The Weaving

I was in the middle of Chapter Two in the Path rewrite, doing something about the very stiff and formal way I phrased everything back then, when one thing made me think of another thing, which in turn led to another other thing, which birthed the plotbunny for a prequel. In the course of minutes that plotbunny achieved full blown jackalope status and has been prodding me with its horns ever since. I haven't been this fevered up about a fic since the early days of Path itself, when my approach was too rigid to be effective about it.

It's a good plot, or at least I'm properly hooked by this harpoon my brain has tossed at me. It's disturbingly complete already, going from start to finish in my head in half an hour, clear as day. I'm going to write it. If I don't it will haunt me. I'm trying to be smart about it this time, creating a solid outline from start to finish before I type a word. It's a bit more like writing-as-work than writing-as-fun, but I can afford to prioritize completion now rather than pure stress relief. The actual process is a bit faster when I have a framework to go from.

I expect that like the Path rewrite, it won't see the light of day until it's all done. I don't want to get stuck in WIP land again, and approaching things like a complete draft is good for maintaining coherence. I don't know what this will mean for deliberately meandering, lighter fics like The Mission, or Paint The Town, or all those other ideas I had on the To Do list. Maybe I'll post chapters in between, when the drama of these other two becomes too much. Forgive me, fandom. I'll be here forever, apparently, but I'll try not to take that long.

Edit: And the outline is done. Six long or twelve average chapters, plus prologue and epilogue.

I know there aren't too many AeriSeph fans left reading this space but it may be of some interest to those of you still around. Last night/this morning I opened up Path of Seduction for my first reread in I don't know how long, too long, and came to the conclusion that it reads like it was written by a 19 year old. Because it was. I do want to finish it, but stylistically it wouldn't match because I don't write like that anymore, and couldn't and wouldn't besides. I've decided not to do a full rewrite because life needs living and that fic took everything I had to give while it was active. So I'll be going back over the chapters and doing some serious editing at some point, and clearing up some rough points that I've learned to recognize over the years.

The plot won't change, major events will stay the same, I'll just be reworking some of the prose. Because it's not all bad, on occasion I come across a phrase and think, "I wrote that? Neat." But Chapter 1 in particular does not represent what the fic could be by its conclusion, and Chapter 1 is how you put butts in seats, fic-wise. This might seem like complaining about nothing because it's that same Chapter 1 that worked for so long. But it doesn't feel like me anymore, so Project Path Update is on the table, being stared at long and hard.