pour encourager les autres

So I'm preserving it here for posterity and the perpetual dopamine rush. Also because it's the kind of in-depth review I wish people would do more often in general, not just my own stuff. (I really thought that Fred/Velma story would be more popular, but I'm notoriously bad at reading the audience.)

Right now I'm writing two different pieces in script format. The pilot episode one I would call my first screenplay since the Daria story "Switch" wasn't written in any kind of real format or style, and for this one I'm using Fountain which is a variation of Markdown that's meant specifically for screenplays. The other is for a comic and meant just as a fun learning experience, but I followed professional examples as my template for the first two chapters before charging full speed ahead. Currently on chapter 15 of 21 and having the time of my life, so my goal is to finish this while still making progress on regular prose stories.

**

Subject: Big Honkin' Review

Thoughtful feedback is the highest form of flattery in my opinion, so I
warn you, this is gonna be a long post.

I just discovered your fiction about 3 weeks ago and read all the FtVS
material. Twice… because you really are that good a writer. You've got a
great grasp of some skills that are exceptionally hard to learn and are
missing from the vast majority of fanfiction. Pacing,
showing-not-telling, managing multiple arcs at once (episode arc,
personal arc, continuing season arc), villains with substance, setting…
and probably more, but if I kept on listing I'd start to sound like I
rain praise on people all the time. I don't. My feedback is infrequent
and seldom unequivocal.

Using present tense was initially off-putting (like first-person
narrative, it just rubs me the wrong way), but your wording quickly made
that irrelevant. There is imagery in emotional descriptors, just enough
detail to make a setting without getting bogged down, and your use of
spacing to place emphasis is not overused. Your OCs have substance (all
too rare in fanfic), whether villain or family, and don't repeat. For all
their spiffiness, the OCs don't detract from the focus on the main
characters.

The whole concept of Faith/Willow almost kept me from reading… I just
didn't see it. Again, I was charmed by your wordsmithing long enough to
give it a chance. Somehow you have made an argument convincing enough to
allow my belief to be suspended. Better yet, you have allowed the
characters to have the same thoughts and questions- that they are
settling for "good enough" because the true objects of their desires are
lost to them (either emotionally or by that pesky death problem).

You may identify more with Faith, but I have to say that it is your
Willow that impresses me. She is the only post-S7 Willow I have seen that
holds together- still quirky, but not a caricature of her quirks. She
hasn't forgotten Tara, but she's come to some kind of brittle peace. She
isn't torturing herself over what she's done (much- you can't have Willow
without some good self flagellation), but again, not forgotten. She's
moved beyond fearing her own power, but has a healthy wariness of her own
use of it… usually. In all this, she is thoroughly imperfect and reads
like she really could be a 21 year-old, albeit a fairly mature and
intelligent one. She makes decisions that are more emotional than
logical, but only when pressed emotionally. There are no rules in her
character without equivocation. It's an equilibrium that you've handled
beautifully.

This little bit sums up so well how you write her (and about her):

>Mostly, though, she's thinking of the last microseconds of that earlier
>connection; how some part of the redhead's soul made its way through
>despite the protective firewall, in that split second before the big
>disconnect. A moment of weariness where Faith got a glimpse of the wiring
>under the board. How hard the other woman struggles to keep it all in.
>
>How big and heavy it is, to be whatever Willow's become.
>
>And how she definitely should have gone for it.
FtVS- Murder By Numbers, Conclusion

Beautiful. Metaphor, profundity without pretension, and humor, all in so
short a space…

And, um… oh, yeah- Faith' good, too.

Incidentally, I appreciate the bibliographies. It is obvious that you
research what you're writing (or you know a lot about a wider range of
topics than most). It's not often I can read someone who has put more
work into their fact finding that I do. Kudos. Also, I appreciate that
you aren't using the comics or AtS to a degree that those of us who
haven't seen them can't follow along.

One item of irritation- when trying to read from the masterlist, you have
several bits that have no link to the following section. As much as I
enjoy wading through every livejournal post you've posted to find the
next chapter or skipping back to your primary page to search, it would be
ever so nice to be able to just read n' click. Am I being lazy? Yes, but
I assume this is an oversight.

So, in short, I wanted to tell you that you have written something truly
impressive. I hope to continue to be entertained by your contribution to
the continuing expansion of the Buffyverse "What if" literature. You have
my respect and I intend to continue to learn from you.

Thank you,

-[redacted]

PS- As if I didn't blather enough already… you also charmed me because:
1) You mentioned sympathetic ophthalmia. (Be still, my heart!) 2) You
know about the Wizard of Speed and Time. *swoon* 3) You listen to Tom
Lehrer ("My heart is in my hand… echk…" ^_^ ), Danny Elfman, and yippee!
I'm not the only person who remember's Remo Williams!

And yes, I could have gone over post by post the little criticisms that I
have, but they are little, nitpicky, and not worth pointing out in the
face of the overall work.