![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
So. Here's a truth: I don't like writing about me.
I never really have. Even as a kid writing blatant self-insert fanfic—projecting every scrap of youthful angst onto characters I wanted to be—I only ever wrote fiction. I kept to the pretext of writing stories and nonexistent events. I never successfully kept a journal; I think I gave up on anything like a diary somewhere around sixth grade.
No matter how many issues I hash out through fictional characters, knowingly or otherwise, the hardest stories for me to write are the ones that hit close to home. The sweet but overwhelming family in "Simple After All" tracks so near to my own that drafting the story was surreal as hell. I'm working on a book now in which a character picks up their violin and discovers the joy/difficulty of playing again after years away.
And then there's Ilsa Vance, my asexual space detective who has a falling out with a close friend in "Open Skies". She's by far the most difficult character arc I've ever written—not least because I was determined to give her the support and acknowledgment I never received from the friend who said the same hurtful things to me.
This habit isn't likely to change. Projecting onto fictional characters has its merits. Even better, the blatant escapism and entertainment of my less personal stories is satisfying in ways I've never really known how to express. (My family, bless them, has supported me at every turn, despite my inability to articulate why I sometimes bury myself in fiction for days or weeks at a time.)
But. Maybe it would do me good to branch out a little. Take a more direct approach now and then. Try and shake off the fierce but irrational voice in my head insisting The Real Me is too boring to waste words on, and instead put myself out there a little more.
That's what this is. No promises, but I'm going to do my best. And hey, if you're reading this and there's anything you'd like to know, go ahead and ask. I may not possess a whole lot of insights or life-hacks, but what I've got I'm happy to share.
Cheers.
I never really have. Even as a kid writing blatant self-insert fanfic—projecting every scrap of youthful angst onto characters I wanted to be—I only ever wrote fiction. I kept to the pretext of writing stories and nonexistent events. I never successfully kept a journal; I think I gave up on anything like a diary somewhere around sixth grade.
No matter how many issues I hash out through fictional characters, knowingly or otherwise, the hardest stories for me to write are the ones that hit close to home. The sweet but overwhelming family in "Simple After All" tracks so near to my own that drafting the story was surreal as hell. I'm working on a book now in which a character picks up their violin and discovers the joy/difficulty of playing again after years away.
And then there's Ilsa Vance, my asexual space detective who has a falling out with a close friend in "Open Skies". She's by far the most difficult character arc I've ever written—not least because I was determined to give her the support and acknowledgment I never received from the friend who said the same hurtful things to me.
This habit isn't likely to change. Projecting onto fictional characters has its merits. Even better, the blatant escapism and entertainment of my less personal stories is satisfying in ways I've never really known how to express. (My family, bless them, has supported me at every turn, despite my inability to articulate why I sometimes bury myself in fiction for days or weeks at a time.)
But. Maybe it would do me good to branch out a little. Take a more direct approach now and then. Try and shake off the fierce but irrational voice in my head insisting The Real Me is too boring to waste words on, and instead put myself out there a little more.
That's what this is. No promises, but I'm going to do my best. And hey, if you're reading this and there's anything you'd like to know, go ahead and ask. I may not possess a whole lot of insights or life-hacks, but what I've got I'm happy to share.
Cheers.
Tags:
