Because I was asked for it AGAIN (and it might get me some betaed texts)... another "30 Days" entry.
I really tried to talk myself out of this one because of the topic of the question but mackenziesmomma wouldn't let me chicken out so I figured I should just get it over with write it and be done with it. Also, until now I tried to find a fitting song for the aformentioned story tag for ancient_leah but I feel so alone without my laptop and my music and most of all my playlists (oh God, the playlists! They were so many I actually had to scroll, even in half screen size oh God) and last.fm isn't really helpful, either so I can just as well write another "30 Days" entry until I get a new laptop (hopefully in the next two weeks because seriously, I don't think I can make the big bang otherwise). So here we go.
1. Tell us about your favorite writing project/universe that you’ve worked with and why.
2. How many characters do you have? Do you prefer males or females?
3. How do you come up with names, for characters (and for places if you’re writing about fictional places)?
4. Tell us about one of your first stories/characters!
5. By age, who is your youngest character? Oldest? How about “youngest” and “oldest” in terms of when you created them?
6. Where are you most comfortable writing? At what time of day? Computer or good ol’ pen and paper?
7. Do you listen to music while you write? What kind? Are there any songs you like to relate/apply to your characters?
8. What’s your favorite genre to write? To read?
9. How do you get ideas for your characters? Describe the process of creating them.
10. What are some really weird situations your characters have been in? Everything from serious canon scenes to meme questions counts!
11. Who is your favorite character to write? Least favorite?
And the newest one:
12. In what story did you feel you did the best job of worldbuilding? Any side-notes on it you’d like to share?
Um. World... building... what?
Or... let me start differently.
You know what one of the reasons for me never really getting into original fiction was? That I'm abysmal at world building. I failed so bad every time I tried to write fantasy or science-fiction that I still rarely go back to the few attempts at that I did make. I think I did marginally better with the SF stories but it was really laughable how unimaginative and downright boring all the settings were. Somehow, for all my skills in creating characters and probably maybe atmosphere, too, I totally lack them in terms of creating a world. Maybe that's coming from the same source that makes it impossible for me to get some really crazy ideas (I talked about this here), I don't know.
However, when I talked about this with mackenziesmomma yesterday, she pointed out that I was building worlds within worlds whenever I write fanfiction. She said that when I created the Minor Characters Thomas Moore, Laura Greenspan, Maureen Reece and Simon DeLisle, I created a little world within the Stargate universe by - quote mac - "making Laura and Tom be from Maine and make Dee as screwed up as he is" (concerning that... after having finished all of Truman and like half or so of Eisenhower in Tim Weiner's Legacy of Ashes: The History of the CIA, I'm surprised at how sane Dee still is... but I'm probably still months away from the 90ies so I might still change my opinion on that). And maybe she's actually right.
Maybe I do create little worlds within bigger ones whenever I write fanfiction, mostly because I usually write OCs or at least like to incorporate them heavily and then they develop their own backgrounds and stories just like that (okay, and sometimes, they don't really like to tell me, such as Charlie Williamson, for example... it's not a bad thing to be from a filthy rich good family background, Charlie, you really don't need to be ashamed of that).
So, um best world-building. I actually have no idea. I'd say Protect and Survive/Minor Characters, but mainly just because it's the biggest series incorporating the most characters and so demanded the most intricate and elaborate world-building (since my world-building skills seem to depend heavily on my characters). I needed to think up all their backgrounds because I didn't have much (in Laura's and Evan's case) or no canon at all (in all the OCs' cases) to fall back on for professional background and family and such.
I'm also not finished with it (not by a long shot, actually) because the farmkids for example need a lot more fleshing out in their immediate family background and the places they come from. I also did practically nothing on Laura Greenspan's family yet and Maureen Reece's family is still mostly a mystery, as well. Laura's and Evan's grandparents, I'm blanking out on and Dee really doesn't like to talk about his time spent in the system as a foster kid but honestly, the way he turned out I just don't think all of his foster parents were terrible. So, erm, yes... still lots of work in that verse.
As for the other ones: I think rareb and I also did a good job of bending the Potter verse to our will in Haven't Thought of You Lately (I think the biggest difference is that both Lavinia and Orion, our OCs, never treat magic like something wondrous and something that they need to discover, mostly because they both come from a wizarding family background and for them magic was always part of their lives... okay, apart from the fact that HTOYL is an AU...) and fleshed out both of them well enough to have added a little to the vast Potter verse. We should get back into writing and I really do mean that.
