Sabbatical, or My New Approach To Handling My Terrible Work Ethic · 3:47pm Mar 16th, 2016
I won't say that it's my last great work. But for the next season, the only thing I'll be working on is Sabbatical, a story born of mixed emotions and a yearning for a place I can never return to. More information below the break.
I've mentioned my stint on iWriter before. Since then, I have written and written, and recently finished my 103rd article on the site. A full reflection on it is due later, when I can find the time to piece it together.
The short of it, however, is that it made me seriously reconsider if it was worth being a writer. Or if I was meant to be one. I was caught in a time of uncertainty when it was all I had to pursue my goal of making money (well, it and other sites), as I wasn't sure if I could remain in the place I was to do a proper part time job. That kind of pressure does things to you. That, and the string of rejections I was getting right after I hit Premium status.
You see, the new writer starts off as a Standard user, who writes words for basically peanuts. When you earn enough reviews and get a better rating, you are promoted to Premium, which is still peanuts but is double the amount. It's the Canaan of iWriter, I guess, compared to the Egypt I started off in.
As it turns out, Canaan was inhabited by Canaanites who rejected me for reasons I couldn't accept*. Losing the time was fine. Tanking my rating unnecessarily, though, was not. My rejection rate in fact doubled submitting to these "better" clients I had hoped to write for. What was the point of being so enthusiastic if it meant jumping from one fire to another?
I paused. Pausing is a very good thing, sometimes, for certain people, if you're decent at reevaluating. I decided that it must be burnout - that I was running myself ragged focusing on it for a good proportion of my waking life, seven days a week. I wanted to write something different. Something fun. Something with no strings attached. Something with best pony Sunset Shimmer.
I wanted a sabbatical.
Enter Sabbatical.
Just like how Scald was a fulfillment of the Korean dream, and how Trust Me was a silly ploy at writing something seasonal and popular instead of good, Sabbatical is my take on an Austraeoh-esque type of story. By that, I mean what Austraeoh seems like to me, not what it actually is - I haven't read any of it, remarkably.
Short chapters. Random. Just enough sense of an overarching plot, but not enough to require much planning. I've got an ending, and I can reach it whenever I want to. But until I feel that the show must go on, it will.
It's also an attempt to be funny. I am not a very good comedy writer. I adore good comedy, and this is both because and despite the previous statement. For now it's still random bits, cheeky wordplay and the kind of comedy tragedy is, but maybe I'll learn something on the way (by the way, this thread at the School for New Writers is pretty cool).
It's also an attempt at being Adventure Time. Or maybe it's just reflective - an awful lot of my stuff is - and happens to be influenced in that aspect by Adventure Time. I know I was super into Everything Stays around the start of writing it.
It is, also also, the spiritual recipient of Pipsqueak's Journal! in terms of worldbuilding. If you enjoyed the portrayal of Maretopia, Little Hillings, and all the parts in between, you'll probably find something to like here.
I won't say it's my last great work. But if it were, I wouldn't mind, because it would be everything I love about writing. That's what it was written for in the first place.
"But Casca! You're horrible at finishing longform fics! What about Caugh"
Herein lies the magic: it's not really a longform fic.
It's a collection of connected vignettes that hopefully stand on their own aside from its ending. That is, each one in the series makes the next stronger, but if the ending never came you wouldn't feel too miffed about it. It's primarily a Sunset Shimmer character driven story that focuses on interactions, Slice of Life style, with an Adventure backdrop, so that never really ends per se, except when it does.
Kino's Journey comes to mind. It's like that. If you've read/watched the series, and I do strongly recommend it, you'd know that Kino never reaches a destination. The destination isn't the point. And it's like that. There might even be a blatant crossover section.
So, if you're worried about being left to hang halfway - don't worry. You won't. Well, it's more of a small hover a couple of inches rather than hang.
I also won't be publishing complete mini-arcs until they're done, so there's that.
So, yes! Check out Sabbatical, a random adventure comedy with fun stuff. Tell me what you think of it in the comments!
*"I am sorry but I cannot accept this". Okay, I guess?
After three rewrites, and every time I asked him if there was anything else and he said no: "This writer does not have the creativity needed to write us an interesting article..." - Bish, if you wanted a full rewrite you should have said so upfront.
"not what I was looking for sorry" - I did leave a note at the end to tell me if that was the case, so I could redo it for you and not lose stars. Bruh.
I am slightly miffed the asterisk leads nowhere. D:
3811057
Whoops! Seems like I published it before it was finished. It'd be pretty funny considering the context - like I still couldn't accept it =x
Edited now.
3811064
Huh. Apparently, being upper-tier clients, they expect their upper-tier writers to just know what they've done wrong. I mean, ob-vi-ous-ly.
3811097
This is surprisingly prevalent among circles that hire freelancers. "I pay you less and expect you to be much better at understanding me, a complete stranger, the first time round!"
Though it could just be that the terrible clients are much more memorable.
3811251
This is the case in retail; why wouldn't it be the case elsewhere?
3815010
Heh. Dealing with people is basically the job in most jobs, isn't it? Even in engineering, senior execs came and told us that it wasn't about the engineering, it was about the people working with you. /shrug