Perfection? (Also a little self-indulgence) · 9:11pm Aug 18th, 2016
So in a little under a week, Letters from an Irradiated Princess has amassed 162 likes, and not a single dislike. (Though I imagine some contrarian will go downvote the story just as a matter of principle by now). This has driven it to become one of my post popular (or at least top ranking) stories, much to my surprise.
I guess it makes a bit of sense, as the story's pretty short, so there's not much there for people to object to. That, or people really, really like Gargantulon, who I may have cameo in a story or something.
Still, I've mentioned this before (in pretty much every other blog post I write on here), but I just feel like I'm in somewhat of a rut, writing-wise. I keep on saying "Hey, I'm going to write an original thing!" and then ... well, I don't. Bluh. It doesn't help that MOST of what I've written over the last ... several years has been fanfic of one stripe or another. Which makes it really awkward when family members ask "Oh hey, are you still writing?" At which point I dissemble a bit and say "just a few practice things, nothing worth publishing." Which ... is kinda true.
It almost seems fanfic is 'easier.' I mean, the various characters on the show are pretty well defined already. That, and sometimes I'm afraid that by writing semi-decent fanfic, I'm setting the bar a little low. I mean, yeah, it's nice to have stories rated in the top 1% or so of the stuff on this site ... but when you're competing with stuff like "Anon makes Rainbow Dash into his clown fetish sex slave" or whatever, it seems like a little less of an accomplishment. Though more importantly (to me, at least) FiMfiction offers near-instant validation as I post up chapter after chapter, and get to check the site in the morning to see the various notifications roll in. (Comments are like such sweet, sweet candy).
On top of that, I've found that the heart of most of the fanfic I've written comes from the juxtaposition between silly magical cartoon ponies and something that you wouldn't expect from the show. Booze (twice!), romantic farce, fanfiction, LARPing, heavy metal, or whatever. Which works well enough, I guess, but sometimes I wonder if I'm a proverbial one trick pony. (One trick brony?)
In turn, working in this sense of thematic dissonance into something original and non-fanficcy is a lot harder. PLUS, I've recently been kicking around various ideas, trying to find a balance between high-concept genre-benders (kung fu space opera! Post Apocalyptic Girl Detective! Swashbuckling Fantasy Heist!) and stuff that, y'know, would sell. Every now and again I eyeball the 'best sellers' on the Kindle section of Amazon and start brainstorming, but it never seems to go anywhere. Hm.
Meh. The real solution is just to stop my whining, boot up the word processor, and hammer out something. Which I will! In theory. Hopefully.
Once I figure out what the heck I wanna work on in the first place.
Oh, fan fiction is definitely easier. The characters, setting, backstory, motivation, it's all pre-established. Original fiction requires starting from scratch. At best, you can build off of the real world, and that only provides so much. Original fiction is terrifying in that respect.
Of course, that doesn't mean it isn't worthwhile. Just know that you're not alone in this state of mind.
It's also easier from a reader's perspective. For whatever reason, I've been reading pony fic, superhero stuff, and certain mystery writers for the last couple years. The well... structure makes for a contract of sorts. A lot of free form writers feel free to violate standards, boundaries, expectations, especially with mentors running around telling writers that it's their business to violate those standards and expectations.
Fanfic at least comes with that reassurance of the ironclad standard .
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Don't forget the pre-established audience, too! That's a big deal, especially if (like every fanfic writer ever) you care about the comments and such.
The Writeoff Association does original fiction writeoffs every six weeks. I think the next one is four weeks from today. If you want to be incentivized by a prompt and a time limit, it might be worth throwing in your hat.
As far as writing original fiction goes... I think wanting to write original fiction is really different from actually doing it. "Original fiction" is broad. I just randomly brainstorm ideas and write down random ideas as I'm inspired/see things that seem interesting/my mind goes off on a tangent.
You can also browse reddit's r/writingprompts and see if you see anything there that catches your fancy.