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You are viewing the most recent 20 entries January 18th, 202006:34 pm: Fic index
If anyone's come here looking for my fic, the best place to find it is on my website here. That's the only place that houses all my fanfic. The design is rudimentary, I'm afraid, but the stories are all there, and that's what matters. I did consider putting together an index here on LJ, but there doesn't seem to be much point, when one already exists on the website. Website last updated June 5th 2009 Most recent updatesJune 5th: The Flowers of the Field (c. 5,000 words) - an outsider viewpoint Sheppard h/c story in which a young girl comes across a badly injured stranger caught in a trap A Walk on the Dark Side (c. 2,400 words) - Even in an evil mirror universe, things don't always go according to plan. Humour. May 28th: On the Wings of an Eagle (c. 50,000 words) - illustrated historical AU written for the bonus round of the gen ficathon, for the prompt "Those Magnificent Men in their Flying Machines." Where the White Lilies Grow (c. 46,000 words) - AU written for the gen ficathon, involving a Sheppard from one AU and a Rodney from another AU who meet up an a post-apocolyptic world where legends and superstitions are rife. The World to Come (c. 6000 words) - Team fic written as a pinch hit for the gen ficathon. "The world ended when John was sleeping…" Friends and Old Wine (c. 2700) - Ronon-centric character study covering his years in Atlantis, written for the alcohol flashfic challenge. ( Previous updates )
June 16th, 200901:48 pm: Time off
I think I am going to take a few weeks, or even a few months, off writing fanfic. I was on holiday last week, and while I was away, I did quite a bit of reading. Reading a new (to me) Sherwood Smith novel prompted me to reread her Inda series (to date; the final book is coming out in August), and even though it's a reread, I'm finding myself so gripped that I don't want to do anything else but read at the moment. Yesterday I didn't even switch my computer on until three hours after I'd come home from work, which is unheard of. ( Ramblings )
June 2nd, 200908:30 am: Fic update
I've been slightly distracted lately by playing Portal and Left 4 Dead, but here are the two short stories I've done in the last few days. I did hope to do one more slightly longer one before going on holiday on Saturday, but I'm not sure if that will work out now. The lure of the advanced levels in Portal might be too great. Anyway... First we have some humour, and then some outsider viewpoint h/c. Title: A Walk on the Dark SideWord Count: 2400 Rating: PG Summary: Even in an evil mirror universe, things don't quite go according to plan. (Written for the bonus round of the gen ficathon, in the genre of "humour", for the prompt "Dark side of the moon") Title: The Flowers of the FieldWords: 4995 Rating: PG-13 for some non-graphic ickiness involving the presence of a corpse. Summary: On the first day of spring, a young girl finds a badly injured man, chained to a dead man and caught in a trap. (Written for the first flashfic challenge on the Sheppard h/c community, for the prompt "traps/trapped.")
May 28th, 200908:18 pm: SGA fic: On the Wings of an Eagle - part 1 of 5
Title: On the Wings of an Eagle - part 1 of 5 Author: Eildon Rhymer ( ![[info]](http://l-stat.livejournal.com/img/userinfo.gif) rhymer23) Words: c. 50,000, plus 6 pictures Rating: PG Genre: AU (also adventure, some angst, some humour, some h/c, and some illustrations) Spoilers: None Summary: It started with a man crashing into a herb garden. Soon a misfit band of four exiles are caught up in a wild ride of sword fights, sewing, rescue missions, shopping trips, high treason, lute-playing, changing the face of scientific knowledge forever, the imminent risk of hideous death, and comfits. Note: Written for the bonus round of the ![[info]](http://l-stat.livejournal.com/img/community.gif) sga_genficathon, in the genre of AU, and the prompt "Those magnificent men in their flying machines". Something about gen ficathon bonus rounds seems to bring out the illustrated historical AU in me. Last year I did The Pirate's Prisoner, and this year I've gone back nearly 200 years to the year 1555. For a prompt about flying machines. Er, yes, well. I suspect that normal people wouldn't see a prompt about flying machines and immediately think "We'll have Tudors! With planes!" but I blame Leonardo Da Vinci. He famously designed flying machines on paper, but didn't get them to work, but he was merely Leonardo; he wasn't Doctor Rodney McKay. I've tried to explain the historical background as and when it becomes relevant, but a very quick outline can be seen here  ( Part one )
