My Little Undead Collaboration · 4:07pm May 18th, 2015

So, my current distraction from my own work of late (*coughcough*) has been Actually, I'm Dead by Wave Blaster.

It is the story of Trixie having to live (sorta, kinda, not exactly) with the consequences of using the Alicorn Amulet during Magic Duel. Suffice it to say, they're rather unpleasant consequences, as you can gather by the title.

But don't just take my word for it, go and have a read for yourselves. I'll be waiting after the break.

So far it's been quite well received. The first chapter got it a top features position on the Trixie character tag (where it's stayed since), it hit the site feature box with at least chapter 3 (not that I'd say I helped with that, but I'd certainly like to think so), and picks up substantially more Likes than Dislikes each time out. (Not sure why all the Dislikes exactly, as none of the 10 involved [to date] have bothered to say what they disliked about it -- overall idea, dead Trixie, writing, GSP, pace, etc.)

My initial involvement in Actually Dead was just cleanup on chapter 1. Wave's a good guy, knows how to tell a good story, just not quite with all the proper phrasing at times. He's Chilean, and he's really working on his English, so you can't blame him there. Chapter 2 got a lot more from me, with actual contributions being included and has continued thusly through chapters 3 and 4 (to date). So far my favorite thing to have written was the part with Trixie's question and Rarity's reaction at the end of chapter 3. The image of that still makes me smile.

And, yes, for those who have read it and are concerned about the slow pace, it will be finally picking up! Death is kind of a heavy topic, in this case just as much for the one who's died as those who didn't. There has to be time devoted to understanding the kind of changes it brings. At least we'll finally be out of that blasted hospital room starting chapter 5 and can start exploring what Trixie's new existence means for her!

Wave and myself have pretty much plotted out where we want this to go and have at least a decent idea of all the beats we want to hit along the way. Amusingly enough, for those who know how I write and work, his ideas are actually longer and more involved than my own! I actually had the less-complex, shorter version of the story this time.

We're hoping to have it told it three major arcs. The first will be set in Ponyville, and follow a number of the events of season 3 but with Trixie added to the mix. (Look forward to the one with Lightning Dust.) The action will then move to Neigh Orleans for arc 2, where we'll be delving more into Trixie's history and those who trained her, as well as exploring more of the Amulet and who/what's behind it. Hopefully with some nice occult trappings throughout. Then a move again for the final arc and resolution of Trixie's situation. Twilicorn will figure into the whole thing... somewhere along the line.

As to my personal round of procrastination on my own work, that hasn't been helped by my current "project" of clearing out my To Read - Incomplete shelf, a shelf I have set up to track stories that are incomplete but haven't either been read by me or impressed me enough to be moved to the Favorites or Enjoyed shelves. I've been trying to clear out the obvious deadwood -- stories that haven't been touched in over 6 months, which have their own shelves depending on age assuming they don't earn a spot in Favorites or Enjoyed once I've actually see what they're about -- for a few weeks now, starting with the oldest and/or shortest. I'm down to 172 of 236 stories at just over 3.4 million words total in terms of those with unread chapters so far.

I've been wanting to do a post about libraries and how people organize them for a little while now, might get to that sometime in the next few weeks.

In the meantime, as I said you can check out my work in the contributions that make it through on Actually, I'm Dead!

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