You may have seen that I was asking louiselux about the whole process of timed writing on my LJ a day or two ago.
I did see that. (I'm glad you asked it, I was wondering, too!)
I know for my own part, I would have a very difficult time if I didn't allow a fic to "incubate" first. Your thought process for the first one sounds a lot like mine--I wasn't planning to write something as of Wednesday night, but on Thursday an idea popped into my head, and I worked on it (without committing anything to MS Word) off and on Thursday night and part of Friday, and by the time I sat down at the computer, I had the whole skeleton, and complete sentences and bits of paragraphs all ready to put down (good thing, too, 'cause I barely finished in time!).
It might be a bit shady to do it that way, but I'm sure no one would be interested in the two-word fic that would result, otherwise!
I think it's really admirable that you tackled the second one, and wrote it straight out (it was so sweet of you to specifically write something for some friends!) I'm gonna leave a comment there later tonight, anyway--but since you asked for concrit, I thought I'd mention that the second one definitely felt "rougher" to me. I don't necessarily think it's Yaone (I thought you captured her character beautifully)--but I found the fic a bit hard to read because the sentences and ideas were so "clipped". Nothing terribly *wrong* there, just a lack of a chance to polish, I think. For example:
"But ... it continued. There was negotiation. He paid the guards. They went off, no doubt trying to figure how to square this with their king, He took her to an inn in the next village, and paid for separate rooms, and told her to rest in hers. She tried to thank him."
There are just so many different ideas all jammed together in the same paragraph, with transitions so quick, a reader finds their eyes moving faster than the mind can keep up. With editing one could break it up and make the transitions from bartering to the guards leaving, to arriving in the inn, to proffering thanks--but in a timed challenge there's just no time. Part of the challenge, I guess! But I'm still very impressed that you managed to write something so complete going into it "cold". ^_^
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branchandroot
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Date: 2008-03-24 02:23 am (UTC)I did see that. (I'm glad you asked it, I was wondering, too!)
I know for my own part, I would have a very difficult time if I didn't allow a fic to "incubate" first. Your thought process for the first one sounds a lot like mine--I wasn't planning to write something as of Wednesday night, but on Thursday an idea popped into my head, and I worked on it (without committing anything to MS Word) off and on Thursday night and part of Friday, and by the time I sat down at the computer, I had the whole skeleton, and complete sentences and bits of paragraphs all ready to put down (good thing, too, 'cause I barely finished in time!).
It might be a bit shady to do it that way, but I'm sure no one would be interested in the two-word fic that would result, otherwise!
I think it's really admirable that you tackled the second one, and wrote it straight out (it was so sweet of you to specifically write something for some friends!) I'm gonna leave a comment there later tonight, anyway--but since you asked for concrit, I thought I'd mention that the second one definitely felt "rougher" to me. I don't necessarily think it's Yaone (I thought you captured her character beautifully)--but I found the fic a bit hard to read because the sentences and ideas were so "clipped". Nothing terribly *wrong* there, just a lack of a chance to polish, I think. For example:
"But ... it continued. There was negotiation. He paid the guards. They went off, no doubt trying to figure how to square this with their king, He took her to an inn in the next village, and paid for separate rooms, and told her to rest in hers. She tried to thank him."
There are just so many different ideas all jammed together in the same paragraph, with transitions so quick, a reader finds their eyes moving faster than the mind can keep up. With editing one could break it up and make the transitions from bartering to the guards leaving, to arriving in the inn, to proffering thanks--but in a timed challenge there's just no time. Part of the challenge, I guess! But I'm still very impressed that you managed to write something so complete going into it "cold". ^_^