Jenna's War... mh. It's been a while since I really revisited it but I do remember how much fun it was to play around in the Star Wars verse and develop a part of it that was never really explored in canon, neither in the movies nor in the books (that is, the world of the dirt-eating grunts that were toyling away in the Galactic Civil War and getting a pat on the shoulder for it if they lived long along for that) and I think I really would like to go back to it (sgteam14283's request for a story with Jenna meeting a canon character from the movies is still hanging around in my head and I think that one really deserves to be written.. and if it's just to have Jenna insulting one famous Princess, possibly in front of her entire chain of command or something...) so yeah, I guess there's still a lot to do in that verse.
Last but not least, the one currently challenging me the most is Not in Kansas Anymore, the big bang story. Kind of like by accident I entered a completely new part of the Star Wars verse (Rebel Spec Ops and storm trooper operations, that much I think I can give away) and I still feel like I haven't even begun to flesh that out as much as I should (or could). There are so many small and big things that still need to be thought of and now my fingers are itching for writing some new big bang stuff but my goddamn laptop is dead ARGH (and my dad's computer doesn't have Office installed)! I think I'll try that Dell order thing again now...
~*~
13. What’s your favorite culture to write, fictional or not?
14. How do you map out locations, if needed? Do you have any to show us?
15. Midway question! Tell us about a writer you admire, whether professional or not!
16. Do you write romantic relationships? How do you do with those, and how “far” are you willing to go in your writing?
17. Favorite protagonist and why!
18. Favorite antagonist and why!
19. Favorite minor that decided to shove himself into the spotlight and why!
20. What are your favorite character interactions to write?
21. Do any of your characters have children? How well do you write them?
22. Tell us about one scene between your characters that you’ve never written or told anyone about before! Serious or not.
23. How long does it usually take you to complete an entire story-from planning to writing to posting (if you post your work)?
24. How willing are you to kill your characters if the plot so demands it? What’s the most interesting way you’ve killed someone?
25. Do any of your characters have pets? Tell us about them.
26. Let’s talk art! Do you draw your characters? Do others draw them? Pick one of your OCs and post your favorite picture of him!
27. Along similar lines, do appearances play a big role in your stories? Tell us about them, or if not, how you go about designing your characters.
28. Have you ever written a character with physical or mental disabilities? Describe them, and if there’s nothing major to speak of, tell us a few smaller ones.
29. How often do you think about writing? Ever come across something IRL that reminds you of your story/characters?
30. Final question! Tag someone! And tell us what you like about that person as a writer and/or about one of his/her characters!
Anyway... any of my verses you'd like to have included this? Any verses you didn't like, regarding world building? Give it all to me!
1. Tell us about your favorite writing project/universe that you’ve worked with and why.
2. How many characters do you have? Do you prefer males or females?
3. How do you come up with names, for characters (and for places if you’re writing about fictional places)?
4. Tell us about one of your first stories/characters!
5. By age, who is your youngest character? Oldest? How about “youngest” and “oldest” in terms of when you created them?
6. Where are you most comfortable writing? At what time of day? Computer or good ol’ pen and paper?
7. Do you listen to music while you write? What kind? Are there any songs you like to relate/apply to your characters?
8. What’s your favorite genre to write? To read?
9. How do you get ideas for your characters? Describe the process of creating them.
10. What are some really weird situations your characters have been in? Everything from serious canon scenes to meme questions counts!
11. Who is your favorite character to write? Least favorite?
And the newest one:
12. In what story did you feel you did the best job of worldbuilding? Any side-notes on it you’d like to share?
Um. World... building... what?
Or... let me start differently.
You know what one of the reasons for me never really getting into original fiction was? That I'm abysmal at world building. I failed so bad every time I tried to write fantasy or science-fiction that I still rarely go back to the few attempts at that I did make. I think I did marginally better with the SF stories but it was really laughable how unimaginative and downright boring all the settings were. Somehow, for all my skills in creating characters and probably maybe atmosphere, too, I totally lack them in terms of creating a world. Maybe that's coming from the same source that makes it impossible for me to get some really crazy ideas (I talked about this here), I don't know.
However, when I talked about this with mackenziesmomma yesterday, she pointed out that I was building worlds within worlds whenever I write fanfiction. She said that when I created the Minor Characters Thomas Moore, Laura Greenspan, Maureen Reece and Simon DeLisle, I created a little world within the Stargate universe by - quote mac - "making Laura and Tom be from Maine and make Dee as screwed up as he is" (concerning that... after having finished all of Truman and like half or so of Eisenhower in Tim Weiner's Legacy of Ashes: The History of the CIA, I'm surprised at how sane Dee still is... but I'm probably still months away from the 90ies so I might still change my opinion on that). And maybe she's actually right.
