FAGE... The 13th Gift for SapranoStewart (and extras)

 The first time I ever joined FAGE was last year for FAGE 12, but I rejoined this year, and this year I was challenged, because I was given a set of fandoms that I didn't feel comfortable with and/or didn't really know. I finally decided on doing a Luigi/Daisy story as my giftee requested. 

From there, I was given four very broad prompts, and I went with the one I knew I could use, and that was 'reveals themself to be a shapeshifter.' It was a prompt I was sure I could work with. And even before I started the story I had an idea of how I wanted it go, but as is fairly common for when I write a story, it took an abrupt left turn.

Part of that abrupt left turn ended with me having not one, not two, but three different endings. However, most fanfiction sites frown on the idea of 'choose your own adventure,' so I chose the happiest of the three endings... even if, had I wrote this story for myself, I would have chose one of the others.

It's mainly because of those that I am writing this post, but before I share those, I wanted to mention that some people may notice little easter eggs to other games, movies, shows, songs, and more  hidden in the entirety of Sarasa Nightmare... I assure you, that was deliberate.

For the main story, you can visit one of five sites that I have it posted in:

Click the image for fanfiction.net

Click HERE for Ao3

Click HERE for Stars

Click HERE for Adult FF

Click HERE for ADifferentForest

And now for the extras:

Post-Story

B

Luigi slid down the front of Daisy's door, sitting against it uneasily as the beast that Daisy had become roared loudly.

There was a loud bang as the beast obviously rammed into something.

For the next several minutes, the ruckus continued, but eventually it slowed.

As the noise died down, Luigi closed his eyes, promising himself that he'd sleep for just a minute.

…

“Come on, Luigi!”

The loud voice woke him, and he sat up in his bed at home with a sudden start, blinking up at Mario.

“It's Princess Peach's birthday party, bro. You're going to make us late!”

“What?”

Mario gave him an exasperated look. “Would you hurry up? You know Peach has her friend coming from that neighboring kingdom. Princess Daffodil... Dahlia... Dandelion... Something like that. Let's go.”

Luigi shook his head in confusion, not quite able to believe that the last few years of his life had all been some sort of dream, or maybe a nightmare.

A Bit About My Thirst Submissions

By the time this posts, the results for the Thirst Contest will have been posted, though as I write this, it is still several days away. I am writing this completely unaware as to if I will get lucky and win a prize or if that will be another day of bad luck - which, given the way the voting was set up, I suspect the latter.

For the record, had I known going into the contest that the only thing the readers would be able to vote for were the specialty awards and not the traditional top three, I wouldn't have even entered. 

Here's a bit about why.

Anyone who reads my stories can pretty much safely say that I tend to write outside the norm. I'm not afraid to make people hate me and I don't write a story for a contest just to go the standard route. For the record, if you don't know what the standard is, it's an E/B HEA romance... typically with minimal to no angst. That's not me. Over the years I've had people call me the queen of angst, and though I will write E/B, they have to earn that HEA if I decide to give it to them. More often than not, I don't even bother. 

Once in a rare while one of my contest entries will actually get a popularity award, even though my stories aren't the standard. And when that happens it makes me certain I did something right. I actually impressed people enough that they voted for my Lauren story (Lost But Not Forgotten) or my Julie story (For the Dogs) or my Victoria story (Tenetur Per Sanguine). For me, awards like this are extremely satisfying. And unfortunately, with the way this contest is set up, there's almost no award the readers can vote on that works with either of my two stories. 

The two stories I entered into the Thirst Contest were Take It Back and Imprint of Yore, two very opposite stories. 

So, let's talk about Take It Back:

A lot of the people that reviewed this story during the contest have asked for me to continue it. I want people to understand, that I wrote a complete story, and I have no intention of continuing it. I gave the E/B lovers a glimpse of potential hope, but in my mind I don't see a continued story ending in anything other than tragedy. 

