Snowflake Challenge #7
Jan. 14th, 2020 03:45 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
pensnestPromote/Rec/Sing the Praises* of Yourself!
Well. Okay.
Obviously I am an Awesome Person who deserves All The Praise, but, eh, I don't really need it for most things. So I think for this one, I will talk about my writing, specifically, my AUs.
Back in my days as a ST:TNG writer, I did not write AUs. The canon was what I wanted more of, so my aim was usually to have something that felt like an episode (albeit, perhaps, not quite television friendly at times).
Popslash eventually changed that: although I certainly started out by writing things that were canon-based at least to the extent that "they're popstars", after a while, the AUs crept in. I've done quite a few, particularly since my adored boys are fairly quiet in terms of Real Life these days (or may be active but I don't much care, see J Timberlake). But AUs are fun.
There are basically two kinds—real-world, in which the guys have recognisable lives that are set in this world, somewhere, and fantasy/SF worlds I've had to create for them.
My favourites among my Real-world AUs
It Pays to Advertise is set in a London advertising agency, probably in the vicinity of Covent Garden. This was one of the AUs which used experiences from their actual lives—the big boss and owner of the agency was doing suspicious things, and the guys made their escape and went on to greater success without him. Once upon a time, I worked in an advertising-adjacent industry, so I had a reasonable idea of what the guys would do, and it all came together very easily. The story was written as a SeSa pinch-hit initially, and I've revised it a little bit. It was a relief to find the recipient liked it, as she had expressed a desire for some angst or h/c or... something which I don't think I'm good at, and got this instead.
Wanna Tell Me About It? presents Adam Lambert as an actor who can sing rather than a singer who can act, and presents Lance Bass as one of a group of five actors who starred in a hit TV show called 'Synchronicity' as teenagers. A few years on, Lance is a TV producer and setting up as showrunner, with the aid of some of his Synchronicity friends. I've read quite a few 'The Making Of…' books about such shows as Babylon 5, Buffy, etc, so I hope my production seems plausible.
Show You the Shape of my What? is a Full Monty AU, based more on the Broadway musical than the film, and featuring the Backstreet Boys as our heroes—they map *so* well. My lovely beta found me several details which really helped (I set it in Pittsburgh, PA, not in Buffalo NY which is I think where the stage musical happens), and I found a few serendipitous things like there being a Hot Metal bridge in Pittsburgh. (In the film, the guys call themselves Hot Metal.) I discovered also one of the major benefits of using real life references in an AU, because it was done for a big bang challenge and my artist MADE ME A TRAILER. Which is, in sober fact, probably the Best Thing Ever!
I remember experiencing a great deal of glee while writing Thriller, in which Chris is a sci fi writer and his boyfriend Joey is a salesman who performs with an amateur drama group. I was scared, initially, of writing a zombie story (for someone who loves zombies, so it had to be done!), but after watching "Shaun of the Dead" and taking copious notes, the story came to me in a flash of glory. Chris shares with me the need to procrastinate when there are words to be written, and I suspect a lot of people who write fanfic will have a kindred feeling.
Finally for this section there is No Man's Fort, in which our heroes are a chef and a pastry chef, plus their sidekicks. I attribute most of what I know about professional kitchens—which isn't much—to Anthony Bourdain, and it was a lot of fun googling plausible-sounding recipes. The setting for this one, incidentally, is here, which would make an awesome setting for Camp Sparkle if my premium bonds ever come up trumps.
There are plenty of others—eg High School (with guardian angels), stunt performers, and quite a few stories in which our guys are ordinary blokes of one kind or another.
Fantasy and SF AUs
The Chronicles of Lancyn and Ser Chrisfer Basically, Chrisfer is a Knight and member of the Elite, Lancyn becomes his Squire, and they travel the world spreading justice and getting into trouble. It began as a response to a request in the Fic_Requests comm on LJ, and grew… Probably most of the fun of the series (I call it an 'episodic' story) is in seeing how I pull other characters from the popslash world into this one, but I guess it might be entertaining enough for people who know fanfic but not popslash.
