Good Lord, has it been one month?

I apologise for taking so long to upload the newest chapter. Let me have a final proofread before I upload Chapter 50.

By the way, the story is coming to an end soon. Just that there's much much more to go before I call it quits!

Workshop: Fiction Writing (Part 2)

Thanks all, for waiting. Here is the second half of my reflections after the writing workshop. You can read about the first half here.

3. Even when you are tired, you can write pretty decent stuff.
Writing, fun as it was, was no joke. Writing and thinking of ideas from 9 to 5 was tiring. At the last exercise, my mind was already like, "let's just do something simple." So yes... I kind of relaxed and chose the first idea that came to my mind instead of working on that idea a bit more. However, after I was done, I took a look and I thought, "Hey, it could have been worse." I've submitted that piece of writing to the facilitator to look through. She will be a good benchmark to my expectations.

Of course, I'm not saying that I'm satisfied with half-committed work. Nevertheless, if there is a moral of this story, it'll be this: Don't make fatigue your excuse... as with other things like work and life and family etc. *feeling really guilty right now*

(I shall join Tamaki senpai from Ouran High School Host Club in his corner of woe...)

4. I appreciate fanfiction.net
For the sheer reason that through them I, at the very least, have been given an avenue to publish something. Anything. Publishing crap work to not-so-crap-but-still-boring work over these years gave me a valuable thing called experience.

5. I'm on the 'right' track
Not trying to be stuck up or anything, but it's just that some of the things that the facilitator had mentioned and recommended are things that I am currently doing. It's pretty awesome to know that. And I can only attribute to that many many years of stumbling and fumbling and getting people to critcise your writing. It was sad to see that I could have learnt those in just a one-day workshop rather than going through the whole thing over so many years. However, I guess I had to learn some things the hard way. What I'm trying to say is, experience is key.

6. Things are better with comrades
I was sitting in a group of six, and these people are really supportive, witty and fun to be with. In addition, they were very tactful with their comments. It was really lovely. Time just flies when I was writing with them, and we even had lunch together :P Well, all of them read my Chapter 50 draft. They did not give much comments (which meant more than it sounded), but it was an amazing feeling nevertheless to give your work to someone to look through. I should try to humble myself more to allow a second opinion because well... all my stories were written and planned and edited by me.

In conclusion, I had a brilliant time. I can't wait to go for another one someday. You ask, "Are you using the things that you're learning into your stories?" Truthfully, not always. It's a little time consuming, hurhur. But the tips do appear in my mind once in a while as reminders. Hehe. Yup. I'll continue to work hard for my readers and my characters.

Tamaki Sempai's corner of woe taken from here.

Workshop: Fiction Writing (Part 1)

I went to a writing workshop a few weeks ago. To those who are clueless, here is the details of that workshop. You may need to click on the image to have a larger view.

If you remember my previous post, I was talking about how afraid I was to meet other writers because of my background as a fanficion writer. Turns out that I was too paranoid about it.

The workshop was amazing. Well, I think it's kinda rude to disclose what I've learnt. I think that it's best to the facilitators at the workshop. At most, I'll give some kind of remark rather than a detailed  So if you are here, expecting some kind of crash course, well, you're not going to get it, sorry :(

Firstly, we did a self-introduction. I was the second one in the line, so I had to make quick decisions. Should I just keep quiet? Or kick myself in the shins and jump into the fire? Well, I made the latter choice.

"Hi, I'm aichioluv, and I'm... I'm a closet fanfiction writer."

No one really reacted. Do they even know what is fanfiction? My facilitator, however, chuckled, though not in a bad way (I hope). So I continued.

"I'm here (in this workshop) because I want to see what I'm lacking in my writing, which should be a lot. And I want to see how I can improve in my writing."

Yup, my self-introduction went by smoothly. Not angry mob of nay-sayers, no pitch forks, nothing. Yes yes yes, I was overreacting, I admit. But seriously, I know the general reputation of fanfiction being completely unoriginal (duh, it's fanfiction!) and substandard. Of course I worry. It was absolutely liberating, my confession. After that, I felt less concerned, for some reason. No one judged me, at least they did not say it out.

I really enjoyed the workshop and I've picked up some tips for improvement. If I really had to nitpick, I wished that we had gone more in depth. Maybe analyse author's works and discuss how we can use their awesomeness to improve ourselves. Hmm, is it even legal?

Apart from that, I'm simply glad that the workshop delivered what it needed to deliver. Here are some of the things that I've discovered and rediscovered during the workshop.

1. I had no idea I have an inner critic.
At the start of the workshop, we were supposed to dismiss our inner critic. I was thinking, "What inner critic? I will be happy enough if I was more critical of my work." Due to everyone from fanfiction.net being so nice and friendly, even if I had any mistakes, they may put it in such a roundabout way... or maybe they did not even notice.

Then, I remembered. Once upon a time, I received a painfully honest review for one of my earlier works. In his/her defense, I'm super grateful for that review because it gave me a good reality slap on my face. Unoriginal as it may be, fanfiction is, obviously, works and characters created by the original author. To make characters out of their character is kind of an insult to the author, in my opinion now. So I'm glad that that reviewer was honest enough to tell me.

That being said, since then I was ever so cautious in my planning and I try to be real critical with myself - especially with character portrayal. Sometimes, I feel exceedingly frustrated when I can't illustrate certain personalities the way I imagined it to be. I guess that could be my inner critic trying to giving my ideas 'friendly reminders' back to oblivion.

So, I do have an inner critic. Never thought about that. While it's good to have a certain standard for yourself, it is just as important to ignore the internal naysayers and write what YOU want to write.

2. I've pushed myself out of the box.
I guess I really surprised myself there. Not that I am a really good fantasy/adventure writer in the first place, but I never considered making characters more than what I was comfortable with. In the end, I thought of things and ideas that were sort of out of my usual style. At least, what was what I tried to do. I did try to make one of the characters in an exercise a failed comedian, but I guess even the function of a failed comedian failed on me. *sigh* humour was never my strong point. Nevertheless, I was glad that I tried to do something slightly different. Turns out that I could so it if I really try.

I'll continue another time!

Details of workshop were taken from here.

Did you ever not know the importance of something until it's gone?

Yes, the cliche sentence.

I'm feeling it big time now.

I've just deleted an entire section of writing.

It's gone. Forever.

Damn it.

I want to curl up and cry >_____<

EDIT: I'VE FOUND IT! I found a previous version in my harddisk. That folder was not backed up for many months but well, I wrote that scene a long time ago so... I'm just so happy and grateful and relieved.

Phew.