Bella has lost everything. She's been through literal, spiritual, and mental hell. And there's one of two ways to look at it. Either everything she's been through is her fault or it's all Edward's fault. You can pick which way you see it. Either way, there's no potential for an HEA, not in this storyline.

With that being said, maybe if I'm ever feeling especially bitter, I might continue it, but understand the ending I see in my mind is not a pretty one. 

In the mean time, I've never been opposed to people taking my fanfics and using them as a starting point for their own - as long as they give me credit for my part in it. So, if somebody wanted to write a continuation ending in an HEA, they could, but it wouldn't be me. 

-------------

Then, there's Imprint of Yore:

Of the two, this is the clear underdog, none of the reviews so far have asked for a continuation, and the review count on the contest is disproportionately low. It having the second lowest count of eighteen stories. 

And yet, I'm drawn to continue this, I want to see the next section. I want Edward and Jacob to find some sort of happy union. I see rocks and bumps and hills and mountains to climb in my mind. And I want it on paper. I want people to be able to read this story. 

So I do intend to continue this. In fact, I see this as at least a trilogy, with rough paralleling to the original Twilight saga. I don't know if it will be a success amongst my readers, but I intend to go with it, anyway. 

We Saw the World End on a Tuesday

I officially started writing We Saw the World End on a Tuesday on Valentine's Day. It's a drabble fic and I don't know how long it's going to be, but it's centering around a very real event that happened in our history. 

I'm not specifying the year or date of this story as of yet, though certain hints can help to determine it for people, and perhaps the biggest hint of all is the title. 

This story is set in, an as of yet, unstated town, and is set at a middle school/junior high level. But the general most accepted pairings: Bella/Edward, Alice/Jasper, and Rosalie/Emmett are being used for this story. There are also characters who are homosexual in this story that weren't in the Twilight Saga. I have many reasons for having lgbtq characters in my story, and I've stated some of them in previous posts so I'm not going to go into my feelings on that again. Just know that it is a part of this story. 

STARs Library Featured Story

My one-shot, Serial Black Widow, is a featured story on STARs Library from October 16th until October 31st. You can click on the banner to go to it on STARs, or you can check on my one-shots page to find all the other places it's posted.

Status Update and Music Torture

So, I'm about halfway done with writing my stuff for Babies at the Boarder. Once I'm done with that I will be getting back to writing all my stories on a more regular schedule. I wanted to work on my stories concurrently, but there's a deadline for BatB which I must meet, so it's my priority until done.

In the mean time, youtube is putting me through tearjerker hell with it's song recommendations, so I thought I'd share the pain.

The Big Question

I think it's the question any writer; be it an author, fanfic writer, script writer, etc gets asked at some point.

The big one.

Why don't you write faster?

And let me be clear, I've seen fanfic authors who were posting 5k+ a day and still get this question. So I know everyone gets asked it at some point.

I don't have an answer for anyone but me. And I'm still not sure I can explain it. For me, whether I'm making a post, writing a fanfic, original fic, or poem, or posting something elsewhere I have a few different pieces I deal with.

I won't call them voices in my head, because they're truly not, its more like instinct than anything else.

I talk about my muse all the time, which is, in essence, what inspires my writing. And when the muse and I don't get along, the writing sort of sucks.

But it's not the only thing I have to work with. There's the banner fairy, which is what helps me make my banners and choose what images I post. The prompt angel, which is almost exclusively used for stuff on facebook, but does have other uses. And finally there's the pull, which is my drive to finish something.

Unfortunately these for unique instincts or voices don't often work in harmony, and it's only when they work in that I get the most out of my writing.

For the Dogs Funny

Nothing to post at the moment, but in honor of Jules and Bella in For the Dogs...

Dog Days of Summer

So, while I'm definitely going to be writing throughout the rest of this week, my internet is going to be spotty (especially during the day) as I'm spending the next several days out fishing with my family.

