PARENTS AND FAN-

FICTION

Different views on

a rather complicat-

ed relationship.

2

3

Welcome to Daedalus Twenty-Three

So you might have noticed that there was no D23 October. This is for several rea-

sons.

A) School started. AP Euro kills.

B) our team of writers also started school.

There will likely not be a D23 November, due to NaNoWriMo. In December we’ll either

get back to once a month, or we’ll just go every-other-month to give our poor writers

some time to actually live their lives.

Lives?

Imagine.

It’s a shock, really. But real life affects FFN life way more than it should. Which is

the theme of this month’s issue.

Parents.

You may play scary music now.

If you’re not too scared, then happy reading!

**note: Please do not submit articles via form, since a certain Theia 47 doesn’t forward

them to me. Please email them instead to stormbrainFF@yahoo.com**

Comments, questions? See the D23 page on fanmortals.tk, go to the D23 t

hread of Veritaville, or leave a note on storm’s formspring.

(formspring.me/stormbrain)

4

Please note that the opinions expressed in

the articles are those of their authors and

not of the Veritas/D23 team as a whole.

Anyone shoving us all into one category

will be laughed at and ignored. That being

said, your opinions on the articles are wel-

come. Feel free to PM the author or send

Storm a message.

5

IN THIS ISSUE

Tips on Secrecy pg.

6 How to keep your parents from

finding out about your FFN

Why You should take

FF seriously pg. 8 And other important things I’ve learned

in college.

Featured Author pg. 12 Green-Giffy’s interview of Koiko

The Parent Problem pg. 10 What the parents think of FFN

6

Tips on Secrecy By Fishpony

Before I get into the nitty-gritty stuff I’d

like to point out that this is not a guide on how

to lie to your parents. I don’t support lying to

your parents. In my personal opinion I think

that if you’ve joined something on the internet

such as fanfiction your parents should know for

safety reasons. Not everyone on the web is as

nice as me.

However, I also believe that what you do

once on fanfiction, or just browsing around for

that matter, is your busi-

ness and you have the right

to keep it private as long as

you’re not engaging in

hazardous behavior. Let’s

face it, parents like to pry

and make sure their baby

bears are safe, if they see

you on a forum there’s go-

ing to be some questions

asked. If they don’t see

anything possibly incrimi-

nating that situation can be

avoidable. This brings us

to the first and most basic tip:

#1: Keep an extra tab open This is very important if your parents

think you should use the computer for Educa-

tional Use Only (E.U.O for short, because acro-

nyms are cool). Your other tab should be some-

thing fairly harmless such as Wikipedia,

Google, or even the Microsoft Word Doc

you’ve been working on.

So now whenever you hear your parents

coming simply click on the other tab. This also

works on nosy siblings, very helpful if you plan

on following tip number two.

#2: With siblings, less is more No way am I implying that your siblings,

no matter how old or young, are untrustworthy.

They can be your best friends or your worst en-

emies/evil little harpies and the rule still is the

same. Anything you tell them is going to get

passed on to someone else or used against you.

Chances are, if you tell a younger sibling

you’re on fanfiction they will tell your parents.

They may not be ratting

on you; little kids think

that the internet is the

most cooliosis thing since

Velcro sneakers and what

do people do when they

hear a particularly juicy

piece of gossip? They tell

someone, namely your

parents. Oops.

If you have an older

sibling it gets worse.

Have you ever heard the

term blackmail? I bet you

have. As an older sibling I can honestly say

that if my brother joined fanfiction without my

mother’s permission I would totally use that

information in a split second, not even. And

then once you do everything they wanted you

to do they still might slip up. Mums the word.

#3: Be vague but truthful It’s no secret that if you overuse the

computer parents are going to get suspicious.

Maybe you are writing for fanfiction. Or may-

be you’ve *gasp* joined a social networking

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site that is slowly corrupting you and you’ve

posted photos on your profile that will prohib-

it you from going to college so you’ll have to

work at McDonalds for the rest of your life.

Which one do you think your parents

will be more inclined to believe? Hint: If

you’re a teenager (which you should be if

you’re on fanfiction.net) than they don’t trust

you!

So if your mother or father asks you,

―Why were you on that computer so long?‖

Give a generic but truthful sounding answer,

―Oh I was typing a story and kind of got car-

ried away.‖ (This only works for nerds).