Anybody who thinks they have a hard life should try shovelling dragon shit for a living.
If You Want To Fly is sorta AU and sorta not, in that it is also my version of Nsync's origins story. It wasn't until I put my origins story together with the tale of how Clena, dragonshit shoveller, gets through his life, that it became a proper story, and I have much love for it.
The White Room, by contrast, is science fiction, set in a futuristic war, down at the level of individual pilots—so who knows what the war is really about. For me, a lot of the fun was in figuring out some of the future tech, and how daily life on a battle cruiser actually worked. It is also, as it happens, a rape story. Or at least, a 'consent issues' story. The original inspiration was The Beloved Scene which I spent most of the story writing towards, and which in the end never appeared in the story because I had to use a particular POV. And it would have been redundant and self-indulgent anyway, although since when does fanfic avoid scenes for such reasons? Never mind, I left it out.
for this world to be unbroken, another Backstreet story, came about in response to a challenge request for 'post-apocalyptic vampires with romance', which I could not write satisfactorily (neither post-apocalyptic scenarios nor vampires being things that interest me, generally speaking) until I came upon a splendid article about 'why medieval fantasy gets it wrong', which talked about sanitation and childhood diseases and suchlike. In the end I was really pleased with how this turned out.
It's possible that Dragon Country is the best story I have so far written, though I guess that's not really for me to judge. It's set in a world not unlike ours, but with a level of technology that's more like the 1970s, plus airships and steam trains, and a certain amount of limited psychic ability. Also, dragons. I am very happy indeed with this world, and very pleased with the way the story turned out. Again, warning, there is a scene of rape and violence (which was actually inspired by comments to a pro author's journal, possibly Seanan McGuire's, in which somebody asked, How do you rape a telepath?). Anyway. And there's a sequel, and if I can figure out how the pieces fit together, there may be more to come.
Well. Okay.
Obviously I am an Awesome Person who deserves All The Praise, but, eh, I don't really need it for most things. So I think for this one, I will talk about my writing, specifically, my AUs.
Back in my days as a ST:TNG writer, I did not write AUs. The canon was what I wanted more of, so my aim was usually to have something that felt like an episode (albeit, perhaps, not quite television friendly at times).
Popslash eventually changed that: although I certainly started out by writing things that were canon-based at least to the extent that "they're popstars", after a while, the AUs crept in. I've done quite a few, particularly since my adored boys are fairly quiet in terms of Real Life these days (or may be active but I don't much care, see J Timberlake). But AUs are fun.
There are basically two kinds—real-world, in which the guys have recognisable lives that are set in this world, somewhere, and fantasy/SF worlds I've had to create for them.
My favourites among my Real-world AUs
It Pays to Advertise is set in a London advertising agency, probably in the vicinity of Covent Garden. This was one of the AUs which used experiences from their actual lives—the big boss and owner of the agency was doing suspicious things, and the guys made their escape and went on to greater success without him. Once upon a time, I worked in an advertising-adjacent industry, so I had a reasonable idea of what the guys would do, and it all came together very easily. The story was written as a SeSa pinch-hit initially, and I've revised it a little bit. It was a relief to find the recipient liked it, as she had expressed a desire for some angst or h/c or... something which I don't think I'm good at, and got this instead.
Wanna Tell Me About It? presents Adam Lambert as an actor who can sing rather than a singer who can act, and presents Lance Bass as one of a group of five actors who starred in a hit TV show called 'Synchronicity' as teenagers. A few years on, Lance is a TV producer and setting up as showrunner, with the aid of some of his Synchronicity friends. I've read quite a few 'The Making Of…' books about such shows as Babylon 5, Buffy, etc, so I hope my production seems plausible.
