Bex's Fanfic Recommendations - Intro.

It's said that 95% (or was that figure higher?) of anything is pure, unadulterated crap.

Ok, that's a little harsh...but there's truth to that. Beyond personal preferences...quality is quality.

And while I'll never ever diss less-experienced/skillful writers for putting their efforts out in public to be seen while practicing the craft of writing (how, after all, do we get better without practice?)... I do celebrate the good stuff.

And now I'm going to impose some of my favorites on y'all. ^_^

If you're in the mood for fanfic, I'd like to think you'll find the fics I'll be recommending off and on over the next little while to be enjoyable, rather than painful experiences.

I'll be focusing on my own fandoms of interest, though, so if you're not into stuff like LotR, SW, DW, etc... you'll be out of luck. I also have a fondness for well-done examples from those troublesome categories such as CROSSOVERS, MARY-SUES and ALTERNATE UNIVERSE stories (I like a challenge, and anyone who can pull one of those off with style is usually damned good). I'll focus most on the fanfiction.net archive...as that's my haunt and fanfic source of late. I'll essentially list my favorites to date by story category, providing links.

But heck, even if you normally eschew those fandoms...you still might be pleasantly surprised if you give my recommendations a try.


Or...you might not. (Only one way to find out. ^_^)

Bex's Fanfic Recommendations - Lord of the Rings Fanfic Intro.

I didn't even dream of the existance of Lord of the Rings Fanfic until I stumbled across it at the fanfiction.net archive.

I never even considered it, even having read and been a moderate devotee of things Tolkien since 4th grade, and having delved into the world of fanfiction years later, writing a goodly amount myself in other fandoms.

I'd gone through a time of, quite frankly, obsession with Tolkien and hobbits during Middle school. I'd used my interest as inspiration for various creaive projects, from drawings to props (a little Mordor flag I made - a little red eye on black felt ground glued to a dowel) to a large poster of two kids approaching a hobbit hole while trick-or-treating. But write stories set in Middle Earth? Never! It would have been sacrilege. Besides, wasn't fanfic only based on tv shows and movies?

Not anymore, I found as I noticed the Lord of the Rings category and dared to peek within. Many, many others apparently didn't share my inhibition. Especially once the first movie came out. Nothing like seeing the characters personified by a few comely actors up on the big screen to give the young'uns (and some not so young'uns) a jolt of inspiration.

I've seen alot of dross...but man, the occasional gold hidden within has been worth the winnowing. Sometimes I even wade through the dross deliberately for a bit...even once it's clear it's the dross...out of vague and momentary curiosity for what it says about the author. Trying to guess at what drives them, and why this fic, now.

But that's not the focus of this series. So, on to the recommendations.

Bex's Fanfic Recommendations - LotR - 'Sequels'

At the top of my list of 'sacriligious' things to do while insipred by Tolkien's works would be to dare to write a sequel. It is, you'll have to admit, pretty ballsy. How do you top an entire trilogy that's one of the best-loved literary works from the last century, one that's been called the inspiration for the entire genre of modern fantasy?

Answer: You don't. But you can still do alot with the concepts. Either with stories set soon after the events of The Return of the King, or by jumping waaayyy ahead to the present day age - or even later. ( Read more... )

Organizing Time

Planned my first 2 week's worth of menus tonight. Nope, I'd never done that before. Ever. I very often relied on take-out in the past, or ate the same entree (usually casseroles) for days at a time. (Umm, now I see exactly why I got take-out so much. Duh.)

Now I can actually go to the market with a list of what I need.