Beth Winter

lgbtfest is running again this year! This is a wonderful issue-focussed fest that last year resulted in two fics I'm rather proud of writing, as well as a busload of material to read :) The general quality's insanely high.

Prompt submission is running until March 3, with prompt claiming from March 5 to 10. Now if only someone would submit the prompts I want... *hopes quietly for a Rose of Versailles one, because fyrie would kill me*

*glares at a certain Kaiser*

A question to the LGBT and history-inclined portion of my friends-list: Can anyone recommend books about Wilhelm II of Germany? I'm looking in particular for information about his youth and private life, including the LGBT inclinations.

Yuletide story: done.

Story I owe someone: not the faintest idea what to write, nor even which version of the canon to use.

Yuletide pinch hits (requests that were defaulted on by the original writer appointed): being eyed for fandoms I have the faintest idea about.

I might well end up grabbing a pinch-hit story tomorrow. Somebody stop me.

I'm stuck, stuck, stuck on the Van Helsing things.

Time for a kick start.

Give me a fandom and either a character, a pairing, an item, a title, or all of the above. Get a 100-word drabble in return.

No Van Helsing for obvious reasons, and also no CLAMP. Otherwise anything I'm vaguely familiar with is fair go. This includes Coldfire, Underworld, V for Vendetta (comic) and anything up to and including Night Watch (Russian version).

First 10 will get written today.

EDIT: *sweatdrop* 6 requesters so far, 4 of which want pr0n. Um. People?

When you're on a diet, Fat Thursday sucks. So I coped by switching my allotted two 200-300 calorie meals to two rose-jam filling donuts and eating a faworek instead of the protein bar :>

I really don't understand how people can eat donuts that don't have rose-jam filling and candied orange peel on top, you know.

In other news, work killed me dead and Gerald Tarrant administered the coup de grace by deciding he doesn't feel like plodding through his conversation with Narilka again, but instead wants the first-time story I promised I'd write for him. Got a 1000 words of it done today, and they haven't even laid eyes on each other yet. Anyone want to take a very pushy muse off my hands?

My Joss Whedon experience is spotty at best. I've watched most of Buffy Season 1, about two-thirds of Buffy seasons 2 and 3, Angel 1-3 and then three quarters of 5. The problem being, I now want to write a Buffy crossover that, for plot purposes, has to be set after Angel discovers the Shanshu thing. This puts it between Season 4 and Season 5 of Buffy. Hence, characterisation problems.

• Willow's with Tara at that point and somewhat aware of her power, but at what stage of her transformation? Still geeky, Wicca girl, Terrible As The Dawn, somewhere in between?
  
  
• What was Giles' status throughout season 4? Any changes in his character since season 3 that I should be aware of? And what was he doing for a living - I believe he only opened up the Magic Box in season 5?
  
  
• And finally, I know what Spike was like at the time, but where was he living between Season 4 and Season 5? I saw mentions of a crypt, I suppose with Harmony tagging along?
  

I know there are Buffy fans on my f-list. I'm sadly deprived through lack of time and money to buy full seasons :( Help me out?

Creative-wise, I'm building up momentum to get past another pivotal action scene in Flowers (NaNo), polishing up the Christmas origific, and hopelessly stuck on Ara's Lorenzo thingie. To unblock everything, I'm planning a meta essay tomorrow, but shhh.

In the meantime, not-so-wildlife on the Sopot beach:

( Big bad white feather things )

Dear Luke Skywalker, get out of my brain. I’m trying to write about the torrid affairs of your father, mother, mentor and assorted hangers-on, which will probably result in your not being born at all. Now is not the time to hang around and try to engage me in discussions on philosophy.

Dear Bruce&Ducard, please reappear. I have pr0n to finish, and the fact you’ve been ensconced in the attic for the past two weeks is getting in the way. Also, the neighbours are starting to complain about the noises.

Dear Sands, shut up. If I want running commentary from the personification of my id, I’ll ask for it. Also, you’re not getting fic at the moment, so live with it.

Dear Obi-Wan, I’m sorry. I really didn’t mean to break your brain the way I did. It’s not my fault if people keep making me think up bad things to happen to you – it doesn’t mean they will happen. At least, not all of them. Even though you look utterly adorable and ravishable with your brain broken like that, a fact Darth Jinn was all too quick to point out to me.

Dear all: just cooperate. Is that really so much to ask for?

(Also: am stuck on who will lose a hand in the Darth Jinn fic. It will not be Anakin, Obi-Wan’s not the hand-losing type, Jinn and Dooku both maintain you only lose limbs when you lose your cool, therefore excepting them from the proceedings, and the OCs are bit players. Um. Padme?)

First of all, two points of interest. One: guede_mazaka wrote a bijou Sin City/Constantine crossover. Go and bother her to write some more. Two: temve, quite apart from being a very good writer, makes customized Qui-Gon figures that had me in stitches. Go and marvel.

But it’s not all fun and games in Beth’s head today...


The curse of Mary Sue

Any fanfiction reader worth their salt knows the basic way to tell Mary Sues from legitimate original characters (OCs). They’re perfect and have the same – or better – powers as the main characters. They are or become best friends, relatives or romantic interests of the main characters. The story revolves around them.

The case in point: Will to Act (working title), also known as the Darth Qui-Gon fic. And the fact it now has a cast of three original characters, all of them Sith and (ex)apprentices to either Qui-Gon or Dooku, and all of them at some moments driving the story forward. One’s even female – if she weren’t African-Corellian, a manipulative bitch and asexual, I’d have no hopes of escaping the Mary Sue bashers.

The problem is that they’re all needed. Will to Act is a large-scale retelling of AOTC and follows its dual narrative structure, so Qui-Gon has to take care of Obi-Wan’s quest. Dooku’s too busy on Geonosis to go chasing after Anakin and Padmé. And if there’s no-one to interfere there, that plotline will take its AOTC shape, which will be boring. Then there’s a large plothole in the end that needs a Sith Infiltrator to plug it up. This means at least two OCs are needed, plus a third for Obi-Wan’s emotional reasons.

Beyond that, each of the OCs serves as a foil for a canon character. Ador is a counterpoint for Anakin and Padmé, the one who puts strange and dangerous thoughts in their heads. Damay lets Qui-Gon and later also Padmé shine: he asks them questions and gives them opportunities to articulate their own thoughts. Est... okay, Est is a pain in the arse, but a cute one. And he’s got a total of three scenes so far, in one of which he gets Dooku to open up, which alone is worth keeping him.

My question: is this too much? I’m not afraid of original characters, but out of an eight-strong main cast three are OCs. I’m wondering if it’s worth it to get creatively invested in something people will dismiss as weak origific or Sith Mary Sues.

(Even though the Qui-Gon|Obi-Wan|Anakin dynamic I’ve got set up is absolutely delicious. With lots of manly touching, natch. Am thinking of pawning Padmé off on Ador and pushing these three into bed together.)

I had a much better and fun idea for this, but I forgot Buffy was on today. Inca Mummy Girl won over PSP.

So let's keep it simple. Think of a:

- a fandom I'm familiar with
- a character
- a pairing
- a motif, object, theme, colour

Comment to this post with any or all of the above, and I'll do my best to write a drabble about it. No deadlines, because I'll be doing those between "real" fics, but hey. Feed me.