your words and I am not going to buy your books.

Is there a place one can go to retrieve memes when one has no friends who do such things?

Some of them look fun, I particularly like the discussion ones. Where, instead of it being telling all about one's self, it's something one thinks about a relatively innocuous subject and one's friends can jump in and share their opinions.

I am, however, extremely wary of things that ask seemingly innocuous questions and generate your "go-go dancer nickname" or whatever. Name of first pet, name of street where you grew up, name of first grade teacher... those are all things that are asked for security questions in various places like banks to verify online transactions.

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I'm tired of sex scenes where it's first base, second base, third base, oral sex, then Tab A into Slot A. (I try not to read too much of the Tab A into Slot B kind. And very very little of the "rub Tab A against Tab A from the second kit.") I've read sex scenes where they skip the kissing--- which is immediately followed with some discussion about whores (I didn't know that whores don't kiss clients, so it seemed like some myth fic writers created to generate imaginary conflict.) But I haven't read any erotic fiction where they skip the breast/nipple play. I'm sure there's some M/M stuff but I admit it does nothing for me and I don't read much of it; the little I do read seems to be written by middle-aged women with too many children and they are obsessed with talking and foreplay... I don't think all women like the same erogenous activities, but breasts aren't optional and I don't understand it. I've read erotic fiction where they never go below the waist but everyone gets off. But I have NEVER read erotic fiction where a female character's breasts don't matter. Most of the stuff written in the sex scenes would leave a woman's breasts covered in bruises and I just don't understand it. For a while, ~10 years ago, it seemed like all erotica was foot-obsessed. Just about every sex scene had toe-sucking in it. I remember my friends asking me if I thought it was erotic. Lately it seems like lots of writers are into spanking and light bondage. I see so much of these things that it's stopped seeming kinky.

I'd like to see a sex scene where a woman who has had a double mastectomy could still read it and be titillated but not feel inadequate.

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I felt less than inadequate today. I taught a bunch of people with whom I share no common language knitting skills. And I sucked less at it than last time.

I also went for Japanese food at a different place. I'd stopped eating there and now I remember why. They've got truly abysmal service and the menu prices do not match the prices charged. Food was good today, but I didn't get what I ordered. I ordered several kinds of sushi and received similar items. Not like I ordered veg and received fish, but like I got mushroom instead of cucumber. That's lame. But I might go back once more since it wasn't crowded.

I dragged my ass out of bed in the middle of the night so I could write down what was in my head.

It's starting out with a crazy lady who talks to cats.

Now in the full bright light of afternoon, I'm worried that people will accuse me of writing MarySue.

I've been thinking I should start writing. Then I could post stuff to the various writing groups here on DW. Responses to prompts and whatever. Then I would be visible and I would see more people myself. Alain de Botton wrote an entire book on the premise, "You get out of things what you put into them." so maybe I should actually participate.

But just because it's a good idea doesn't make it easy to start on.

All the prompts lately haven't been inspirational. I might as well be using WOTD things.

I've got snippets of things in a notebook, but nothing really stellar. I wrote an essay from the vampire's perspective of dealing with an anti-vampire bias. It's one of those things that functions as a controlling paragraph; when I read that, I know what that world feels like. I don't think it works as something other people can read.

I attempted to write a sequel chapter to "Lindy Hop" [must go find link, pls wait], but so much of the original is out of date already, it seems really bizarre. There isn't a good way to build on that since it's not making the same kind of connection it did when those referents were current pop culture.

I've almost got something else from my interactions with the local cats. But nothing has gelled in my mind. Of course the danger is if something completely sets, I don't have any need to write it down. I tend to write because I want to know how the story ends and I don't mind sharing it with you all. But if I know how something goes, fuck the audience, they can write their own.

Last week's disgust with the fanfic was almost enough to draw me back into that, but I need a new fandom before I can be bothered. I know it's not right to say that the canon poisoned things, but that's how I feel and I don't want to play in someone's catbox even if you give me a shovel and pail.