Nerves

Long time no post, right? Sorry about that. I've had a lot of real life crap going on, and pretty much I tried to convince myself not to write anymore. But now I'm back! And so we move onto today's topic.

One of my good friends recently decided that she was going to actually start writing fics. Of course she won't tell me her user name, so I can't exactly post it here and send you people to go read her, but back on subject. I was talking to her a few days ago, and she said she really wanted to write a hetalia fic that was England/Queen Elizabeth. But she was also afraid that people would hate it. That she would be flamed for it.

Well, I have some news I shared with her that I shall share with you now. In my experience 98% of people online will not flame. In fact, they won't only not flame, but they also won't make suggestions, unless asked. And that 2% that will flame are laughable. They are the ones with no purpose in life other than to try to make you feel like crap. In all seriousness, I have only ever gotten 2 flames. 1, my most recent, I laughed at. The other, my first, I had a good cry over and moved on with life. That first one was almost a year and a half ago. As you can see, it didn't stop me from writing.

The other little tidbit I told her, was that people are weird. You can not predict what fans will like. Seriously. My two most popular stories, Haunted and Camisado, I swore I would get flamed for. Haunted was the first mpreg of Kuroshitsuji as far as I can tell, and Camisado was serious rape. For both of them I knew I would need hard skin to get through the flames. Neither of them have ever been flamed, and both of them gain so many reviews/favs/and alerts.

So my news for you? Write for yourself, not for others. The minute you start caring what others think of your writing is the minute you talk yourself out of writing it. Write what you want, what inspires you, and if people don't like it, they can just fuck off.

To write or not to write...

A little break from mid nano blues, because I need it. Really. I do.

So I'm a senior in high school this year, and as part of my college applications, I have to write an essay about an issue that is important to me, my community, or my friends. Now the first issue I could easily write about is gay rights and homophobia. Many of my friends are not heterosexual, just as I am not heterosexual. I am asexual, and a grand total of 7 people know that. (Well, now all you internet nerds know it too.) Since last year I have been fighting against homophobia, since at that time many of my friends were coming out, and most people thought (and still think) that I am gay.

Now I can easily turn out a nice long essay about homophobia and how it has affected me and my friends. Not only that, but it could help me get some diversity points, since Asexuality is a definite minority of a minority. However of the 7 people who do know, my parents aren't among them. Now there is a definite chance that my parents will request to proof my essays, at which point they will have a very sudden realization.

So what to do? What to do? Write what I want, and care about? Or chose a problem that's safe and easy?

If I had a brain left I would somehow connect this to yaoi. However it is currently 11 pm and I'm too tired to BS some sort of connection. So good night!

Happy Nanowrimo!

Dear followers (if there are any of you out there)

Well, it's that time of year ago. November first has rolled around, and once again I'm jumping into the hazardous blood sport that is National Novel Writing Month. Every year I promise myself to write one original novel length story during the month of November. I hopefully will be able to update this blog, with the strifes and joys of the month, especially if I continue the progress made today, and stay ahead of schedule. Hopefully I'll get a word war started between my brother in law, and best friend, and post that in the side bar. (I'm winning btw.)

However there is a downside. I probably won't get much updating done during november. (I know, I know. I never update anyways. ) So that's about all I have to say! Good luck if you're doing nano too!

Yaoi Sakka

Outlining

Forgive me if this doesn't make since. I currently have the cold from hell.

So outlining. The very word sends some writers running for their life. And well, I hate to break it to you, outlining is an invaluable tool for writing anything that takes time.

Why is it that so many writers hate it? Because it's just to hairy of a problem. Take an mpreg story for example. You have 9 months of important events to write about. Not only will have to write about the standard drama of fictional life, but also about standard pregnancy, and find some way for your uke to have gotten knocked up. That's three seperate subplots that have to be combined into one HUGE plot.

But of course, there is a solution. Create a time line. Now, timelines on their own are a bit of a hairy mess, 'specially if your a perfectionist like me and like to see how big of gaps there are between important events. However there are some basic tools that make this process as painless as possible (which still feels a bit like child birth, by the way, it just numbs it a bit). The simpliest, and most useful of which is already on your computer. Excel.

I have this lovely little tutorial here that I'm following to create a timeline for one of my nano fics. So far it's going swimmingly.

On the note of Nanowrimo, anyone else doing it?

Twilight Rant

Why? Because it's almost midnight. I don't want to go to bed. And every blog needs a twilight post.

So once upon a time I heard about this unknown book called Twilight. I heard about it from a Harry Potter fan, whom I have great respect for, so I decided it's probably a good book. Then another friend dragged me out to see the movie. I was somewhat excited, after all I was leaving the house to hang out at the mall. In fact I even promised myself that if it was good I'd read the book.

For those who are wondering. I haven't read the book yet.

But Twilight pisses me off. Just from the plot description it sounds like some 13 year old's vampire fanfic. I mean sparkle? WTF? As a proud creator of a vampire OC I am disgusted. Half the charm of a vampire is that they gave up sunrises, sunsets, and normal food for eternal life! Now they can see the sun rise and set, why? It's original yes, but there is a reason why no one else has EVER had a sparkly vampire. Besides, I can't use the word sparkly to describe a boy. It makes it seem too yaoi.

Bella on the other hand pissed me off to. Just by watching the movie I could tell she was a Mary Sue. I mean come on! She moves to a new school, all the guys love her, she's "average," she fixes everyone's relationship problems, and she has a werewolf and a vampire after her heart. Why? WHY!?

