Describe your comfort zone—a “typical you” fic.

I honestly got stumped on the first question; I literally do not know the answer to this.  So I messaged Tiff on Kakao and she said: “Something sweet and crisp like autumn in a coffee shop in a busy city with a cinnamon smell in the air.”  Her words, not mine.  Obviously.  Because quotations.  So yeah.  Going with that answer.  It’s probably pretty apropos because I love all of those things.  Plus cardamom (which is a spice, not a mom cardigan—as opposed to mom jeans?).

Is there a trope you’ve yet to try your hand at, but really want to?

I just really want to write a coffee shop AU.  (UNINTENTIONAL SEGUES.)  I know there are practically a million of them out there, but I have IDEAS for one.  I even have the name of the coffee shop in mind.  It’s a two-way pun.  But yeah—coffee shop AUs are just super cute and I’m a coffee lover, so it works?  And I feel like I could (theoretically) write a pretty good one because I like to incorporate the five senses into my writing, and coffee shops are just full of scents.

Is there a trope you wouldn’t touch with a ten-foot pole?

Probably the arranged marriage trope.  Unlike Korekrypta, I can’t think of a way to do it so that it’s actually...realistic and/or understandable?  (Unless I stole her idea, which is something I am definitely not going to do.)  It’s just hilarious to me that someone can actually sit down and think of a problem to which the illogical solution is an arranged marriage between a couple of teenagers, and then write it without a trace of satire.  Which, now that I think about it, is probably what I’d do if I were to do it: write the thing with so much satire it becomes a satyr.  

How many fic ideas are you nurturing right now?  Care to share one of them?

I have a list of about 40 ideas, to be honest.  I will never get around to writing them all, especially considering I add new ideas every day.  I’m still writing Of Free Will and Freeways, which is looking to be a frakking long oneshot and is about Chanyeol’s most pivotal romantic journey.  It’s very fluffy and very funny and then it is very sad and angsty and real.  My goal is empathy.  

I’m also seriously tossing around a couple other ideas.  One is sort of a baseball/diamond doll AU featuring Kai and an OC; if I write it, it will probably not be a chaptered fic.  The other idea would definitely be a chaptered fic, though.  It’s sort of...supernatural/action/fantasy/friendship in nature?  It really needs fleshing out more.  But yes.  Probably a Chen x OC fic.  (Chen is vastly underrepresented in fics!!!!  It’s a shame!!!!  Emotions!!!!)

Share one of your strengths.

I think I do well at making the readers feel something.  I mean, none of my writing is blatantly emotional or anything.  Even Of Free Will and Freeways.  But I focus on the five senses a lot.  Texture and atmosphere.  I want you to feel like you are there—either as a close bystander or as one or more characters.  I’m often so emotionally and mentally detached when I read things.  Dialogue and a perfunctory description of your heart beating wildly will not get to me.  Especially when I feel like I don’t know you, like you’re just words scattered on a page to me.  You gotta make me believe it.  And incorporating the five senses is a really good way to make someone believe.

Share one of your weaknesses.

Letting my inner editor dictate my creativity.

Share a snippet from one of your favorite pieces of prose you’ve written and explain why you’re proud of it.

If a teaspoon of sand were thrown at him each time something reminded him of her, he’d be buried alive.  

A spice rack—the crunch of paper and a dripping coffee pot—jjajangmyeon tinged Merlot tinged tongue in cheek tinged teeth—orchids and apples and rain that soaked her skin until white was no longer a color but a geometric shape—thick woolen sweaters like her hair that draped everything—

And he was gone.

That’s the opening to Of Free Will and Freeways—spoiler alert!  But I don’t know.  I guess I like it because it’s very...expressive and even a little lyrical, although it is prose.  I like reading it aloud, feeling the words sit on my tongue.  It’s like a montage.  But with words.  Does that even make sense?  Probably not.  YOLO.

Share a snippet from one of your favorite dialogue scenes you’ve written and explain why you’re proud of it.

“We are going to be lumberjacks for a day,” declared Baekhyun.

“But neither of us have beards…”

“That’s a stereotype, Haeun.  You’re stereotyping.  Don’t stereotype.  It’s bad.  No, you don’t hold it like that!  God, why are girls so useless?  Here.”

Pretty self-explanatory why I like that one.  It’s from pt. II of Peppermint Lemonade, by the way.

Which fic has been the hardest to write?

Definitely Of Free Will and Freeways.  It just means a lot to me, so there’s some measure of self-imposed “pressure to perform” there.  Freeways is about something that has seriously affected my life.  Not really through firsthand experience, but I was an inner circle to the cause and effect ripple.  Do you catch my drift?

Which fic has been the easiest to write?

None of them have been easy to write.  I’m too much of a perfectionist for that.  But Peppermint Lemonade came easy enough in the beginning.  Then it got strangely hard so I took a bit of a break from it.  I’m not going to force myself to do something doesn’t feel genuine or natural.  But PMLA is something I will finish.  Just give me time.

Is writing your passion or just a fun hobby?

