Writers' Workshop General Chat Thread

[Ahnyo]

Plasma's Folly is currently 106,010 words long (it will most likely be even longer once I rewrite it) and Legendary Genesis is 20,031. PF has four times as many chapters as LG, though LG's chapters are usually much longer. I've written about 100,000 words of plans for PF, and probably a little over a third of that amount for LG.

 

[AceTrainer14]

Mine goes:
Dawn of Darkness: 61,074
The First Warriors: 71,960
Eight Easy Steps: 261,386
Galactic: 447,192
And my total according to FF.net, of every story I've ever done, is 1,606,318.
I must say, this does seem like a lot.

I also calculated, as I do this every year, how many pages I have written since I began actively writing, and over the past five years I've written 2685 pages!

 

[ShinyFlareon]

New year new sig that is barely different from the old one aw yeah. Why does a quote from a bunch of angry murderesses sum up my life so well.

 

[Lugion]

So I'm slowly starting to catch up on all the fanfics I read.

I think.

 

[AceTrainer14]

That reminds me of all the stories I really need to read :/ There is so much I want to read on here, but I'm in my holidays and Im about six months behind on all my writing so I am trying to make a dent in that first.

Just as a note, us moderators have begun discussing things we will be working on this year (more on that later ), but firstly we have all mutually agreed to unsticky the Review Exchange, which you'll find a few mouse-scrolls beneath this for the next twenty four hours or so. I will keep it open in case anyone suddenly decides to use it, but as it has not been posted in since January last year its spot as a sticky is better served for other threads

 

[Ahnyo]

I haven't read any fics on here... I really should, though. Ever since I started high school, I've found myself not enjoying reading fiction. I sometimes like science books and articles, but I can't even remember the last time I willingly picked up a novel. I'm too easily distracted to be able to immerse myself in someone else's fictional world... I can't even focus on my own stories most of the time.

 

[Soulmaster]

Hey guys, Soulmaster here, finally back and so on, not sure if I already made this part of the post but oh well.

*puts mod hat on*
Remember to go check out The Review Game. The current story up for grabs is Unpredictable by AetherX. Twice a winner in the Awards here, I actually read it this last time, and I do say I enjoyed it. So yeah, go and review denizens of the Fairground.
*takes mod hat off*

Yup, glad to be back, *insert more stuff here.*

 

[Murkmire]

Hello, everyone. How goes it?

 

[Squeaky the sixth]

Not too bad.

Thanks for asking.

 

[Murkmire]

Cool, cool.

What's up with you? Doing anything?

 

[Beth Pavell]

Plotting the second half of the Azalea Town arc is giving me a right headache. Why oh why did I think that two protagonists was a good idea? Two Gym Battles, protagonist character development and a capture in an 8,000 word budget. This probably looks like nothing to all you fellows used to writing for four or five protagonists xD

 

[kintsugi]

Pavell--if I may ask, why the 8,000 word budget, and is it more of a "WOW I HAVE 8,001 WORDS I BETTER GO CUT" or is it more of a guideline? (I'm assuming it has to do with pacing, which is why I'm intrigued. Never head of anyone who measured by words, though).

In other news, I migrated the prologue and the first two chapters of SRBS to fanfiction.net, just to see what general response was. Interesting site, couldn't figure out how to do anything for a bit, and then the first reviews came in. At first, all I got was a visit from some guy I think everyone else called the laconic reviewer guy, who criticized my use of: .44 shotguns (which, as it turns out, do exist, and he was using his knowledge of guns from Fallout), exposition dump (entirely valid), and use of curly brackets for telepathy/pokemon speaking (couldn't find any legit convention for that, so I'm not sure) XD
Then, turns out that January is the month in which Farla, uh, goes through the fanfiction.net Pokemon subforum and reviews every single fanfiction published in the month of January. Which, uh, I wasn't exactly psyched for, but since we apparently use the exact same capitalization of "pokemon" the animal and I can punctuate dialogue, she actually seemed okay with stuff maybe? And then she favorited it and mentioned on her blog that my story wasn't terribly awful, so then other people looked and reviewed as well?

I HAVE VAGUELY MIXED FEELINGS ABOUT ALL OF THIS LOL.

 

[AetherX]

So I want to know other people's experience. Is it a requirement for higher level math courses to be taught by someone with an indecipherable accent?

