Meme meme meme Yes I am Still Working on the Prompts Meme
Picked up a meme from the lovely tempest_strife!
1. Tell us about your favorite writing project/universe that you've worked with and why.
My favourite so far as been an old one, from when I was in middle school, in combination with my oldest friend. Close running is the various things with Dar, the grumpy pacifist fish man empath, in them, as they are shared, and most of the rest that are original in my head are some derivative of existing works or rather scattered. Modern Gods is the most coherent of this latter category.
2. How many characters do you have? Do you prefer males or females?
Altogether I have a lot, some with various levels of completeness (many even without names) and tends to be pretty evenly men and women in the OC land.
3. How do you come up with names, for characters (and for places if you're writing about fictional places)?
When I am basing it on a region or culture, I start to look for echoing meanings in name and baby name sites in order to get a feel for what may work. Far more often I just play around with sounds in my head, or just spontaniously come up with something on my own.
4. Tell us about one of your first stories/characters!
One of the first...goodness. I don't actually know who would count as such. To choose one at Random, one of the earlier men that is from a universe of my own making entirely is Blue, a young man with sky-blue hair, glasses, and clumsiness who is a young God without any purpose, whom no one can identify, and ends up working as secretary for the mysterious Xenna Grey who ensures the safety and secrecy of gods, demi-humans, non-humans and their ilk from the hard destructive power of the 'Real World'. Accompanied by Ai, a young grand-something daughter of the Goddesses of Love who has become unhealthily obsessed with shoujo manga tropes (she is the self-proclaimed goddes of Pure and True Love), and occasionally through the aid of various other figures, he ends up trying to find his place and surviving Grey's mercurial methods.
5. By age, who is your youngest character? Oldest? How about “youngest” and “oldest” in terms of when you created them?
My youngest is Pied, a mockingbird that was unfortunately turned into a boy and cannot find a way to turn back. He's only a year and a half old when he gets transformed and suddenly has about ten times as much brain and reasoning power then he did before and no wings to speak of much to his confusion and alarm.
My oldest hands down is Xenna, since she's older then the concept of dirt.
In other terms, the most recent is my Summoner-Woman-Person, who goes around solving supernatural problems, and the oldest....I couldn't even tell you.
6. Where are you most comfortable writing? At what time of day? Computer or good ol' pen and paper?
At a laptop someplace where I am relatively alone, with the right sort of vibe music, around 2 o'clock PM or AM.
7. Do you listen to music while you write? What kind? Are there any songs you like to relate/apply to your characters?
I always do, unless for some reason its not working and I end up writing better otherwise... its not so much the music matching the characters, as the music matching the state of mind I'm in at the time so I can zone out and concentrate.
As for art, listening to radio or podcasts works fantastically because it occupies one level of my mind while I'm working with another, or songs that relate to the character are key.
8. What's your favorite genre to write? To read?
Fantasy definitely takes the cake in both counts. Fiction tends to bore me, which I know makes me a heathen, and Sci Fi is a close second when written in a certain style. Then there's Reading for Knowledge and thats a multi-level wonder of readingness, but I can't write it unless assigned.
9. How do you get ideas for your characters? Describe the process of creating them.
I will suddenly ask myself a question, "Hey what a minute what if blah or blah" and bam there you go. Or they will just randomly appear, full formed. Or just the edge of a thought will tease at me until they gain a face or name. It's...multilevel.
10. What are some really weird situations your characters have been in? Everything from serious canon scenes to meme questions counts!
Really Weird kinda just happens to them. Blue's had to defend himself with an indestructable clip-board more then once. Another's had her older brother be embodied as a sword and worn him as transformed jewelry. Pied's ended up in the hands of a dragon because he couldn't resist the shinies of his jewels. Another frozen in stone in order to leach a demon of death out of her. Uh. If I could get very far with most of these stories, I'm sure hilarity would ensure...and Dar, poor Dar, has been in more weirdness then he cares to recall.
Like getting eaten by a fish and loosing all of his hair in the process.
11. Who is your favorite character to write? Least favorite?
My favourite to write is Dar, at the moment, with Xenna right with him.
