Just a Little Update

Okay, so I said that I went on vacation this past weekend. So, my goal was to write up to chapter 20 of MoaG. It was an unrealistic goal, but if I don't think big like that then it gets boring. I did get up to chapter 18 though. I just got dragged down because chapter 13 was so flipping hard to write. So hard. It was aggrivating the heck out of me.

Such a delicate balance.

After chapter 13 was sent off to Nightfaux and Kaytala for examination, I could work on other stuff while they tried to help me figure out how to fix that horrid piece of pure trash. I didn't think I was ever going to feel happy about the way that chapter was going to play out, but in the end - I was pretty happy.

But seriously, once I didn't have to think about chapter 13 - I just flew. It was incredible. I just sat down and pounded out the story because I knew exactly what I wanted for chapters 14 and 15. They were a snap to write. Chapter 16 and 17 turned out to be a little more complicated, but still good. I didn't have many notes for chapter 16, so I had to B.S. it. But anyone who knows me knows that I'm a championship B.S. artist, so that worked out well. I'm glad that I didn't postpone it so that I could try to generate more ideas - the way it played out when I improvised was quite good. I relied on my notes for Chapter 17 very heavily for that chapter. I would have just stared at my computer screen blankly if I hadn't had notes. They saved me. I was seriously sitting there going, "Okay? Now what's supposed to happen?" I need to go over those two chapters once more and then I can pass them off onto Kaytala. That makes me four chapters ahead of the game. Wicked eh? Maybe if I keep this up I can finish the whole book in three weeks and start working on my next project. That's wishful thinking for you. Not even I am that good. I get drained just like everyone else.

But I hate myself when I get drained. It's not that I can't come up with ideas for writing, but I also can't come up with ideas for life. Every part of my life suffers when I finally deflate.

Anyway, chapter 18 ... I'm not quite finished it yet. It's one of those chapters that everyone has been waiting for (chapter 17 is one of those chapters too), cause I'm coming to the end. Actually, everyone has been talking about chapter 18 on the forum and stuff (even though they don't know it) and I feel a little pressure to make it a little more awesome than the regular. But it doesn't seem awesome to me. I've known what would happen in this chapter for some time, so I guess I'll just have to make the plot carry itself and I'll go take a nap.

An English Moment

Okay, so I am a freaking brat. This is something that is not always true about me, but when it comes to my writing - I am a freaking brat. Also, just as a side note: one time I was talking to my boss at work about how I was jealous of a certain professional writer that I know, and I told her that I never get jealous over other things besides writing. I never get jealous if a girl is prettier than me (I have a Scarlett O'hara mentality, which means that I think I can charm the pants off someone without having to be pretty - I can convince anyone I'm a darling if I want to with my personality rather than having to rely upon my appearance), and I never get jealous over other girl's boyfriends (this only counts for when I was still in the dating game - I've been out of it for some time), and I am NEVER jealous over money - only writing. This is the way I am. I don't care enough about all those things to get ripping mad over them. I just don't care about them, but writing is something that I care a lot about and it makes me behave unreasonably. So, when I say that I am a freaking brat - I mean it.

One of the symptoms that I am a brat is that I will only take harsh criticism from people who have proven that they're better than me. If someone doesn't write better than me then (depending on their comments, which are sometimes meaningful) I am more than likely to file it under 'g' for 'garbage' in my brain. This is because I'm a giant baby when it comes to criticism and my writing career is taking me to a place where everyone wants a piece of me and people like to pull me in different directions. So, in order to maintain my sanity and in order to maintain my vision of the kind of writer I want to be - I must be choosy about who I take hardcore advice from.

So, this past weekend, I was on a little vacation. I was visiting the English teacher in my life. Oddly enough, he never taught me an English class, and I am always sorry that I couldn't have been in his class. It was impossible at the time, but since I know him personally, I get to lay all my writing troubles at his feet and listen to his advice. But since I get the impression that he's not very interested in talking shop with me, I have to keep my comments and questions brief, so these are always rare moments. Once again I feel the bitterness of not being able to find a mentor that will hold my hand periodically as I proceed along my path to being an exciting writer. I've been cranky about this fact since I was thirteen and I have almost started to accept that I am never going to find that person. So, I don't have that kind of relationship with the English teacher in my life. Instead, I can only ask his opinion a couple of times a year.

So, I told him my troubles and he told me the following, which I will try to quote as accurately as possible (probably impossible).

