You know, I always give rather general requests too, because there isn't usually anything very specific that I'd want to receive—I mean, I always say I'd rather have a story the writer *wants* to write than a story written 'to order', and that's *true*, really. My Santa letter this year included a bit more of 'things I don't want' than before, but didn't go as far as to give anything specific.
And I was *so* frustrated last year with my very particular AU request... and yet, in retrospect, it was good to have the *challenge* aspect going on. With all my fretting about my post-apocalyptic, vampire-infested universe I didn't have time to worry that I'd not written the pairing before! And in the end I was very pleased with the story that turned up, perhaps because it's not something I'd ever have thought to write without the MTYG prompt.
So I conclude… that it's impossible to figure out what kind of prompt to give! (And, MTYG authors are never satisfied.)
I think with your story, I ended up feeling I'd put a bit more emphasis on the Chris/Howie than I'd really intended, and that's probably because it's a less obvious pairing, one which I'd only written a couple of times before, so there was more of a challenge in making it happen. Whereas Lance/JC is one of those pairings where they just work so easily! Funnily enough, I'd decided the story should have a cat in it, but the puppies just introduced themselves. And Howie thought up the porcupine, not me! (I just had to go back and make Christ pricklier.)
Anyway, I'm very glad you were pleased with it. :-D That's always the most important thing about the SeSa challenge.
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branchandroot
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Date: 2011-01-08 09:26 pm (UTC)And I was *so* frustrated last year with my very particular AU request... and yet, in retrospect, it was good to have the *challenge* aspect going on. With all my fretting about my post-apocalyptic, vampire-infested universe I didn't have time to worry that I'd not written the pairing before! And in the end I was very pleased with the story that turned up, perhaps because it's not something I'd ever have thought to write without the MTYG prompt.
So I conclude… that it's impossible to figure out what kind of prompt to give! (And, MTYG authors are never satisfied.)
I think with your story, I ended up feeling I'd put a bit more emphasis on the Chris/Howie than I'd really intended, and that's probably because it's a less obvious pairing, one which I'd only written a couple of times before, so there was more of a challenge in making it happen. Whereas Lance/JC is one of those pairings where they just work so easily! Funnily enough, I'd decided the story should have a cat in it, but the puppies just introduced themselves. And Howie thought up the porcupine, not me! (I just had to go back and make Christ pricklier.)
Anyway, I'm very glad you were pleased with it. :-D That's always the most important thing about the SeSa challenge.