12. In what story did you feel you did the best job of world building? Any side-notes on it you'd like to share?
I don't always get very far with it, so I can't really say. The odd universe I'm building for one story idea with five gods is the most complete in terms of background, underlying world existence (I actually know how and why magic works and exists.) Modern Gods just happens to be the most complete.
AH I NEARLY FORGOT THE XANTHIS UNIVERSE. Ack. That's the most complete, but created in concert so of course it is.
13. What's your favorite culture to write, fictional or not?
The Gryphon People from one of the versions of Xenna's backstory. They're cute.
14. How do you map out locations, if needed? Do you have any to show us?
I really, really should, lets put it that way XD
15. Midway question! Tell us about a writer you admire, whether professional or not!
I admire quite a few, fanfiction or not. I'm bad with names, however.
16. Do you write romantic relationships? How do you do with those, and how “far” are you willing to go in your writing? ;)
I can, but in original fiction, I don't usually end up with many of them! Somehow. For some reason. And even when I've been writing fanfiction lately everything has been (almost) gen except for when I needed someone to find England playing Guitar hot for a PoV character....
18. Favorite antagonist and why!
The only one that's apparently creeped out rather uncreep-out-a-ble friends of mine, the antagonist from Modern Gods, who often takes the form of a large horde of large beetles, dead black, with red glowing eyes and giant scissor pincers.
19. Favorite minor that decided to shove himself into the spotlight and why!
JM! Short for Jingly-man, and so named by the characters of the players, he was supposed to be a once-or-twice filler for a Vampire: the Masquerade game I ran and ended up being a recurring character beloved by the characters.
20. What are your favorite character interactions to write?
Small moments of revelation between two people; separations, and reunions. Tense, dark little things. Good people being horrible to each other. Grumpy people finally being kind. People with hard exteriors showing a bit of inner softness. Dealing with the aftermath of tragedy.
21. Do any of your characters have children? How well do you write them?
Only a few side characters in things I've developed with others. Most of them end up being not things that have children, not at that stage in their life, or just not interested. (Ro, from the Xanthis-verse, not only has children but is married. In contrast, Xenna hates children and refuses to go near them.)
22. Tell us about one scene between your characters that you've never written or told anyone about before! Serious or not.
Can't...use...spoilers....uh.
There's a universe where summoners literally open up their souls to powerful beings, are possessed, and in a symbiotic relationship use the power and leverage of the possessing being that is forever linked to their soul to summon and control other beings through coercion or pure power, and access magic in this way. In this universe, she is called to a great meeting of other summoners to parade before the court of the king whose country hosts the summoner's training grounds, and is fiercely put out by having to wear what she calls useless and restrictive clothing. She normally walks around in very, very little. (This gathering is, in fact, dangerous because the various entities that possess summoners with great amounts of power tend to hate each other, or at least are territorial, and there have been known incidents of blowing up things...thus strict rules to house them in separate rooms, and the necessity of a specific summoner who is a friend of her's possessed by a minor goddess of friendship and grace to keep things from imploding. They have to do this PR because they cannot move the summoning grounds, for the large crystal deposits there make the process of being a summoner possible.)
23. How long does it usually take you to complete an entire story-from planning to writing to posting (if you post your work)?
No time line yet, we've yet to finish anything on my own.
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?
Depends on whether I want to still play with them afterward or not. If you aren't a major character, though, free reign.
25. Do any of your characters have pets? Tell us about them.
Generally not, unless you count things like the summoner's dragon that possesses her, or partnerships with non-human creatures (including non-living ones) but rarely in a 'pet' sort of way.
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!
If they are mine, there's an image somewhere, generally. I tend to work out personalities on paper that way, buuuuut its hard for the ones that don't start out on paper to get images on paper of them.
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.
They do and they don't. I don't often get a clear image of a face, in fact, with most of my Original-Original characters. I have trouble drawing them, as mentioned, when they do not start out as a concept on paper.
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.
Nothing major, beyond Post Traumatic Stress Disorder, which I would not call exactly a disability as much as a gained condition, and some sociopathic tendencies in a few. I should correct this, actually.
29. How often do you think about writing? Ever come across something IRL that reminds you of your story/characters?
A lot! If I'm staring off into space, I am likely going through story-related things in my head. I stare off into space a lot.
30. Final question! Tag someone! And tell us what you like about that person as a writer and/or about one of his characters!
