elementalv

What I really want to know is if anyone has written a genderfuck Supernatural with an always-gay Dean being inexplicably attracted to a Castiel who started out in a female vessel? If not, I think I want to write that.

Title: Getting A Word In Edgewise
Author: elementalv
Characters: Dean & Castiel and a few others
Rating: PG
Spoilers: Nothing specific, though it assumes knowledge of season 5 to date.
Notes: Gen, roughly 2,900 words or so.
Summary: They stumble across God at 4:16 on a Friday afternoon in a park that sits along the edge of Lake St. Clair.

~*~*~
( Getting A Word In Edgewise )

Authors: elementalv and instantramen
Rating: Crack
Summary: It’s the end of the world as they know it
Pairings: Dean/Castiel, Sam/Michael, possibly others (the crack is still flowing)

~*~*~
( To be named )

Title: Finding Vonnegut
Author: elementalv
Rating: PG
Notes: Gen, follows episode 5.2 — Good God, Y’All; 1,325 words.
Summary: Dean will deny it to his dying breath (and has, come to think of it), but the truth is that more than crappy motels even, libraries feel like home to him.

~*~*~
( Finding Vonnegut )

At the moment, I'm reading Greywalker by Kat Richardson. It's urban fantasy, but more important, it's well-done urban fantasy. I'm not even 60 pages into it, and I already like the protagonist. I also like the writing, despite the first-person POV, because Richardson doesn't fall into the trap of having the character give random info dumps about herself.

Richardson maintains a true first-person POV, which means the character isn't really thinking about her physical appearance unless the action calls for it. For instance, we know the character is female at the start, only because her narrative reads, "I groped for my purse..." (a quibble: you're a P.I.; why the hell do you keep your gun in your purse?). Later in that same paragraph, we know she has long hair, but only because the guy she's fighting grabs her long ponytail. We don't even get the character's full name until she introduces herself to someone at the start of chapter 3. This is the way information should be presented in a first-person POV.

In contrast, we have Death's Daughter by Amber Benson, which starts with (the formatting is hers):

My name is Calliope Reaper-Jones, and I think I'm losing my mind.

Calliope goes on to describe her day job, her friends, the way her life works — it reads like a boring blog — instead of letting action tell the tale. Shortly thereafter, she goes into too much detail about the clothing she's about to put on, and while I can buy that to a certain extent as character development, overall, it fails. I, as a reader, don't give a shit what Calliope is wearing, especially with a dragon downstairs (yes, really, the info dump about her wardrobe comes after the realization there's a dragon downstairs). There are other problems with the writing, but the info dumps are my main gripe.

First-person POV is a tricky thing to write. You can't really include a physical description or history of your character unless the story goes there or someone else comments on it. Even if you have another character speaking, the commenting will be imprecise: "I know you want to be in a size 12, but face it: you're at least an 18. So quit bitching and get something that fits you for once." This sort of dialogue is useful in a first-person POV, not only for the description (we know the narrator is overweight) but also for what it tells us about the narrator's personality that we might not otherwise get: she's vain about her appearance and hates the fact that she has to wear larger clothes.

Anyway, this post started out as a recommendation for Greywalker and ended up veering off into personal pet peeves about first-person POV, so I apologize. That said, do give Richardson a shot. I'm only 60 pages into Greywalker, but I'm reasonably certain it will be good to the end. Her writing strikes me the same way Jim Butcher's does, which is as a solid piece of story-telling.

Words cannot express my full love for this remix of Buffy and Twilight. We're talking serious, full-on glomping kind of love.

FYI, I found this video courtesy of the OTW feed.

(crossposted to DW, LJ and IJ)

Oh, Paul!

http://blog.zap2it.com/frominsidethebox/2009/05/video-eastwick-first-look.html

Dude! You’re getting dissed by the readers. Also, what’s with the hair?

Title: Sacrifices
Author: elementalv
Fandom: SGA
Pairing/Characters: John Sheppard, Carson Beckett, Rodney McKay
Rating: PG-13 for language
Disclaimer: Stargate: Atlantis and its characters are the property of MGM.
Prompt: Prompt 1225 — Stargate: Atlantis, John Sheppard. The one good thing his father had ever done for him was cover up his original gender and the surgery. With the Air Force’s policy against transgenders, he never would have gotten to fly without his help.
Summary: John has always been willing to pay the price for his career and to keep his people safe, but he’s just found the one price he’s not sure he can afford.
Author’s Notes: Written for lgbtfest. Huge thanks to sabinelagrande for handling the beta. The story itself is set in the second season, several months after the events of Trinity. 2,645 words.

~*~*~
( Sacrifices )

[is a sheeple]

For those of you who read my fic, thank you. Seriously. I don't care if you lurk and never say a word, though I'm always happy when you do, because comments of any sort are always love. But really, lurking is good, too, and as a life-long introvert, I fully understand why you do so. Please don't ever feel badly if you don't comment because you don't know what to say or don't feel you have anything to say in response to a fic; I've been there, too, and I know what it's like to stare at the screen and go, "Damn it."

Anyway. Thank you again for reading and being interested in what I have to say.

Love, Me.

(crossposted)