Dec 4 2102

I have a chapter nearly ready. It's been that way for a time, but a pesky last scene that doesn't quite work is holding me up. I ponder: Am I giving too much away and putting an Ending where there shouldn't be one yet? (That's a fair criticism I got on Fish Job, after the Jayne/Mal rescue.) Should I edit this new moment out or move it to a later chapter? But where would it fit?

I struggle with these decisions, though not as much as I do with the many absorbing challenges of real life. Long story short: I have to carry on existing in RL, so yes, without RL I might have finished this fic years ago... Or maybe not, given that it's taken more than a little effort to come through the trials of reality still living and aware and even somewhat better at getting through the day. Sometimes RL needs a slap down, and that takes a lot of energy. But I will, I swear, carry on and finish. At least I will string together the few select super-dramatic scenes I sketched out when the firefly madness was on me, long long ago when the Repubs still controlled the WH and both houses of Senate and Blackwater and Cheney were the source of all evil. (Those entities would NEVER appear as fictionalize versions of themselves in my fics oh no NEVER!...)

Please:reviews, comments, PMs. They help more than anything. Being favorite-d or followed is nice, but I want to hear what you *think*.

Example: I think Ben and Jerry's Peanut Brittle ice cream is next to God but Starbuck's decaf is garbage. See? It's not so hard.

June 26 2011

OK, not to get any hopes up too high, but something's been happening the past few days. I had been stuck on an unnecessarily long and not particular fun OC scene for months, tweaking it over and over because I wasn't sure what to do with the rest of the chapter. But suddenly other scenes have appeared, unexpected new ways of telling what needs to be told. For the first time in a while I'm actually a little excited about what I'm writing! (Anything that was good about the last few chapters was written years ago. There just hasn't been much fresh creativity in this brain lately.)

So yay for writer's block being less blocky! And let me give credit to an amazing South Korean spy drama that I fell in love with last weekend. It is not without flaws, even some fairly annoying ones, but was good enough to get me thoroughly addicted. It made me miss story telling, which made me sit down and force myself to write, dammit!

BTW, if you're looking for 20 hours of entertainment and don't mind subtitles, a bit of repetitiveness, long melodramatic musical interludes, and the occasional heart-wrenching plot twist, go to hulu RIGHT NOW and watch IRIS. But the time you get done, I might have a new chapter ready to post. ;)

June 6 2011

I have lost my way. My characters have become unfamiliar to me, and my mind balks at burrowing back into their ficworld. Why? How can this be? I love my fic, really I do! (Most of it, anyhow.) I want to get to those last moments that wait somewhere in a dark corner of my mind, threads hanging loose. How did I lose hold of them?

It doesn't matter, as long as me and my fic find each other again sometime soon. (Strike up the band: Strangers in the night...) I will make those last few events In Backstories happen as they should. (Do you see the scene, reader? The one that ends it all? I do. I have for some time. But I can't quite see the path to get there...) After five long years, the weight of unfinished fic will fall from me, and those beautiful last words will appear:

"The End"

I will get there. Somehow!

March 26, 2011

Wow, that was some rant last time, huh? I should chill the hell out, huh? :)

Anyway, comments following Chapter 22:

The time between my postings is awful. Especially when I'm so very close to finishing this fic! Sorry about that. I'm afraid the next chapter is pretty incomplete, so it won't be soon. I'll do what I can to move it along!

And yes, Inara's story will be finished. Mal's too. The flashbacks from book 2 needed one more "episode" each: Inara's ending, Mal's beginning. (His story went backward in time, right?) I once meant to put all of Inara's conclusion here, but I think it works better to make you wait for the second half. I think you'll understand why when we get there.

Oh - and as for how a large bathing tub got on her shuttle, and why we never saw it before... I've been pondering that for a while, and just decided to hell with it. The props department brought it in and built a new storage closet on the set, and they did such a good job that it looks like it's been there all the time and no one should even notice that it hasn't. All right? :)

March 4, 2011

Can I just say how annoyed I am with fanfiction.net right now? It's not hard. It's not complicated. All I want is some kind of break between one scene and the next. Just a little dash-dash-dash kind of thing to suggest that the POV or timing or whatever might be shifting before the next scene takes place. But it seems that whenever I check back at what I once posted, the spacer I used to change the scene is no longer recognized by this fucking stupid website.

Why is it so hard?

I am tired of going through my thousands of words and reformatting every chapter to have a -- -- -- or o--o--o- or .*.*.* or whatever, because I keep finding that whatever I try, it still doesn't work. As if I didn't take care of this when I first wrote the damned thing. So if you, dear reader, are experienced in my fics sudden shifts in POV that seem odd, blame the idiots who spam fine websites like this and make it impossible for normal folks to just post their stuff the way it's meant to be.

I'm sick of fixing it. I've fixed it several times, and it still keeps being wrong. So it'll be what it is (wrong!) until there is an actual published novel to set the type the way I want it. Until then, it'll just be flawed. And I'll be annoyed with the GD internet.

/rant

November 16, 2010: Chapter 21 in a day or two. Just need to edit, and give folks time to read Chapter 20.

