Tea Time: Lessons and Readings. (Also, hi new followers!)

I threw up Tea Time as a way to clear the cobwebs from all the work on Stronger, Adorkable, and the other stuff I have started but not finished. I didn't really expect much of it, although I was happy with it.

So, a thousand views and change later, a bunch of faves, notes from Skywriter and other heavy hitters, new followers, a very nice guy named Arwhale offering to do a youtube reading (and then ACTUALLY DOING IT see below), etc, etc....

I mean, all I can say is...

Two things. First, here's the reading of Tea Time.

As Kafka once said, "Zomg, you guys, how cool is this. I am a giant cockroach."

So here's the thing. I wrote Tea Time in one night. One. Oh, the editing took two days, but the draft was done in about 3-4 hours. That’s not to brag, but it’s more that one I am (what most of us) are capable of if we just sit down and write the damn thing. But it’s more than that. I learned some things. Maybe they will be helpful to you?

Here are the 10 things I have learned from Tea Time.

1) For a short piece, time spent exploring the concept/prompt is time wasted

The prompt for Tea Time, from Sir Skeeter The Lurker, was only this: “Cadance and Celestia have tea.” Five words. That’s it.
I usually brainstorm, make playlists, try to outline every story I’ve written in my head. It’s fun to do, fun to play with. Fun to basically waste time in a creative but non productive way. Then when I get down to it, to actually write the thing… I stall. I hesitate. I play again with the soundtrack. I think up gags. All well and good, but it’s not writing.

This time, I was figuring it out as I was writing it, so it was all exciting and new as it poured out. I didn’t have time to get bored with the idea. I didn’t get frustrated by the pesky middle, that annoying unformed part of a story in your head inbetween your great start and awesome ending. I didn't have an ending. I just had tea.

Does this work for, say, a story that’s novel length? Probably not. Then again, that’s what I was doing on Adorkable at the start, and now it’s gotten bogged down in my plans. Plans are the enemy. Plans stink. Time spent on plans is time not spent writing!

2) Do not stop until it's done, or you chance never finishing it.

I almost bowed on TT three times, each at a good stopping point. I’d written 1k, 2k, even 3k, that’s good enough, better than I usually do on one night. And then I thought, no. Power ahead. Get it done. It’ll be rough and need work (and it did), but you’ll feel better and it’ll be ready to edit, ready to send to those that make it better.

I cannot tell you how many half-started, even partially edited stories are laying around in my gdocs right now. I don’t want to post them semi-done, but it’s SO hard to get back into the groove on things once they’re started. Especially short pieces. Just keep doing it, even if you have to stay up until god knows when. For this story, it was worth it. I assure you.

3) Do not go back to correct something, you have editors for that (and yourself)

Kurt Vonnegut, Jr., once spoke of two kinds of writers, bashers and swoopers. Swoopers go on and one, every which way, and then once the flight is done they go back and say, hey, how did I get here? Bashers, on the other hand, literally bash their heads against the keyboard (typewriter for Mr. V), again and again, until the sentence comes out right and then they move on.

I keep thinking I’m a basher. I keep going over sentences as I write them. Then I lose steam. Then I get bored or tired. Then I say I’ll come back to it later.

For Tea Time, for the heady early chapters of Adorkable, I swooped. Then I came back later. This is better. Bashing gets me better sentences in the moment, but then your head hurts and you stop. I already have enough attention span problems. Just keep writing. Just keep swimming. Had I gone Basher with Royals, I would have never finished it. I got stuck on the first flashback, nothing was working, and then I decided ‘f—k it, let’s get on with the date.’ I’m very happy with Royals, and I shudder to think what would have happened if I kept bashing. It’d probably be in the to be finished later pile, like the read later pile, like a Netflix Que. Not gonna happen.

4) With Romance comes higher scrutiny, both positive and negative

The second two ponies kiss, more people are gonna read, more people are gonna hate. I offer the following as evidence.

Every story I’ve written with romance has at least six downvotes. Behold, from most to least downvotes:

Romance Tags:
Adorkable Love: 28
Faster: 25
Stronger: 13
Royals: 11
Baking is War: 6

Non Romance Tags:
The Cells: 5
Trixie, Appleloosa Sheriff: 4
Despicable Blue: 3
Mayor Mare: 1
Tea Time: 1

Now look at upvotes, again, from highest to lowest:

Romance Tags:
Adorkable Love: 760
Faster: 688
Royals: 362
Stronger: 281
Baking is War: 92

Non Romance Tags:
Tea Time: 224
Despicable Blue: 137
Trixie: 80
Mayor Mare: 72
The Cells: 53

Aside from the one outlier of Baking is War, my most liked and most viewed stories are Romances. My least liked stories are Romances. With great Shipping comes great Scrutiny, folks.

5) Don't be afraid to try new stylistic choices....

So, that last part of Tea Time. For whatever reason, I thought you know what, let’s let this just be Tia. Just let’er rip. John Galt this thing. (Note: I have not read Atlas Shrugged, but I did try to watch the movie. I failed.) Write a full fledged monologue. And when I went back to add in the Cadance parts, I thought, you know what, no. I don’t need them. We’ve had enough time in Cadance’s head. It balances perfectly as a little three scene story. It was liberating. It was freeing. It was a healthy reminder that when people say, ‘you have to do it this way’, you can respond, ‘says who?’

6) .... but be prepared to accept criticism, not that you made them, but that they're not accomplishing what you really wanted to do

Based on a series of posts, this stylistic choice I made in part three is the one part that’s giving most people pause. And it’s not because I went that way, but because I either didn’t give a good enough reason why, or I didn’t do it well enough. I still stand by the choice, but point taken. “It just feels right,” is not enough on it’s own. Explain why to yourself, and show why in your writing. Not sure if I did that here. Point taken.

