Unfinished Business Chapter 9 has finally been posted! Sorry about the cliffhanger, but the next stopping point I had in mind would make the chapter way too long.
I've been thinking a lot about my writings and why I have this almost fanatical desire for a certain level of anonymity. I've seen writers around on fictionpress who wouldn't think twice about offering up their facebook and myspace accounts, listing up all sorts of contact info from AIM to MSN to whatever. On some level inside me, I think that it must be nice to be able to make friends amongst fellow writers.
On another, I find it a bit scary opening yourself up so freely to the world wide web. Ever since the plagiarism issues, I've realized that not everyone around fictionpress lives by a good set of morals, let alone the random people who might float in from haphazard search engine inputs.
Ultimately though, I think it's brave what these people do. For me, I have a pet peeve about people finding out about my writings. I don't mind talking to readers and posting chapters if I could hide behind a penname and some level of anonymity, but to completely reveal my true identity ... wow.
It's a weird quirk of mine. Unless I have something completely polished and substantial to me, I don't like to offer it up with my real name attached to it. That usually doesn't include romances. Romances are probably one of my favorite kinds of stories to write for fun, but family stories are definitely my forte in the literary workshop/award/publishing domain. (Oh, quick happy note, a short story of mine has recently been accepted for publishing in a small literary magazine. I believe it's a really small publication, but I'm still happy they liked my work enough to accept it. The editor got back to me with a list of helpful revisions and I returned it to her several weeks back. It's all thanks to an English professor of mine who noticed it and submitted it on my behalf for me. I only wish I had more professors like that.)
Fictionpress to me is still a productive hobby and a way to practice my writing and a way to entertain myself and other readers out there, but my chapters are really rough. This is why I started posting writings online for two years before I dared to tell my cousin that I've been writing as a hobby.
It's why I posted for nearly four years before I let literally a handful of my closest friends find out I frequent fictionpress.
I didn't tell my ex at all that I liked to post my writings online. My cousin might have accidentally mentioned it to him once though or something because somehow, he found out and pestered me about giving him a link for a while. I still didn't tell him.
My cousin thinks I'm crazy and she usually lets it slip out sometimes to some friends that I write online and that they should read my writings. I try to shush her or cut her off a lot. It doesn't always work. One time, I believe I tried to tackle a mutual friend and then had to physically pry his fingers off the mouse to keep him from checking out the link immediately.
My cousin's a sweetie, but she doesn't take hints very well and the last time she started to talk about my stories to one of her friends again, I literally unleashed my full strength and karate-chopped her across the arm or something. It probably gave her a bruise on her arm for her efforts, but she got the hint.
It's weird, but I think I like having a sense of anonymity because there are still levels of writings I haven't explored yet and I'd rather not have to worry about the reactions of people I know, acquaintances and whatnot, finding their way to my writings and then attempting to offer their feedback and comments.
Because I haven't yet figured out for myself what completely works and what doesn't. Darker themes, sex scenes, more mature language ... I haven't really tried working with these elements at all. I haven't yet figured out when or if I would. Think of me as still sorting out my writing ideas. Baby steps. It's tough to write to an audience. And it may be tougher still when the audience knows you.
Thus, kudos to all the brave souls out there who can vent out their ideas and thoughts with no barriers. Maybe someday, I'd be just as secure about my FP writings too. :)
Writing note: Through Me Chapter 20 is coming along. It was around the same length as the UB Ch. 9 draft this morning and I chose to finish up Ch. 9 instead.
Random note: My friends and I went on a crazy karaoke marathon the other day because it was really cheap. On a weekday, you can get a room til 8 for only about $11 per person. That meant my crazy friends decided to meet up at like 2 and we literally stayed in the room for six hours. By the time we staggered out of the room, our voices were hoarse.
They also got me addicted to a song, Sara Bareilles' Love Song.
Over a weekend sleepover at a friend's place, we happened across her interview and she mentioned that the original idea behind the song was her feelings against all those people who were pressuring her to come out with a hit song even though she didn't have any particular inspiration then. I thought that was cool because in a way this could be taken as a song against writer's block. Bwahahaha, take that, evil block.
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