November 8, 2010: Two more chapters are just about done. Just need a proofread. And I had to write and post these together, since they're basically Big Action Scene part 1 and part 2. Chapters 20 and 21--soon. The get ready to be sad in 22, but not in any expected way. I like to think at last a few plot twists are wholly unseen. But terribly sad, this one.

September 12, 2010, comment with Chapter 18

A few things:

I really meant to post Chapter 18 two weeks ago, but life got complicated. Like call-a-lawyer complicated. Luckily, I have a good friend who practices the trade, and specific threat of action got me through the mess in the near term. Who knows how it’ll turn out in the long run, but I’ll get through. It’s nothing too scary, just the possibility of financial stress. That’s a helluva lot better than death and dismemberment by Reaver, right? Sooo glad I have Firefly fic to set my standards for me.

Don’t mean to whine, since many good things have happened in the past month as well, only want to explain that it wasn’t a good time last week. It’s not any evil plan to up the drama by making you wait for updates. I just needed to not think as much as possible.

Thing 2: I generally reply to every review I get from live journal and fanfiction, but I’ve totally gotten behind in the past month. I have read each review and they make me feel all warm and fuzzy! I’ve picked up some new readers and handed out a few sleepless nights, and nothing makes me happier. I love to hear about that, because getting caught up in reading all night is awesome. Like the day I took off work to read the last Harry Potter. Good times. So thank you for leaving the reviews!

And last thing: My beta, desertgirl, said after this chapter, “I bet your going to make us wait months to find out if Inara, Mal, Zoe and Wash survived huh??” Well…. that’s not my plan LOL! I’ll tell you this: we’ll get back to them in Chapter 20, and ride that wave to the end of this monstrous tale.

Thank you for being so patient! The end is in sight…

Update: June 28, 2010

I've gotten a few emails lately as to how the fic is doing - thank you for asking! I have been making a lot of progress lately, in fact I've got chapters 15-22 very nearly done. But several more chapters beyond that are needed, and I don't want to start posting again until I've got it all down, both to avoid more delays and so I can have things tied into the ending nice and tight. I do love the details. Gotta get them right.

I hope to start posting again by the end of July. Fingers crossed!

Update: January 24, 2010

I posted Chapter 14 of Back Stories II a few days ago. There's going to be a break of a few weeks before I move on. Much editing to do on the next few chapters!

Update on holiday break 2009:

Finally I have new chapters for Back Stories 3! I've just posted chapter 9, and I have up to 13 or 14 (depending on how I break it up) pretty much done. Just some polishing and formatting needed. I'll post 1-2 chapters a week for a while, and hopefully finish writing the ending as I go so the posting can continue right to the end.

Thanks to everyone who keeps checking in. It's nice to see that the hits keep trickling along, even with nothing new for so long.

Happy Holidays!

Update on Christmas Eve 2008:

Been writing lately. I'm up to chapter 8 of Back Stories 3, but I won't post anything till I get further down the road. The plot details need much ironing out, and I'm sure I'll have to make adjustments in the "finished" chapters to stay consistent with future developments. But it's coming along! Another chapter or two and I'll be caught up to things I wrote long long ago, finally! That should help with the forward momentum - having big, juicy chunks all done.

I'm also trying to be a little less wordy, and keep things moving forward. (I've had some criticism as to that which I heartily agree with!) but I think I'm not succeeding. It takes a lot of words to arrange things as I want them, and I seem to just love all those little moments that turn what could be a half page scene into 2-3 pages. I do believe that concise is best, and I'll keep trying, but it's a tough battle!

So, in the past month I've discovered the updated story traffic page here on fanfiction.net. I'm a little shocked that anyone is still finding my stories, though they are far off the front page and I haven't posted to any community type pages since livejournal's ff_fanfic community went all private. So it does make me happy to see the ongoing trickle of traffic. Thanks for stopping in! I love how the countries of visitors are shown. Kudos to the fanfiction folks for putting that page together. Shows how small the internet world is, since folks in New Zealand and Korea and Slovakia and such can read stories written by some schmoe in New England.

Info about me:

I'm here on fanfiction for one thing really - posting my fic. Sorry, I don't tend to read a lot of other fic. Writing takes about all the mental energy I have. And I'm pretty choosy and tough with the criticism, so it's just as well I stay away from other stories. I've managed to offend more than one poor writer with my honest opinion LOL!

About me: I'm now a science teacher after years in research. This accounts for the long break in fic posting - I've been busy. First year of teaching is no joke! And I'm not as insanely fannish as I was in the first year or two of my Firefly obsession. It's really not like me, btw. I'm one of those who had never been this kind of fan before. I'd never even joined a website! But suddenly I found myself writing fanfiction and going to cons and spending hours online arguing fine details of characterization and dialog and the merits of each lovely episode. It's been so fun - I loved every minute of it!

It's hard to maintain that level of devotion after years with no new material, but I am going to finish my fic, sooner or later. I doubt I'll write any more fic after this. I'm pretty burnt out with it. I do love writing and will pursue original fiction during my summer breaks, but I don't think I can do any more with the Firefly verse. Not until Joss gives us more to work with (I wish!). And I'm just not really interested in any other fictional world, not enough to write about it.

Anyway, thanks for reading, and please do leave a review or drop me a line. I am open to all levels of criticism about my writing - I find it very helpful!