FAM #05

[aadler]

The Fanfiction Ask Meme (from cornerofmadness through trobadora through naye through something from Tumblr).

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What made you start writing fanfic?
Which of your own fanfics have you re-read the most?
Describe the differences between your first fanfic and your most recent fanfic.
Do you think your style has changed over time? How so?

You’ve posted a fic anonymously. How would someone be able to guess that you’d written it?

That may sound like a theoretical exercise, but in fact my daughter sroni went through it every time we participated in a remix together; she was always able to identify which story was mine (except for one time when she skipped over the one that was mine because she thought she’d read it along with the other candidates, but got interrupted, and then went on to the next one in the mistaken memory that she’d already checked it). I suppose I could ask her which criteria she used, but I suspect it would come out to something like, “I just read what’s there till I find the one that feels like you.”

So, some cues that can be followed. All of these are indicative rather than definitive, but taken together they can gradually draw an outline of probability.

Fandom. It’s just about always going to be set in the Buffyverse. I’ve done seventy-five stories in Buffy fandom (which includes those set in Angel; same universe), and five in other fandoms. A fifteen-to-one ratio may not be infallible, but it’s fairly strong as a predictor.

Sex. There probably won’t be any. If it’s there, it’s more likely to be background than addressed directly. If it’s addressed, it’s more likely to be referenced than depicted. If it’s depicted, it’ll be presented in procedural or emotional terms rather than in anything approaching explicit detail. (The closest I ever got to ‘explicit’ was in “Beg to Differ” and “Otherwise a Perfect Sky”, and that’s pretty much my limit.) I’m an avid fan of sex in my own life, but written sex scenes? if I’m reading, I skip right over those sections, and if I’m writing I pretty much don’t do ’em at all. “There Ought to Be Clowns” was all but totally about sex, but the sex itself was never shown. Just not my style.

Action. This one used to be all but mandatory: for quite a while, I basically didn’t do stories without some kind of action scene (frequently several such), and my particular style there could be … distinctive. I’ve said in previous posts on this issue that my overall approach to action sequences was based on influences from four basic sources: Robert Heinlein, Dashiell Hammett (primarily his Continental Op tales), Peter O’Donnell (the Modesty Blaise books), and William Goldman (the Princess Bride, of course, but also Marathon Man). When I do action, then, I’m trying for stream-of-consciousness, clinical detail, emotional impact, and a kind of lyrical artistry. I’m nowhere near the level of those who inspired me, but that’s where I’m aiming, and that particular approach can generally be used as an aid in identifying me.

Slash. I don’t do it, not at all. The closest I ever got was a few things that contained (or could be read as implying) elements of femslash, but overall it’s simply not my cup of tea. Part of this is characterization: my view of fanfic is that you don’t explore characters by changing the characters, and I got mightily sick of seeing characters ‘turned gay’ for no other purpose than … well, than turning them gay. The list of canonically same-sex oriented characters is pretty short — Willow, Tara, Kennedy, Larry, and (though never specifically identified, but they made it pretty clear) Andrew — and I don’t have any particular feel for same-sex relationships and no desire whatsoever to play in someone else’s playground.

Grammar/language/punctuation. Several subcategories here.

• I’ve heard that most editors hate the semicolon; my attitude toward that is screw those editors, because it’s part of the English language and it’s useful. When I posted “Otherwise a Perfect Sky” as a remix, I worked carefully to not include semicolons (keep people guessing about the authorship before the reveal) because I already knew they were characteristic of my style.
• Similarly, writing instructors and writing snobs are always going on about the amateurishness of adverbs, and I reject that as well; I try to use adverbs appropriately and judiciously, but I don’t scorn or avoid them.
• Down into the nitty-gritty, I’m a big user of the ellipsis (…) and the em-dash (—), but I decline to follow whatever rule that says an ellipsis at the end of a sentence has to be followed by a period (….), that just strikes me as unnecessarily pedantic.
• I’m a believer in the Oxford comma, but not a fanatic about it.
• I will almost always put punctuation outside quotes (in this ‘general style’, for instance) unless that punctuation is itself an actual part of the quote.
• Over the last several years I’ve gradually transitioned to the full ’s following nouns ending with an ‘s’ or semi-‘s’ sound — Giles’s or Oz’s rather than Giles’ or Oz’ — for possessives.
• Quite a bit of italics use for emphasis, but restrained (or no) use of bolding.

There might be some other things I could cite, but this has already gone on for a bit. I’ll close by noting that I posted Top 10 ways to know you’re reading a fanfic by Aadler in 2006 (over a dozen years ago), and many of those simply don’t apply any more, or at the very least are much less reliable now than then.

People change. And, though doing it more slowly now, I’m still changing.

Still to come:

Name three stories you found easy to write.
Name three stories you found difficult to write.
What’s your ratio of hits to kudos?
What do your fic bookmarks say about you?
What’s a theme that keeps coming up in your writing?
What kind of relationships are you most interested in writing?
For E-rated fic, what are some things your characters keep doing?
Name three favorite characters to write.
You’re applying for the fanfic writer of the year award. What five fanfics do you put in your portfolio?

Comments

[snogged.livejournal.com]

Thanks for sharing this analysis of your writing style.

[aadler]

De nada.

[sroni.livejournal.com]

I can actually give the "how did I always figure out which ones were you" criteria, and yes, it does more or less boil down to "I read until I found the ones that felt right".

The one time I didn't was, as noted, the time that I started it, got interrupted, thought I'd finished, and kept going with reading Buffy/Angel fics. While I'd been reading it, I thought it was you, but when I thought I had finished it, it couldn't possibly be you because it hadn't felt like a complete story, and was just one that hit the required word count, found a closing spot, and called it quits, and that's not what you do so it couldn't be yours.

So basically I'd read it, and the word flow would be indicative? I don't really have any other explanation; every writer has their own flavour, and I know yours really well at this point. Other stories could be just as good but they weren't right so I'd keep going until I found you.