Koakuma's Writer's Parlour ~ Have some tea and discuss fiction and writing here!

[Alfred F. Jones]

I'm with Iced Fairy on this one; purely random. I wrote Honesty of Purpose within five hours of DS' release, and I've written some chapters of White Rose in a matter of days, but right now, I haven't touched White Rose for three weeks.  (For me, artists' block is significantly easier to handle than writer's block, but they are both still terribad.)

For me, it is much easier to write drama than comedy. You would be surprised at how much work goes into Kurumi and Elly fics. And hanging out with UD has instilled in me the habit of throwing a story into the refrigerator and letting it cool off before letting it out for editing. I've also found that I can brute-force Roukan (or E-Mouse, back in the day) into proofing my fics, as well. :3

[Gpop]

Motivation. For me, it all depends on that.

I haven't been too motivated to write my fic atm. I have the next chapter planned out and all, but I haven't been motivated to write it all down. I suck -_-

[Hideki]

Agreeing with Iced as well. If I get an inspiration I can create three pages in an hour, but If I don't, It can take me up to a month just to write a paragraph.  It's worse for fanfiction due to the fact that there are really no deadlines except for self-imposed ones, and my normal mode for writing papers is last minute panic, which doesn't happen in fanfiction.

[Nobu]

Next Question!

What are people's stances on the English-Japanese crossover in the fiction they write? I'm talking about stuff like name order, use of honorifics like -san or -chan, using Japanese terms for certain things instead of the English, etc.

I'm at a crossroads, and i'm not quite sure which way I like better for my own writing. The name order sounds fine either way for me, but that's probably because when ZUN writes the name in English for the games he uses First/Last naming order.

[Moerin]

Oh, something I have a stance on!  Hooray~!

Ahem... In what few pieces of fiction I've written, I try not to use Japanese conventions.  I refer to characters family name last ("Reimu Hakurei" rather than "Hakurei Reimu", etc.), refrain from using Japanese honourifics ("Lady Shinki" rather than "Shinki-sama"), and use westernized terms ("shrine maiden" rather than "miko").  Why?  Because I'm a westerner.  It's how I learned to write, and besides, it wouldn't seem right at all for me to write using eastern conventions.

But that's just how I feel, I guess.

[Tengukami]

Can't say I'm incredibly orthodox about it one way or the other. I'm not hardcore anti- or pro-localization. I try to be as faithful as I can while keeping the English graceful. I guess that's about it.

[Dizzy H. "Muffin" Muffin]

I do whatever I feel like at the moment (I'm somewhat inconsistent, really), and the characters are explicitly speaking in Japanese (c.f. "Translation Convention") unless otherwise specified.

[Hideki]

Un, I tend to prefer to keep it in English, and not to use fangirl Japanese, but I'll use loanwords and I'll usually allow the use of honorifics.  Especially in the case of honorifics, some things spoken in the Japanese language just don't translate well into English, and I'll allow the use of them so long as they're not overly used and misused.

[IcedFairy]

It depends on my audience to some degree.

I always use any noun that doesn't translate directly to English in it's original form.  English is all about stealing other language's nouns, and I encourage doing so for Japanese nouns as well.

In my fics I use honorifics, because I actually think in those terms when writing for Touhou characters, and because I know this audience won't be confused by them.  For the VN I'm strenuously avoiding those because it's pseudo-professional.

I'm trying to avoid using ANY random expressions (Ara ara, is my biggest offender) and I despise using sentence endings in English fiction.  (~Ze I'm looking at you.)  Only sayings will get a pass and a translation note.

[Tengukami]

I would welcome more 'yare yare'.

[non-lolicon Ange fan]

I use the Western naming order in my fics.

I do use Japanese honorifics, but only for certain characters. Youmu uses them because she's old-fashioned, and the Moriya family uses them since they're outsiders who are still unaccustomed to Genoskyo's ways, ways that are pretty lax on how to (im)properly address people.