Show You the Shape of my What? is a Full Monty AU, based more on the Broadway musical than the film, and featuring the Backstreet Boys as our heroes—they map *so* well. My lovely beta found me several details which really helped (I set it in Pittsburgh, PA, not in Buffalo NY which is I think where the stage musical happens), and I found a few serendipitous things like there being a Hot Metal bridge in Pittsburgh. (In the film, the guys call themselves Hot Metal.) I discovered also one of the major benefits of using real life references in an AU, because it was done for a big bang challenge and my artist MADE ME A TRAILER. Which is, in sober fact, probably the Best Thing Ever!
I remember experiencing a great deal of glee while writing Thriller, in which Chris is a sci fi writer and his boyfriend Joey is a salesman who performs with an amateur drama group. I was scared, initially, of writing a zombie story (for someone who loves zombies, so it had to be done!), but after watching "Shaun of the Dead" and taking copious notes, the story came to me in a flash of glory. Chris shares with me the need to procrastinate when there are words to be written, and I suspect a lot of people who write fanfic will have a kindred feeling.
Finally for this section there is No Man's Fort, in which our heroes are a chef and a pastry chef, plus their sidekicks. I attribute most of what I know about professional kitchens—which isn't much—to Anthony Bourdain, and it was a lot of fun googling plausible-sounding recipes. The setting for this one, incidentally, is here, which would make an awesome setting for Camp Sparkle if my premium bonds ever come up trumps.
There are plenty of others—eg High School (with guardian angels), stunt performers, and quite a few stories in which our guys are ordinary blokes of one kind or another.
Fantasy and SF AUs
The Chronicles of Lancyn and Ser Chrisfer Basically, Chrisfer is a Knight and member of the Elite, Lancyn becomes his Squire, and they travel the world spreading justice and getting into trouble. It began as a response to a request in the Fic_Requests comm on LJ, and grew… Probably most of the fun of the series (I call it an 'episodic' story) is in seeing how I pull other characters from the popslash world into this one, but I guess it might be entertaining enough for people who know fanfic but not popslash.
Anybody who thinks they have a hard life should try shovelling dragon shit for a living.
If You Want To Fly is sorta AU and sorta not, in that it is also my version of Nsync's origins story. It wasn't until I put my origins story together with the tale of how Clena, dragonshit shoveller, gets through his life, that it became a proper story, and I have much love for it.
The White Room, by contrast, is science fiction, set in a futuristic war, down at the level of individual pilots—so who knows what the war is really about. For me, a lot of the fun was in figuring out some of the future tech, and how daily life on a battle cruiser actually worked. It is also, as it happens, a rape story. Or at least, a 'consent issues' story. The original inspiration was The Beloved Scene which I spent most of the story writing towards, and which in the end never appeared in the story because I had to use a particular POV. And it would have been redundant and self-indulgent anyway, although since when does fanfic avoid scenes for such reasons? Never mind, I left it out.
for this world to be unbroken, another Backstreet story, came about in response to a challenge request for 'post-apocalyptic vampires with romance', which I could not write satisfactorily (neither post-apocalyptic scenarios nor vampires being things that interest me, generally speaking) until I came upon a splendid article about 'why medieval fantasy gets it wrong', which talked about sanitation and childhood diseases and suchlike. In the end I was really pleased with how this turned out.
It's possible that Dragon Country is the best story I have so far written, though I guess that's not really for me to judge. It's set in a world not unlike ours, but with a level of technology that's more like the 1970s, plus airships and steam trains, and a certain amount of limited psychic ability. Also, dragons. I am very happy indeed with this world, and very pleased with the way the story turned out. Again, warning, there is a scene of rape and violence (which was actually inspired by comments to a pro author's journal, possibly Seanan McGuire's, in which somebody asked, How do you rape a telepath?). Anyway. And there's a sequel, and if I can figure out how the pieces fit together, there may be more to come.
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Date: 2020-01-14 06:36 pm (UTC)no subject
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Date: 2020-01-15 04:41 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2020-01-16 01:18 pm (UTC)I'm still ticked off at Joey for concocting that HIDEOUS plan in Thriller. I mean, okay, fine, it was funny. And cute. But still!