#4: Unsubscribe From the Forums This is the last but certainly not least

tip on how to keep your life private. As any-

one who’s ever been on Ghost Town knows,

posting and forgetting to unsubscribe will kill

your inbox.

How does this involve your parents at

all? Well here’s a completely true story that

happened over the summer. My sister

(Oceanmuse) did not unsubscribe from one of

the Ghost Towns. We had left for vacation

for a few weeks. Little did we know that

there was no internet there except at my

aunt’s house, granted my aunt’s house was

only the one behind ours.

Halfway through our vacation my sister

asked our mom to check her emails on her be-

half. To her disbelief she found that my sister

had 1,704 emails.

That little incident almost blew our

cover. Needless to say, my mother knows all

about email alerts now but she hasn’t really

put two and two together about forums and

fanfiction.

***

So remember, keep up another tab, less

is more, be vague, and unsubscribe. T.L.V.U,

because acronyms are cool.

Drawing by Moonrise

8

Why You Should Take Your Fan-fiction Seriously (And Other

Things I’ve Realized in College)

Mercury Grey

There are a lot of cool things you get to start doing in college. You only have class a few days a week. You can

join clubs for obscure hobbies or take classes for subjects and topics you'll never use again but find fascinating

anyway. And by the time you've reached your senior year, when everyone is stressed out after realizing that

the real world and life after college are coming to get them, you'll have to play parent to at least one roommate

when they break down crying. At least, that's where I was Saturday night. And so, to talk my roommate out of

her funk, I talked to her about everything I could think of. I remembered she was a Lord of the Rings fan -- I

talked to her about my fanfiction, how it works and why I write it and why some of the other fanfiction out

there right now isn't exactly top shelf. She looked at me with sincere interest and said "That must really help

you as an English major, Merc!"

I had never thought about it that way, but after a while, I realized she was right. Writing fanfiction has helped

me as an English major because in order to produce well-planned fanfiction, we as writers take apart and ana-

lyze the original text to form an argument about the text's interpretation. When we take apart a text to write

fanfiction about it, as we take apart a scholarly or literary canon text, we read it multiple times and gather evi-

dence supporting our argument. While we do this, we pay attention to the author's writing style, how they form

their sentences and how their characters speak. We research background information to see where the author

might have gotten their inspiration, so that in the event that the text doesn't supply us with enough information

we can make a best guess. Sometimes, we even read what other critics or other readers are saying about what

dissatisfied them about the text. After we've written it, we proofread it, diligently and militantly, and finally

send it out to our peer review board to see what they think of our arguments.

The process of planning to write a fanfiction is, for me, at least, like taking off the back of a particularly com-

plex clock. You watch how the gears move and what hammer strikes what bell to chime the hour. You look for

blank space in the machine. All the elements of the clock, all the elements of the story, they all move to form

one complete object. Fanfiction seeks to add an extra gear that either makes the clock run smoother or is simp-

ly there for ornament, another gear that has no direct purpose but at the same time doesn't make the clock stop

running entirely.

Some of my friends wonder why I take writing my fanfiction so seriously, and I usually tell them a variety of

things: that it is my hobby, that it is a way to practice writing without being obligated to try to find a publisher

when you’re done, or that it is good fun and a lot cheaper that going out to the bar on Friday nights. Now I'll

start adding another reason. I write fanfiction because it's helped me become better at studying English litera-

ture and the English language.

And that, friends, is why everyone should take their fanfiction seriously, why they should plan it out and re-

search and proofread and give good, solid critique when it's asked of them. These are life skills you're practic-

ing here. You could be practicing skills you’ll need in every English class you’ll take until college. Or better

yet, you could be finding your career.

Mercury Gray is a senior in college majoring in English with a minor in Secondary Education, and believes

that years of serious fanfiction reviews are some of many reasons she will become a good high school English

teacher.

9

Antrevine’s Annex

For those poor souls who have not yet had the pleasure of meeting me, I am Antrevine,

or Nanceh according to Theia. I am a fantabulous person who deserves your worship… just

saying. This is my column, Antrevine’s Annex. It will be roughly 300 words and will range

from stories I love, people I hate, kittens I’ve eaten and stuff that has been happening all over

Fanmortals. This is the first of many of my columns, which I hope you will find humorous

and entertaining, maybe interactive? If you have a message you would like to send me to put it

in my column, or to nominate yourself as person of the month, send it to editorforyour-

sake@gmail.com!

