2019: Writing

I saw someone on tumblr do a similar post and monkey see, monkey do. So here's what I've written this year!

According to AO3, where pretty much all my stuff has gone, I've written 26693 words. I'm trying to think of what isn't included in that, but there's not too much. Most of what isn't posted on AO3 or isn't posted on that account is just, terrible porn. Anyway.

Original work I'll talk about first! Most of it is Ladiesbingo. Or at least, the stories are the ones I wrote for Ladiesbingo. You can find them in my ladiesbingo tag here on dreamwidth, or in this work on AO3. The stories are all around 1k or under and they cover topics from ghosts to "what if Orpheus/Eurydice but modern and friendship", zombie horse girl communism, and gentle love magic. My goal for a while now has been to get back to writing original stuff so I'm glad I took a shot at it this year.

Also kind of original was The Princess and the Pea-Curse, a gay 'n magic-ier take on the Princess and the Pea for the fairy tale exchange. I like it!

In terms of porn, I set up a pseud for some Tiger's Curse nonsense. I'll quarantine any other absolute nonsense that involves dicks on it in the future. I really am proud of the story, no matter how... oh boy... it is in a lot of ways. The idea itched at me until I wrote it and now the idea has left me alone. Fuck yeah. You can read it here if you like, but it's extremely lore heavy and sappy so ymmv. 2356 words though!

The other porn is a noir parody, two stories so far. Together they clock in at 1322 words which really. Is too many. Fucking save me. Save me from the fucking. And no, I won't post links or anything. You'll have to write your own. 

And huh, I only wrote for two fandoms this year! The Adventure Zone: Amnesty, and Star Trek. Though I guess I did write for Star Trek: Discovery and also Star Trek: Deep Space Nine.

Only half the TAZ stuff is up, cause the second (longer) story is for a candlenights exchange. Story one is this, which is a short story about all my feelings on revelations in the finale and how they would probably lead to eerie snuggling. The second story is... god I can't say anything about it. Only that I really like it and also talking about it with a friend made me laugh very hard.

Star Trek! I actually only wrote one Discovery fic, a 2k Michael/Tilly uh. Porn fic. I wrote a lot of porn this year didn't I. It's a first, I guess. Gotta get the practice in somewhere! It's called supernova and its less porny than it sounds, it's more about that good good emotional connection.

DS9 and KiraDax is where the real fic was this year, in no small part to my lovely KiraDax discord server. I haven't been as active as I'd like lately because more people keep joining and they all talk so much now which is overwhelming but I love it there. Anyway, Spotted Kissing On The Promenade is my new compilation fic for any KiraDax prompts I get through Tumblr or elsewhere I guess. I did two fics for the biweekly prompt challenge on the server. This one is about nature ghosts and is honestly one of my fave fics I've written. And this one also has some little worldbuilding. Then when my grandfather said something homophobic earlier this year I wrote this fic who's True Name™ is "they get super ultra extra duper married".

Finally this year, my big project at 13k was Counterbalance. I wrote the intro in June 2018 or something and finally picked it back up and finished it this year for a Big Bang. It morphed from a story about "lol fuck the government" to me pouring out my feelings about love and trauma and communication and community. Which seems like a lot for 13k, but it took months to write. I don't know. I'm so, so proud of it. Here's the post I wrote about writing it, if you wanted to know more.

Stories not in original wordcount: 2356 Tiger's Cursed, 1322 Noir Porn, 1549 Candlenights. Which is 5227 words, which takes my total 2019 to 31920 words. Given that I felt I wrote """nothing""" this year that's pretty kickass. In 2018 I wrote 48k words, and in 2017 it was 89k. Which is a trend downwards but I've been going to uni and also dealing with *waves hand at all mental stuff*. So I'm proud of where I am and where I've been.

2019: Reading

This is going to be mostly about books of which I read 114 this year. Here's some fics I bookmarked this year though!

• TAZ:A Outsider POV comedy of "Mama creeps out a dude VERY HARD bc he is the WORST" (by gayprophets, here)
• Daredevil Pining Olympics feat. arranged marriage worldbuilding that kicks ass, Matt/Foggy (by lady_ragnell, here)
• Star Wars EU soft? ish? sort of? whump and bonding, Luke/Mara (by BananasAreForParties, here)
• TAZ:B Extremely good bullshit "Barry and Kravitz meet when Barry is still a bounty, shenanigans ensue", Gen (by jothending, here)
• Leverage Thanksgiving fic which I don't super care about holiday-wise (fuck Christopher Columbus!) but v good OT3 (by phnelt, here)
• MCU Thor 'n Jane and birth control. 11/10 comedy. (by shinyopals, here)

This is where I'm at with one per fandom and also things I'm willing to admit in public that I've read. I tend to uh, hide under blankets before admitting I read something E or M rated even if it's 100k and there's only one scene of The Junks: Touching? It's what it is. They're in reverse order, with my recent bookmarks on top and beginning of the year stuff on the bottom.

ONTO ACTUAL BOOKS.

I read 114 books this year, which I know because I tracked them all on goodreads. I think the authors I read the most this year were Seanan McGuire and that author with 4 names some of which are Ann Gallagher and L.A. Witt. Oh damn, and Cat Sebastian and Alyssa Cole and Courtney Milan. I forgot that this was the year I really jumped headfirst into the romance genre. Okay so. (These will all be goodreads links FYI).
 

