Oct
11th
2014
Friends doing Stuff... and an AMA because why not? · 11:33pm Oct 11th, 2014
First of all, RaylanKrios claimed one of my unfinished fics from the post I made a few days ago, and he finished it up and posted it already! So, if you're interested in a fic I co-wrote (AppleDash and Flarity) check out Operation Hearts and Hooves Day. I know I'm amused by it.
Second, the incomparable GhostOfHeraclitus has made an awesomely generous offer: anyone who donates to my blog who would receive a custom blog post from me ($50) can also request one from him. More info on his offer is here, and if you want to rush to donate you can find the links in this post.
Finally, I've been meaning to do this for a while. Go ahead and ask me anything in the comments.
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bookplayer · 374 views
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She is, and she continues to think it's hilarious. She also thinks it's funny when I talk to her and she makes noises back, She is truly a genius.
Be honest (and awesome): How much MLP merch have you decked out your kid in?
How long til Trixie can eat tacos? (Solid food)
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There is very little for her to wear, only because there's not much pony stuff for babies (though she's very big for her age so far, so soon.) She does have her pony socks, which I love because they stay on her feet. (She mostly wears the Pinkie Pie ones, because most of her clothes are pink.)
She also has Rainbow Dash, Applejack, and Twilight plushes; the books I mentioned in a previous post; some mini-figures that used to belong to her father; a poster of The Great and Powerful Trixie, and one of Sweetie Belle that says "Blank Flank."
Oh, and we have a flash drive with season four on it. Any episode will keep her entertained for about 15 minutes, so I've seen all of season four about a dozen times.
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About three and a half months from now.
What kind of stories can we expect moving forward? AppleDash? Non-AppleDash? AppleDash again?
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Of the two I'm looking at right now, one is a fluffy TwiJack/RariDash/FlutterBulk/CheesePie Hearth's Warming story in the style of Love, Actually. The other is some AppleDash, specifically the long awaited sequel to Somepony's Daughter and Of Cottages and Cloud Houses. I just figured out the missing piece from it, so it should be finished in a reasonable amount of time, now.
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Yay, a sequel to Cottages! ... Wait, that sounds familiar
Oh man. A blog post from you and another from Ghost?
I wish I had some sort of source of disposable income, because that sounds amazing. I've dropped as much money on worse.
Hmm... Now I'm tempted to pony up the money to get a Ask a Pony blogpost from Ghost with the civil service ponies. Just need to rationalize it out of my budget for the month...
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Ooh, you should ask him to do a Ask a Pony type thing with the Civil Service ponies. That would be hilarious.Was that there before? Was I just not reading? Nevermind.
Never have I cursed my lack of monetary assets more.
Why do you smell like bacon?
Out of Fallout Equestria, Past Sins, or Immortal game, wich have you read and wich is your fave?
Is my avatar cute or adorable?
What is your favorite fanfic on this site? (besides everything I write of course) what is your least favorite?
What is your favorite fanfic outside of this fandom? What about the worst that you ever read, that is not my immortal/Vengance Revelations?
Why is Trixie so cute? (and yes, I mean both)
How do you find time to juggle motherhood, writing, and a career?
I'd be curious to know how the paid-for blog posts thing is working out. It's an interesting idea, but it seemed like a bit of a long shot. But obviously it must be working, or you wouldn't still be doing it. Are you making more or less than you were hoping for? Has it exceeded expectations?
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It's hard to get a shower with a baby.
I've read none of the above. They all fall outside of my usual romance/comedy wheelhouse.
Cute!
So Long, and Thanks for All the Ponies by Sir Ginger
My favorite is a Fried Green Tomatoes fanfic called I Love You, You Silly Bee Charmer by MirellaArabesque on fanfiction.net. It's rated M and contains adult content (sex) so I won't link to it.
In terms of bad... the entire reason I write fanfic was that in my last fandom, I read a fic. I can't remember what it was called, and it was competently written technically, but it was an OOC angstfest. The fandom was for The Babysitters Club, a kids book series with characters not that different from the mane six if they were human middle school students. The fic was a future fic where (among other storylines) one character gets drugged and date raped and ends up pregnant and giving birth to surprise twins. I read that and I was like "ya' know... I can't do worse than this." So I wrote my first fanfic.