May 24th, 200905:12 pm: Stories
Taking a quick break from dealing with the zombie apocalypse… Firstly, I did finish the story in the end. I wrote like a mad thing, and finished after midnight on Thursday night. It needs a tonne of work, and the pictures aren't finished, but I'm very pleased to have got to the end before the weekend, since I'll be too busy blowing my friends' heads off, taking over the world and eating junk food to think about story issues until Tuesday. When I got up last Monday, I thought I had two chapters to go, but the content I had actually took four chapters to write, so I'm particularly amazed that I managed to get it done, given that I was working throughout, had to go out on Wednesday evening, and was away for 13 hours on Thursday in London. Secondly, some of my favourite literary heroes are masters of disguise, who cunningly save people's lives through their stealth and cunning. I, plainly, am not one of them, since my identity was so totally guessed in the gen ficathon. Admittedly, I wasn't really trying to disguise myself, and was heard to say that I'd eat my hat if at least some people didn't guess my story almost from the start, but, still… So, anyway, here are links to my stories: Where the White Lilies Grow46,000 word AU (or, rather, two AUs for the price of one) written for the prompt "Clarke's Law: any sufficiently advanced technology is indistinguishable from magic". Sheppard and McKay are very much the main characters here, though others appear in the final third. Summary: People tell stories about the wonders of the Time Before. They tell stories, too, about magical creatures with long, fair hair, who emerge from the hill and can turn you to dust in an instant. But John Sheppard has never been one to believe in stories... And my pinch hit: The World to Comec. 6000 word team fic, written for the prompt "I found the end of the world, of course; And it's not the end of the world, of course (Gordon Downie, "Vancouver Divorce")" Summary: The world ended while John was sleeping...
May 18th, 200906:48 pm: Pesky muse
Gah! I wish my muse didn't have such decided opinions about how it wants to work. It absolutely refuses point blank to multi-task, forcing me to be a strictly "one story at a time" person; it refuses to contemplate me writing even a single line out of linear order; and it detests me taking a break even of two or three days in the middle of writing a story. Just two or three days can be enough for it to get all sulky, and say, "You're the one who decided to ignore me. Don't want to play now." This means that I have to think hard before starting a story, to make sure that I'm likely to be able to finish it before any forthcoming weekends away. This week, it's all gone horribly wrong. I've got a bunch of friends coming round on Friday for a long weekend of computer games, with the last of them not leaving until Tuesday. For four days, my brain will be full of nothing but games, cider, junk food and chat, and I'll have a wonderful time, but it will be enough to totally drive my muse into "Shan't!" mode if I go into the weekend with an unfinished story and try to pick up the threads next week. The trouble is, the story I started two weeks ago, confident that I'd finish it in time if I worked hard, has grown somewhat, and now looks like being nine chapters, rather than the six I'd vaguely expected back in my original "haven't really bothered to plan it out yet, but we'll see" stage. I had to work on Saturday, got up at 5 to walk a stupid distance in a howling gale yesterday, failed to get much sleep last night due to painful legs, and thus am rather too tired tonight to get much done. (My muse also refuses to play when I'm tired.) I've got to go out for all of Wednesday evening, and go to London all day Thursday. I've got about 25 pages to go, and while I probably can finish it (first draft, at least, which is what matters for now) if I work like a mad thing and don't stop for anything else, I'm really not sure if I want to. I'm tired, there's stuff to do to prepare for the weekend, I want to carry on with the drawing part of my story, and there's lots of other stuff I'm keen to do, too. Wah!
May 14th, 200908:49 pm: Writing, reading...