I do use a little bit of Gratuitous Japanese in my Touhou fics. Japan is always Nippon, Japanese, as in the language, is always Nihongo, moe doesn't get translated, and Marisa occasionally says ze or da ze, but I usually leave it at that. The texts of my fics, in-universe anyways, are supposed to be English translations of Japanese texts, which is strange, considering that one of my Mentor and Protege chapters uses a pun I'm pretty sure only exists in English. (My gawd, I'm printing my own Woolseyisms!) I don't do more than that: no one ever says "Kawaii desu~!" Flandre never calls Remilia "Ojou-sama", I have yet to print "baka", nothing goes just as keikaku . . . and yet, I still feel the need to leave a few things "untranslated" anyways. Man, I'm so weird.

[Serp]

I've set a resolution for myself to avoid usage of honorifics and gratuitous Japanese, for the simple reason that I don't speak Japanese, and so I don't have a true understanding of what those terms actually mean.  It's one thing to know how they're translated into English, but it's another entirely to be familiar with all their conversational uses and implications.  I've considered the fact that using honorifics can lend flavor and uniqueness to particular characters' portrayals, but I'd still rather use other methods where I can.  Though, on a related note, I tend to prefer translations of VNs or whatever to keep the Japanese honorifics for the same reason.

As for Japanese nouns, I prefer to keep those as-is unless either there's a good western equivalent with its own word, or the audience can't be expected to recognize the Japanese term off the top of their heads.  So, "gohei" remains "gohei," but "osaisen" becomes "donation."

[Nat Tea]

It's time for a *fun* question!

Is it possible to have a CYOA thread here instead of RPG?

Two reasons for that:

1) I do not like having users deal with RPG's ten post rule.
2) I can use the NSFW tag for it and I'll be fine sailing.

Anyways, thank you for reading this. I hope you will respond!

[Alfred F. Jones]

I don't see why not. CYOA is just interactive fiction, after all. And if there is any NSFW, tagging it should be fine-- though I haven't seen that you've been planning any. Are you just covering all your bases?

[Hawk]

Question i'd like to pose to any and all of you fiction writers. About how long would you estimate it takes you to write? Of course it's all dependent on the length of the story, but how long do you think it takes you to write a few pages on average?

I feel like I take forever, personally. I just spent the past three hours writing, and I have barely three pages worth.  :ohdear:

My ever so humble advice is the following.

We all have things we're good at and not-so-good at in writing.  For me, I'm good at dialogue, I'm okay at narrative, and I'm bad at description.  When I try to write, if I tried to describe everything I should be, I'd never get anything done.  First drafts should be quick and dirty.  Refine harder things later, because the earlier you do something, the more likely it's going to change, and you want to change the easy things.

You just might want to give that a shot.

[Nat Tea]

Question i'd like to pose to any and all of you fiction writers. About how long would you estimate it takes you to write? Of course it's all dependent on the length of the story, but how long do you think it takes you to write a few pages on average?

ahhhh, 30 minutes to write half a page (usually for an update to a CYOA), sometimes 5 hours to do the same.

1 hour per page if the thing is a fiction (anything in WWC, the actual fictions I should be getting to, etc).

It's not that I'm lazy, it's that I'm incredibly never in the mood to write because real life is really really really really annoying.

Also,

Someone calls technical support; wacky hijinx ensue.

why did I laugh at this? Why would anyone make a fiction about this? 

EDIT:

A place is described, with no plot or characters.

As bad as this sounds, it could be pretty nice.

[FinnKaenbyou]

Also,why did I laugh at this? Why would anyone make a fiction about this? 

Well, fuck.

[Nat Tea]

Well, fuck.

In a time of need, technical support is there to be your:
a) wacky psychologist
b) confession bin
c) Usually Dead
d) all of the above

Please note which problem you have at this moment.

[Alfred F. Jones]

Hm. I've found a message lying in one of my inboxes somewhere, and it seems we're down one of our beloved authors. He better return from his journey of self-discovery as fast as he can so he can write more Cirno. I'll be waiting eagerly.

