that it's actually quite hard to read. I thought this was appropriate for Down There in the Reeperbahn, but here I'm not 100% convinced
Me neither. I do think it's hard to read, and I was surprised by how many people liked it. Obviously, the clutter at the beginning and end are supposed to textually mirror Buffy's lostness, but one should be very careful about textual clutter. (My prof always said, "Just because your characters are insane, your prose doesn't have to be; just because your characters are confused, your readers don't have to be.) It didn't help that I was rereading Gravity's Rainbow at the time.
And I'm not won over by massive amounts of alliteration. ;)
It's a bad habit I'd like to break. I'm like a person who tells a joke that's funny, but then keeps at it until I'm not funny any more, only tiresome. I don't know when to stop. What's frustrating is I know I have this problem, I just really can't tell. I can't tell what's poetic and what's schlock.
I find the juxtaposition of setting -- the Tibetan temple, a place of stillness, clean lines, unity -- and all your battering words, fascinating.
Only because I didn't manage to achieve what I wanted. I'd been reading Hesse's Siddartha, which I've hope you've read. Anyway, Hesse strings these long, long flowing sentences which should feel cumbersome, but instead feel lilting and peaceful. That's what I wanted for the third section. And yes, the words fall away into a realization, but yeah, again, that realization isn't a big nirvana thing. It's just a . . . when you're sitting on the toilet, and realize oh hey, I want to be a writer. Something like that. It's a big thing, but your life doesn't turn on a dime that instant (because first of all you have to finish going pee), and it isn't this mind-altering skull-popping whoa. It's just, oh hey.
Part of the problem there--with the Tibet part--was I wrote it under a time constraint. I spent more than a month on the L.A. diner part. In the end, it was what I wanted, even though I'm not sure it worked. I spent about a week on the last scene, two days on the second section, and about 3 hours on the Tibet part (not including research). It actually turned out much better than I thought it would, but it's not really what I wanted. I'm never doing another ficathon/marathon/whatever again. This was really, really hard for me to write, especially because it was not the story I wanted to write just now (I had another idea but had to ditch it because it didn't seem B/A enough).
Anyway, sorry to have gone on for so long, but you hit the nail on the head (several times) about things that displeased me in that fic, and you don't know how awesome that feels. This and Down There In The Reeperbahn were very experimental for me, and I really wanted honest opinions about whether they worked or not (because they're experiments, dammit!).
What would you think of doing a DVD commentary for it?
Well, if you still want one after all that, I'll do one.
Thank you so much for your thoughtful comments. I'm on the verge of gushing here, but really, it's so nice to know how this works for you and how it doesn't. It's so very useful to me as a writer.
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that it's actually quite hard to read. I thought this was appropriate for Down There in the Reeperbahn, but here I'm not 100% convinced
Me neither. I do think it's hard to read, and I was surprised by how many people liked it. Obviously, the clutter at the beginning and end are supposed to textually mirror Buffy's lostness, but one should be very careful about textual clutter. (My prof always said, "Just because your characters are insane, your prose doesn't have to be; just because your characters are confused, your readers don't have to be.) It didn't help that I was rereading Gravity's Rainbow at the time.
And I'm not won over by massive amounts of alliteration. ;)
It's a bad habit I'd like to break. I'm like a person who tells a joke that's funny, but then keeps at it until I'm not funny any more, only tiresome. I don't know when to stop. What's frustrating is I know I have this problem, I just really can't tell. I can't tell what's poetic and what's schlock.
I find the juxtaposition of setting -- the Tibetan temple, a place of stillness, clean lines, unity -- and all your battering words, fascinating.
Only because I didn't manage to achieve what I wanted. I'd been reading Hesse's Siddartha, which I've hope you've read. Anyway, Hesse strings these long, long flowing sentences which should feel cumbersome, but instead feel lilting and peaceful. That's what I wanted for the third section. And yes, the words fall away into a realization, but yeah, again, that realization isn't a big nirvana thing. It's just a . . . when you're sitting on the toilet, and realize oh hey, I want to be a writer. Something like that. It's a big thing, but your life doesn't turn on a dime that instant (because first of all you have to finish going pee), and it isn't this mind-altering skull-popping whoa. It's just, oh hey.
Part of the problem there--with the Tibet part--was I wrote it under a time constraint. I spent more than a month on the L.A. diner part. In the end, it was what I wanted, even though I'm not sure it worked. I spent about a week on the last scene, two days on the second section, and about 3 hours on the Tibet part (not including research). It actually turned out much better than I thought it would, but it's not really what I wanted. I'm never doing another ficathon/marathon/whatever again. This was really, really hard for me to write, especially because it was not the story I wanted to write just now (I had another idea but had to ditch it because it didn't seem B/A enough).
Anyway, sorry to have gone on for so long, but you hit the nail on the head (several times) about things that displeased me in that fic, and you don't know how awesome that feels. This and Down There In The Reeperbahn were very experimental for me, and I really wanted honest opinions about whether they worked or not (because they're experiments, dammit!).
What would you think of doing a DVD commentary for it?
Well, if you still want one after all that, I'll do one.
Thank you so much for your thoughtful comments. I'm on the verge of gushing here, but really, it's so nice to know how this works for you and how it doesn't. It's so very useful to me as a writer.