Pony Trixie is cute because she's a pony. Baby Trixie is cute because she's a baby, and I'm really lucky.
I don't, I just deal with motherhood and writing (which is the reason for my blogging donations) and bee keeping (including selling honey.) I'm usually able to work around my husband, who does have a full time job, and is also a freelance writer for Cubical 7's The One Ring RPG (among other games).
That being said, taking care of a baby is a full time job-- if I wasn't doing it I'd be paying someone else to do it, after all. Luckily, babies sleep (and sometimes spend a few minutes watching ponies.)
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It's actually going better than I had expected, for now. I'm budgeting carefully because I do expect it to drop off after a while, but my Patreon is funded to $200 a month, and several people have been very generous with paypal donations.
I'm sure it's been answered before, but: where did the photo of the pen in your avatar come from? What other shows beside ponies do you watch? Who'd win in a fight: Rambo, John McClane from Die Hard, or Steven Seagal from any movie from his entire cinematic library.
And when are you gonna do a humanized work, nerd?
Alright, think I blew through all the Q&A I can think of off the top of my head.
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It's just a random stock photo I grabbed back when I picked the name bookplayer, because it seemed classy. As I've said before, I like to think it gives the impression that I'm posting from my 19th century garret.
You know, I always want people to ask me about this, because I literally only watch shows I love. This is everything I ever watch: Vikings, Penny Dreadful, Downton Abbey, Project Runway, and Survivor. And of course ponies.
Of those, if you've never checked out Vikings, I'd highly recommend it. The first half of the first season suffers from an annoying villain, but everything else about it, and the rest of the series so far, kicks all sorts of ass. Penny Dreadful is also awesome, but I doubt it's your style (much less punching and kicking.)
Those are all people who hit things.
I'dd do one just for you one of these days. It won't be a long fic, but it will be people shaped ponies.
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Believe it or not, I actually really like that show, even if it's not what I normally enjoy watching. Solid acting helps, I guess. Only about midway through season 2 ATM, but I'm hoping to get caught up before season 5 comes out in January.
And shoot things too, thank you very much.
i228.photobucket.com/albums/ee222/merc_the_jerk/dawww_zps89711b41.jpg
Do you think it's better for a writer to experiment with their works, or to stay within their niche and play around with that (as to not write the completely same thing every time)?
If you had to pick one, which background pony is the best? Would you ever write a shipping story for a couple?
I know you're not a fan of it but would you ever write an Equestria Girls fic?
What's your headcanon on Scootaloo? (Her family life, her issue with flying, if she'll ever fly at all, etc.)
Random question because I'm currently on a Buffy kick: Have you ever watched Buffy the Vampire Slayer, and if so, what was your impression of it?
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That depends on what you want out of writing. If your goal is to have fun, or to write what you like to read, I think you should do that, even if it means staying in a niche. If your goal is to be able to write broadly, you should practice that by writing as much different stuff as you can.
Marty Grass. If you're talking about more common, Ponyville ponies I do like Roseluck a bit.
And I assume you're asking if I'd write a fic shipping background ponies? Probably not. If I was tempted, I'd probably just use OCs. Now, side characters are another matter (characters with a canon personality.) I already wrote Daring Do x Zecora, and there are probably more I'd enjoy writing if I had a reason.
Actually, I had an idea for a fic where the Canterlot High girls come through to Equestria to visit Twilight and see the Summer Sun Celebration. They are, of course, pony shaped, and the Dashes switch places. Canterlot High Dash has a crush on Canterlot High Pinkie and pony Dash has a crush on pony Rarity, but they are trying to pretend to be the other, causing hijinx to ensue. (There's another subplot about pony AJ liking Twilight and getting jealous of Canterlot High AJ. The whole thing is kind of like a Shakesperian comedy.)
Scootaloo lives with her parents, one or both of whom are earth ponies. Because of that and stubby wings she's been slow learning to fly. She'll learn eventually, but she'll never be a great flyer. Her wings aren't built for power or speed, but she has some pretty impressive dexterity.