The topic of my first column will be the awesome new

Halloween layout of fanmortals.webs.com! If you click

on every page on our website, you will clearly see the

fun, spooky and creative layout created by none other

than…. Well, I don’t know. [edit by Storm: it was The-

ia.] In spirit if the season, nicknames have also

changed on the C-Box. For example, Antrevine the Au-

ror, Hana the Pumpkin Queen, Wintra the Mummy and

so on. Be sure to get your nickname before the layout

switches back! POLL: Did you like the change of theme? Email me your answers and com-

ments!

Yes, it was a fun surprise!

No, I’d rather it stay the same

Now a little about me for all those interested… My name Is Antrevine, I live in New

York, I love cupcakes, I have traveled all over the world and I am failing Algebra. My dad is a

publisher and my mom is an editor which basically means, grammar is in my blood. At least, I

should hope it is. I try to be on FanFiction as much as possible, but with school it is hard.

Look for me on the C-Box and feel free to send me a message! Final words: If someone would

like to make me a banner for my column, I’d love you forever!!! Much love ^^

10

The Midnight Doe When I first got on fanfiction, I had no intention whatsoever to tell my parents about it. Some things, (or so I though) you don’t need to tell your mom and dad. Though now that I’ve been on a few months, when my mom asks me what I’m doing on the computer, every now and again, I’ll

say fanfiction. But I never, ever tell her about the forums. She says “they’re too dangerous, and there are internet predators.” But to that, I have a strong opinion that I’ll never voice. Would internet predators take the time to read the books? Would they write fanfiction for the books? The answer, if you haven’t guessed it, is no. But would my mom listen to that? No. She’d just take away my computer. And for that reason, I’ll most likely never tell my mom about the forums and my fanfiction friends. Well, maybe when I’m an adult, or a fa-mous writer or something. Maybe.

storm-brain

I am one of the few people that have been

blessed with (relatively) tolerant parents. I

mean, it took awhile. I mentioned that I

joined fanfiction sometime in seventh

grade. But since I have a phobia of having

my parents read what I write (I was literal-

ly hiding in the closet writing half the time

for at least a year) I made it very clear that

I wasn’t writing anything, even when I

was really producing crap at an alarming

rate. This is beside the point.

I think my parents mostly trust me

online. They’re going to let me meet a

friend from Goodreads over Thanksgiv-

ing. Unfortunately, because of the Zoe

thing, FFN has a bad rap with them— but

at some point they’ll probably start trust-

ing you guys again. Honestly, it bores

them. They can’t keep the names straight,

(Yes, Sella, and Sheva are very different

people, Dad) and you can tell by the ―uh-

huh‖s and the ―I see‖s that they don’t real-

ly want to hear about it. At this point,

they’ve accepted the fact that their daugh-

ter is an antisocial weirdo and seem glad

that I get at least some interaction. Even

with my ―imaginary friends.‖

Moonrise

My parents know that I like to write;

I’ve been creating stories since fourth

grade. So it wasn’t such a big shock to

them that I had an account on the inter-

net to post what I’d written. Of course, I

had to explain the concept of fanfiction

to them. And, in doing so, I deterred

them from ever reading anything on that

site. But I guess that’s good, since they

wouldn’t understand anyway (I can’t

get them to even think about picking up

Percy Jackson and the Olympians or

Fullmetal Alchemist). So as long as the

internet doesn’t take up too much of my

time, they don’t care much about what I

do on it. Which is a win-win situation,

because then I, in turn, don’t make fun

of the silly Asian dramas my mom fre-

quently watches on that Chinese

youtube site of hers (for the record, she

agrees that they’re silly, but she watches

them anyway), and tolerate my dad ran-

domly singing ―The Banana Boat

Song‖ (please, please don’t ask).

11

Picture stolen guiltlessly from Google Images

Mercury Gray

I'm twenty-one years old, I've been writing

fanfiction for seven years, and my parents

still don't approve of my fanfiction account.

No matter how many friends I make or countries

I find I have new readers in, the fact that I

have never meet many of my internet friends

(and probably never will) is still something

my mother is getting used to. However, they

are still my parents, and I am still their

daughter, and any time I want to read some-

thing aloud to them, they are my first critics

and my biggest fans.

