Tag: personal waffling

WIP List, updated for 4/22

Now that the Bân of My Existence fic is finally finished and posted, aka #6 on the Tol-in-Gaurhoth kill list, time to see what’s left on the proverbial docket:

  • Beren’s Band of the Red Hand, #3 – Aglar
  • Beren’s Band of the Red Hand, #8 – Gadwar
  • Beren’s Band of the Red Hand, #10 – Edrahil
  • (#10 Finrod?)
  • Release from Bondage – only have Chapters 11 and 12 left.
  • Bân and Fân’s Excellent Adventure
  • The Hangover, featuring the Band of the Red Hand
  • Of Ingwë Ingweron – chapters 6+
  • The Vanyar and Teleri switch narratives AU, aka Queen Ravennë
  • Best AU EVAR aka Fëanor is never born
  • The Great Fever of Dorthonion
  • Andreth gets into a Song Duel with Hadorim Fuckboi
  • Meng Jiang-nu of Dorthonion
  • Galadhon asks Círdan about their relatives across the sea
  • The conclusion to the Baby Eöl, Your Parents are Orcs
  • Dwarf watches Thingol mourn Denethor
  • Thingol drunkenly reminisces with Huan about Hound-shaped Maia at Cuiviénen
  • Vagabond Gondor
  • Bortë of the War of Wrath and First Queen of Númenor

Trying to remember any others I’ve hinted, pondered, suggested, or have a start of a draft. Open to suggestions.

And of course the various bits of the original universe Rose Red stuff, especially Under the Rose Hood and the Sad Dog Squire Story.

at least the now predictable side effect of reading a Sanderson series (having recently finished all the Mistborn novels in May) is the desire to organize the magic system a little bit more in Rose Red. As that world is still in nebulae instead of star, and getting more and more stuff tossed in all the time – plus that desire to make the setting closer to a Western Hemisphere versus ‘Old World’, even if it’s original goal was ‘standard medieval fantasy AU setting for characters/tidbits’ (which includes the temptation to go paleolithic critters to justify horses and some other domesticated animal fore-bearers).

What I really should do is write out the plot summaries/skeletons before I forget and to give myself more concrete scaffolding – even if so much of the skeleton should be labeled ‘fossil’ for how long it’s been mentally marinading and how partial it is.

Wish I had someone to brainstorm and bounce ideas off of as I decide that this summer I want to spend the time to write this original universe (with its expies and fusion-inserted characters). Trying to solidify the magic system and who are some of the villains and motivations and how to connect some of the disparate characters and elements and shove some structure into how to go about telling it. And stick to one time period/sharp focus on characters…

So I finally found the easiest way to hammer out the timeline for some of the original story stuff is graph paper. Four boxes per year gives me rough suggestions for which season. Still moving dates and ages around and trying to name characters, plus fusion! means I get into debates with myself over which ages and dates to keep and which to throw out. (Plus, ~comics~, so dates and ages are contradictory or non-existent or don’t work for this story.)

Shuffling things around still, like if keeping Rupercht’s parents’ death as happening when he’s nine or moving it up to ten, eleven, twelve, thirteen… (Every time they redo Batman’s origin, his age moves up by a year I swear). Amused though that I arbitrarily picked St. Bartholomew’s Day Massacre as my go-to date, since I changed the circumstances so much (late August), only to discover that there is a (Pre-Crisis) date for the deaths of the Waynes on June 8 (which is weird because I never pegged that as happening in the summer from the art). Ages for other characters matching up nicely so far for the most part. Moved Ash’s death to right before his eighteenth birthday, but at least I’m not killing a fifteen-year-old. Now the question of how long he stays dead…

Lost (hopefully just misplaced) some handwritten notes about the quasi-AU I’m currently working on and drawing that pic for. Bummed. Also trying to figure out a timeline. Which is authorial weakness for vague math meeting the notorious comic book timeline math. Just trying to keep some of the ages relative to another while having some of them meet in the right order.

That last post has slid from ‘loose rambling’ to ‘feels enough like a fic for me to repost it elsewhere’ – except though I’ve gone back and edited it like twenty times now, it’s still missing the last line. (And everything about it is probably too snug and pat and allusions for its own good. I can’t do subtle Lay of Leithian at all; I hope y’all were groaning at everything Beren) If only I knew what I wanted to say to wrap it up neatly. Think I should completely avoid any overt narrative nod forward.
Also the title is barest of bones terrible, but I can’t pick just one lyric from the songs that inspired it. And the Hallow’s Eve bits weren’t as strong in the original plan – though partly I’ve made a conflagration between this headcanon ceremony and the Edain having a lantern/fire-based winter solstice event, so autumn equinox fun times.

And who knows how well it works without having first read The Brides of Death…

Prehistoric elf shopping trip and bartering fic. Y’all, I don’t know why this fic is taking so long to finish, or why I would think readers would want this…

Its focus should be on the first meeting and friendship genesis of Elwë and Finwë, but my authorial attention is getting bogged down in ‘huge fish! what materials are the elves using as clothing? second-hand gossip about Dan and the mastadon! what color rock salt do they have? can I mention malachite and azurite based dyes now or wait until Oromë introduces copper smelting and mining to Mahtan? why can’t I fill in the dialogue gaps between what I have had written for months to get this damn fic finished?”