whiteaster88

Wow, so much has happened since I last posted...I moved to a new city, a loved one got cancer, I've had my own health challenges.  I really need to get back to writing again, but I need things to settle down in my mind from the body blows my family has taken lately.  I continue to read, though, and it has been a fine distraction.  

Just edited this entry because I noticed my last one was exactly one month ago.  I'm getting better at writing in this!

I have been forced to revise my self-imposed ban on WIPs, because I have been reading some good ones lately and I find I can enjoy being in the moment with these stories.  I still wish every story not completed would be, but that is a silly wish!  Have discovered some new writers and look forward to trying out some new genres.

I'm really falling behind on real-life reading, so I need to get on that.  I have a long train trip coming up in December, so that will give me a chance to catch up.  I will be spending some time in New Orleans over Christmas, so I should revisit Anne Rice.  My favorite of her books remains Witching Hour-the sequels are not in the same league, unfortunately.

My obsessive-compulsive tendencies truly come to the fore when I get interested in something I read.  I remember reading The Sunne in Splendour in the early 1990s, and suddenly I was ordering obscure books through my public library (this was before Amazon and the Internet) to learn every tidbit I could find about the Wars of the Roses.  I did the same thing with the French Revolution after reading an historical novel set in that period when I was a teenager.  I could mention my preoccupations with Star Trek, Jane Austen novels, Harry Potter, Anya Seton books, but why?  It has become clear that there are a hell of a lot of people out there just like me.  Strangely, I only see these people online--my immediate circle of friends and family do not appear to get all worked up about Mr. Darcy's dive into the pond, nor do they envision reading HP fanfiction as an excellent way to spend a lazy evening.  I do have one friend who adores Alan Rickman, but otherwise my friends and family think I'm rather strange.  I am very handy at trivia games, though...

Back to the obsession thing.  As my interest in HP fanfiction has refused to wane, I am working my way through approximately three to four thousand stories.  I have them organized by bookmarks on my browser, grouped by first letter of the title, and randomly select a story based on the story summary or the pairing.  After I have read the story, it gets deleted from bookmarks and goes into an Excel file, where the story is sorted by my rating (Best, Excellent, Good, Read, etc.) and I make comments as necessary.  I plan on importing the Excel file into a database, but that will remain a pending project for now.

Not sure how I got on this topic.  I think it was because I just finished a wonderful three part series by Razzberry, in which the final story was not completely uploaded.  I have little hope of ever reading the last twenty chapters, as Razzberry apparently does not want to be in the fandom anymore  My little OCD mind cannot fathom this kind of authorial neglect.  One writes thousands of words (and it really is a well-written series), then fails to completely upload the story.  Why???  I knew when I started the series that I would face this disappointment, but for some reason I guess I thought the story would miraculously turn up via the Wayback Machine.  No dice.  I checked the comments on the story, and no one had reviewed it since 2006, so I guess everyone has become resigned to never knowing how the story will turn out.  I will resign myself as well, and reinforce myself against the temptation to read works-in-progress...it never ends well.

I reorganized my bookmark files, transferring all of the "Read" stories into Excel.  I need to develop an online database for my skating website, so I think I will do a test run with the stories.  So much easier to have all the data in the spreadsheet first, at least for me.

Ah, there is such freedom in knowing I can write whatever I want here, but I somehow never think about writing until the middle of the night...I'm still recovering from the flu, so I guess I should trot off to bed.  Such a dramatic month of RL, but Januarys usually are for me.  I always get sick, there's the drama of US Nationals (thank god I wasn't scheduled to go this year, would have lost a ton of money...special note to get a flu shot before next year in Boston!)  Add in some unusual family twists and turns and it has been an interesting couple of weeks...

Back to the bookmarks--I seem to have over 4,000 stories linked and wanting to be read.  All but about twenty of them feature SS/anyone.  I'm definitely noticing a trend as far as ratings go, in that SS/HP stories have usually been rated more highly in my reviews than the other ships.  I also have noticed that while a I don't need a referral to try out SS/HP, I do tend to avoid SS/DM unless it is highly recommended.  Fanon Draco can be a cool character, but canon Draco is unpleasant and I can't wrap my head around those two having a relationship.  Definitely can see HP/DM, but that is a ship that I have no interest in reading.  I hope to run into some more Snape/Kingsley, doesn't seem to be a lot of that.  

I've been reading a lot of het lately, mainly because of my anal need to sort out a spreadsheet page where I had recorded a bunch of early stories and hadn't rated them.  When I first started reading HP fanfic, I started with SS/HG.  Some really nice stories there, and as I prefer Hermione to be a single professional at least five years removed from Hogwarts, I manage to avoid the squicky stuff.  It's been fun going back and rating these stories, now that I have a (shall we say) more discriminating palate?  Some stories I remember loving 2 years ago I hate now, and vice versa.

Night.

Well, I certainly haven't been doing much here on Live Journal!  Nearly the end of the year, and I haven't written anything since September 1.  Real life just keeps on being real, fortunately and unfortunately.  Home remodel, family issues, change of focus in my work, and myriad other things just get in the way of trying to write.  I will hopefully get inspired to write soon...

In the meantime, I have been reading a lot of FF, and am preparing a database of the ones I like.  So many great stories, so little time.  It would help to remember what I have and have not read, so I'm going to get this all put together in a handy-dandy db to keep track.  Fun!

A strange thing happened to me last summer.  I became an admirer of Harry Potter fan fiction.  

I think a lot of fans begin the way I did.  I had read all the HP books over the years as they were published, but had only seen a few of the movies.  I don't care to go to movies that much, mainly because I can't stand the sound of crunching and coughing.  The first Deathly Hallows came and went and I barely noticed.  For some reason, though, I really wanted to make an event of the final movie, so I re-read all of the books, saw all the movies (including DH Part One), and dragged my husband along to see Part Two in 3D at our nearby IMAX.


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