OK, CC, I think I'm going to ramble a bit, but hopefully I will also give you some useful nuggets.
Firstly, Woody!!! OMG you're so close to moving up in the world! 996 posts. Wow.
*snort* Tank, you crack me up. 'Paltry fics' my heinie. You're a great writer.
CC, I've read a lot of the fanfic in the archives. You've gotten some great feedback from great writers. I can't write, but I can read. I agree that how you do the villian depends upon the story. One of the most effective villians done recently is Wendy's
24 Hours . Brutal, that one, and lots of misdirection and red herrings. But that's Wendy, and a long fic, and she could revel mid-way and still throw LnC through the wringer. I agree with Tank - it depends upon the story you're writing. Personally, I don't like when the villian is revealed right away. It's been done, and done well, too (hi, ML!
), but I like it better when I have to work at figuring things out. I really like it when I'm working with LnC to figure things out.
I'm not as bad as Jojo, though! I do read the entire fic.
OTOH, I've read some sterling fics that don't reveal who the villian is, but do show the villian working to "get" Lois or Clark or both, such as Tank described.
Paul's also correct. I mean, that if a fic is episode related, we already know who, what, where, why, and when. The great fun is in seeing the twists Folcs apply to each episode, or the little oddities that get magnified into fics. I suppose that won't help you? I know it's a shorthand, but it can be useful.
Caveat here. I DO suspend belief when I'm reading. I spend most of my life figuring things out, and when I read I want to be entertained. So if a fic is well written (meaning good dialogue, believable plot(s), interesting situations), I would focus on the words, the flow of ideas and the turns of phrase, and I'm willing to NOT figure things out if it would spoil my story to do so. Which is probably what happened with
24 hours . I just got caught up in the story. I did the same with Paul's
The Cape of Good Hope. Tempus snuck right in and said 'Boo' and I never saw him coming!
Hm. OK, CC, I'd better stop for the night. Yeesh, where does the time go?
Oh, yeah. Blue. In any shade.
mmouse
