I drew my avatar being inspired by the wonderful, hilariously funny web comic "The Order of the Stick", words and art by Rich Burlew. Check it out at www.giantitp.com - if you ever so much as played one session of D&D, you'll love it!

01/12/2013

I mourn the loss of one of my favourite fanfic writers and a great source of inspiration! I have no idea why esama decided to disappear from the internet :( but I'm going to miss those stories, badly.

About the status of my in-progress works:

A Switched Chance:

I have fixed the little mistakes and typos in chapters 1 to 4 - will do the others as soon as I manage. And sooner or later get around to fix the mistake about Snape being Head of House that everybody seems fixated about :)
As for Chapter Fourteen... don't give up hope. It's being written, however slowly!

A True Gem:

Well, I have the crime all sorted. Now I only have to figure out how to let Sherlock figure it out...

Building anew:

Oh, my, it's been so long. I'll see if I can get back in the mood for this, I have so much planned... unfortunately I can't just skip to a while later and write the good stuff if I don't get them settled and started.

Let the Games Begin:

Part Six is in fieri - and I've found the perfect way to sort the ending too, even if it's still a while away, so now I just have to find the time to write it all properly.

Ever In Your Favor:

I have some ideas fluttering in my brain about this, but I'm not giving it any priority as of now.

Exit Materia

I'm currently writing the third part. And trying not to make it depressing. Which is really rather harder than one might think, considering what the FFVII universe is like...

Specialist of the Impossible

Err... don't even ask. :P

When Worlds Collide

And the third Guardian's POV is done at last! I know it took far too long, but at least it's a lengthy chapter. And the next one is already underway.
Plus, you know, the Epilogue is already written (actually that was the whole point of writing this story, I came up with that scene and then I couldn't stop figuring out how it might ever possibly come to pass...) - anyway, I know where I'm going, now I only have to get there.

Challenges answered!

Author Luan Mao has - well, not answered one of my challenges, per se, but taken it, twisted it, and made something absolutely funny of it! The resulting one-shot is In Vino, Memoriam and you can find it at: http://www.fanfiction.net/s/8766440.

Author Hija del Angel has answered one of my challenges! The title of the fic is Cross your heart and hope to die and you can find it here: http://www.fanfiction.net/s/8507033. Thank you so much, Hija del Angel!

Author lovenarnia has taken up the task of continuing my Chronicle of Narnia fanfic, Of Telmarine Descent. Her fic is called Lady Alana of Beruna: Of Telmarine Descent and you can find it here: http://www.fanfiction.net/s/7099901.

Also, should anyone be interested, Shaunee Altman has translated my fic 'Force sensitive' to Polish - the link is http://www.fanfiction.net/s/8904292/1/Wra%C5%BCliwy-na-moc

04/21/2011

I’ve seen a few authors put up ‘fanfic challenges’ on their profile and I’ve decided to try as well.
Why not? It might be a way to keep the rioting plot bunnies quiet at last…

Hope someone takes them on. If you do, please PM me!

2) The beginning of a beautiful friendship

Fandom: Chronicles of Narnia

Inspiration: From Chapter Fifteen of ‘The Horse and His Boy’ by C.S. Lewis:

“Presently Queen Lucy came out from the castle and joined them and King Lune said to Aravis, "My dear, here is a loving friend of our house, and she has been seeing that your apartments are put to rights for you better than I could have done it."

"You'd like to come and see them, wouldn't you?" said Lucy, kissing Aravis. They liked each other at once and soon went away together to talk about Aravis's bedroom and Aravis's boudoir and about getting clothes for her, and all the sort of things girls do talk about on such an occasion. ”

Challenge:

What did Aravis think of Queen Lucy as the golden-haired lady with the warm smile took her to her new rooms, and her new life?
What did Lucy think of this brave yet oh-so-different Calormen girl as she welcomed her in a new place, a new family?

NOTES: I’ve never found a fanfic that explored this friendship; I don’t really feel like writing it myself, but I would like to read it.