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I have not watched it. I've read enough analysis of it to fill several books, internet people love talking about it, but I never got around to watching it.
I don't know if your "ask me anything"-offer is still valid, but thanks to the AppleDash-Forum and me currently digging through your blog and your stories, I do have some questions. (Maybe some more in the future, so I would really appreciate to know, if you're still willing to answer here.)
1) You know any "good" (in terms of well-written) stories centering around Rainbow and Scoots? Anything you would recommend? I'm trying to avoid anthro, humanized and that giant hill of creepy-zone-stories, but since I decided that Scoots is my favorite CMC, I would like to read something about her...
2) To be honest, I'm sort of... new to this hole fandom-thingy. Up until now, I've found some fanfictions I really liked, although I still struggle about giving comments, as I don't feel I'm... competent enough. Yesterday, I found the first story I... disliked, sort of. Partly, because important themes and sidestories were horribly rushed, but what bugged me the most was the way the author treated two themes: Rape and suicide.
From what I've read so far, it seemed to me, that you prefer happy endings, something to smile, to laugh. As I do. It can hurt, it can make me cry, but by the end, it should work out someway.
I still would like to know what you think about using these specific elements in a story. If they should be used at all, if so, in which way to treat them, etc. (I'm sorry if one of your blogposts already covered this, I'm not through yet. Not even close to the end...)
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I'm happy to answer questions like this any time. If I ever don't have a recent AMA, feel free to leave them on my userpage!
For the first one, there are the two Scootaloo fics I've written, both with her aged up to be an adult. One is sad but uplifting (How to Do a Sonic Rainboom) and the other is an aged up ship fic that addresses the potential creep-factors (Best Young Flyer.)
From other writers, UnlicensedBrony's Follow the Rainbow is a series of episodic stories about Rainbow and Scoots around the time of canon. Another kid-Scoots fic is Tiny Wings, but that another sad-but-uplifting one. One I've never read but I've heard amazing things about is bats' Spellbound Fireflies (and I know bats is an excellent writer. It's on my read later list.) That one has some kid-ScootaBelle shipping, and TwiDash, so I don't know how you feel about those.
As to the second question, I feel like it's important to use story elements like that carefully. The writer needs to do their research, and make sure to show the character affected as a full character, not just a victim. Those things are too easy to milk for cheap emotion, and too serious for that to be something people should do. (Not that people should be milking things for cheap emotion in general, but it's especially bad when it's something that seriously affects so many people.) I tried to treat a similar subject as seriously as I could in To Tell the Truth (which is unfinished, and I'm not sure when it will be finished. It's also rated mature,) so that's a good example of how I think it should be addressed.
And in terms of comments, you shouldn't worry about not being qualified. Just tell the author what you thought (and why you thought it, if you feel like it.) Authors love comments. Just be polite and honest.
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I'll try to keep that in mind. You don't know me and owe me nothing, so this is... a really generous offer, so: Thank you.
Getting into this fandom while being unstable probably wasn't the best idea, so I don't exactly know how much I will be able to read, but since I've bin through a dozen stories in a few days... we'll see. Thank you again, for the recommendations. Also, I will try to... leave something behind. Comments, I mean. I always thought of this "wow"-comments as a waste of time and space, so I'll try to be... at least more creative than that.
I'm not sure, if I can hate anything or anyone, but I really, really, really dislike the way rape is treated in most stories, may it be written or a movie. As you said: Cheap emotion. I always loved to go to the cinema for years with my friends, especially the sneak preview. Not knowing what movie would be shown could always turn out as a unpleasant waste of time - but if you have some friends around, even the worst movie (especially the worst!) can become quiet entertaining. That was, until they played "the hills have eyes". The only movie I ever left (long) before the credits were rolling.
Anyway, sorry for getting off track... again. This story I mentioned - Rainbow tried to commit suicide due to the belief that all hope being together with AJ was lost. It was nearly impossible to think about Rainbow do that, but what really pushed me away was the way AJ reacted to this. Nothing. There was just no reaction. It wasn't even mentioned afterwards.
You seem like someone who takes such serious topics as they should be taken - serious. If you would read such a story... what would you comment on it? What would you write?