I've managed all of one day of the gen ficathon so far, as far as reading is concerned. The trouble is, no sooner had it started posting, than I started writing my latest historical AUs. Historical AUs eat my brain like nothing else, because they attack on all flanks. When I'm in a mood for writing, I write them. When I'm not in a mood for writing, I draw the pictures. When I'm in a mood for reading, I read history books or historical novels set in the period. There's just no room for fanfic reading at the moment, and it's the worst possible time for it, since there are so many wonderful-looking stories out there. But I suppose they're not going away, and I can always catch them in a few weeks. It's proving a lot more challenging than my pirate AUs. I thought it would be easier. The early eighteenth century is one of the few periods that I never studied at school or university, although I've read plenty of historical novels set in the mid to late eighteenth century, so the general mood was easy enough to write. In contrast, 1555 ought to be so much easier. I spent a month living in the year 1553 at a residential historical re-enactment. The doctorate I almost did (I changed my mind before finalising my plans) was going to be something about the cultural history of the period 1547 to 1558. I ought to know this period so well. However, nothing's been invented yet! McKay wants to go into long diatribes about the state of scientific knowledge, but almost everything interesting hasn't been invented or discovered yet. (Thank goodness for Copernicus, at least.) Virtually ever bit of technology or weaponry I would love to use hasn't quite got invented yet. The world's so much smaller, too. It doesn't provide that rich seam of reference that I had in 1720, when my characters had travelled the world and gone to plays and salons, and read novels and newspapers, and had ready access to books. Gah! But I'm getting there - definitely over half way through the writing, and about a third of the way through the pictures. And speaking of which... Off to draw.
May 3rd, 200909:06 am: Historical AUs
I'm writing historical AUs again. All is well with the world. :-D Six lines in, and I've already done four urgent Googles to find out certain things that come up in passing (e.g. ink-pot design, the history of blotting paper, and the history of herb gardens.) Writing my pirate AU was the happiest experience I've ever had in writing, so I hope this new one gives me as much joy. (I reserve the right to post again tomorrow saying, "Oh no! It doesn't work at all!", so don't take it as read that the story will see the light of day. The basic premise is one of those mad, crazy ideas that cause most of your brain to say, "oh no, I can't!" but a wild, loud, pushy part to say, "Oh, go on! It's fun" and then, when it thinks it might be thwarted, to say, "I refuse to let you write anything else until you at least try.")
April 21st, 200907:36 pm: SGA fic: A Sure Anchor - part 1 of 4
Title: A Sure Anchor - part one of four Author: Eildon Rhymer ( rhymer23) Words: c. 16,000 in total Rating: PG (violence, injury and angst, but nothing that graphic or extreme.) Characters: Sheppard and Ronon Spoilers: References to quite a lot of episodes. Fifth season episodes referred to are Search and Rescue, Broken Ties and The Shrine. Summary: While visiting a place from Ronon's past, Sheppard and Ronon are attacked by snipers, but there's something there that's more dangerous and deadly than any human enemy. Note: This is complete - c. 16,000 words - but I'm posting it in parts while I edit. Be warned: thar be cliffhangers ahead. I intend to post daily, though. Thanks to kristen999 for giving me a couple of prompts which were the jumping-off point for this story, even though I doubt I did justice to them. ( A Sure Anchor - chapter one )
April 10th, 200905:33 pm: Writing. Or, rather, no writing
I've not written anything for a week. I know that this doesn't sound like much, but this is unheard of for me. In the last two years, I don't think I've ever gone this long without writing something, except when I've been away. It's not as if I don't have ideas, I just don't seem to feel like sitting down to write them. Partly it's because my new computer (plagued with problems since I got it) is finally working okay, which means that I've been playing Baldur's Gate 2 again (I modded it so much on my old computer that it broke), and I've been rather obsessed, despite the fact that I've played it at least half a dozen times before. (Certain things in the games are giving me story ideas, though - mind flayers, for one.) Partly, though, I think it's because of my gen ficathon story. Looking back on past occasions when I've struggled to write, I think that they've usually come just after I've written a ficathon story - i.e. a story that won't be posted for a while after I write it. I think it's because the story doesn't feel properly finished until it's been released into the wild, and my muse persists on thinking of it as the active story, even if it's completely finished. Oh well... I've played BG2 all day today, and am working tomorrow, and I want to do some touristy things or country walking (weather permitting) on Sunday and Monday, but do hope I can at least start a story. The start is always the hardest part. (Actually, I have written something, and I suppose I ought to post the link here, since this is my writing journal, after all. It's not fanfic, though. You see, I did a post on mnemonics over on my other LJ, which led someone to tell me that modern scientists had banished indigo from the spectrum. Poor indigo! I thought. I wonder how he's coping with this shame.. Not well, it seems. Princess Bride quotes, a downgraded planet and some runaway Imperial measurements somehow got caught up in it, too.)
