Introduction and Getting Started Name: unbroken_halo Fandom(s) you are working on for this fest: HP Participation: Writer,(for this fest) beta, mod, and reader The one item from your list that you most want to complete: Lyv's B-day gift. She's been waiting a month now. Items with a deadline other than this fest: My other fest fics Most fun item on your list: The phoenix_flies fic, I think. I've never written this pairing before. Item you are dreading the most/need the most encouragement on: Harry Hols fic. I just have no clue on this fic.
How do you start a project? I just start writing. I usually don't plan anything it seems to work best that way for me and I don't know why. If I try and write out an outline of how I want the fic to go I screw it up every time.
In what conditions do you work best? It doesn't seem to matter when but I write best at the computer. I can't seem to sit down with pen and paper and try to write. the words seem to flow better, for me at least if I'm in from of the keyboard.
One thing that always inspires you to create: As strange as it sounds, I usually get my ideas while I'm on the phone with my gf. We could be talking about our kids, and suddenly I tell her, hang on a sec, I need to type something out before I forget it. Nine times out of ten I'm on the phone headset, talking with her and typing out a story at the same time. I've let more smokes burn up and coffee get cold this way than I can count.
One general thing you would really like to improve on: My punctuation and grammar skills. I hated English in school but I love to write.
Advice and/or questions regarding the creative process that you have for the other members of the community: Write? Just write as much as you can. You don't have to put everything you scribble down out on the interwebs. I really don't think it matters what you write at first, just so long as you are able to get your ideas down in a coherent pattern. Style, plot, and characterization can and will come later. I feel that, in some ways, you'll improve through practice and feedback from others. Good and bad feedback, so long as it's delivered properly, can really help. I know I have, or at least I like to think I have improved with time, but I know I still have miles to go. I think the main thing is to make certain that you, yourself, are satisfied with what you are writing. If the fic you are putting out doesn't appeal you, then how is it going to please someone else? Err.. okay sorry about that. /soapbox.
A teaser from something you've got at least partially done:
Severus Snape never needed much sleep. His spying days were over that much was true. Potter had fulfilled his destiny and the Dark Lord was destroyed. But the insomnia that had plagued him through those covert days still dogged him and try as he might, despite the lack of stress in his life, he still couldn't sleep.
Potion induced sleep had never appealed to him. One never knew when the Dark Lord or Merlin forbid, a little cretin entrusted to his care by the more polite of society, might demand his attention. So he tossed and turned, read his tomes and created in his laboratory at all hours of the night, hoping to induce some form of exhaustion to his body so he could rest peacefully. But still, it was not to be so.
Scowling, he wrapped his dressing gown around him and decided that a walk just might be in order. Thank Merlin, the students had left and only a select few faculty members were left in the castle. He didn't fancy running into Albus or anyone else that would inquire about his health. Small talk had never been his forte.