occasionally, i have to wonder about my writing process.  i'm waiting for my betas to get back to me with Green Day, and in the meanwhile, have another story pinging my brain.  i never thought i'd be into Buffy the Vampire Slayer, but i'm currently writing a Buffy/Mag7:OW cross.  and i'm going along and it occurred to me i'm still on 'Part 1', and ( Read more... )

so, i  was thinking about the time-traveling girl fic i put on the back burner a few months ago.  i named it 'in time relieved', but then i got to thinking, and the lyrics to 'One Night in Bangkok' (anyone know which group does it?) are more appropriate as story titles to this particular group of stories i want to tell.  the lyrics are presented ( Read more... )

Thanks for staying with me this far - only three more essays to go - Factual Realism (this post),  Characterization, and OOMPH-factor.  The first three essays in this series - Visual Presentation, Story Mechanics, and Story Flow - all represent foundational factors to some degree or other.  When they're done well, they 'disappear' from the reader's ( Read more... )

 I'm having a great time with this rec-meta series, and am a bit surprised at how easily it's flowing.

In the past few days, I've discussed the two major hurdles readers face when accessing a story: How the author Visually Presents the story, and the basic Story Mechanics that are likely to throw a reader off his or her game.  Today, the essay is ( Read more... )

Story Mechanics:  Rec Meta 2

In this post of recommendation meta, I'm going to look at story mechanics.  For myself as a reader, 'story mechanics' means something mildly different than it might as a writer(1).  As a writer, I think of 'story mechanics' as: grammar and spelling, punctuation, sentence structure, paragraph structure, and basic  ( Read more... )

 So, I've enjoyed my time at the helm of the  Crack_van for Mag7 fandom, and thought I'd write some related meta.  BMP, one of the authors I recommended, asked me how I chose stories for recommendations.  My answer was somewhat off the cuff and boiled down to 'after I get past the 90% of stories that are dreck, I look for things I'd pay for in a ( Read more... )

well, had a burst of energy this weekend, and managed to finally vaccuum the house.  spent a ton of money on the son of lwj2 and his platoon-mates, because i get such a kick out of it.  managed to calig two scrolls for christmas revel and wash fabric for the new garb ( Read more... )

this is just a general grump, but sometimes when reading senfic, i feel like i'm the only one who views the military favorably.  i don't think i've run across a fic yet that has the military discovering jim and blair, but also treating them with dignity and respect.  except for sg-1 crossovers.  makes me grumpy.  also makes me want to continue on ( Read more... )

so i just settled down with a paper at work, and the abstract begin:

'A computational algorithm based on the multiquadric, which is a continuously differentiable radial basis function, is devised to solve shallow-water equations.  The numerical solutions are evaluated at scattered collocation points, and the spatial partial derivatives are formed ( Read more... )

so instead of poetry friday, i'm going to try my hand at meta today.  i have been reading a lot of lj essays lately - especially cupidsbow's essay* on whether/if/how fanfiction keeps women poor.  and it occurs to me that one of the over-riding themes of the essays i read, whether implicit or explicit, is that fanfiction has a language, a symbology ( Read more... )