April 6th, 200908:23 am: Oh dear...
My favourite part of my website's statistics page is the bit that lists search terms that people have used to access my site. It's not complete, since it only lists the first 30 per month, so after the first week, it only lists search terms that have appeared twice or more. At the start of the month, though, all the one-offs show up, much to my amusement. For example, when someone does a search on "risks of marrying a man who's scared of commitment", A, why on earth does my fanfic site come up, and, B, when it does come up, why on earth does the person doing the search click on it? Today, though, when I checked my stats, I see that someone reached by site by searching for "someone who talks nonsense." Oh dear... Oh, and while I'm here: I really shouldn't be considering writing another eighteenth century historical AU, should I? No, no, don't tell me. I know I really shouldn't be. (Not another Pirate's Prisoner sequel in this case, but a whole new, different story, set in the 1790s, but doubtless also including pictures and pseudo historical scholarship.) Also, is there anything in Stargate canon that would allow me to have stuff happening (in this universe, not by having someone travel first to an AU), then to press a reset button to erase it, but to have the person who'd pressed the button remember everything about the erased stuff? I want to explore the emotional repercussions of remembering bad stuff that no-one else knows about, and also about being the one who rejected one future, and thus (arguably) bears responsibility for any fresh bad stuff that happens in the new time line. However, I need a plausible bit of technobabble to set the whole thing up.
April 3rd, 200904:48 pm: Various writing things
- I wrote a Ronon-centric one-shot yesterday for the alcohol/drunkenness challenge on sga_flashfic. It's not about drunkenness at all, though, but is more about Ronon settling in to Atlantis, and rebuilding his life after his losses. Here it is: Friends and Old Wine- My time in the LFWS contest at sgahcchallenges has come to an end. I knew beyond a shadow of doubt that this would happen this week, because I was seriously unhappy with my story. I just have this huge mental block when it comes to writing and reading first person. As a reader, a first person narrative is a barrier between me and the story. "Why is this person doing a running commentary on their life?" I wonder. "Who are they telling the story to? Why are they describing their surroundings in flawless prose when a dragon's chasing them?" The only way I can cope with it is if we have a framing structure which explains why this person's telling the story: letters, a diary, memoirs, or storytelling. Therefore the only way I could bring myself to respond to this challenge was in storytelling mode, and I knew the entire time I was writing it that it wasn't working. So, really, I totally deserve to go, since I ought to have forced myself to get over my first person mental block and write a sensible story from the viewpoint of a minor character. I signed up for the contest to be challenged to try new things, and in this case I refused. But I used no skips at all over 13 weeks, and was placed (IIRC) 9 times and won (IIRC) 4 rounds, so I'm far from displeased. I deserved to go this week for not getting over my "do not want!" reaction to the challenge. - I wrote rather madly last weekend (10,000 words on Sunday alone) and have finished my inappropriately-long gen ficathon submission. Just a bit of editing left now. It always feels weird to finish a story so many weeks before it will get posted, since normally I post chapter one only a day or two after finishing the final chapter. - I have no story next story lined up for after I've finished editing. I've had a "next long story" for months now, but I'm beginning to wonder if I'll ever write it. The thing is, the idea for the story is all about the emotional themes, and doesn't actually specify anything about the plot or even the initial set-up, so my poor muse just doesn't know where to start with planning. Perhaps I need to wait until I come up with a totally separate story idea – a plot-based one this time – and marry it to the emotional plot, or I might appeal to people for plot ideas. ("Bad stuff happens" is my only requirement.) Alternatively, I just need to make it a much shorter story, focusing far more exclusively on the emotional/character stuff. - I've realised a few weeks ago that I haven't written a one-shot for ages, not counting humorous ones (and not counting the Ronon story I wrote yesterday, of course.) I used to write lots, responding to almost every flashfic challenge, or sometimes being inspired by recent episodes. There are no recent episodes left to inspire me, of course, and flashfic challenges have been thin on the ground lately. I might have to start appealing for prompts for one-shots, since I miss them.
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