7) References to events in the show, without contradicting them, are almost always a good thing

One of the best tools I have (and you have) to flesh our your stories is the show itself. This sounds obvious, but I don't mean major plot events or character tics. I mean throwaway lines, beats or characters that you can build a whole world around.

From the Royals/DB references to Coco Pommel being a great fashion designer, to finding a way to further explain why Trixie apologized at all in Sheriff, there are moments and beats that hint at another life just outside the camera’s view in the show. A lot of very good writers do this all the time, (see: Skywriter), but the point is that you don’t need to be good or even great to do it. There are gifts everywhere: Mr. Cake’s immortal line about pony genetics. Or in this case, Cadance saying in Three’s a Crowd “Life in the Crystal Empire is…. Fine.” Once I knew who my characters were and who was talking to whom, that immediately jumped out.

There is also negative space that invites writing as well. Why was Cadance visiting Twilight? Why does Celestia always drink tea? How would it be to grow up the niece of the most powerful pony on the planet? How did Cadance adjust to suddenly having a new relative?

The show is a treasure-chest of spare ideas and concepts, far and away from the huge plot elements. Guys, there’s an entire book on how to do a proper Goof-off. This is a thing in Equestria. You need ideas? Just pick any episode and go fishing.

There is an exception to this reference thing. See #10.

8) Every day, there are people on the site who have not read your stuff.

I've been around for almost a year, and made some good friends and achieved a certain amount of notoriety. I figured, with my followers and views, people know me and either like my stuff or don't. Then I have all of these new readers saying, who are you and where have you been?

Even if the average amount of people on the website overs between 1,500-2,500, there are always people passing through who will be looking at your stuff for the first time. They may be more or less inclined to read on once they look at your followers and other work, but really, it's the title and concept that will bring them in. They don't know you, but maybe they want to. Never stop posting new stuff, you might be surprised who faves and comments.

9) It's nice to support artists and commission, artwork, but don't let it slow down posting

I love my artists. I love commissioning them, I love promoting with them and collaborating with them.

But a few times now, I've been caught in a cycle of either waiting on cover art to be done, or having cover art done without the story being done. Right now, as we you read, I'm sitting on two beautiful pieces of art by Ruirik for two new stories. Dreamingnoctis has begun sketching a wonderful look for the Royals sequel. And when I look at this art, I should feel inspired. Instead, I feel guilty because the stories are sitting there, started but not finished. I get antsy, bored and guilty about their unfinished state. It's no way to run a railroad, I tell ya.

I googled Celestia and tea for the image for Tea Time. I found it in under ten seconds. A reader helped me identify the artist to give proper credit. And while some day I may commission a proper cover for Tea Time, the lesson has to be... Don't even think about art until a draft is done. Waiting on editors and making corrections is the perfect time to find an artist and collaborate with them. It puts an impetus on finishing the edits, gets the artist excited that their work is going to be up soon, and makes the whole thing seem more real. And if you have to wait on the art to finish, you can always go temporary or (even better) have the story all ready to go, you're just waiting to pull the switch.

10) Flash Sentry is the third rail of fimfic.

There’s no other way around it. Even a passing, neutral reference to him, based on his actual cameo appearance in the episode, and people were getting their pitchforks. Now, I don’t believe the story’s one downvote came because of this, and if Flash was really important to the story, I would have used him. But he wasn’t, I just thought it was a fun way to explain why he was there. Instead, it was like the one drop of oil in the water.

People hate Flash Sentry. They just do. The point isn’t don’t go there. The point is only go there if you have to.

Finally, to all you new followers, to you I say: Thank you for friendly legally stalking me. But I am legally obligated to inform you that anypony watching me gets watched right back by George Clooney.

There is very little I can do about this. I apologize in advance.

Comments

[TheLastBrunnenG]

Ten exceptionally good advice nuggets!

Amen to # 5. I wrote Concerto using 100% internal dialogue, swapping POVs between two characters. It sounds odd on paper, and it almost requires seeing it here as opposed to downloading the .TXT file. It's one of those that doesn't work without the correct formatting in place. I don't think I'd do it again (unless I feel like a sequel) but it was fun to explore briefly.

Corollary to #9:

You do need cover art of some sort. Screencap, gallery shot from the MLP Wiki, randomly Googled relevant art, custom commission, what have you, but having no art risks potential viewers skimming and skipping a story when they don't feel the description is quite enough. Very few stories can achieve popularity / notoriety / Featured without cover art. * So don't hold up a story waiting for art, but don't rush to publish without it. The fandom is massive enough that no matter your topic, someone has something you can use. Of my 'Big Four' stories, two have screencaps for art (both grabbed myself from HD Youtube rips) and two have art I found while browsing DeviantArt, whose creators thankfully gave me permission.

* There are a few. L0x0r's Don't Let the Sun Catch you Crying is a legendary one I can think of which lacks cover art to this day.

Addendum to # 9:

It's okay to wait a reasonably short time if you're doing your own cover art. I slapped together a few vectors to make cover art for Pursuit and Concerto and I'm very happy with how they turned out. Coincidentally, I had both cover pieces done before I had the stories more than 50% complete, and picturing that artwork next to a published story made for good inspiration.

[FanOfMostEverything]

It's kind of funny. At first, I thought that third part was a monologue and that you were making the understandable mistake of putting quotation marks at the end of each paragraph in continuous speech.
Then I kept reading and realized, no, Celestia's responding to Cadence. We may not be seeing Lovebutt's lines, but they're still there, breaking up Sunbutt's dialogue sound unseen.
That's another problem with that sort of stylistic flourish on a fanfiction site: it can be hard to tell when it's intentional.

(Also, I've written a one-shot based on that Mr. Cake line, so I can confirm that that's very good advice indeed.)