Then, turns out that January is the month in which Farla, uh, goes through the fanfiction.net Pokemon subforum and reviews every single fanfiction published in the month of January.

You know, I've actually seriously considered doing this here.

 

[Caitlin]

and use of curly brackets for telepathy/pokemon speaking (couldn't find any legit convention for that, so I'm not sure) XD

I myself haven't dealt with telepathy in writing, but I would do it in italics. It's how I do all thought-based dialogue, and since telepathy is direct communication between two minds, I'd classify it as thought-based. As far as Pokemon actually speaking, I'd probably do that in standard quotation marks, like people. Though if they're speaking to each other and the humans don't understand... well, it gets into a whole mess of complication.

Now, is this a standard? I couldn't tell you. I only do this because I remember seeing it in a book I read in second grade, and most novels I've read have been from a third person limited viewpoint, where the reader/narrator wouldn't have access to someone's thoughts.

 

[Life]

I've been trying to start writing Chapter Three and finish the second entry for Jeff's Journal of Poison Touch, but I can't come up with any good ways to start off the chapter. I feel a bit overloaded with conflicting ideas and I'm not sure what I want to put down on paper. x_x

I keep telling myself not to give up and to try and write just a little bit, but right now one sentence seems like a paragraph. Hopefully I'll be able to clear my head a bit during the week.

 

[Beth Pavell]

I am seriously beginning to lose my temper with Fanfiction.net. The damn site has apparently thrown a temper tantrum and now I can't upload the Interlude. No way am I faffing around e-mailing error messages around for the sake of a chapter that about four people will read.

Anyway. @kintsugi, yes, the budget is a pacing device to force me to stop me meandering about and focus on what's important to the story. If I find that I really can't get what needs to be said into 8,000 I can give myself some more but ideally I want to get it done in two chapters of about 4,000 words each. Oh, and I don't think the brackets for telepathy is a bad idea - I always thought it was obvious that it denoted telepathy so I didn't have a problem with it.

 

[kintsugi]

Regarding the use of brackets and telepathy--in my story, certain types of pokemon can generate what is called a "telepathic field," which automatically translates the thoughts of other pokemon within a certain radius into a form that humans can understand. As a result, a good deal of the conversations in some chapters will take place between a mix of humans a pokemon, some of whom are speaking (and their dialogue is in quotations) and the rest of whom are being translated by the field. I mostly wanted to avoid italics for these instances--if I did telepathy in italics, then I would have entire chapters that would be entirely in italics, said the pikachu, and that would eventually become really, really distracting and I'm not sure how I feel about that.

Suggestions?

@AetherX--I tried reviewing every update here (pre-Awards), but then some of the longer fics started updating and it was like 'AH GOD YOU HAVE HOW MANY CHAPTERS?.' There's probably only one or two newly-published fics a week here, though, compared to the twenty to thirty a day that ff.net sees.
I'd totally be down for this if you are, though. Lord knows I need some motivation to start reading around here again. ^^

 

[AceTrainer14]

@kintsugi: Whats your username on there? I will gladly give you a review and a favourite/follow if you want I do sometimes find it easier reading on there as you get a better idea of how long chapters are there, I feel, and its generally easier finding where the latest chapter is And I am tempted to get a review from Farla, but I am quite afraid of what would be said.
@Pavell: It does that a bit sometimes, but if you go back in 24 hours it usually will be fixed by then. I have had some annoying experiences there as well, but I generally upload there first cause it automatically spaces my work for me
@AetherX: That would be quite cool if people did stuff like that. Would definitely make things easier for people to find new stories. And this has given me an idea for another possible reviewing function, but word on that later

Remember that, once again, the Awards start next month, even if it does feel like they only just finished.

 

[Ahnyo]

Heh, I almost wish I could get a comment from the laconic guy or whoever. It'd certainly be more satisfying than the endless void of no reviews I've been getting as of late.

I write telepathy with a combination of italics and quotation marks.

I think I finally got my inspiration back... and of course it had to happen at the end of break. Oh well, at least there's no school tomorrow. I'm really close to finishing the fourth chapter of Legendary Genesis. c:

 

[Flaze]

I've actually been considering starting to post my academy fic in ff.net myself xD though I'm a bit uncertain.