Perhaps thecurtain when she has the time.
1. Tell us about your favorite writing project/universe that you've worked with and why.
My favourite so far as been an old one, from when I was in middle school, in combination with my oldest friend. Close running is the various things with Dar, the grumpy pacifist fish man empath, in them, as they are shared, and most of the rest that are original in my head are some derivative of existing works or rather scattered. Modern Gods is the most coherent of this latter category.
2. How many characters do you have? Do you prefer males or females?
Altogether I have a lot, some with various levels of completeness (many even without names) and tends to be pretty evenly men and women in the OC land.
3. How do you come up with names, for characters (and for places if you're writing about fictional places)?
When I am basing it on a region or culture, I start to look for echoing meanings in name and baby name sites in order to get a feel for what may work. Far more often I just play around with sounds in my head, or just spontaniously come up with something on my own.
4. Tell us about one of your first stories/characters!
One of the first...goodness. I don't actually know who would count as such. To choose one at Random, one of the earlier men that is from a universe of my own making entirely is Blue, a young man with sky-blue hair, glasses, and clumsiness who is a young God without any purpose, whom no one can identify, and ends up working as secretary for the mysterious Xenna Grey who ensures the safety and secrecy of gods, demi-humans, non-humans and their ilk from the hard destructive power of the 'Real World'. Accompanied by Ai, a young grand-something daughter of the Goddesses of Love who has become unhealthily obsessed with shoujo manga tropes (she is the self-proclaimed goddes of Pure and True Love), and occasionally through the aid of various other figures, he ends up trying to find his place and surviving Grey's mercurial methods.
5. By age, who is your youngest character? Oldest? How about “youngest” and “oldest” in terms of when you created them?
My youngest is Pied, a mockingbird that was unfortunately turned into a boy and cannot find a way to turn back. He's only a year and a half old when he gets transformed and suddenly has about ten times as much brain and reasoning power then he did before and no wings to speak of much to his confusion and alarm.
My oldest hands down is Xenna, since she's older then the concept of dirt.
In other terms, the most recent is my Summoner-Woman-Person, who goes around solving supernatural problems, and the oldest....I couldn't even tell you.
6. Where are you most comfortable writing? At what time of day? Computer or good ol' pen and paper?
At a laptop someplace where I am relatively alone, with the right sort of vibe music, around 2 o'clock PM or AM.
7. Do you listen to music while you write? What kind? Are there any songs you like to relate/apply to your characters?
I always do, unless for some reason its not working and I end up writing better otherwise... its not so much the music matching the characters, as the music matching the state of mind I'm in at the time so I can zone out and concentrate.
As for art, listening to radio or podcasts works fantastically because it occupies one level of my mind while I'm working with another, or songs that relate to the character are key.
8. What's your favorite genre to write? To read?
Fantasy definitely takes the cake in both counts. Fiction tends to bore me, which I know makes me a heathen, and Sci Fi is a close second when written in a certain style. Then there's Reading for Knowledge and thats a multi-level wonder of readingness, but I can't write it unless assigned.
9. How do you get ideas for your characters? Describe the process of creating them.
I will suddenly ask myself a question, "Hey what a minute what if blah or blah" and bam there you go. Or they will just randomly appear, full formed. Or just the edge of a thought will tease at me until they gain a face or name. It's...multilevel.
10. What are some really weird situations your characters have been in? Everything from serious canon scenes to meme questions counts!
Really Weird kinda just happens to them. Blue's had to defend himself with an indestructable clip-board more then once. Another's had her older brother be embodied as a sword and worn him as transformed jewelry. Pied's ended up in the hands of a dragon because he couldn't resist the shinies of his jewels. Another frozen in stone in order to leach a demon of death out of her. Uh. If I could get very far with most of these stories, I'm sure hilarity would ensure...and Dar, poor Dar, has been in more weirdness then he cares to recall.
Like getting eaten by a fish and loosing all of his hair in the process.
11. Who is your favorite character to write? Least favorite?
My favourite to write is Dar, at the moment, with Xenna right with him.
12. In what story did you feel you did the best job of world building? Any side-notes on it you'd like to share?
I don't always get very far with it, so I can't really say. The odd universe I'm building for one story idea with five gods is the most complete in terms of background, underlying world existence (I actually know how and why magic works and exists.) Modern Gods just happens to be the most complete.