( Fave books from said authors )

If I had to say my favourite story this year though, it would absolutely be The Mermaid's Daughter. This book was written to push every single button I own. Art and singing and mermaids and lesbianism and craving the ocean and feeling out of control and!!! And also the writing, dear god, so good. It's one of the few books in recent years that just hit me like a truck and left me staring at the ceiling and thinking deep thoughts. A warning though: though I was satisfied by the ending, under pretty much any other circumstance I wouldn't be because ( spoilers )

Witchmark was another reread this year, and I enjoyed it just as much on my second go-round. Queer with a wlw sequel coming up, witches 'n things, VERY cool world, good character relationships. Do recommend!

On the opposite side of that, I have two books... god it could be more, but lets stick to two books that I opposite-of-recommend. McHugh by Jay Flynn is one, which my wonderful and beloved friend Satan themself sent to me. It's so much. It's too much. 400 pounds of gold in a car and he's dead of alcohol poisoning by the third chapter or I'm a fucking goose. Also, please never read this long list because I've decided the second part of this isn't one book with an explanation it's a list of books without: Come Home To Me by Peggy L. Henderson, probably anything by Peggy L. Henderson if I'm being honest, One True Mate by Julie Trettel, or Girls of Paper and Fire by Natasha Ngan. 

Or I mean, you can make up your own opinions and read them and stuff but like. Why. Why would you do that. (Though I'm also putting this in as a caveat: I'm sure the authors are fine people and I'm only dunking on the books because I'm a nobody. Except Jay Flynn, my dude, what the fuck.) If anyone has books they'd like to rec or uh, warn me off of, that's always fun! I like scifi and fantasy and romance, but when books are Heterosexual™, the kind where they're like I'm A Woman And He's A Man!!!, then I start screaming a little. Mermaids are a huge pro, being shitty at communication is a con. 

And happy new year to everyone!

2019: Listening

 This year has actually been a super big year for Listening To Things™. Lots of new music! But also, podcasts. I've been very into podcasts this year. 

The Shrieking Shack is my fave, I think. It's a Harry Potter podcast where they literally go through the books chapter by chapter to see Is It Good? Or Is It Bad? The results will surprise you! I mean, probably they won't if you've seen what JKR is like on twitter but. It's a very good podcast, and the Patreon bonus content extra episodes are also very good. I can never think about Harry Styles without screaming ever again. 

Behind the Bastards is a pretty recent addition to my podcast roster, but it's been loads of fun. Half because there's episodes like "The Goat Testicle Implanting Doctor Who Invented Talk Radio", but also half because there's really considered discussions of what makes people suck. And also like... Here's how I've tried to advertise it to the more conservative people in my life: the facts are unbiased, the delivery is biased. By this I mean it's heavily sourced but the host also tries to convince the audience to key someone's car or buy bolt cutters every once in a while. 

420 Day Fiancé is just... nonsense. Two people discuss a bad reality show (90 Day Fiancé) while stoned. Good for background nonsense. Still haven't watched the show it's based on and probably never will. 

The Adventure Zone is also something that I've listened to a lot of this year. I've done a tiny bit of a relisten to parts of Balance, and obviously Amnesty finished off this year. I did have some issues with the plot of Amnesty re: one of the character arcs but... that criticism is really, REALLY rooted in my own personal preferences in storytelling. So. I've written fic for this fandom and made cross stitch merch so that's probably more telling of how much I enjoyed it. 

My music library this year is up to 23.56GB, 656 albums, or 9.7 days of listening depending on how you want to count it. My phone only has 12GB of my music on it which is honestly such a huge fucking sacrifice. One day I'll have a phone with enough storage that I can have all my bullshit on it. Here's some music recs from this year though! And by this year I mean, I discovered them this year, not that they came out this year. 

• The Counterweight (Deluxe) by Thea Gilmore. Album.
• Jackboot Jump by Hozier. Single.
• Blue Wing by Tracy Grammer. Single.
• Resentment by Kesha et al. Single. 
• Hadestown. Musical / Album.
• Hey Ho by Tracy Grammer.
• I'm Too Sensitive For This Shit by Hayley Kiyoko. Album. 
• Inland Territory by Vienna Teng. Album. 
• Turn by Great Big Sea. Album. 
• Lease of Life by Errors. Album. 
• Blue Caravan by Vienna Teng. Single.
• Washing Machine Heart by Mitski. Single. 
• Small World Turning by Thea Gilmore. Album. 
• A Different Kind of Human by Aurora. Album. 
• GIRL by Maren Morris. Album. 
• Golden Hour by Kacey Musgraves. Album. 
• Left Here by Roisin Gordon. Single.

I can't really quantify my music or podcast taste, only that either it grabs me by the neck and shakes me or it doesn't. I know that's not helpful. Oh well. That's life.

2019: Roundup

 Hey! It's a new sticky post!

You probably know me from tumblr as writerproblem193 or ao3 as ThatAloneOne. This place is behind the scenes stuff and journalling. The journalling is mostly access locked, but only so it doesn't go floating around the internet at random. If you request it and you don't look like a bot (Tumblr made me paranoid forgive me) then I'll accept the request!

Here's the roundup stuff though. 

• Writing, fanfic and otherwise. 
• Reading, fanfic and otherwise.
• Listening, podcasts and music. 

I tag stuff mostly consistently, and tend to clean them up over time. So you'll probably find what you're looking for there.