I'm sorry for any delays in posting stuff that this may cause, but, I'm hoping to start getting into a regular schedule with my writing, and maybe if I can get some chapter pre-written while I'm on this semi-cation then it'll be all the better to help me start sticking to a schedule.

I essentially have six active Twilight stories, and if I can get to where, I'm posting a chapter twice a week, that'll mean each story will be rotating every three weeks. I'm not sure I'll be able to get there, but it's my goal.

Animals Mentioned in On The Island

Breton Dwarf Sheep

Pygmy Hog

Pudu

Rusty-Spotted Cat

Coconut Crab

Sea Turtle

Unable to Reply

So, like all fanfiction authors, I occasionally get guest reviews which are allowed on both Ao3 and FFN.

Ao3 allows review threads so I can respond directly to them. Unfortunately, I can't do the same for guest reviews on FFN.

With that being said, today I got the following review:

So, no definite conclusion to this story. I have to say that while I accept that this is your ending, I don't care for it. These types of ending are so unsatisfying. Even if you say it was always your intention, it leaves the impression you either didn't know how to end it or you were afraid to end it the way you wanted for fear of backlash from your readers or you were trying to suck up to all the readers by leaving it so open that anyone could make anything out of it they wanted. I'm an hea girl, but would have preferred a non-hea over something like this. To me this says the author has lack of faith and conviction in her own story.

To this reader, who I don't know, obviously you've never ready anything of mine before, because open endings are my jam.

I love endings that leave a reader wondering what happens next, that leave enough space that if, someday in the future, I want to continue it, I can. It's why a good majority of my one-shots are left with questions unanswered. And though I don't do it as often with my full length stories, it is truly what I prefer, because to me, nothing is less satisfying than when a story ties everything up. 

This is a personal preference, and I completely understand that not many people feel the same. But never doubt that I have the conviction to complete a story to my satisfaction. Trust me, it is one of the most terrifying things to choose to close a story, knowing readers are going to hate me from both sides because I decide to not tie everything up in a bow one way or another. 

Unsung Heros Contest Winners

I entered two stories in the TwiFandomNews Unsung Heros Contest and they took first and second.

You can click on the images below to be directed to the stories.

           

The awards

Commander in Chief Entry and Winner

I entered two stories in the Commander in Chief contest. 

         

Both stories have now been posted on my FFN account (you can click the images to be linked directly to them), but I actually won an award for Through Their Eyes. 

Mental Illness in Stories

So, a lot of fanfics, books, movies, and even shows, add mental illness into their storylines. Sometimes, you'll see real gems that display things absolutely beautifully, and there are many others that do great jobs in this respect, even when they aren't gems.

And I want to start by saying that there are literally hundreds if not thousands of ways to display any one mental illness, so, if you've done the research (or have personal know-how from other means) then generally speaking, there is almost no wrong way to display them.

But there is a very disturbing trend in books, movies, shows, and fanfics. And that's having a very serious story and rather than using something naturally funny as the comic relief they choose to use someone with a mental illness as the comic relief.

Now, I'm the first to admit, when watching Shrek 3 and Sleeping Beauty suddenly falls asleep because she has narcolepsy, I find it hilarious. So, if a story is a comedy in nature and they choose to use a mental illness or anything in that kind of form, that's fine. But when the entire story is serious except the way they choose to display that one person with mental illness, it no longer is, instead it's degrading and disrespectful.

Now I'm not writing this to point fingers, so I'm not going to say specific stories, but there are a lot out there (and I don't just mean fanfiction, it happens in everything).

So please, if you choose to write about illnesses like Narcolepsy, Tourettes, OCD, etc that you show them in the correct light, because Tourettes is far more than just a swearing disease, anxiety disorders are not just an excuse to avoid things but can actually be truly debilitating, and so on.

