I realised that when I tried reading it while pretending I didn't know the characters - indeed, as you can probably guess, that's what sparked the characterisation thing. I was quite amazed at how little non-dialogue there was, actually!
If you knew that Val is an old smoking slapper, and Grayson is a posh lawyer, and Matthew is a hot and utterly gorgeous family-oriented businessman, I think it might come across as exciting (though I don't like to say so myself, but the Emmerdale fans reading it told me so), but without that background...
LOL. It *does* help. In fact, a fuller description of them all probably would help even more. I read through the story. It made me laugh in several places, so it's certainly doing something right, and the plot certainly works.
I still didn't really care about the characters, but I think that can only work if I knew them a lot better. And I don't know if anyone could have done that within the story.
Actually, what bothered me was this just didn't feel polished the way Van Haffling and Mothicle did. Those were really good, but here my mind kept objecting to word choices and sentence phrasings... I feel silly pointing it out, considering the quality of my writing :) But I don't know if you know what I mean, and would like to rewrite it if only you had the time to spend, or know what I mean, but think I shouldn't nitpick without being able to fix it, or don't know what I mean, and it's just because we disagree how to phrase things, or because other people know the characters and I don't?
Well, the thing about fanfic is that I reckon it's just not worth polishing it. With Death in the Dales, I wrote quick and fast and only checked back for inconsistencies - it reads well *enough*, and I wasn't going for the same level of prose I would in original fic.
I know Dark Times (you can't call it Van Halfling, it gives away the twist!) is fanfic, but that was fanfic for a fairly discerning audience, hence the polishing. Plus, I was deliberately parodying Tolkien's style, which seems like a genre in itself. My Robin Hood slashy fanfics are less polished ;)
Also, if you read the other fanfics on the Emmerdale forum, you would see what I mean about it being generally quite stream of consciousness. People seemed impressed I made an effort to give it plot and direction ;)
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If you knew that Val is an old smoking slapper, and Grayson is a posh lawyer, and Matthew is a hot and utterly gorgeous family-oriented businessman, I think it might come across as exciting (though I don't like to say so myself, but the Emmerdale fans reading it told me so), but without that background...
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I still didn't really care about the characters, but I think that can only work if I knew them a lot better. And I don't know if anyone could have done that within the story.
Actually, what bothered me was this just didn't feel polished the way Van Haffling and Mothicle did. Those were really good, but here my mind kept objecting to word choices and sentence phrasings... I feel silly pointing it out, considering the quality of my writing :) But I don't know if you know what I mean, and would like to rewrite it if only you had the time to spend, or know what I mean, but think I shouldn't nitpick without being able to fix it, or don't know what I mean, and it's just because we disagree how to phrase things, or because other people know the characters and I don't?
Reply
I know Dark Times (you can't call it Van Halfling, it gives away the twist!) is fanfic, but that was fanfic for a fairly discerning audience, hence the polishing. Plus, I was deliberately parodying Tolkien's style, which seems like a genre in itself. My Robin Hood slashy fanfics are less polished ;)
Also, if you read the other fanfics on the Emmerdale forum, you would see what I mean about it being generally quite stream of consciousness. People seemed impressed I made an effort to give it plot and direction ;)
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