BONUS points if it takes into account how different Aravis’ culture is from Lucy’s…

3) It would be nice if the out-of-control drunk wedding guest was only a cliché.

Fandom: Harry Potter

Inspiration: What can I say? I’m a sucker for do-over stories…

Challenge:

Harry, Draco and Neville are the only singles at Susan Bones’ wedding and so they find themselves in a corner at the reception, drinking heavily together and complaining that their lives suck.

Once roaring drunk, they decide it would be neat to do their life over, possibly a little better this time around.

So they do it.

BONUS points if it actually happens by chance – say, Harry’s accidental magic acting up because of Draco’s taunts or something.

PLEASE NO Harry weak or submissive, Voldemort winning this time, or Bellatrix being anything other than the insane psychotic sadist that she is.

Notes: Complete freedom on Houses, pairings, friendship among the three or lack thereof, role of the other characters and so on…
I would really, really like this to be something funny, but it’s up to you.

4) A Cloud Strife/Yuna pairing (from Final Fantasy VII and X-2 respectively

Fandom: Final Fantasy VII and X-2 crossover

Inspiration: I saw a beautiful image of Cloud driving his Fenrir with Yuna sitting behind him, arms around his waist and her head laid down on his back and I've been wondering about the pairing ever since. I can't come up with a story that would justify it, though, so I'm setting it up as a challenge.

Challenge: Any kind of story centring around this pairing, whether long or just a one-shot. It should be set after Yuna defeated Sin and went on to join the Gullwings, though, so FF X canon has happened, and it should be after Cloud has escaped Hojo's labs too, so he has the whole enhancements and related problems set.

BONUS points if it's the Cloud from Advent Children, or at least has an awesome motorbike for whatever reason.

08/06/2012 - Review reply to Confused:

Reviewing 'Job Interview', Confused wrote: "Ya know, Pinky is a girl."

...Says who?

In the animated series he's a bloke, just so you know. Deep gravelly voice and all (the actor who voiced it was the same who voiced Blinky, if I'm not mistaken). And it has no feminine traits in the Ms. Pac-Man series either.

It's only in Pac-Man World 2 that 'she' gets large eyes, long lashes and sort of longish hair and the whole 'crush on Pac-Man' thing comes out - and I have yet to find one thing about the Pac-Man World series I like, so I'm blithely ignoring it.

I much prefer the original Arcade game and the characterization there has nothing to do with gender. (Hence the pronoun 'it'). Since in the context of a job interview gender has no relevance whatsoever (unless it's about the cast for a play or something) I find it better this way.

03/04/2012 - Review reply to Karasu99:

Reviewing 'Let the Games Begin', Karasu99 wrote: "I was wondering how many chapter is there left until they meet Yugi?"

Truthfully, I have no idea. I'd never dreamed this story would grow as it has when I started it off. Many of the twists I've come up with I hadn't foreseen. However I am sticking to the original layout of the 'dungeon', which will make them pass the room they just entered and another connecting corridor before reaching the fifth and last big room. So...

03/03/2012 - Review reply to nic:

Reviewing 'Cardcaptor Harry', nic wrote: "...I just read and then reread the latest chapter and I have a question [...] it seems like Eriol's contemplating murder or at least assisting. Like he'll maybe help Harry die via Voldemort."

Nothing of the sort! Eriol is simply completely fatalistic, and that, in my opinion, is a very dangerous attitude.

If you believe in 'Fate' so totally and blindly, you end up accepting all sorts of things out of a form of apathy that is, ultimately, a lack of hope.

He isn't happy about Harry's death, which he considers likely inevitable, though certainly sad, nor would he ever aid Voldemort to murder an innocent, not even indirectly. But as the saying goes... it is sufficient for a good man to do nothing. Since he believes everything is preordained, he will do nothing to stop what he considers 'meant to be'.