AH I NEARLY FORGOT THE XANTHIS UNIVERSE. Ack. That's the most complete, but created in concert so of course it is.
13. What's your favorite culture to write, fictional or not?
The Gryphon People from one of the versions of Xenna's backstory. They're cute.
14. How do you map out locations, if needed? Do you have any to show us?
I really, really should, lets put it that way XD
15. Midway question! Tell us about a writer you admire, whether professional or not!
I admire quite a few, fanfiction or not. I'm bad with names, however.
16. Do you write romantic relationships? How do you do with those, and how “far” are you willing to go in your writing? ;)
I can, but in original fiction, I don't usually end up with many of them! Somehow. For some reason. And even when I've been writing fanfiction lately everything has been (almost) gen except for when I needed someone to find England playing Guitar hot for a PoV character....
18. Favorite antagonist and why!
The only one that's apparently creeped out rather uncreep-out-a-ble friends of mine, the antagonist from Modern Gods, who often takes the form of a large horde of large beetles, dead black, with red glowing eyes and giant scissor pincers.
19. Favorite minor that decided to shove himself into the spotlight and why!
JM! Short for Jingly-man, and so named by the characters of the players, he was supposed to be a once-or-twice filler for a Vampire: the Masquerade game I ran and ended up being a recurring character beloved by the characters.
20. What are your favorite character interactions to write?
Small moments of revelation between two people; separations, and reunions. Tense, dark little things. Good people being horrible to each other. Grumpy people finally being kind. People with hard exteriors showing a bit of inner softness. Dealing with the aftermath of tragedy.
21. Do any of your characters have children? How well do you write them?
Only a few side characters in things I've developed with others. Most of them end up being not things that have children, not at that stage in their life, or just not interested. (Ro, from the Xanthis-verse, not only has children but is married. In contrast, Xenna hates children and refuses to go near them.)
22. Tell us about one scene between your characters that you've never written or told anyone about before! Serious or not.
Can't...use...spoilers....uh.
There's a universe where summoners literally open up their souls to powerful beings, are possessed, and in a symbiotic relationship use the power and leverage of the possessing being that is forever linked to their soul to summon and control other beings through coercion or pure power, and access magic in this way. In this universe, she is called to a great meeting of other summoners to parade before the court of the king whose country hosts the summoner's training grounds, and is fiercely put out by having to wear what she calls useless and restrictive clothing. She normally walks around in very, very little. (This gathering is, in fact, dangerous because the various entities that possess summoners with great amounts of power tend to hate each other, or at least are territorial, and there have been known incidents of blowing up things...thus strict rules to house them in separate rooms, and the necessity of a specific summoner who is a friend of her's possessed by a minor goddess of friendship and grace to keep things from imploding. They have to do this PR because they cannot move the summoning grounds, for the large crystal deposits there make the process of being a summoner possible.)
23. How long does it usually take you to complete an entire story-from planning to writing to posting (if you post your work)?
No time line yet, we've yet to finish anything on my own.
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?
Depends on whether I want to still play with them afterward or not. If you aren't a major character, though, free reign.
25. Do any of your characters have pets? Tell us about them.
Generally not, unless you count things like the summoner's dragon that possesses her, or partnerships with non-human creatures (including non-living ones) but rarely in a 'pet' sort of way.
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!
If they are mine, there's an image somewhere, generally. I tend to work out personalities on paper that way, buuuuut its hard for the ones that don't start out on paper to get images on paper of them.
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.
They do and they don't. I don't often get a clear image of a face, in fact, with most of my Original-Original characters. I have trouble drawing them, as mentioned, when they do not start out as a concept on paper.
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.
Nothing major, beyond Post Traumatic Stress Disorder, which I would not call exactly a disability as much as a gained condition, and some sociopathic tendencies in a few. I should correct this, actually.
29. How often do you think about writing? Ever come across something IRL that reminds you of your story/characters?
A lot! If I'm staring off into space, I am likely going through story-related things in my head. I stare off into space a lot.
30. Final question! Tag someone! And tell us what you like about that person as a writer and/or about one of his characters!
Perhaps thecurtain when she has the time.