"It's exactly like when you take your car to a mechanic and he does a wonderful job fixing your car, but when you get home you get out of the driver's seat you see that he accidentally dropped a spot of grease on the seat. You're wearing a new suit and he's totally ruined it because of his carelessness. He's still an excellent mechanic, but because he didn't take care for the details he becomes a terrible tradesman. People like details."

The interpretation of this story - I am the mechanic. I looked at him and I almost wanted to cry or slide onto the carpet and put my head on his knee because I needed comforting. He saw straight through me. He saw me as the mechanic, which I clearly am. This is the story of my life. If I make an error - it's usually the little things instead of the big ones. I'm the type that doesn't mop the baseboards. And yeah, it would make me uncomfortable if someone noticed dust there. But when kids review on fanfiction.net, they usually don't point out how many mistakes I make. The true reason why - they don't know what's correct so they can't call me on it.

I didn't cry myself to sleep, but the older I get the more I realize that I need to go back to college for this. Otherwise, I can never compete with those who really know their stuff. This really hurts me since I can't do that. I'm not even sure I want to be the kind of writer who caters to publishing companies. When I read the criteria for manuscripts, I usually cringe. I don't want to write what they want to publish.

The truth of it is - I am not hardcore enough to write what will sell without paying attention to what I want. I can't write anything I'm not passionate about, so I can't write for them. I am going to be an online writer forever and I have to decide right now if that's good enough for me.

Hmmm ... I really am lazy.

Slump

Okay, so anyone who's been reading my blog or anyone who knows me personally, know I've been in a slump for the past little while. I think it started about three weeks ago. I've been so bummed about writing and feedback and blahhhhhhh........

Long story short - I've been really bummed.

Over the past few days, I really got my second wind. I just finished writing chapter 15 of 'Mark of a Goddess'. Can you believe that? I almost can't. I can't believe I was able to scrape up any inspiration at all. I think there's only one reason why I've wanted to continue. Once I started writing chapter 13, I started to get excited about the story again. I've been dying to write this plot arch and working on it was really fun.

I've also been thinking really hard about what I want to do with myself once 'Mark of a Goddess' is finished. I've been wondering what I should do next. I have two ideas for novels that I haven't completed to my satisfaction. One is called 'Ghost Mist'. I think everyone knows about this because I've been trying to promote it. It's original fiction. The second one is called 'Half the Moon'. Both of these ideas are old ideas of mine and they've been stewing in my head for a long time - both of them. I had been thinking that I'd do 'Ghost Mist', but after quite a few long conversations with a hardcore fantasy reader, I think maybe I shouldn't. 'Half the Moon' is sci-fi. I think both of these are amazing stories, but I know that I won't be able to scrape up half the readership that my Escaflowne stuff has been able to generate. I find this so depressing, especially when original fiction is SO much harder to write. No seriously - anyone who has any illusions about this - abandon them NOW. Fanfiction is WAY easier. Even just the help of giving you the appearances of the characters is LOADS of HELP. That sparks your imagination. If you have to invent the characters yourself than you're screwed.

Welp, in order to answer this question, I'm going to go post a poll on 'Wild Moon Swings' just to see which story would be more popular. Both of them are fairly advanced ideas, so I could do either one.

I'm on my way!

Action Romance

Okay, so today I thought I'd talk about the weirdest realization about my writing. I have this problem when I write. I write crappy romance and good action. Why is this? I don't even like action as a genre when I read. I have only read a couple books in my whole life that could be classified as 'action'. The genre bores me to death, so why am I so good at writing it when I don't enjoy reading it? Then there's the problem with romance. I love romance. That's usually my favourite part of anything, so why do I suck so much at writing it. I have thought about this long and hard and I think I've finally figured out why this is.

When I write a romance scene I cannot write one of the following situations:

1. Something I have experienced myself.
2. Something I have read.
3. Something that I think of as corny. It's okay to be a little corny, but I think it's a fine line and I'd rather not read something I wrote that makes me want to gag.
4. Something skanky. This is so bleeding hard, it's ridiculous. No - seriously. Since I like to write things that are a closer reflection of true human nature - this is near impossible. People do stuff ... but I don't like to describe it. This is a trap that I have to work so hard to avoid.

But when it comes to action - I am so inexperienced that I describe everything - which makes it better than the romance I write. I leave out the sensual (anytime any author uses this word in anything they write - I seriously laugh out loud. I cannot take this word seriously - it makes me laugh at the poor loser who wrote it and deminishes my opinion of anyone who uses this word. It just strikes me as too ridiculous), exotic details because I think everyone is well acquainted with what it's like to have some guy ... something or other.