It’s a bit of both.  But writing is a serious thing for me, and I often contemplate doing it For Real.  But then I think about how I am so just freaking terrible with deadlines and how writing might lose a bit of its savor if I start doing it For Real.  So then I decide to switch to a different train of thought before I have a panic attack.  :D

Is there an episode above all others that inspires you just a little bit more?

This is a very ambiguous question.

What’s the best writing advice you’ve ever come across?

“Just write your thoughts as they come.” —emchan’s mom  

Don’t worry about form or coherency or plot or eloquence.  Just do it in the moment—that’s what your characters are doing.  Life isn’t lived out of chronological order.  Of course, as the author, you are omniscient—but don’t get ahead of your characters, because they’re the story.  And stop being tense, worrying if you have too much plot.  First of all, you can never have too much plot; you can only reveal too much plot.  Second of all, and most importantly, being tense about anything you’re writing is just going to limit your ability to produce material that is good and real.  It’s like singing: people are afraid of their voices breaking on that one note that is slightly above their vocal range, but if they just say screw it instead of oh God and let it happen, it will only take them a few more times of that happening before they are Ariana Grande and can hit that note with no problem.  

TL;DR: Just write your thoughts until you feel like you’re at a good stopping point, then go back and polish what you’ve written.  Check for continuity (current and future) and other things like language usage, grammar, punctuation, and ease of read.  Does it make sense?  Does it flow?  Is your character acting according to his/her personality?  Is the plot moving along at a steady, believable pace?  Are the characters developing naturally as a side effect of the things happening around them, within them?

What’s the worst writing advice you’ve ever come across?

This is a subjective question.  The other one kind of is, too, I guess.  But I’ve never come across inherently bad writing advice.  Different things work for different people.  I take everything with a grain of salt.  But in my personal experience, things like outlines have never worked for me.  Obviously, you need to have a general idea for the whole story.  You can’t proceed plotless.  But for me, outlines where I actually sit down and start with a Roman numeral have always constricted, as well as restricted me, in ways I can’t afford when it comes to writing.  I need to be...free.  I’m a detailed person, but not everything is meant to be compartmentalized and put in a little gray box.  Some things are meant to float about then be retrieved when needed.

If you could choose one of your fics to be filmed, which would you choose?

Eh, probably none, to be honest.  I use a lot of internal dialogue and conflict in my writing.  It’s pretty key in the development of my stories.  So I don’t think it’d be very interesting to watch a character stare at a wall half the time.  There wouldn’t even be much of a script.  I can sort of imagine Résumé from Hell being adapted into a web series.  Except not really.  But generally speaking, I’d rather my stuff be adapted into something like a web series rather than an actual silver screen production.

If you could only write one pairing for the rest of your life, which pairing would it be?

I don’t write .  It’s cool if you do, but I personally don’t.  Although if I ever did write a pairing between two idols, it would definitely be Baekhyun x Amber.  I love LiuB.  /squeals/

Do you write your story from start to finish, or do you write the scenes out of order?

I know I talked about writing in the moment because life happens chronologically, but I admit I do write a lot of paragraphs that come for later.  Like if I think of some good phrasing for a specific part or anything like that, I usually go ahead and write it down.  But never entire scenes.

Do you use any tools, like worksheets or outlines?

Not in the strict sense, no.  But for myself, I do use a very loose form of a character profile.  Sometimes I write it down, sometimes I keep it in my mental filing.  It really depends.  Oh, and sometimes I take the MBTI and iPersonic tests for each character.  I’m not obsessed with those tests like some people are (I don’t like labels and putting people into a box), but I have found that those two particular tests are largely accurate and useful.  It can shed more concrete insight on things you may recognize cognitively but are not able to articulate.  But I mostly do it ‘cause it’s fun.  xD

Stephen King once said that his muse is a man who lives in the basement.  Do you have a muse?

As a fanfic writer, the k-pop idols we incorporate into our stories work as a muse.  But I feel you.  And I dunno.  I draw inspiration from those around me.  I like to watch people; they’re fascinating to me.  And I like to learn from them, even if it’s in a small way.  But if I had to pull from someone specific, I’d have to say my brother.  He’d be so weirded out if I told him this, but a lot of his character traits and habits and speech patterns have been given, in some way, to my characters.  Particularly in Résumé from Hell.  In other stories and characters, there’s maybe just a small impression of him here.  But in RfH, you will find that Jongin is so, so, so much like my brother.  Almost exactly.  And that is because real-life Jongin reminds me of him so, so, so much.  So yeah.  My brother is my muse.  My life is weird.  Bye.

Describe your perfect writing conditions.

I just want the frickin’ house to myself, man.  Just let me be able to move around with my laptop.  Or use the big desktop in the living room without someone being around and bothering me.  I want to blast downtempo or chillwave or the blues or K hip-hop so loud that it sounds like a club from outside.  And walk around pants-less.  The end.

How many times do you usually revise your fic/chapter before posting?

I usually go over it once or twice after I’m through writing it, but I rarely have to fix anything.  This is because of my dumb inner editor person.  

Choose a passage from one of your earlier fics and edit it into your current writing style

Nah.  Writing style hasn’t changed much.  I’m not a “new fic, new me” type of person.

