Well Hells boys and girls, it’s December! I missed my writing update last month as I was wrapped up in NaNo so let’s get back into the swing of things!
I had many a lofty goals in November to work on original fiction and that went straight out the window. So original fiction is in pretty much the same shape it was in…August? Whenever the last update happened. *sigh*
I actually talked to my side thug, Maye, about why I’ve been doing so much fanfic writing and less original stuff. She’s been doing more poetry than long form. And we’ve both come to the conclusion that writing stories we want to submit to agents exerts a ton of artistic pressure. Every line you’re thinking, is this a cliché? Does this make sense? Is there too much exposition?
And certainly, I want the fanfics I post to be good, but we’re all here for fun. No one’s paycheck is in jeopardy if I only get six reviews on a story. The only person I’m in competition with is myself, not the hundreds and hundreds—thousands even—of other writers in a slush pile.
I’m trying to find a way to shift this fanfic mindset back to my original writing, but it’s hard. Although, with the way my fanfic has been evolving I told Maye by this time next year I might be able to change some of the details and submit it as original, lol.
Hey man, if Fifty Shades of Grey can do it, I sure as hell can.
oOo
Anyway, fanfic updates!
I have scrapped my previous posting timeline.
Let me explain before you grab torches and pitchforks.
I had a reader suggest a story over on Archive of Our Own called Iacon Prophecy by ntldr. It’s set in the Barbarian AU. It’s not a humanformer fic, which is why I’d skipped over it previously. It’s a great story and just wrapped up not long ago. I absolutely loved the idea of a more primitive take on Transformers and I started writing a story with that in mind.
And so, I now have about 100K words written for a Ratchet-centric piece set in what I’m calling the Primitive AU because I’ve left out all modern devices. Of course when I started this it was just going to be a one story deal and going to be kind of short. And then I kept writing…and writing…and thinking and writing. And now this first story is probably going to another 100K before it’s done and I have already outlined the second and third stories in the series. Series is tentatively being called Constellations.
I’m still going to do the sequel to Where the Lonely Ones Roam and get up Tracks’ story for the Street True AU, but the priority has shifted a bit. I really like this Ratchet series. So I want to get at least this first look at Ratchet done and posted and then I’ll start on the others.
oOo
I also started an open ended series of unconnected stories under the title Of Gods and Mortals. They’re mythological stories because I loooooove mythology and I want to write a story for each major culture on Cybertron and then move into subcultures. So far I have a Polyhexian myth and an Iaconian one. I think next I’ll do Vos or Praxus. These are all with OCs but as another reader, Vela13, commented, these stories do relate to the universes I’ve written already and others that haven’t been written yet.
They don’t give away any major plot points or anything like that, but it adds some new textures and perspectives to characters if you really want to nerd out with me.
oOo
Make Believe I want to have wrapped up this month because January and February are going to be hectic. Also, my focus is drifting more and more to this Ratchet series so I need to get this Red Alert/Jazz thing wrapped up before my attention drifts too far.
I have four chapters left to write, next chapter will be up this week after I fine tune it a bit more.
That’s all I’ve got for you this month! I’ll check in again in February!
Forever Fiction Books 