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I've been asked off and on if I would write a post about plot, more specifically how I write and the method to my madness. (Believe me, there really isn't any...)
I have a little time so I thought what the hell.
Plot writing or - what the hell were you thinking?
The simple answer is, I have no idea.
I've been writing ever since I can remember but I mostly started exploring it when I got into roleplaying my first year of Uni. (Yep, came into my geekdom late and I think I'm way up there on the geek pyramid - only partially negated by the fact that I wear a skirt.). Hell, the roleplayers were friendly and predominantly *male* which was fun. I never had to buy drinks at the pub after a convention.
Playing other people's games though bugged the crap out of me because I'm a control freak who needs to know what's going on. I started writing and pretty much that's what I did. I ran "freeforms" which were large, live action games. (Think of a play with twenty+ people and no script - they all ad lib based on a character they've been given and plot you introduce throughout the game).
It was fun and I was in supreme control of large numbers of people who had to bow to my every whim.
Cool.
The important thing about roleplaying was that it taught me to World build. If you ever want to survive an apocalypse or have someone poke holes in your plot, have a roleplayer for a friend. They know that you need to control the pharmacy when all hell breaks loose (my non-LJ friend Kat is a freakin' genius!) and how to thwart every plot device you can think of.
The worlds and stories I created had to stand up to intense scrutiny, be visceral and have no gaps. I had to know intimately every sound, smell, taste of the place I'd created and I find that translates into my writing now. I can't start a story without having a lay of the land it's set in first.
I think that's why I also like AU's so much. Playing in someone else's sandbox is fun, but building a place to call my own is where my happy lies. I reuse original characters over and again because as soon as they've had the life breathed into them, they exist for me, forever after. In a few years when you are hopefully picking up something of mine to read off the shelves, you might see someone you know...
Every now and again though, I have to let my hair down. That's the only way I can explain stories where a sentient severed hand is one of the main characters, people randomly get turned into bears and dolls and sometimes you just grab a character you love from every fandom and chuck them together and see what happens.
It's my retreat, popcorn for the brain, my way of unwinding.
So, my question is... how did you start writing?
I have a little time so I thought what the hell.
Plot writing or - what the hell were you thinking?
The simple answer is, I have no idea.
I've been writing ever since I can remember but I mostly started exploring it when I got into roleplaying my first year of Uni. (Yep, came into my geekdom late and I think I'm way up there on the geek pyramid - only partially negated by the fact that I wear a skirt.). Hell, the roleplayers were friendly and predominantly *male* which was fun. I never had to buy drinks at the pub after a convention.
Playing other people's games though bugged the crap out of me because I'm a control freak who needs to know what's going on. I started writing and pretty much that's what I did. I ran "freeforms" which were large, live action games. (Think of a play with twenty+ people and no script - they all ad lib based on a character they've been given and plot you introduce throughout the game).
It was fun and I was in supreme control of large numbers of people who had to bow to my every whim.
Cool.
The important thing about roleplaying was that it taught me to World build. If you ever want to survive an apocalypse or have someone poke holes in your plot, have a roleplayer for a friend. They know that you need to control the pharmacy when all hell breaks loose (my non-LJ friend Kat is a freakin' genius!) and how to thwart every plot device you can think of.
The worlds and stories I created had to stand up to intense scrutiny, be visceral and have no gaps. I had to know intimately every sound, smell, taste of the place I'd created and I find that translates into my writing now. I can't start a story without having a lay of the land it's set in first.
I think that's why I also like AU's so much. Playing in someone else's sandbox is fun, but building a place to call my own is where my happy lies. I reuse original characters over and again because as soon as they've had the life breathed into them, they exist for me, forever after. In a few years when you are hopefully picking up something of mine to read off the shelves, you might see someone you know...
Every now and again though, I have to let my hair down. That's the only way I can explain stories where a sentient severed hand is one of the main characters, people randomly get turned into bears and dolls and sometimes you just grab a character you love from every fandom and chuck them together and see what happens.
It's my retreat, popcorn for the brain, my way of unwinding.
So, my question is... how did you start writing?