I was browsing flairs on facebook and one said "who cares? It'll be dead in 5 years anyways." Unfortunately I don't think it will. Twilight has left such a mark on teenage culture that it will stick around. There are so many fangirls and so many haters that it will never be forgotten. And the whole Team "insert character name here" will stick too. It's kinda ingenious. Please tell me the Twilight fangirls didn't create that part?

That's really all of my rant. Life's kicking my ass at the moment, so I don't get much time to update. Sorry!

A little personal rant time...

I'm currently failing English and Government, so I have no time for a full out yaoi post, or even to work on my stories. (How many months late is the last chapter of Haunted again!?) But I currently have a little rant to get off my chest.

If you think something is lame you don't have to say so! And putting a little smiley after it doesn't help! Honestly, remember your mother's advice if you can't say something nice, don't say it at all!

So to explain where that little rant came from, I had a story idea on the way out to band practice. Not really a story, but just a character, and three questions that sum him up. Basically he's a vampire that contracted AIDS by biting someone. Now, it has been months since my good friend or I have had any sort of good inspiration. (The most memorable night of inspiration added 8 prompts to my prompt list, that was three months ago.) So I was quite excited to tell her about it. Well... I forgot one thing. This friend is a vampire fanatic, and I know next to nothing about vampires.

So I explained the vampire to her. Her response: "lol that's lame XD"... and then she continued to totally tear apart the character, and ended with, "but that's an interesting idea."

Now, the cherry on the top of this? Yesterday I gave her advice on how to deal with someone calling her dumb. And she goes and says this, and URG! Oh so sorry I don't obsess over vampires, and that I don't have time to research them. NEXT TIME I have an idea, I won't tell you till I've researched it... or perhaps just not tell you at all!

To conclude I had to leave the conversation. Her words really turned my mind upside down and I couldn't deal with it. I'll have to go back later and tell her why I disappeared... maybe...

EDIT: Yeah for quick fights. I finally went back to the chat, and asked her to never preface a response to an idea with " lol that's lame XD." Turns out she wasn't talking about my story idea, just that it would suck to be that vampire. So I feel a bit better now. ^.^ And yeah. I'm good. ^.^

When life gives you lemons... write smut!

"Writing smut is an exercise in combining pointless sentences and cliche adjective in an attempt to make a simple listing of actions a story." - Yaoisakka

Okay, okay, cliche title I know. Please forgive me, I'm ill.

As you might have guessed today's topic is smut writing. Why? Because I've been beating my brains out trying to finish a smut piece that just refuses to be written, also because I saw a quote I once said,

and finally because I've been reading weepingcock, a livejournal community that is dedicated to bad smut.

So hopefully you read the quote at the top. If not you might want to, because that's what today's topic is!

I honestly believe this quote to be true. When you write smut you are honestly writing pure action. Very rarely will your MC being coherent enough to actually say something crucial to the plot. So your scene will probably consist of action, moans, and very very purple prose.

After all, for those of us who are virgins writing smut, or in the sense of yaoi, aren't guys and don't know what a prostrate feels like, all we know is what we've read/watched. So we recycle scenes, phrases and descriptions in our own words to recreate our own scenes. (Please don't misunderstand what I just said. I was not attempting to call anyone a plagerist.)

So what can you do? How can you keep your list of actions from being a list of actions? Well, I do in fact have a few tips.

• Watch sentense legnth - One thing that tends to happen is that we writers try to squish actions into the same sentense. Don't! If you just had a complex sentense describing how his tongue ran over the exposed flesh as his hands carded through dark ebony hair, then the next sentense should just describe how one hand floated down to tweak a nipple, now how his tongue traveled lower, as did his hands, tweaking both nipples as they passed. (Is it bad that I can't write smut when I try, but when giving examples I'm somehow writing it?) Keep long setenses next to short ones and vice versa.
  
• Look out for repetition - This comes in two categories. Repetition of names, and repetition of descriptions. As a general rule, I only mention each character's name once per paragraph. Why? Because you don't want:
  

  Sora moaned as Riku swallowed his cock. Sora couldn't believe that Riku was that skillful with his tongue. Hand's burried in Riku's hair as Sora threw his head back with a gutteral moan. Sora finally pulled Riku back up for a heated kiss.

  See? Not pretty. Try substituting the silverette, the shorter male, and simply he, instead. As for the repetition of descriptions, basically just be aware of the scene that's being described. Don't repeat descriptions, colors, and even try to avoid repetion of nouns. For example if you just called a phalus a cock a sentence ago refer to it as a member, manhood, length or even dick, just not as a cock. It just makes the prose prettier.
• Keep one character's POV per paragraph - Some might be confused. Some might skip this section because they think it only applies to First person stories. But it doesn't. What I mean is that when you start writing a paragraph you pick a passive character and an active character. The active tends to be the first person mentioned, so in the excerpt above it's Sora. Notice how every sentense is about Sora? Riku is just mentioned so we know what's happening to Sora. Wouldn't it be weird/bad if it was:
  

  Sora moaned as Riku swallowed his cock. Riku eagerly swallowed, trying to take in as much of Sora as he could. Hand's burried in Riku's hair as Sora threw his head back with a gutteral moan. Riku felt the cock slip from his mouth as Sora pulled him back up for a heated kiss.
  

  See what I mean? It changes the focus too much. Find a character, and stick with him for a few paragraphs before the other one takes control!

So that's about it for today. Hopefully I'll be going to a convention this weekend, as long as I feel better tomorrow. -crosses fingers- And perhaps then I'll be able to write some more smut and finally finish one of the 10 or so stories that are just sitting around waiting for smut...