Incest in Fics

Let me start by saying that, in the state of Washington (and actually over thirty states) the relationships between the Cullens in the original story would legally qualify as incest - to qualify this, so people are clear, Emmett, Edward, and Alice are adopted, while Rosalie and Jasper are supposed to be Esme's niece and nephew, this makes them legally first cousins: in the state of Washington, first cousin relationships are considered incest. We all read twilight, or, at the minimum, watched the movies.

And per wikipedia: Incest is human sexual activity between family members or close relatives. This typically includes sexual activity between people in consanguinity (blood relations), and sometimes those related by affinity (marriage or stepfamily), adoption, clan, or lineage.

So, yes, I have Necromancy in the Fifth, which is an incest fic (and some might argue It's a Twin Thing is one too), but I guess it's not that weird of a thing after all.

Where Is?

Where's my updates, you ask. I wanted to have chapter 17 of Rebirth and Affliction out by now (like a week ago, actually), but unfortunately the muse and I aren't talking. And when I say the muse, I'm talking my inspiration, my desire to write.

And it's about more than just Rebirth and Affliction. The words just aren't flowing for anything I write at the moment. To put this into perspective, normally when the words are flowing, I can put out an easy 1000 to 1500 words in an hour, however I recently finished a 2k one-shot that took me a week and a half to finish.

I know a lot of my readers want another chapter of one story or another, and I want to get them to you, but the one thing I really don't want to do, is put out subpar work. If I write something and I post it, I need to be able to accept what I'm posting, and the stuff I'm putting down at the moment just isn't acceptable to me.

My goal at the moment is to try and get a chapter of something out by the end of the week, hopefully that will be Rebirth and Affliction, but I can't promise it.

The Emotional Roller Coaster Of Life Has Been Nominated

TwiFanfictionRecs has The Emotional Roller Coaster Of Life on the voting list for this month's top ten. 

There are also some other great stories on there, including Emergency Room Encounter by Pandora's Box Is Heavy, Dangerous Secrets by Sukiethree, Lord of Disasters by MissLiss15, and The List by JeskaWood, just to name a few. 

People can go on and vote for one story every 24 hours so be sure to go and vote for your favorites. 

Twilight Parents

There's all of nine living parents actually mentioned in the Twilight Saga.

Those parents include:

• Charlie Swan
• Renee Dwyer
• Carlisle Cullen
• Esme Cullen
• Karen Newton
• Billy Black
• Sue Clearwater
• Harry Clearwater (mentioned all of twice before his death)
• and Joshua Uley (mentioned once, I think)

And that's it.

Other parents are referred to but never named in the books (E.G. Tiffany Call), and some were mentioned in outtakes (E.G. Mrs. Stanley).

So, here's the thing, out of all these parents, I'm not really impressed with many of them. In my opinion, most of the parental figures were a joke. 

I could go down the list on the shortcomings most of these characters have. (I mean they seriously all have them - from absenteeism to lack of concern to barbie mom)

But instead I thought I'd talk about the ones who didn't fail as much as the rest. I don't often show it, because I tend not to use either of them that much, but I find both Sue and Karen to be good parents. They both seem to put into real effort, both seem to care.

Unfortunately, we don't get to see a lot when it comes to Karen, mostly just her working (ironic that she seemed to be the one always there when supposedly her and her husband both owned it). She really only makes a couple of comments throughout the entire series, but there's nothing disparaging about her. What little we get to see of her, she seems like a legitimately decent character.

We get to see more of Sue than Karen, though not by much. One thing that is very evident about Sue, is her desire to protect her kids. Perhaps she's overprotective... but given that both her kids are shapeshifters, the mother in me is saying there's no such thing. 

I wish there'd been more of both of them in the saga.

Now, I will say this, I don't dislike most of the other parents, I just find the examples that were displayed in the story to be very lackluster

Information on The Emotional Roller Coaster Of Life

So... I finally finished one of the most difficult projects I ever took on.

254 days, 209 posts, and 134,650 words later (per ffn, which includes everything written)... and The Emotional Roller Coaster Of Life is finally complete.

