Case (![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png)
case) wrote in ![[community profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/community.png)
fandomsecrets2015-07-19 03:53 pm
case) wrote in fandomsecrets2015-07-19 03:53 pm
[ SECRET POST #3119 ]
⌈ Secret Post #3119 ⌋
Warning: Some secrets are NOT worksafe and may contain SPOILERS.
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Notes:
Secrets Left to Post: 03 pages, 060 secrets from Secret Submission Post #446.
Secrets Not Posted: [ 0 - broken links ], [ 0 - not!secrets ], [ 1 - not!fandom ], [ 0 - too big ], [ 0 - repeat ].
Current Secret Submissions Post: here.
Suggestions, comments, and concerns should go here.
Re: Not a single fic?
I think the reason a lot of people don't do that is because there's this fear that if you actually shove a wedge into the crack in the relationship, it's so easy to shatter completely. And if you're writing a shippy fic ultimately you want them to be together... but when they manage to overcome it's so dang SATISFYING.
On the other hand, my other pet peeve is when people write a fic that raises a real serious issue in the relationship, but then has some external force fix it for them. Like a friend waltzes in and is like "oh no no you are wrong here this is what both of you think now kiss and make up". I HATE that. It's such a copout T^T
(as you can see I have a lot of feelings about this)
Re: Not a single fic?
Love doesn't fix everything, and especially not overnight.
And yeah the friend fixing thing is most of the time not something that I am on board with, sometimes it can be done very well, but most of the time it feels like copout as you said. Also I just can't relate to it, because I wouldn't meddle to that degree in my friends love life.
(yeah you aren't alone in that, I am just not great at putting my feelings into words
oh the irony,I'll just talk about my story here, feel free to ignore it:
Mine is a bit less angsty and a lot more built on the fact that my characters have no ability to communicate and instead they just assume and go angst in separate corners. Which is a really hard balance act, because on one side I need it for the story to work, but I don't want any of their misunderstandings to be unnecessary. I just keep having to try to move the story forwards, but not just resolve everything with one conversation and then they live happily ever after.
Also make them actually get to know each other and resolve everything step by step. Adding an actual storyline and characters and making them believable. Thankfully I'm not writing it alone, I have a Beta reader (who also helps me plot and writes some of the dialogue) who writes with me, and I will need to make another friend read through it before I start posting. Because at this point my Beta and I are a bit blind on the entire thing.
Maurizio meets a handsome younger man they hit it off, but it wasn’t supposed to be a serious thing. When Christian finds out Maurizio has kids his reaction is less than optimal and Arrivabene leaves thinking Christian doesn’t want anything to do with an old man with three kids. is my working summary, not the one that will be posted with the story.
We do have two characters who could in theory have done the "showing them it's true love thing," but they aren't, because two adult men are trying to date, they will have to figure it out themselves. And that is brought on partly because I don't like it when an outside force fixes everything magically. The only help both of them sometimes get is offhand comments made by the kids, but they don't really understand what is going on and they really aren't that much help.
Re: Not a single fic?
This is 100% the crux of the issue. I would say in terms of theory you've got the makings of it coming out good!
I think that another one of the mistakes a lot of people make is they don't put in enough plot. So the characters end up angsting in a vacuum, and have nothing to think about but their relationship. I think that when you're trying to work out something, it helps to have actual external events.
Like, if they have a fight, have something else happen that gives them the opportunity to pull together, or remember something they love about each other, or prove that they are serious. Letting plot happen, or putting in plot to help along the emotional arcs is very helpful (to me, at least).
Having a good beta is a GREAT resource. CHERISH HER.
Love doesn't fix everything, and especially not overnight.
So much this. And the addendum - just because it's not fixed overnight, doesn't mean the love isn't true. I think getting over the fear of having the characters not get along perfectly 100% of the time is a good step already.
Re: Not a single fic?
Yeah, having the kids as a pretty big part of the story does help and a lot of the time they drive the story forwards because they like Christian and develop a relationship with him on their own. Which also means a lot of the time both of them put the kids ahead of their love-life.
But yeah that is what I am trying to do, most of their encounters aren't because they planned it, they just keep running into each other (on account of working in the same place) and things happen.
My Beta is my partner in everything and thankfully she loves our stories just as much and is the maker of a lot of our plots and so on. But I know I am very lucky to have a person who will spend hours writing with me (Google Docs is the best invention of the 21st century!) and talking with me on voice-chat, without her I wouldn't be writing. Quite literally, she is the reason I wrote my first Fanfic because she wanted to read it and no one had written it. (months later and the one and only fanfic I was going to write has turned into quite a lot more)
Yeah that is how I feel too, I don't need them to always get along (or in this case they get along for like half a scene then they as we say in Norwegian "step in the salad", say something and the other person thinks it is meant in a different way.) I need them to figure out that they actually do like each other and that it is mutual and they could actually be together.
In a way I am lucky being a bit older and more experienced when I started writing, because I both know how it is to be an adult and how it is to date and how the world works in a more complex way than I did when I was younger. I also have read a lot of fanfics (and books) and know what I think is good and not so good. On the other hand I missed out on a lot of "training" to be a writer, so I don't really have as much experience as I've never been much of a story-teller.