[Paul Debrion]

I have the first chapter "done" for my current fic and I'm looking for someone else give it a quick read.

To be honest it has probably been in different states of being "done" for the past month or so. I keep changing my mind on things and rewriting a lot of it over and over and I'm probably not improving it any by doing so.
I should probably either post it soon or get rid of it before I make too much of a mess.  :V

[Tengukami]

I'd be happy to read it.

[Forte Blackadder]

hi guys, I'm still struggling on the "Japanese convention" stuff. In my recent fic (in my sign) I use both "-san" and "miss". -san for somewhat close, like when Elly talked about Yuuka. And miss is for other, like when Yukari addressed Kanako or Aya talked to Eirin.
Since I'm not Japanese or English native speaker, the mix looked fine to me, but I'd like to know about the readers' thoughts.

And a quick read if you have time, thanks ^^"

[Nobu]

hi guys, I'm still struggling on the "Japanese convention" stuff. In my recent fic (in my sign) I use both "-san" and "miss". -san for somewhat close, like when Elly talked about Yuuka. And miss is for other, like when Yukari addressed Kanako or Aya talked to Eirin.
Since I'm not Japanese or English native speaker, the mix looked fine to me, but I'd like to know about the readers' thoughts.

And a quick read if you have time, thanks ^^"

Maybe if you made certain characters exclusively use 'miss' or '-san'? I think it'd be a little less awkward if you didn't have the same characters switching from one to the other, but variance between characters might be alright. '-san' is a respectful title and usually closer people omit suffixes altogether, or use a more informal suffix like '-chan' or '-kun'.

[Esifex]

Challenge to readers has been issued!

For someone just going for a story - like me - it works. Otherwise, consider Nobu's suggestion - consistency between the characters would be ideal.

When I read it, I personally didn't even catch on to the fact that they were swapping back and forth. I was looking to see if it was forced or not - and to be honest, I think the suffix 'hime-sama' is a bit redundant for Kaguya.

I'm no expert on Japanese conventions, but, isn't '-hime' the suffix for royalty - and '-sama' is 'one of great respect'? I would assume that '-hime' would imply the spirit of '-sama'. It'd be like addressing your boss as 'Mr. Sir', or 'Mrs. Ma'am.'

{Edit} Think I just found myself a new display name.

[Iced Fairy]

Hime is the term for princess, and I think it can be used as a suffix or as a noun.  I believe the rule is if you're using it as a noun you have to use the politeness suffix with it, but I'm not certain.

Anyway hime-sama is correct Japanese speech, and to some degree Japanese politeness is about making your speech as long and redundant as possible.  For English works though I'd stick with one suffix, if any.  And definitely keep it consistent between two characters (unless they're pretending to be more formal in public or are trying to be insulting).

[ふねん1]

I might be a bit late regarding the honorifics topic, though I guess I can still give a stance. I admittedly haven't thought about it much before, but I think I would mostly stick to Western conventions, mainly because it's recognizable for the language it's written in. Perhaps the only exception would be having one character address another with the family name first, like "Hakurei Reimu" - specific to dialogue.

It's odd, for the past five years or so it seems like I've always tried to organize some story ideas in my head or on paper in hopes of actually writing something (I've been exposed to the idea of fanfiction since the early 2000's), but the only thing that even barely saw the light of day was a "Chao in Space" story I had in 2006 (only had several chapters written, never published). Now that I'm into Touhou, more ideas are coming up, and I'm once again sorting ideas out in Word. But unlike the rest, I feel pretty passionate (if that's the right word) about this one, and I think I might actually get started on it. I'm of the position that I won't post the story until it's finished, but I wonder if anyone here would mind taking a look at what I have so far (just a set of notes). Obviously still a lot of planning to do, but my paranoid side wonders if the story idea would hold much ground.

[Esifex]

Funen - sure. Also, don't be afraid to do serials (that is, chapter by chapter). The whole lot of us authors here are doing it that way, and everyone here eats it up.