Add to that the fact that he's been the most powerful and far-seeing magician in the world for longer than he's been alive – literally – and therefore, he sins of arrogance without meaning to, or even realizing it. Like with the Sakura and Harry situation... he is unable to accept that 'Destiny' might not have been set in stone, he doesn't even take into consideration the idea of having been wrong himself, so what conclusions is he to draw?

I never thought Eriol was evil – not in my fic, and not in canon; in fact, one of the things that awe me the most about Clamp's manga is that there are no bad guys in it, which is an impressively original way to build a story – but I always classed him firmly in the 'producers of pavements for the road to Hell' category, mainly because of his selfishness. The second movie clinched it for me. He completely disregards what effect his manipulations, no matter how well-meaning, have on others – or rather, he only looks at the magical effects, and forgets that people (and magical entities, if they are sentient!) have this little things called feelings...

12/04/2011 - Review Reply to S ():

Since you don't have a reply URL, I can't really interact with you, but your review to Ch. 2 of my story 'A Switched Chance' deserves a bit of a response:

"Racing Bike, Computer, A telly, and then golden watch? The Dursly is not that
rich to afford those fortune. And I didn't reallt see Dudly owning all of
those above in canon. And I haven't seen, or heard a mention of it from the
movies or the books as well."

Hmm... how can I say this? It *is* canon. I copied the list from Ch.2, 'Vanishing glass' of 'Harry Potter and the Philosopher's Stone' and then reworked it to fit Hermione's comments in!

Also...

"Wait. So it's 1991... Internet back then is limited to dial-up, or NONE. Websites didn't really
start popping up by 1995...
So owning a computer back then was... Well, not beneficial, and is not
considered as something to gain unlimited knowledge, facts, and etc.
Hermione shouldn't be jealous. And I doubt that Dudley would appreciate
anything BUT toys..."

One. As I mentioned, it's canon. And *I* doubt Dudley appreciates anything at all, but that doesn't mean he wouldn't want it, if he so much as saw an advertisement for instance. It's called greed.

Two. I don't know what your personal experience is, but *I* had a computer from September 1990 and I distinctly remember using it as a support for schoolwork since Primary, among other things: that doesn't mean I had Wikipedia or the likes, mind - and I don't believe there's any mention of Internet in my story (though it did exist in 1995, as an aside: Video Games On-Line was formed in the March of 1994) - but my Mum still keeps our first Digital Encyclopaedia in a box - all 72 floppy-disks, copyright 1990. I frankly think that, in Hermione's place, *I* would have been jealous, even back then - and I certainly considered a computer a great benefit as early as 1991 - let alone 1998! Hell, by then I wouldn't have known what to do without one!

And...

"I doubted there would be 16 games to play for it, and
it's not going to be Windows '98 as well. From my experience, games from 1995 only amounts to these requirements: 64MHz
Processor, 1Mb Memory, and 16Mb RAM. (and that's 1995 and NOT 1991.)
So by standands, it's even lower than the phone that I'm using to read and
review this story.
Games from back then was Homebrew, Arcade type games like Pac-man."

Maybe 16 games are Rowling's exaggeration (again, let me refer you to canon) but I can list 8 off the top of my head from the computer I had back then, ranging from Acqua Blooper Piper and the classic Tetris to an early coloured version of Space Invaders which now would make me cry with impatience so slow it is, but back then I adored.

Granted it was a MacIntosh and I have no idea what Windows' requirements are - though I remember a RPG called 'Eye of the Beholder' that worked on my best-friend's PC as early as 1992 (despite the fact that PCs were still a low-profile gaming platform at the time) so perhaps it's not an issue after all.

Incidentally, I only got to play Pac-man much, much later - and Arcades were something only to be found at seaside resorts and other touristy places for me, up until well after I played FFVIII on my PlayStation - and that was what? 1999? But this last bit is rather irrelevant to my point.

Anyway, if you're interested in having a clearer idea of what could and couldn't be found in terms of videogames at a certain time, I recommend the site www.thedoteaters.com. Videogame history 101!

Luna