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Mar. 2nd, 2018 09:59 pm1. News's continues to be...difficult to watch. And impossible to discuss without falling into rant mode.
Apparently the NRA has a fandom. Who knew.
2. Making progress on story, which I think takes place in the same world as published novel. It's not a sci-fi so easier to write in some respects.
3. Saw Lucifer tonight.
I loved this episode. Even the procedural, which I admittedly lost track of...half-way through, but so did the writers.
There's a bit in the episode that concerns a fanfic writer of a favorite YA sci-fi series -- who states how the writer loved his writing, and the publisher did too, and he'd even helped her finish her book, when she got writer's block. Or so he thinks.
And... well...
By the way? Writers of books do not read the fanfic of their own books, or admit to it at any rate. Nor do their publishers or editors. Any more than television and screen writers do. Why? Copyright issues. They are all terrified the idiotic fanfic writer will sue them for stealing an idea. This has actually happened, so not a far-fetched fear. There's another even more obvious reason -- nothing is more guaranteed to give you writer's block than reading someone else's take on your characters or a plot point you came up with and seeing it on paper by someone else. A lot of us write stories because no one else is writing them, if you read someone else writing your story or something similar, why bother?
I like fanfic fine, but from a publishing and professional writer's perspective -- it's troublesome.
Urslua Le Quinn famously despised fanfic, as did Anne McCaffrey, and several others -- mainly because you have another writer out there taking your characters, your ideas, your world and creating their own fic off of it along with a readership who is eating it up. Instead of buying your books, they are reading the fanfic. Ouch. Which I can sort of understand -- if you are writing fanfic based on a novel verse, because same medium and hello, infringing on the brand.
But if it is fanfic based on a television series, movie, or comic book -- in which hello different medium --- then that's slightly different. OR if the work in question is completed, you aren't continuing it or moving forward --- and/or have died and your estate is collecting royalities, then who cares if they are writing fanfic? It's not like it is going to interfere or change your story any.
Also, there's something to be said for the fact -- that once you publish your story or throw it out there, it's not really yours any longer. The conflict between owning a story and allowing people to interact with it, learn from it, and discover it...remains a dilemma. At least to me. I mean, on the one hand, I don't want anyone playing with my story and characters but me, but on the other hand -- if they don't play with those characters then they aren't truly interacting with the story and it does not live outside of the pages in which I placed it. Then again, do I want it to live outside those pages? But if I didn't want it to...then why publish it in the first place?
Similar to the dilemma -- do I want people to only have access to and be able to read and enjoy my stories if they pay me for them? Or do I just want them to be able to read them? Or a little of both. (Obviously I've decided a little bit of both -- since I keep doing free Kindle campaigns and have given it away here and there. I'm not writing for the money. There's something to be said for "playing or rather writing real good for free".) Another thing Ursula Le Quinn was famous for? The statement that writer's had ridiculously large egos. Maybe that's my problem? My ego isn't that large. I don't need to be famous or have accolades. I just want to write my stories, have the time to do so, and share them with the world.
They are movies playing inside my head, in stereo-surround sound. Is it so bad to want to write down the movie, so I can see it and taste it and feel it, and then share it with you? Just not sure about doing it for free. Maybe it isn't the sharing that matters but the process of getting to that point?
God only knows.
Anyhow..sorry for the sub-tangent. Back to Lucifer.
( spoilers )
Apparently the NRA has a fandom. Who knew.
2. Making progress on story, which I think takes place in the same world as published novel. It's not a sci-fi so easier to write in some respects.
3. Saw Lucifer tonight.
I loved this episode. Even the procedural, which I admittedly lost track of...half-way through, but so did the writers.
There's a bit in the episode that concerns a fanfic writer of a favorite YA sci-fi series -- who states how the writer loved his writing, and the publisher did too, and he'd even helped her finish her book, when she got writer's block. Or so he thinks.
And... well...
By the way? Writers of books do not read the fanfic of their own books, or admit to it at any rate. Nor do their publishers or editors. Any more than television and screen writers do. Why? Copyright issues. They are all terrified the idiotic fanfic writer will sue them for stealing an idea. This has actually happened, so not a far-fetched fear. There's another even more obvious reason -- nothing is more guaranteed to give you writer's block than reading someone else's take on your characters or a plot point you came up with and seeing it on paper by someone else. A lot of us write stories because no one else is writing them, if you read someone else writing your story or something similar, why bother?
I like fanfic fine, but from a publishing and professional writer's perspective -- it's troublesome.
Urslua Le Quinn famously despised fanfic, as did Anne McCaffrey, and several others -- mainly because you have another writer out there taking your characters, your ideas, your world and creating their own fic off of it along with a readership who is eating it up. Instead of buying your books, they are reading the fanfic. Ouch. Which I can sort of understand -- if you are writing fanfic based on a novel verse, because same medium and hello, infringing on the brand.
But if it is fanfic based on a television series, movie, or comic book -- in which hello different medium --- then that's slightly different. OR if the work in question is completed, you aren't continuing it or moving forward --- and/or have died and your estate is collecting royalities, then who cares if they are writing fanfic? It's not like it is going to interfere or change your story any.
Also, there's something to be said for the fact -- that once you publish your story or throw it out there, it's not really yours any longer. The conflict between owning a story and allowing people to interact with it, learn from it, and discover it...remains a dilemma. At least to me. I mean, on the one hand, I don't want anyone playing with my story and characters but me, but on the other hand -- if they don't play with those characters then they aren't truly interacting with the story and it does not live outside of the pages in which I placed it. Then again, do I want it to live outside those pages? But if I didn't want it to...then why publish it in the first place?
Similar to the dilemma -- do I want people to only have access to and be able to read and enjoy my stories if they pay me for them? Or do I just want them to be able to read them? Or a little of both. (Obviously I've decided a little bit of both -- since I keep doing free Kindle campaigns and have given it away here and there. I'm not writing for the money. There's something to be said for "playing or rather writing real good for free".) Another thing Ursula Le Quinn was famous for? The statement that writer's had ridiculously large egos. Maybe that's my problem? My ego isn't that large. I don't need to be famous or have accolades. I just want to write my stories, have the time to do so, and share them with the world.
They are movies playing inside my head, in stereo-surround sound. Is it so bad to want to write down the movie, so I can see it and taste it and feel it, and then share it with you? Just not sure about doing it for free. Maybe it isn't the sharing that matters but the process of getting to that point?
God only knows.
Anyhow..sorry for the sub-tangent. Back to Lucifer.
( spoilers )