When I write action, I just write what I imagine it would be like and I get far more into it. Which is the whole reason I write action better.

So, I think I'd probably write better romance if I hadn't drowned myself in romance novels/movies/poetry.

How weird is that? My inexperience is actually an aid.

The Difference in Archives

Okay, so now that I've been working on fanstory.com and writing.com a little more I can finally flesh out my response to the communities.

I'm not sure what the average age is on ff.net but I have gotten the impression that there probably aren't many people there over the age of 25. However, I also wonder if people lie on their profile and say they're young when they're not. I was looking at one profile for someone who wrote a story that could only be described as a bodice-ripper. She said she was 15, but I somehow doubt it. I know that I couldn't write like that when I was 15, but then there is the possibility that a) she read a lot of bodice-rippers herself so it wasn't difficult to try to immitate one, or b) it had been five years since she updated her profile, or c) was involved with screwing around and evaluating it at age 15, or d) my first thought - that she was lying about her age.

Anyway, if the oldest writers are on ff.net are 25, then I haven't got long to live there before I'll be too old to participate anymore. Well, honestly, I don't think anyone is too old, but if I stay on after 'Mark of a Goddess' it'll be because of a decision to stay where it's safe instead of trodding the wastelands that are other archives. OR - it'll be because I want to goof around and write fanfiction for amusement. I can tell myself whatever I want. Now, I'm going to tell y'all how the other archives work and why. I know - this is going to be long and painful. I'll do alphabetical order just for your amusement.

Fanfiction.net

Fanfiction.net doesn't allow scripts, or original fiction, but there's very little else that it doesn't allow when it comes to stories. There's not a lot of criticism, because if the story isn't good than there would be no reason to read it. So, there is no incentive to review except to be nice. People only review when they want to. Also, fanfiction has the added bonus of being something that a reader is already familiar with, so just by the nature of the fiction that is posted there - you already have an audience depending on which fandom you pitch to. Generally, the audience is young, so you can pitch things to a funner crowd and they'll accept it (AKA - blanket scenarios). Fanfiction.net also offers a pleasant layout that is easy to navigate and the screen isn't full of a lot of extra ads and crap. It has tons of functions and the very best part - IT'S FREE!

Fanstory.com

I probably said this before, a reading account on Fanstory is free and a writing account costs. So, I bought a two year membership, and I still can't decide if it's worth it. Fanstory has a fairly elaborate set up. Here's the deal. You post a story, poem, chapter, and it can go into one of two modes - workshop and published release. When it's in the workshop mode, you can still work on it and people can still review it. When it's in the workshop mode your reviews don't count towards your author ranking. When you move it into the published release section and your item (poem, story, chapter) will stay in a random generator that offers extra writing dollars for reviewers until it gets three reviews. Once it gets three reviews it goes back to your profile - where it may never be seen again. Naturally, these rankings count towards your ranking. So, if you want your story to be seen by the public again you must put a 'certificate' on it that offers readers member money for reading your story. You earn member money by reading other people's stories or by purchasing them with real money. Once your item has 15 reviews - it goes in a 'recognized' area which is very much like what the regular listings look like on ff.net. I both think this is a great and crappy system. It's crappy because someone could easily read their can off and get so many certificates on one item so that it would easily get 15 reviews (and be a sucky piece of writing). And a great system because it forces people to review (Yeah, I'm bitter about people who read and don't review).

After looking around there a bit, I'd say the average person at fanstory is between the ages of 35 and 55 - which is a MUCH different audience than I'm used to catering to. That's why I think I may have made a mistake. I have never even thought about pitching my stuff to a group older than me.

The last thing I want to say about this site, and I've said it before - searching through it to find something good to read is like traversing the highway to hell - you're never going to find what you're looking for.

Oh, and one more thing about fanstory - YOU CANNOT DELETE YOUR STORIES.

Fictionpress.com

Fictionpress is a lot like fanfiction, except not as popular. Does anyone read stuff there? I think someone must. I know I read fantasy poetry there, but other than that I haven't read much. Marketing original fiction when there is no incentive for reviewers is really hard. I've already this in great detail in another post, so I think I'll leave this topic, but with that said - it's still FREE!