Not like we're doing it deliberately, mind you, it's just that the most of us writers (cuz, you know, we're people too) don't have the free time to sit down and hammer out an entire story all at once. The exception are short stories that fit into one single post.

[Ghaleon]

I have yet to write anything at all, short stories included. Yet a part of me wants to. Sometimes I tell myself that I should just do it for the hell of it, I might surprise myself. But given how often I'm criticized for being too long-winded, or the number of times I'm misunderstood, it's a pretty stupid idea. In addition, I know that when trying something for the first time, you start small, and you work your way up. Problem with writing, I have absolutely no interest in anything but big huge monster series that just go on and on. Stuff like George RR Martin, Raymond Feist, Salvatore (though I've since lost interest in his series approximately after book 10 or 12 or something, not that they are numbed, but you know what I mean, the set of series' about Drizzt).

 I have never read a short story I enjoy, even by authors I adore. Sometimes I research and find a new book with their name on it, and then after getting it, I realize it's just a buncha short stories. I think "aww not this shit!", then think "I might as well give it a try since I have it now I guess". I'll read 3-4 of them, and be bored to tears with each and every one, then toss it. If Raymond Feist can't write a short story worth a damn, how in hells name can I? Yet still, I want to write a big epic series, but it's not exactly what I've dreamed and educated myself for to be my career, so why get involved in such a commitment? Am I the only one who has felt this way?

[Iced Fairy]

I have yet to write anything at all, short stories included. Yet a part of me wants to. Sometimes I tell myself that I should just do it for the hell of it, I might surprise myself. But given how often I'm criticized for being too long-winded, or the number of times I'm misunderstood, it's a pretty stupid idea. In addition, I know that when trying something for the first time, you start small, and you work your way up. Problem with writing, I have absolutely no interest in anything but big huge monster series that just go on and on. Stuff like George RR Martin, Raymond Feist, Salvatore (though I've since lost interest in his series approximately after book 10 or 12 or something, not that they are numbed, but you know what I mean, the set of series' about Drizzt).

 I have never read a short story I enjoy, even by authors I adore. Sometimes I research and find a new book with their name on it, and then after getting it, I realize it's just a buncha short stories. I think "aww not this shit!", then think "I might as well give it a try since I have it now I guess". I'll read 3-4 of them, and be bored to tears with each and every one, then toss it. If Raymond Feist can't write a short story worth a damn, how in hells name can I? Yet still, I want to write a big epic series, but it's not exactly what I've dreamed and educated myself for to be my career, so why get involved in such a commitment? Am I the only one who has felt this way?

Hm... I'm not sure I'm the best person to comment on this since I work almost exclusively in the short story range, but I can kind of understand getting caught in a huge commitment.  The one nice thing about writing a short story is that when I post it, it's done.  I never have to worry about losing my will to write it halfway through.  For the longer stuff you're going to have to decide if you've got the will to keep going, or at least the will to face the fact you can't keep going.

Having a large vocal fanbase can help keep you commited.  Having others depending on your work can help keep you commited.  Being bloody minded about completion can help keep you commited.  But it's something very personal that you have to figure out yourself.

As for story length, I view big stories as being made out of smaller stories.  Most of the stuff I've written on this site is actually part of a collected whole, but there's usually no overarching plot so they're short stories.  If there was an overarching plot they'd be "chapters" instead, but the essence of the story would be the same.  Admittedly longer stories require more continuity checks, but that's true of anything of length.

Hopefully something in that is usefull...

[Tengukami]

I think that if there's a story in you that wants to come out, you should outline it and then write it, one chunk at a time. You can post each portion here, or wait until it's done. I know everyone here would encourage you. Myself and others here have also read pieces in PM, going over them and working on them with you, offering constructive criticism. I'd for one would be happy to.

I find that with larger projects, work becomes its own motivation. For every bit you finish, that sense of accomplishment can carry you over to write the next portion. It's helpful to have someone encouraging you of course, but even if you work alone until you believe the piece is done, seeing what you've done so far can definitely help you move it along.