2025 Writing Log, Part Four
Jan. 26th, 2025 06:31 am![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
rynling- I posted "The Sleeping Princess," a short gothic horror story about the Impa who appears in Zelda I + Zelda II, on AO3 (here). I’m honored that the story includes three incredible illustrations by Pumpkinsouppe, who managed to capture the Dark Souls style grittiness of the Downfall Timeline perfectly. I also posted a promo on Tumblr (here).
- Something I’ve noticed about fanzines is that their writers tend not to leave comments or kudos on one another’s stories, nor do they share each other’s story promo posts on social media. That’s a shame with this zine especially, as horror is a very hard sell to begin with, especially on AO3. I’ll do my best to find, promote, and appreciate the work of the other zine writers, but I’ve resigned myself to my own story getting maybe ten kudos if I’m lucky. But you know what? This is a really good story.
- I wrote the first third of Chapter 4 of “What Dreams May Come,” a Zelda x Bloodborne crossover fic. Now that I have to go to work again, my pace is slowing, but no matter. I’ll get where I’m going eventually.
- Speaking of Zelda fanfic, one of my favorite Dragon Age artists, AntaARF, finished a book cover commission for Legend of the Princess, a Zelda/Ganondorf story that I’m planning on editing later this year. It’s a lovely illustration, and you can see it on Tumblr (here).
- I finished writing “Belladonna,” a grisly tale of beastly murder in which a cat takes action against the toddler that has monopolized his human’s attention. This story is for a hanahaki-themed event (here) that will go live in April. Since I have plenty of time, I think I might go ahead and create an illustration of a cat whose fur is overgrown with moss.
- I posted a short meta essay about the cozy temptations of a status-quo world based on Chapter Five of An Unfound Door (here). The chapter preview graphic features a lovely character illustration by the magical Madeline Hale.
- Am I using these meta posts as an excuse to procrastinate on sending queries to agents? Yes. Moving on.
- The last ever monthly comics recommendation post is up on Women Write About Comics (here). Everyone has nice things to say about Beneath the Trees Where Nobody Sees, a short graphic novel about cute animals committing ghastly murder in a picturesque small town. It sounds trite, but it really is super fun.
- This week’s post on my book review blog (here) is a lengthy review of Rio Shimamoto’s novel First Love, a psychological mystery about a 22yo college student who kills her father. I say “allegedly” in the review, but I’m 100% convinced she did it. And good for her. The story is painfully honest about the very real effects of childhood abuse on “well-behaved” children who learn to fawn, and I appreciate that honesty. Despite the heaviness of the themes, I flew through this book. Each of the characters is exactly the sort of hot mess I love to see.
- My “analog nostalgia” paper proposal was rejected from the conference I applied to. I won’t lie; this broke my heart. Tears were shed.
- Still, I rewrote the academic abstract as a general-audience article pitch. I was planning on submitting this essay to WWAC if the conference didn’t work out, but WWAC is shutting down. So we’ll see what happens, I guess. It’s a really fun essay, and I hope I can find it a good home.
Unfortunately, this week was filled with horrors. I am doing my best, but goddamn.
- Something I’ve noticed about fanzines is that their writers tend not to leave comments or kudos on one another’s stories, nor do they share each other’s story promo posts on social media. That’s a shame with this zine especially, as horror is a very hard sell to begin with, especially on AO3. I’ll do my best to find, promote, and appreciate the work of the other zine writers, but I’ve resigned myself to my own story getting maybe ten kudos if I’m lucky. But you know what? This is a really good story.
- I wrote the first third of Chapter 4 of “What Dreams May Come,” a Zelda x Bloodborne crossover fic. Now that I have to go to work again, my pace is slowing, but no matter. I’ll get where I’m going eventually.
- Speaking of Zelda fanfic, one of my favorite Dragon Age artists, AntaARF, finished a book cover commission for Legend of the Princess, a Zelda/Ganondorf story that I’m planning on editing later this year. It’s a lovely illustration, and you can see it on Tumblr (here).
- I finished writing “Belladonna,” a grisly tale of beastly murder in which a cat takes action against the toddler that has monopolized his human’s attention. This story is for a hanahaki-themed event (here) that will go live in April. Since I have plenty of time, I think I might go ahead and create an illustration of a cat whose fur is overgrown with moss.
- I posted a short meta essay about the cozy temptations of a status-quo world based on Chapter Five of An Unfound Door (here). The chapter preview graphic features a lovely character illustration by the magical Madeline Hale.
- Am I using these meta posts as an excuse to procrastinate on sending queries to agents? Yes. Moving on.
- The last ever monthly comics recommendation post is up on Women Write About Comics (here). Everyone has nice things to say about Beneath the Trees Where Nobody Sees, a short graphic novel about cute animals committing ghastly murder in a picturesque small town. It sounds trite, but it really is super fun.
- This week’s post on my book review blog (here) is a lengthy review of Rio Shimamoto’s novel First Love, a psychological mystery about a 22yo college student who kills her father. I say “allegedly” in the review, but I’m 100% convinced she did it. And good for her. The story is painfully honest about the very real effects of childhood abuse on “well-behaved” children who learn to fawn, and I appreciate that honesty. Despite the heaviness of the themes, I flew through this book. Each of the characters is exactly the sort of hot mess I love to see.
- My “analog nostalgia” paper proposal was rejected from the conference I applied to. I won’t lie; this broke my heart. Tears were shed.
- Still, I rewrote the academic abstract as a general-audience article pitch. I was planning on submitting this essay to WWAC if the conference didn’t work out, but WWAC is shutting down. So we’ll see what happens, I guess. It’s a really fun essay, and I hope I can find it a good home.
Unfortunately, this week was filled with horrors. I am doing my best, but goddamn.
no subject
Date: 2025-01-26 02:42 pm (UTC)I should write up my single fanzine experience as well. It's not positive, mostly because my goal is to find pockets of community and I didn't find it there either! Congrats on getting in and that story done, that is cool!
no subject
Date: 2025-01-26 04:15 pm (UTC)What I've noticed is that activity on fanzine servers tends to cool down over time as people finish their work and move on to other projects. A lot of contributors (not just writers) don't post their pieces on social media at all. Often, a full year or more will have passed since the story or art was finished, so I can understand the hesitation to share "outdated" work. I can also understand how it might not be a priority to return to someone else's story that you've already encouraged and complimented in the zine server.
Still, I get the feeling that a lot of fanzine experiences that aren't nuclear-explosion bad but also not 100% positive tend to be glossed over. The idea that every zine is a big fandom party is a problem, because (a) rookie fan creators don't know what to expect from the experience, and (b) people who don't get accepted to a zine can feel very hurt and excluded.
Nobody wants to badmouth zine mods, of course! But even a short post about "fanzines aren't necessarily the communities I thought they would be" has value, I think.
no subject
Date: 2025-01-30 09:47 pm (UTC)That is a killer gorgeous book cover, damn.
no subject
Date: 2025-01-31 02:34 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2025-01-31 06:00 pm (UTC)