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Filing off the serial numbers
Monday, 13 November 2017 21:08So, in my life as a fanfic writer (which lbh is the best part of it always and forever) I have had two (very bisexual) unfinished longfics that I considered filing the serial numbers off of. As an exercise in long-form writing, the thing I spend my life angsting about, it wasn't a bad idea per se. One of these, I have more or less let go of the idea of. I don't really have enough passion in me to write a novella's worth of bisexual vampire urban fantasy in some "vague North American city" setting, let alone constructing from scratch the kind of secondary setting that plot would require.
The second, I have more complicated feelings about. Because the crux of that second story is an emotional arc involving a series of relationships and shifting allegiances between three very different people. My emotional investment in these three characters and their need to resolve around each other hasn't flatlined, even if it's not as strong as it was two or three years ago. And I'm still pretty mad about the worldbuilding things in the canon for that fic that I was using the fic to try and address. But time has passed and my storytelling voice has grown and evolved and changed, I did NaNo for 2016 and started developing a story of NaNo 2017 that I have high hopes for.
One of the things that I have high hopes for w/r/t this story (henceforth TAOS) is that, as I only just realized, it takes a subplot from this abandoned fanfic, guts it, reconstructs it, and basically wears its skin. And wears it much better, I should add, while also incorporating some elements from two of my favorite stories, the kind that I've been obsessed with referencing or retelling since, uh, time. TAOS basically makes the "bones" plot of the fic redundant, and undermines a lot of my reason for wanting to file off and rewrite it.
What TAOS doesn't have, though, is that complex emotional dynamic that I was so attached to, that I still want to revisit in some way, shape or form. And no, I cannot inject this dynamic into the story, either, as its structure is completely wrong and its core cast can't be wrapped around the ideas central to the character conflict in the other. Individual elements, maybe I could. Like, I could add an antagonistic, resentment to respect relationship that starts sexual and evolves into a romance. Probably. I could add a poly relationship, probably, pretty easily. But not the whole thing, not the complete structure that was the pivot of the emotional arc of the original fic. Not without it being awkward as fuck and undermining the narrative integrity of the plot and characters.
Now I'm stuck wondering whether I should just mourn that whole story and move on. Or leave well enough alone, allow it to stay dormant in the back of my mind, until my mind can find a suitable home for it, which may be years from now or never. Or force the issue, try to deconstruct the core plot elements that made that dynamic possible and use them as bones to build a new story more or less from scratch, without the social/political component that compelled me to write it to begin with.
Writing is hard.
The second, I have more complicated feelings about. Because the crux of that second story is an emotional arc involving a series of relationships and shifting allegiances between three very different people. My emotional investment in these three characters and their need to resolve around each other hasn't flatlined, even if it's not as strong as it was two or three years ago. And I'm still pretty mad about the worldbuilding things in the canon for that fic that I was using the fic to try and address. But time has passed and my storytelling voice has grown and evolved and changed, I did NaNo for 2016 and started developing a story of NaNo 2017 that I have high hopes for.
One of the things that I have high hopes for w/r/t this story (henceforth TAOS) is that, as I only just realized, it takes a subplot from this abandoned fanfic, guts it, reconstructs it, and basically wears its skin. And wears it much better, I should add, while also incorporating some elements from two of my favorite stories, the kind that I've been obsessed with referencing or retelling since, uh, time. TAOS basically makes the "bones" plot of the fic redundant, and undermines a lot of my reason for wanting to file off and rewrite it.
What TAOS doesn't have, though, is that complex emotional dynamic that I was so attached to, that I still want to revisit in some way, shape or form. And no, I cannot inject this dynamic into the story, either, as its structure is completely wrong and its core cast can't be wrapped around the ideas central to the character conflict in the other. Individual elements, maybe I could. Like, I could add an antagonistic, resentment to respect relationship that starts sexual and evolves into a romance. Probably. I could add a poly relationship, probably, pretty easily. But not the whole thing, not the complete structure that was the pivot of the emotional arc of the original fic. Not without it being awkward as fuck and undermining the narrative integrity of the plot and characters.
Now I'm stuck wondering whether I should just mourn that whole story and move on. Or leave well enough alone, allow it to stay dormant in the back of my mind, until my mind can find a suitable home for it, which may be years from now or never. Or force the issue, try to deconstruct the core plot elements that made that dynamic possible and use them as bones to build a new story more or less from scratch, without the social/political component that compelled me to write it to begin with.
Writing is hard.
