Vicarious Living through Fiction

Warning: This is a 100% non-fiction post!

Today, I wrote a list of "things I want to do/achieve" today, and I realized that the majority of mine are all ongoing lifestyle items as opposed to than one-time milestones. (Yes, lots of people write these lists. Ever done a "100 things I want to do before I die"? Because I haven't. I just wrote my first one ever! Maybe I should make an "inspiration board" next?)

It quickly became apparent that I've got three major life goals/foci:
1 - Friends
2 - Travel
3 - Creative projects

I do pretty well at 1&2, I think. You can't beat having social engagments 6.5 days per week and recently getting engaged for "Friends". Moving to Seattle mixed wth trips to Vegas, family, and Southern California might be a bit light for "travel", but they definitely flesh out the category.

So, for the rest of the year, I'm going to remember to work on "creative projects". That could mean more writing; it could mean spending a lot of time rehearsing with my band; or it could mean doing some dance or choreography work (as soon as my back heals).

What's on your your lists of things you want to do and achieve?

As I mentioned over in servalan, I’ve been reading The Best of Surfer Magazine. I do not surf. I know nothing about surfing. I live in one of the few SoCal beach cities that doesn’t have surfing. (The city installed a break a few decades ago.)

Yet, The Best of Surfer Magazine is strangely compelling. There are travel stories, fictional pieces, weird rambles about Malibu from the 1960s. One article starts with a mention of men walking on the moon (it’s from November 1969), but then is really about some mid-level surf contest. One article is about avoiding insurgents in CentroAmerica when in search of the best East Coast surfing.

It’s wild, yet mellow. I’m madly in love with it. I may decide to read current issues of Surfer on purpose, but maybe not. They apparently skipped a lot of articles from the LSD years, and that may be a sign that Surfer is pretty hit or miss. At least, for the non-surfer.

How does this relate to fiction writing? Because the articles are so awesome, I’ve been struck by the urge to write short fanfic for every fandom I’ve ever written in, making characters go surfing. They’re probably all going to be similar, and will (drabble-like) have no point, but the urge is there. Hopefully, this will get me back in writing mode so that those of you on the right filter will see A God to Demons chapter 10 soon.

( Alias – Nadia – Jack Knows Everything )

( Alias – Dixon – First Alias )

( B:tVS – Xander – Port Hueneme )

( SG:A – John Sheppard – Perils of Pegasus )

( Forever Knight – LaCroix – Dark Waters )

( Sailor Moon – Moon, Mars – What could go wrong? )

( Harry Potter – Draco – An Interview with Britain’s latest surf star )

( New BSG – Starbuck – Cylon Slapstick, a piece of first year fiction by Kara Thrace written on a dare for the <I>Galactica Intelligencer</I> )

( The Prisoner – Number Six – Better Luck Next Time )

My piece of Valentine's Day microfiction won (well, tied for) Circlet Press's V-Day contest! The prompt was: erotica on the Future of Valentine's Day. This just means space opera sex, right? And we all know I can do space opera (and I've finally learned to write sex, it seems).

Read the award-winning "Terran Export" by Victoria Pond (me!).

Totally not work safe, I'd accompany it with warnings if I posted it here.

I threatened that I wasn't going to write this on my regular LJ, servalan, but I couldn't help myself. Well, actually, I started drafting the comic/manga/graphic-novel version of it. But my illustative skills are sorely lacking. So, unless someone wants to draw this for me, it's going to be prose-ish. Or, y'know, just one scene. We'll see.

Title: Entanglement - a love story in quantumn physics
Genre: kitschy, manga-style romance
Rating: G
Warnings: bad science
Originally posted: today in jani_s
Summary: Wherein we meet Miriam, Bostonian PR agent who hasn't yet realized she's going to be traveling sans clothing.

( Quantumn Entanglement, the graphic novel that didn't - scene 1 )

Everyone has written a Harry Potter creature fic. You know the one: Harry (or other) is turns into a magical creature and then finds his mate. They have animalistic sex (on or off the page) and live happily ever after. Potions and poison may or may not be involved; same with jealous ex-lovers.

How could I resist?

But then, how could I do it seriously? I'm not good at serious sometimes.

Title: Mates!
Fandom: Harry Potter, Gargoyles
Rating: PG
Warnings: Post-DH (and epilogue compliant), crossover, not really slashy at all, completely unbeta'd
Originally posted: today in jani_s
Summary: Harry becomes a Gargoyle. Do Gargoyles even have mates?

( Mates! )

A God to Demons, chapter 2, will be going up today. So, if you joined up to read it and don't know if you're on my AGtD filter, you ought to comment here so I'll know to add you in.