Maybe I do create little worlds within bigger ones whenever I write fanfiction, mostly because I usually write OCs or at least like to incorporate them heavily and then they develop their own backgrounds and stories just like that (okay, and sometimes, they don't really like to tell me, such as Charlie Williamson, for example... it's not a bad thing to be from a filthy rich good family background, Charlie, you really don't need to be ashamed of that).
So, um best world-building. I actually have no idea. I'd say Protect and Survive/Minor Characters, but mainly just because it's the biggest series incorporating the most characters and so demanded the most intricate and elaborate world-building (since my world-building skills seem to depend heavily on my characters). I needed to think up all their backgrounds because I didn't have much (in Laura's and Evan's case) or no canon at all (in all the OCs' cases) to fall back on for professional background and family and such.
I'm also not finished with it (not by a long shot, actually) because the farmkids for example need a lot more fleshing out in their immediate family background and the places they come from. I also did practically nothing on Laura Greenspan's family yet and Maureen Reece's family is still mostly a mystery, as well. Laura's and Evan's grandparents, I'm blanking out on and Dee really doesn't like to talk about his time spent in the system as a foster kid but honestly, the way he turned out I just don't think all of his foster parents were terrible. So, erm, yes... still lots of work in that verse.
As for the other ones: I think rareb and I also did a good job of bending the Potter verse to our will in Haven't Thought of You Lately (I think the biggest difference is that both Lavinia and Orion, our OCs, never treat magic like something wondrous and something that they need to discover, mostly because they both come from a wizarding family background and for them magic was always part of their lives... okay, apart from the fact that HTOYL is an AU...) and fleshed out both of them well enough to have added a little to the vast Potter verse. We should get back into writing and I really do mean that.
Jenna's War... mh. It's been a while since I really revisited it but I do remember how much fun it was to play around in the Star Wars verse and develop a part of it that was never really explored in canon, neither in the movies nor in the books (that is, the world of the dirt-eating grunts that were toyling away in the Galactic Civil War and getting a pat on the shoulder for it if they lived long along for that) and I think I really would like to go back to it (sgteam14283's request for a story with Jenna meeting a canon character from the movies is still hanging around in my head and I think that one really deserves to be written.. and if it's just to have Jenna insulting one famous Princess, possibly in front of her entire chain of command or something...) so yeah, I guess there's still a lot to do in that verse.
Last but not least, the one currently challenging me the most is Not in Kansas Anymore, the big bang story. Kind of like by accident I entered a completely new part of the Star Wars verse (Rebel Spec Ops and storm trooper operations, that much I think I can give away) and I still feel like I haven't even begun to flesh that out as much as I should (or could). There are so many small and big things that still need to be thought of and now my fingers are itching for writing some new big bang stuff but my goddamn laptop is dead ARGH (and my dad's computer doesn't have Office installed)! I think I'll try that Dell order thing again now...
~*~
13. What’s your favorite culture to write, fictional or not?
14. How do you map out locations, if needed? Do you have any to show us?
15. Midway question! Tell us about a writer you admire, whether professional or not!
16. Do you write romantic relationships? How do you do with those, and how “far” are you willing to go in your writing?
17. Favorite protagonist and why!
18. Favorite antagonist and why!
19. Favorite minor that decided to shove himself into the spotlight and why!
20. What are your favorite character interactions to write?
21. Do any of your characters have children? How well do you write them?
22. Tell us about one scene between your characters that you’ve never written or told anyone about before! Serious or not.
23. How long does it usually take you to complete an entire story-from planning to writing to posting (if you post your work)?
24. How willing are you to kill your characters if the plot so demands it? What’s the most interesting way you’ve killed someone?
25. Do any of your characters have pets? Tell us about them.
26. Let’s talk art! Do you draw your characters? Do others draw them? Pick one of your OCs and post your favorite picture of him!
27. Along similar lines, do appearances play a big role in your stories? Tell us about them, or if not, how you go about designing your characters.
28. Have you ever written a character with physical or mental disabilities? Describe them, and if there’s nothing major to speak of, tell us a few smaller ones.
29. How often do you think about writing? Ever come across something IRL that reminds you of your story/characters?
30. Final question! Tag someone! And tell us what you like about that person as a writer and/or about one of his/her characters!
Anyway... any of my verses you'd like to have included this? Any verses you didn't like, regarding world building? Give it all to me!