Hayley Barry What do parents have against FanFiction? It's not like it doesn't help improve our writing and social skills. We learn new ways to express ourselves and be creative; by writing fics and meeting new people. Most parents say that it'll 'Affect your studies' or 'ruin your eye-sight'. But they fail to understand that the reason behind the escalating composition grade is, in fact, FanFiction. Authors get to wrack their brains and write fics. When they publish the fics online, a more experienced author tells them how to improve it, and so the original author gets better accordingly. The wide variety of fics also helps with learning new vocabulary and obtain-ing new styles of writing. Many fics are bad, but there a quite a few that are exquisite. All it takes is a bit of patience and the knack of noticing a good fic, and you'll find a prize winner in no time. Some parents still don't like FanFiction, even though it has all of these pros. You could always try to change their perspective. On FanFiction, people learn from their mis-takes, and improve, thus acquiring new skills that might help them in later life. So why do parents think that FanFiction is no good? Apparently, my parents think that spending excessive amounts of time on the com-puter is unhealthy, which is true. But, after all, we are reading, writing, and proof-reading other people's work. So FanFiction really is helpful, but parents just don't see it. To them it's just a waste of time. If you really are in love with FanFiction, try explaining all of its pros to them, hear them out, and tell them why they're wrong. Chances are, they'll love it just like you.

12

Best known for her Percy Jackson fan fics

"Invulnerable and Invincible," "Death's Dare" and "The

Three Lives of Luke Castellan," Kioko is a veteran writ-

er. Off FFnet, she can be found on her LiveJournal ac-

count, greenconverses, and she enjoys reading whatever

she can get her hands on in her spare time, which is how

she came across Percy Jackson in the first place.

When did you start writing FanFictions?

I started writing fan fiction when I was in the fifth

grade, so almost ten years ago. Yes, I'm old. ;) I didn't

get an account on http://www.Fanfiction.net for another

couple of years though.

How did you discover the land of the PJO Fandom?

I discovered Percy Jackson over winter break over

a year ago when I was looking for something to read. I

nearly put The Lightning Thief back down after I read

the first couple of pages, but I ended up buying it and

after I tore my way through the rest of the series, I

hopped on http://www.FanFiction.net to see what was in

the section.

What was your fist FanFiction? What was it about?

My first fan fics were for the anime, Sailor Moon,

and I had filled up a couple of notebooks with stories

before I realized that other people out there were writing

stories just like me. I published the first chapters on my

Geocities fan site, but my first fic posted on FFnet were

for Dragonball Z.

How did it turn out?

My first fan fiction was pretty bad. I had self-

inserts, Mary Sues, implausible plotlines, unnecessary

angst… you name it and it was probably there. I didn't

realize it was bad while I was writing it. I didn't know

the rules of writing or what made a good story, so I was

just writing it for the fun of it. It was only when I looked

back a couple years later and read through them again,

some of the stuff I wrote made me wince.

Would you agree if somebody said that all first FanFic

sucks?

No, I don't completely agree with that. Some people

can churn out really great stories their first time writing

fan fiction. It all depends on how experienced you are

with writing, the rules of English, and if you pay atten-

tion to the way stories are structured and told. I didn't

publish a lot of my fics until a had a year or two of writ-

ing experience under my belt, so I was loads better by

the time I decided to start posting things for other people

to read.

What are your views on the terrible situation of the PJO

Fandom now?

I think it's really disappointed that a series like Per-

cy Jackson has such a lackluster fandom. I was really

hoping the movie would bring more people with experi-

ence into the fandom – and it certainly has on Livejour-

nal – but the FFnet section is still pretty crappy. It's just

very disheartening to find maybe one or two readable

stories a week, if that.

Do you plan on doing anything about it? [Like making a

guide, whatsoever.]

I plan to keep writing. It's more important to have

examples of good writing around for people to read than

to have guides, which are fairly useless, in my opinion.

You can tell people to avoid Mary Sues or cliché ideas

all you want, but until you get a writer in there who

shows others how it's done and what a good fic should

look like, you're not going to get very far.

Do you have any ways that can destroy your writer’s

block?

When I get blocked on one story, the easiest thing

for me to do is go work on another story that I have no

plans on publishing until I break the writer's block for the

first story. Sometimes working on another story will pro-

duce something good, but usually it won't. I also tend to

switch between writing mediums. If I'm writing on a

computer and nothing's coming out, chances are if I

switch to pen and paper, I'll start to produce something

and that's always better than nothing.

Why is your penname Kioko? [Is there any special rea-

sons?]

