Re: 30 Days of Writing Meme
Posted by:
ocean cat (IP Logged)
Date: August 27, 2010 01:27AM
Okay so Var has convinced me to post the ones I've answered so far and just try and catch up later, so here goes.
#1
My current favorite universe that I've worked with is for the story that Var and I are working on together.
I love how the premise is a blend of science fiction and fantasy, which gives us almost complete freedom in character and story development. Also, the major plot twists both flow naturally from and serve as sensible explanations for some of the stranger elements of the world. In other words, it all meshes quite neatly, yet the twists will still (hopefully, if we do our job right) come as complete shocks.
Also. Six-limbed aliens with tails, transparent fur, large, sharp teeth, and color-changing skin whose native language consists mostly of colors and gestures.
Also, magical dancing.
'Nuff said.
#2
Hm. Because I am a masochist, I am actually going to count up all the characters I have. (However, because I am a lazy masochist, I am only going to count characters in stories that I am currently actively working on.) Which would, by my count be, thirty.
Re: m/f preference, I honestly don't know. My default seems to be female—that's the vast majority of my characters—but the three characters that are easiest for me to write are all male.
#3
How I come up with names usually depends on the story and the characters. I nearly always have a character before I have a name, and have to wait for the character to tell me his/her name. If that doesn't work, I have to guess until s/he says I've got the right one. (Which is downright infuriating, really—in the case of a certain sparkly court jester, I STILL don't have a name.) When I have to guess, I either play with combinations of sounds that I like, or go to Behind the Name and find names I think fit the character. Sometimes I'll go by meaning, sometimes I'll go by sound.
Occasionally I will get a character that pops up fully formed already with a name, or a character that forms around a name, but unfortunately that doesn't happen too often.
#4
Oh gosh this is embarrassing... Oh well, here goes.
...I never actually wrote any of this down, you understand, as this was before I could read or write, but I suppose it counts as it was the first recurring characters and ongoing story that I can remember? (Though I'm quite sure there were others before that.) Well, anyway.
At one point in the far distant past I was a tiny, and, like all tinies, took baths rather than showers. Baths which typically included a washcloth. However, unlike most tinies, I had a limit on the number of washcloths I could have in the tub at one time. You see, I had this habit of getting out every single washcloth I could find (which was quite a lot, actually) and dumping them all in the bath. My mom always asked me why I needed so many, or why I always spent so long in the bath, but I was too embarrassed to tell her. (I seriously only just told her a few weeks ago when the topic came up at a family gathering. I was like, “You never figured out why I wanted all those washcloths?” and she was like, “No, you wouldn't tell me,” and I was like, “*lol* Okay well lemme tell you,” and she was like, “Kitti hurry up and tell the story already, you're babbling.” Oh wait, that last is you forum peeps.) Anyway.
...They were my fish. But not just any fish. They were magic fish who could take any shape as long as they were in water, and the super-special princess fish (she was an especially large, emerald-green washcloth who swirled very prettily in the bathwater) could change her shape even out of the water, but she couldn't be away from the rest of them for very long or they would all lose their shifting and eventually die. She always got captured by the evil imitator (the black washcloth), who could shift but got his shifting by killing good fish and taking away their powers and colors—which was why he was black—and many of her people would die before the super-special prince fish (he was the white cloth—no I was not a racist child I just liked how the white looked in the water) came to her rescue and had to carry her back to the—oh yeah there was an underwater palace (have I mentioned that my favorite movie at that age was The Little Mermaid?)--back to the underwater palace where she would quickly recover just in time to keep the few remaining magical fish alive. And she and the prince fish would get married and have lots of baby fish and everybody lived happily ever after, except of course for the ones who died horrible painful deaths while the princess was being held captive. And also the imitator would always not-really-die and start gathering strength and plotting to capture the next generation's princess, but I never got farther than that because by that time the water was cold and my sisters needed to get into the bathroom to get ready for bed.
So yeah. That's my embarrassing childhood tale. (Of course what's even more embarrassing is the fact that I would actually speak aloud for them, and narrate in third person. Occasionally one of my siblings would catch me at it and they'd be like, “What are you doing?” and I'd be like, “Eep! Nothing!”)
#5
Again, going by characters in stories that I'm actively working on.
Age-wise, my youngest character is Ryph, the baby griffin (from Rin), who is I want to say like six months? Oldest would definitely be Fai'ad, also from Rin, who is 143.
Creation-wise, my youngest is Angela from my library story, and oldest is Saadi from Rin.
#6
I'm most comfortable writing sitting on my bed all nestled up in a pile of blankets and pillows. Favorite time of day would be super-early in the morning, before anyone else gets up, or super-late at night, after everyone else is in bed. Oh and I have to write on the computer unless I have detailed notes and am absolutely certain about every single detail in a scene, because I have this weird mental block/panic attack whenever I see a blank sheet of paper.
#7
I usually can't listen to music when I write unless it's to drown out other noises, and in that case it can't be anything with words (or at least not in English). I'm just too easily distracted. Occasionally, though, I'll hear a song and it'll inspire a character or a story. And yes, there are MANY songs I relate to my characters. Though mostly it's Mum who finds them and sends them to me. :P
#8
By far my favorite genre to write is SF/F, because the laws of reality encourage rather than restrain the story.
Favorite genre to read... that's a tough one. I mean, my bread and butter is SF/F, but really any fiction if it's well-written. ...Okay who am I fooling, I read almost exclusively SF/F.
I do, however, love the occasional mystery. Though, to be honest, most of those are SF/F, so. Um yeah. XD
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A word is not the same with one writer as with another. One tears it from his guts. The other pulls it out of his overcoat pocket.
~Charles Peguy