However, at the end of the day, there are certain points I want to answer that I simply can't in review replies.

Over the course of the story, I had people comment that I was clearly E/B or J/B. Again and again I got those kind of remarks, and again and again, I replied that this story was about the journey. Because, in matter of fact, I was neither. While I was letting the characters lead me where they wanted to go, this story was about growth. And for Bella, that was learning how to stand on her own two feet.

More recently, I've had some people comment that they feel Bella is too harsh on Edward, that she's made her share of mistakes and shouldn't judge him. I wanted to explain, if she'd never had a child, they could have worked. But she separated, not for herself, but for the sake of her kids, no matter how much she would like to be Edward's savior, she couldn't be that and be her kids' protector too.

And finally, I want to talk on the giant elephant. Again and again, I've had commentators who've said that it should have been Leah and not Seth who died. That Seth deserved happiness. That they wish Seth had made it. People don't always get what they deserve. And, ultimately, there was a purpose behind Seth committing suicide, there wouldn't have been with Leah.

I'm sorry if this story disappointed you.

The Drive to Finish

As anyone who was reading Death and Rebirth by me when it was posting will remember, when I get close to the end of a story, I start pushing myself to new limits. I like to call it the drive to finish.

I am extremely close to the end of not one, but two different stories. Those two are The Emotional Roller Coaster Of Life and RR. Because of RR's topic, that normal drive I have is a bit muted, but I have every intention to finish Roller Coaster by the end of the month and RR during the first part of the month of June.

This, while I'd like to say it won't affect my other stories, most likely will. So while I will definitely get Chapter 17 - Alliance of Rebirth and Affliction out in the next few days, and most likely Chapter 7 - Reappearance of The Hunter out soon, they will probably be the only two stories I get posts on until I complete both Roller Coaster and RR.

 The good news is, with the completion of both Roller Coaster and RR, I'll be able to focus more on my other stories and hopefully find the inspiration to go back to working on The Differences Between Fantasy and Reality and It's A Twin Thing.

This will also let me spend more time on Rebirth and Affliction (and it's numerous outtakes and other pieces), The Hunter, and Necromancy in the Fifth.

Triggers

So, while I'm working on some of my stories, specifically Necromancy and R&A, I wanted to talk about something that anyone who has been reading, writing, or leafing through fanfiction over the course of the last thirteen years or so has seen.

And that's WARNING: TRIGGERS

So, if you do not know what that means, here's the very brief overview. A trigger is something that cause a negative reaction for readers, such as major tears, panic attacks, epic break downs, or even a depressive episode.

Often times, people mark triggers for things that include, but are not limited to, suicide, abuse, alcoholism, drug addiction, rape, molestation, murder, etc. But triggers come in and all shapes and sizes. So I thought I'd talk about mine.

A) Illness/Death of children. This is a huge one for me. Those who know me well, know why, but for those that don't lets just say it hits really close to home. I've tried to work through this trigger several times, using it as something in several of my stories, but for those who aren't aware, I bawled the entire time I was writing the one-shot Any Given Day, almost didn't write Serial Black Widow, and have had several major break downs over the course of writing Roller Coaster. It's not something I handle well, though most don't realize it.

B) Cancer. This is another giant one for me, even if the story is one where the person recovers from it, is already in remission, or at least survives through the end of the story, I find it almost impossible to read about it, and even harder to write about. Though, once again it is something I'm trying to work through and have used in the past in my stories.

and finally

C) The words whore, slut, cunt, or bitch when used in a sexual connotation. Now, in a normal conversation, when someone is spewing insults or playing the name calling game, I'm fine with them. I'm also fine with them if their used for what they're meant to be (a dog, a prostitute, and a vagina). But, if someone puts them into a sexual scene, especially one that is meant to kinky, but not abusive/not rape, I can't handle it. It's an immediate shut down for me. I lose it and usually completely stop reading. And unlike the other two, this is something I don't see myself as ever even trying to work through.