Mediaminer.org

Mediaminer allows original fiction as well as fanfiction. It's got a more complicated review system so that stories can receive rankings, but there aren't many readers there. Most things don't have any reviews at all. The site isn't as pretty as ff.net or fictionpress, but it's still clearly more organized than fanstory - and it probably has as many people hanging out on it. Anyway - it's FREE as well, and offers no reader incentives. And as memory serves - it also allows dirtier stuff than ff.net and fictionpress - like mature stuff.

Writing.com

This place is like a combination between Mediaminer and Fanstory, but with a whole other twist that I honestly don't completely understand - like they conduct polls there for business. Anyway, here's how it works for the average little monkey who has no money. With a free account on writing.com, you are allowed to have five 'items' up at once (poems, short stories, chapters). These guys have a member point system as well. You can offer members points for reading your work (minimum 100 points), and when you read and review something you like, you can also send some of your member points to them as a present. With a Basic account, you can upload 25 items and with an Upgraded account you can upload 250. I have an Upgraded account for three months - it was a present from someone I don't know. But I don't know if it's going to help me. Even with the reward system it seems that the reviews are as sparce as they are on Mediaminer. It's hardly worth the trouble to upload. Not only that, but I wish this account had come when I was ready for 'Ghost Mist' instead of wrapping up 'Mark of a Goddess' - bad timing, eh? I don't really want to sport my old stuff. But I like the atmosphere at writing.com better than at fanstory. It seemed warm and friendly. But obviously, if you want to post a novel, a free account just won't cut it.

Oh yeah, and I forgot to say one more thing about fanstory. When you receive a review, there's a window that allows you to send the person who reviewed a message. In this message to the reviewer you may only ask for clarification on what the person said and/or thank them. You may not defend your story if they were harsh - that's against the rules. Fun eh? That place makes me want to die.

Basically, if you want your work read there are only two places to go - fanstory and fanfiction. One's easy and the other's heavy. But, it's weird, because I always wanted to write for teenagers - because they're full of hopes and dreams and angst. Adults are about as much fun as paying child support.

I think I'm going to be on fanfiction.net forever.

Five Kinds of Screw-ups

So, today I thought I'd list five different kinds of screw-ups that a person can make while writing.

Screw-up Number One - Typos

This is a misspelled word or a grammatical error. These are so frequent that online archives will chew you out for not at least attempting to do this one right. So, you can report abuse on ff.net if someone really doesn't do this well and they'll probably get their stuff removed for playing poorly. Anyway, this is stuff on the small word or sentence level.

This is the biggest reason I'm a lazy author. Meaning, that I try to do this one well, but frankly, if I don't catch the mistake and my beta reader, Kaytala, doesn't catch it than I probably don't care. I'm not nit picky and the longer my chapters get (by demand) than the more room for error there is. Looking for these sorts of mistakes bores me, and not only that, but after I have read a chapter a certain number of times - the mistake starts to look right. There are arguments that I could probably use another beta reader besides Kaytala in order to catch any and all teensy mistakes that may or may not occur in my writing. Blah! Even thinking about this bores me as well. I have had more than one person beta read chapters before - far in the distant past - and even thinking about wading through two people's notes on the chapter sounds ... unpleasant. Don't get me wrong though - I love Kaytala and her comments. She's a gem! But without the reassurance that the second beta reader would be EXACTLY like her I'd rather not participate.

However, right now I have a couple people beta reading chapters for DM. If one of them turns out to impress me than maybe I'll think about it.

Screw-up Number 2 - Order of Events

When I was a little munchkin I remember learning how to write instructions for things in the form of a paragraph in language arts class. So, this is when someone screws up on the order of events. This is to describe an error in the order of sentences - once again on a pretty small scale. So this is errors in paragraphs. Basically, to describe this more accurately, this is when someone arranges their sentences in an order that disrupts the logic of the reader.

I remember that I used to have a lot of trouble with this when I was in my teens and writing on loose-leaf paper instead of on a computer. I'd write something and then I would be too lazy to rearrange the order of events so that the paragraph would make more sense. There wasn't room and often I didn't have enough paper. But since the advance of 'point and click' this has become a much smaller problem.

Also, since my adult life I have written a multitude of procedures manuals and oddly enough - this has helped me tame this problem. The thing is when I write a procedures manual, I write it so clearly and so thoroughly (explaining what is done and why so completely) that ANYONE off the street should be able to come in and do the job the manual was written for without screwing everything up or setting the building on fire. Needless to say - updating these things used to make me want to die, but if I was gone, I always left plenty of information so my boss or replacement weren't left in the dark about what needed to be done.

