Tips on prompting/Dear Author letters/Doing Yuletide

[lilka]

OMG, sign-ups are almost upon us! I'm so excited. It's about this time that I go digging through meta from previous years, to remind myself of the pearls of wisdom people have compiled about how to get the most out of your Yultide experience. These are my favourites:

liviapenn: How to Not Ruin Yuletide

penknife: Eight ways to break your ficathon writer's brain

Comments

[lizzy_someone]

I know this goes against conventional wisdom, and most people are...more creative, I guess, than I am, but I have to say that I have never seen a prompt too specific for me. I want structure! I want you to help me write stuff I know you'll like! I don't want to face that blank page all alone!

Alternatively, advice that is probably more widely applicable: I like each request to contain a variety of prompts. "I would love an A/B story, or C backstory, or what happened to D post-canon, or..." Then I have options, but it's not so open-ended that I'm paralyzed with indecision.

[chiana606]

I also like requests with lots of different prompts. They give me something to go off of, while also giving me options.

[calenlily]

Glad to see other people like having lots of prompts. I'm actually almost afraid that I'm giving too many this year. Adding more possibilities can't hurt, can it?

I just have too many ideas.

[astrogirl2]

I like to hear this, because I always worry a little bit that I might overwhelm my writer with suggestions. :)

[bluerosefairy]

Seconding! I love specifics, especially if an author gives a number of different ideas that they like. It gives me a better idea of where to start, and more certainty that I'm writing something they'll like.