MetaFic

More or less randomly, I found myself thinking about Ages today. I went back and read it again on SIYE, and then for the sake of my ego I read the comments. I noticed that in several places I'd responded to reviews by saying that my first draft had been much less clear than the final version. So, still curious, I dug up that very first draft. It's pasted below, in case anyone else is curious.

One thing that I've done in my three months without work is to try and hone my writing skills and I've found podcasts a great help in this.

The ones that I've found most useful so far are Writing Excuses and The Roundtable Podcast.

Writing Excuses

Fifteen minutes long, because you're in a hurry, and we're not that smart.

As I continue with my enforced period of leisure I've been reading more of the stories that I've loved over the last 8 years or so since I first happened upon HP fanfic.

Three that have made their way across my screen recently are:

The Order of the Phoenix by Ruskbyte

Fate's Debt by Intromit

All three were stories that I really liked, but they've not all aged well.

The one that was the least satisfying was The Order of the Phoenix. I think its a great idea, but now I think its poor executed and very annoying. I didn't finish reading it.

I tried to post this as a forum post but apparently I couldn't enter the correct number and letters to prove I'm not a bot :)4

On to the post....

If you listen to the podcast or watch the video show you might know this, but Sword and Laser are putting together an anthology.

Submissions are open until 15th May 2013 and more details can be found on the link below.

http://swordandlaser.com/anthology/

I've been rereading this as I have time on my hands as I have been made redundant.

Aside from the writers style, its interesting to see what was still up for grabs at the time. One line that stood out was this one.

“The problem, Harry, is that the Disarming charm works best in academic settings, not in real world application. A wizard who has a death grip on his wand will not be disarmed with that spell. A properly configured wand will not respond to it either.”

It's been three years since I updated Echoes.

Again: No, it's not abandoned. I said I wouldn't, and in the untimely event of my death, my wife has instructions on what to post, how, and where for the full overview and chapter-by-chapter sketches and the portions that are fully written.

Seven is the powerful number. So that's what Tom would have gone for. You would think after he was resurrected that he might have said to himself, well, let me get back to that horcrux business. And he did, I think, because he made Nagini one. (I'm assuming he did this after he was resurrected.) So he'd be thinking "Now that I'm back, let me up the count to six. And then one more should do it."  Or am I wrong?  Did Tom know what Harry was?  No, because he wouldn't have been so eager to kill him.  So why didn't he end up with eight and mess everything up?

THere are a million of these. It's almost why fan fiction was invented. But there are questions that bear asking, and that have been answered by someone, surely.

I downloaded iBooks Author the other day and began thinking about making Phantom Limb into the media-rich mess I'd always imagined. Embedded music (of my own) and artwork (not my own, as I can only draw pictures that make my little girl laugh) and typefaces and formatting that I like. Really interesting. Especially when I'm trying to avoid doing something useful, like finishing the story. Then I thought - I wonder if the iBook Store has a policy covering derivative fiction, and I wonder if (since I'd be distributing it for free) I'd get into trouble.

Thought I'd drop in and say hello, let people know what I'm up to, what I'm writing.

Leaving aside the normal 'real life ' stuff (including the fact I'm back to taking exams at 50) I'll let you know what I'm working on.

I sense that I'm on the way out of HP fanfic, but I don't think I'm alone in that. The last thing I published - The Day That Ginny Weasley Came To Stay - received some very hostile feedback including accusations of it being misogynistic and seemed to indicate that what I have to offer doesn't fit the mood.