Apparently, sometimes I still make this mistake - and it really pisses me off since I've come so far with it.

Screw-up Number 3 - Scenario

This is a screw-up on a larger scale. This is bigger than sentences or paragraphs - this is a screw-up the size of a chapter. This is when a scenario (or subplot) of a story has a bad premise. This usually occurs when the author misreads a character and designs a plot around circumstances that wouldn't occur because of a character's personality. This also can occur when there is a gigantic break in the story where a bunch of time has passed, and when the author picks it up again - the heart and soul of the story is gone. This screw-up has the ability to pour tomato juice down your brand new white dress (ruin the rest of the story), but not necessarily.

I think my biggest example of this was a certain chapter in 'Mystic Wings' called 'Heart of the Dragon'. This is the chapter where Van is sitting by the pool talking to himself. Man alive! That was a majorly unpopular chapter. There were a few people who liked Van and lot of really vocal ones who didn't. There were lots of people who didn't like certain things he said, or the way he said them, or - the list goes on. Personally, I like Van in that chapter. Maybe it's not my favourite chapter to highlight him, but I like that he's uncertain and feeling lost. So, I wouldn't change it - no matter how many people complained. At best, I think it was an accurate depiction of what girls that age want in a man - weakness is not acceptable. At worst - I write crappy romance and need some more practice. The thing about that is that when I write romance I can't write:

• Something I've read in someone else's book;
• Something I've experienced myself; or
• Something skanky.

That leaves precious little.

Screw-up Number Four - Mythology

This is when you are making up your own world, your own power system, your own mythology and to screw it up is when you haven't got your facts straight. This is sad, because you made them up yourself.

Yep - I do this sometimes. There are a couple screw-ups in my Escaflowne series and I know where they are. I know there are at least two - maybe more. DON'T LOOK FOR THEM! As far as I'm concerned this kind of screw-up is permitted in fanfiction, because you can't market fanfiction or sell it. To go fix these two mistakes would be so much work that even thinking about it makes me want to cry. I'm not going to fix them, and I'm not particularly bothered that they are there - it doesn't ruin the story or the plot. It's just my own private screw-up. However, I have to say that this is not okay in original fiction. If I found errors like this in something I could sell - I would be really disturbed - really disturbed. But for fanfiction -- it's hardly worth the effort. If anyone noticed - goodie for them.

Screw-up Number Five - Overall Plot

This is the biggest screw-up anyone can possibly make and yet it's amazing how often this one happens. This happens the most often when authors neglect their stories and go do something else for months on end. This also happens when authors don't have storyboards and have no direction for a piece. They end up getting dictated to by tiny details they threw in during the first chapters when they had the premise and introduction all worked out. In the end, they are not in control of their story and end up getting pushed around by it instead of reining it in - if they finish it at all.

This happens all over the place on ff.net. It's probably the most common problem, but this is the area where I truly shine. The only piece that I can say had this problem was a Slayers novella I wrote called 'Shadow Magic: Xellos and Filia'. I wrote nine chapters and planned on cutting it off, but it was more popular than anything else I'd ever written on ff.net at the time, so I continued it for a few more chapters, but I HATED IT! I only did it cause it was popular. I only posted it on ff.net because it was popular enough on my website to warrant it. I got requests from fans for me to post it. BUT I HATE THAT STORY! It was SO weak, and honestly pathetic. The Slayers audience isn't as big as the Escaflowne audience, so it has a lot fewer reviews than my Escaflowne stuff, but for the Slayers section - it did very well.

So, just to finish off I'd like to say one thing - I usually know when I screw-up, thanks.

Like a Ghost

So, I said the other day that I was eaten alive on fanstory. Yeah - that's what happened. So, this is my post about the after affects of having my head chewed off.

I still feel like crap.

This time it feels like the wound goes so deep that it doesn't seem like it'll mend very easily. It's not just that, but it's other things too. In the end it amounts to one thing - I'm discouraged.

I've had some really good encouragement on my stories, but when I get chewed into, no one ever comes to my defence. I always have to fight for myself ... and that really hurts me. It's like, where are all those people who thought my story was great? They're no where to be seen.