Since I've gotten amazing feedback already, the readership list while the novel is in progress is going to be extremely small. Turns out there is a market for it after all. (At least, so long as I manage to pull back a bit on the odd sub-plots I was planning.)

Right. I couldn't do it anymore. I was already bored with the fantasy medieval version. So I'm scrapping the old version in all of its seriousness (unless someone on my f-list requests a continuation) in favor of doing a novelette length contemporary version.

It's all very chick-lit paranormal romance and I like it tremendously better. Also, I don't feel half as weird about my pregnant heroine. Yes, I woke myself up for this.

Title: A God to Demons (alternate version)
Chapter: Scene 1
Genre: Contemporary paranormal romance, chick-lit, steampunk leanings
Rating: PG for adult themes so far
Warnings: none
Originally posted: August 25, 2007 here and at servalan
Summary: Scene 1 - Samantha Jones, New Jersey woman, decides to visit her grandmother. Unable to scrape together the $850 for a ticket to London, she pulls out some old-timey steam-coach tickets through the Shadowlands which her Grandma gave her ages ago. Thankfully, they have no expiry date.

( A God to Demons, Scene 1, Newark (New Jersey) )

Next time: Meet Avrael, the smart and sexy demon who will lend his blade to Samantha's protection in scene 3.

Title: A God to Demons
Chapter: Chapter 1 - To Grandmother's house we go
Genre: Paranormal romance, medieval fantasy with steampunk leanings
Rating: PG for adult themes so far
Warnings: none
Originally posted: August 24, 2007 here and at servalan
Summary: ( A God to Demons jacket-copy )

( Chapter 1 - To Grandmother's house we go )

Next time: "Chapter 2 - There must be some kind of way out of here" where we meet Avrael, the smart and sexy demon who will lend his blade to Samantha's protection (in chapter 3).

The crossover of smart, secondary characters who totally deserve a good day: I'd been meaning to write an Alias fic to the tune of "How Marcus Dixon spent Sydney's Summer Vacation". But tonight I was watching Forever Knight, and I'd really like to do something to the tune of:

Title: Untitled
Fandom: Alias, Forever Knight
Rating: G
Warnings: crossover
Originally posted: today in jani_s
Summary: Drabble. Dixon's first taste of protecting the public.

( Dixon's first taste of protecting the public )

I know what you're thinking. You're thinking:

Janine, you created this journal for fic posting. Why have we not seen anything in a month? Not even an old repost?

Answer: I've been busy.

Also, I'm writing a novella to an anthology prompt. I have a feeling the antho won't want it (they tend to like things with sex in them, even though they've said it doesn't have to have any), but it might be worth trying out on the YA/MG circuit before y'all see it here.

Anthology description: Must have shapeshifting cats central to the plot. Any "heat" level. (The publisher has non-romance novels available, and some few space-based ones, as well as fantasy.)

Janine's plot desciption: "The Menaechmus Twins" (by Plautus). As a Space Opera. With two species of shapeshifting cats. I've been dying to write "TMT" in space, and (now that I've finished plotting it out) I don't know how I ever managed to imagine it without the shapeshifting cats! Plautine comedy is hard to do in prose form, though. We'll see how it turns out.

Title: You are Number Six
Fandom: The Prisoner, Battlestar Galactica
Rating: G
Warnings: crossover
Originally posted: today in jani_s, servalan
Summary: Drabble. The Sixes meet.

( You are Number Six )

Title: Never
Fandom: Sailor Moon (North American)
Rating: PG-13 for adult themes
Warnings: attempted suicide
Originally posted: 1997 or 1998 at A Sailor Moon Romance (now available at Moon Romance)
Summary: When Darien breaks up with Serena for her own good, the pain of it becomes too much for her. Her attempted suicide drives the Moonlight Knight to become his own man – a man who will try to be enough to keep Serena among the living.

( Never )

With all the writing I do, I figured it was time to get a journal just for fiction.

Not that I do a lot of fiction writing, but there's definitely been enough to make it worth it.

This'll mostly be fanfic, since I always make a go at selling my original fic when I think it's any good. (So, that probably means whatever original stuff I put up here is horrid, permanently unfinished, or has no market. Probably the first.)

Recs posted here may or may not be crossposted to servalan . I really haven't decided.

I'm going to start by putting up a whole bunch of old fic. This will include at least one story from:
- Sailor Moon
- Harry Potter (way more than one)
- Buffy, the Vampire Slayer
- Forever Knight
- Art Marju Duchain (j-rock)

Some of these will be finished, some have been permanently abandoned.