If you were to revise one of your older fics from start to finish, which would it be and why?

This was never a fanfic and I never finished it, but I once started writing this thing where the two love interests met at a wake.  Like, they literally met at a viewing for someone’s dead body.  And I recently went back and reread it, and there are no mistakes as far as technicalities go, but there are some things I would change now.  And I still love that idea of two people meeting at a wake, so I might turn it into a fanfic someday.  So I guess you could say the original version is just a rehearsal.

Have you ever deleted one of your published fics?

Nah.

What do you look for in a beta?

Never actually had a beta, unless you count my mom.  Alicja (taelighted) is kind of my beta, though.  Like, unofficially.  And will probably be official when Of Free Will and Freeways comes out.  But with my mom and Alicja, it just sort of happened.  So.  I don’t know the answer to this question.

Do you beta yourself?  If so, what kind of beta are you?

Yep!  I’ve been doing it since I was really young.  (Most days I’m convinced it’s the only thing I am actually sort of good at.)  As for what kind of beta I am, it really depends on what the author wants/lets me do.  If you just want me to proofread and/or copy-edit, I will.  If you want constructive criticism and/or general feedback on the material, I can do that as well.  If you want an exchange of ideas, I’m up for it.  So I basically do anything and everything.  (This feels a lot like self marketing.)

How do you feel about collaborations?

They’re pretty awesome.  

Share three of your favorite fic writers and why you like them so much.

taelighted—she writes really interesting stories that are also funny, well-written, and...interesting?  Yeah.  She also writes some pretty sweet action scenes.  I have the pleasure of beta-ing both The Seoul Saints and Running With Wolves.

Korekrypta—her stuff is honestly just so funny.  But I never like telling her that because sometimes I just don’t like giving people a reaction, and I’m like 100% sure she knows she’s funny, anyway.  Does this make me a bad person?  Probably.  But I don’t want her to feel like I’m flattering her.  I don’t know why???  But yes.  Back to her funny.  Lots of wordplay and characters with interesting personalities and habits and general weirdness to their names.  I like it.  FIN.

052896—this person has only written one fic on this site, and there’s currently only seven chapters to it.  But holy schnitzel, I am already in love????  It’s very well-written (I’ve spotted very few mistakes), funny, realistic, and makes me feel things, honestly.  Like, I’m not going to cry over it or anything, despite being sapdad’s daughter, but yeah.  I’m less emotionally/mentally detached with this one.  So good job, 052896.  I look forward to seeing more from you.  Let’s be friends.  Or awkward stranger-acquaintances on the internet who recognize each other’s usernames.  That also works.

If you could write the sequel (or prequel) to any fic out there not written by yourself, which would you choose?

Ha ha haaaa, I may or may not be considering writing something within the Running With Wolves universe.

Do you accept prompts?

Not officially, but I would if people gave them to me.

Do you take liberties with canon or are you very strict about your fic being canon compliant?

All I can say is that I consider what I have seen of their personalities.  I want to write them with integrity.  And I don’t do caricatures.

How do you feel about ?

You can write what you want.  I don’t care.

How do you feel about crack?

Love it.  Hard to write, though.  And often a little painful to read.  

What are your thoughts on non-con and dub-con.

I normally live in the gray areas of life—everything depends on context for me.  But for this, it’s pretty much either consensual or it’s not.  Soz not soz.

Would you ever kill off a canon character?

Yep.

Which is your favorite site to post fics?

AFF.  Though I have considered LJ recently.  It used to scare me; less so now.

Talk about your current WIPs.  

Peppermint Lemonade on hiatus but it’s basically about a tween Baekhyun and a tween OC growing up and learning how to be people who have crushes but don’t want to acknowledge them because they don’t know how to be people.  It’s cute.

Résumé from Hell is a college!AU that was inspired by the anime adaptation of Ouran High School Host Club.  It’s mostly crack with elements of fluff and romance, along with a fair amount of gallows humor.  Because gallows humor is my lifeblood.  There’s an OC.  Love triangles, love squares, love tridecagons at 0%.  But anything between four and thirteen is a possibility!  

Already talked about Of Free Will and Freeways so nahh.

Talk about a review that made your day.

They all make my day.  But someone once said my writing style reminds him/her of James Joyce for the whole stream of consciousness thing, and another said PMLA reminded him/her of the days she was into Anne of Green Gables and the Little House books.  And I was like yoooooooooooo, Lucy Maud Montgomery is my homegirl!  Also lots of people say they literally laugh out loud, which is cool because I rarely laugh out loud at anything.  xD

Do you ever get rude reviews and how do you deal with them?

I’ve actually never gotten a rude review.  But someday.  

Write an alternative ending to [a fic of yours] (or just the summary of one).

Nah.

SO THAT’S IT.  HOW RIVETING.  It’s ten till five a.m. so I guess I should try to sleep or something.  Dumb.  

Unofficially tagged by AsianNoodles.  Officially tagging taelighted, Korekrypta, and headinthebooks101.  You’re not obligated to do anything.  GOODBYE.