Lately, I have been thinking about Tolkien a good deal. Maybe because I was power-watching Lord of the Rings or maybe because his name just keeps coming up. For me, he's an important person, because I have no intention of reading his books because I don't admire his writing style, and yet I still admire his imagination and elements of his ideal. He did not get Lord of the Rings published until he was 62 and even then he had serious doubts about whether or not it would be successful. Let me explain my idea about him more thoroughly.

You see, I had the super extended version of The Two Towers and so I was watching the segment about how the screenplay was pulled from the books. In the commentary, one of the writers who worked on it was explaining why they did something different with the character of Faramier (please forgive me if the spelling is wrong - I'm too lazy to look it up). She said that in the book, Faramier didn't want the ring and was an all round decent chap who offered Frodo and Sam tea, and how devestating to the plot that was. She said that Tolkien had spent all this time working to convince everyone that the ring was a dangerous item that could corrupt anyone and because Faramier did not want it than that essentially stripped the ring of all power. So, I was sitting there thinking about this. Tolkien is really legendary, and yet there are people who still rip him up. And you know what - that author was completely right about the change in Faramier's character. The thing is ... Tolkien wrote the way he wanted to.

Tolkien's way of story telling isn't exactly conventional - something like what he wrote would probably get eaten alive by a publishing company now. Each book would probably been trimmed by a hundred pages or more - each.

On the other hand, he has been able to inspire generations and spark the imagination of millions - telling the story exactly the way he wanted to. Is that not writing at it's best?

In my opinion - this is the drawback when there is only one person working on a story - it's going to be imperfect (like Faramier). There's only one perspective (the lonely author's), so it's not going to be perfect. One perspective alone is NOT PERFECT. Thus to attain perfection (not just from a literary standpoint, but also from a marketing standpoint), there needs to be several people working on it. This has been a bridge I have had to cross on more than one occasion - especially about creative consulting. It has come to my attention that I wouldn't work well with a partner. Either I would be a burden around their neck or they would be a burden around mine. There would be no happy ending and the entire creative process would turn into hell for me and them. I work best alone, and it's taken me a long time to learn this.

So, I am still completely deflated. I'm begining to understand that I am two things as an author.
Number One - I'm lazy.
Number Two - I don't care.
I just want to have fun telling my stories. I get better as I go as I make more and more people happy with my work, and if I don't get any better, I at least want to have a good time. But even though I've come to this grand conclusion - I still feel discouraged.

Eaten Alive

Okay, so I uploaded the first chapter of 'Dragon's Moon' on fanstory.com and on writing.com. The pickings are pretty slim, but one person read the first chapter on fanstory. That was weird. Actually, I went and checked out his profile and it was a MAN old enough to be my FATHER. Needless to say, he ripped me a new one. No - seriously! This was the likes of which has probably never even been SEEN on fanfiction.net. This was different - he ripped apart every bit of my story - every bit.

At first I was really insulted. I didn't think it was that bad, so I went to his profile to find out why he was such a jerk, and he turned out to be a MAN old enough to be my FATHER! In my opinion, it's a miracle he made it through the chapter at all. If I were him I definitely would have quit.

The major things that he got after me for were that Hitomi is not really introduced as a character and he thought the few paragraphs about Marlene should be pitched entirely - he had no idea why I included it at all. He also thought that the story was really setting heavy.

I wrote him back and told him that fanfiction was not the same as general fiction - at all. That most of my readers are really familiar with the characters and if I were to go on a descriptive tirade about Hitomi's characters - my readers would bolt. Also, that Marlene is not a well established character in the series, and if I don't take the chance to tell a little about her personality now - the chance will never come again. I also told him that the setting is key in this case because it's different than the regular Escaflowne one.

He didn't write me back.

Oddly enough, I had only had to deal with this level of criticism a few times in my adult life and it was weird how I reacted this time. I sorta flaked out.

The first time - I had no respect for the person who decided to subject me to their criticism, so I threw their comments out the window once I got wind of what they were doing. The second person's comments I took to heart. They were a respected author on fanfiction.net, so I really took her words to heart. It was painful, but I got better because it.

The thing is with this release of the first chapter of DM - I'm not following my own advice here. I hate it when people ask me to check out their work when it's old. I wrote the first chapter of DM when I was 17 and I've only done revamps on it since. So, it's too old to try to learn from anymore. It's time to let it die and move onto something else. But that seems hard since I'm still working on MoaG. Blahhh....

I'm still going to release it, but I'm not doing any revamps on it after the first 20 chapters are beta read. I'm just going to post it and see what happens. And if I get eaten alive again - so be it.