The writing meme

[dreamflower]

Gacked from baylorsr

Ask me anything at all about my writing and then post the same question in your LJ so I can ask you about yours. Yep, anything!

Comments

[slightlytookish]

Which is your favorite character to write, and is this the same as your favorite character in LOTR as a whole, or a different one?

[dreamflower]

My favorite character to write is Bilbo. He's fun, he has a very distinctive "voice" and there are not a lot of fics focussing on him. Anytime I can do a story with Bilbo, it just makes me feel happy.
But my favorite character overall is not one, but four. I love to explore the interaction of the Travellers, how their friendship has connected them through the years, and with the cousins, how that blood relationship colors their friendship. It's this give and take between them that really appeals to me most.

[holdur.livejournal.com]

Why did you start writing fanfiction?

[dreamflower]

I had been reading it for a couple of months. I had known about fanfiction for a while, but some that I came across in another fandom was just dreck, and so I had avoided LotR fanfic. Then I found a link to "The Care and Feeding of Hobbits" by Baylor, and I got hooked on reading it, started to find some really good quality stories.
I read a story on West of the Moon, by Lulleny, called "The Prodigal Took". It just haunted me. I woke up at about 2AM, with a sequel almost complete in my head. I emailed Lulleny, and asked if she minded my writing the sequel, and she was very encouraging, even beta'd for me. That first story was "When the King Comes Back (the Great Smials)", and it was like a dam had burst. All of a sudden I had stories just clamoring at me to write them, and I haven't looked back since.

[ansostuff.livejournal.com]

Why do you love writing post-quest stories?

[dreamflower]

I like post-Quest stories that take place before Frodo leaves the best, since he is still there for the action. After the Quest the bond between the four is so firmly cemented. Sam is as close to them as if he is blood-related, and of the other three their own cousinly closeness is at its peak, if I could put it that way. They have been through so much together, and they understand one another so well.

Stories that are *after* he leaves are so sad. I haven't done very many of them so far. Most of them would have more angst than I care for.

[topaztook.livejournal.com]

Which of your OC’s is closest to your heart? Which do you most enjoy writing?

[dreamflower]

Well, Folco was more of a minor canon character, and it just broke my heart to kill him off, so I have a real soft spot for him. I've been toying with the idea of a pre-Quest story featuring him, but so far the appropriate bunny hasn't hopped along yet.

But so far my favorite OC to write is Menelcar. He's just so much fun. I sort of imagine him as a Gondorian version of Danny Kaye in the Court Jester, in that he is completely inept with weapons, and he's so very laid back and happy with his life as a rover. But he's not quite so clueless, LOL! nor is he a klutz in general. And he's wandered around M-e for thirty years, so he's had a lot happen, and met a lot of people...

[coneygoil.livejournal.com]

Where do your ideas spark from?

[dreamflower]

I get ideas from a lot of places. Oftentimes from other people's fics, which inspire me to think of the characters in different situations. Sometimes other people give me plot bunnies as well. Sometimes there is a question left unanswered or an incident only lightly mentioned in one of my own fics that I feel called on to expand. (For example "Merry's Milestone" came out of the little anecdote Frodo tells at his birthday party in "Conspiracy"...) Sometimes challenges also spark ideas.
But my best ideas seem to come from the books; the in depth discussions we have on Chapter of the Week at rec.arts.books.tolkien very frequently make me think about certain incidents in a new way, or notice phrases that need expanding or gaps that need filling.

[gamgeefest.livejournal.com]

How many times do you revise a story/chapter before you're satisified with it?

[dreamflower]

It all depends on the story. Some of the shorter ones get almost no revision except for spelling, punctuation, etc. There are a few of my stories that just seem to flow out of nowhere, and I wonder where they came from.
My longer, multi-chapter stories tend to get a bit more revision before I post each one, and on rare occasions I may even use a beta for one of those. I tend to revise each chapter three to five times, generally speaking.
Since I archive all my stories at Stories of Arda, some of them even still get revision after posting. I may notice later on something that doesn't quite jibe with my "universe" or that violates canon, so I will go in and tweak it. For example, the SoA yahoo group recently had a discussion on the use of "Your Majesty" for addressing the King, and the consensus was that it wasn't quite canon, so I went in and changed some of my stories that had that.
My "bunny chase" I am not revising at all. I will probably have to do a lot to it before I gather it up into one long story and archive it.