I chose the penname Kioko when I was still in

anime fandom. There's no particular meaning to it - I

think I had picked the name for an OC that I made and

when I didn't use the name for the story, I decided to use

it for my screenname. I've been thinking about changing

it to my LJ username so things will match, but I obvious-

ly haven't gotten around to that.

You have a Live Journal under the name of greencon-

verses, is there a special reason why the name is that?

Author of the Month: Kioko

Green-Giffy

13

Again, no special reason. I was looking for a username

that wasn't connected to a particular fandom so I wouldn't

get sick of it so fast. I had just bought a pair of green Con-

verse All Stars (which I still have), so I decided that would

be a fun username.

The stories/FanFics you post on your LJ, is there a differ-

ence between them and the ones you post on here, FanFic-

tion,net?

Yes, there is. I keep most of my M-rated fics

LiveJournal-only. Usually I cross-post everything I write,

but I decided that since Percy Jackson is a fairly young

fandom, I'd keep the more explicit stuff off FFnet. I'm be-

ginning to change my mind about that though, just because

I'm sick of there being very few well-written and realistic

M-rated fics in the section. There's also quite a few drab-

bles that I haven't posted on FFnet, mostly because they're

too short or I don't like them enough to cross-post.

How do you feel about winning the Veritas Award?

I'm always happy to win awards! It's great to be re-

warded for all the hard work you put into a piece, and I'm

honored that readers chose my fic.

How did you come up with The Three Lives of Luke Cas-

tellan?

After I read "The Last Olympian," I really wanted to

write a Thalia/Luke fic because I didn't think they got

enough attention in the last book... but that was kind of

hard with, you know, Luke being dead and all. Then I re-

membered the bit about reincarnations and the fact that

Thalia was immortal, so I started playing around with sce-

narios and thus "The Three Lives" was born.

Which three lives of Luke was the most enjoyable or memo-

rable to write?

I cried while I wrote "Part One: Adam." You'd think,

being the writer and knowing what was coming, that it

wouldn't affect you as much, but his death was very hard

for me to write. I also liked writing the scene where Thalia

gets her memories back in "Part Three: Liam."

Why was the death of Adam hard for you to write?

Writing Adam's death scene was hard mostly because I had

become attached to his character while I was writing it and

killing a character off you like is always a hard thing to do.

Thalia's reaction to it also hit him a little hard because it's a

defining moment in the story, where she realizes she still

loves Luke and she lost him almost immediately afterward.

What was so interesting about when Thalia got her memo-

ries back?

For me, the main theme of "The Three Lives" was true

- that no matter how hard you try to forget or how many

times it takes you to find that one special person, it will

happen and you'll be happy. That's why I used the quote

from "The Princess Bride" in the summary: "Death cannot

stop true love; all it can do is delay it a little while." When

Thalia gets her memories back, it's the moment when the

readers know that yes, she and Luke are going to get their

happy ending from that point on. It's just one of those mo-

ments you wait forever to write, and it makes it so fantas-

tic.

Some people would actually think that Artemis isn’t

as forgiving, since Artemis tends to turn the girls who quit

the Hunters into animals. Why would you let Thalia get

away this time?

It's important to note that Thalia didn't break her vow -

Artemis freed her from it, and that's the difference between

her and Hunters who might have tried the same thing with

a boy. Thalia had served Artemis faithfully for 500 years,

and her reunion with Luke was her reward for that service.

I think Artemis has nothing but the best interests of her

Hunters in mind and when it comes to their happiness,

she'll do what's necessary to secure it.

The Three Lives of Luke Castellan was a very heartfelt sto-

ry; do you get emotional when you write other stories simi-

lar to this one too?

Oh yes. I have a number of stories running through my

brain that constantly break my heart. In fact, I was telling a

couple of my friends the other night about an idea where

the end result would be Annabeth's heart broken into tiny

little pieces and just plotting it out made me tear up. Writ-

ing's a very emotional process; if you're not laughing or

crying or getting angry about whatever you're writing, then

who's to guarantee your readers will?

14

Critic Corner: Book Reviews

The Ranger’s Apprentice se-

ries

By John Flanagan As reviewed by Willful Destruction (Des) and

Aventine Hill (Ave)

Ranger's Apprentice, The Ruins of

Gorlan (review written by Willful De-

struction)

To start off this review I

have to state the blatantly obvious:

this book is amazing. As the first

book in the series, it has a lot riding on it to

capture people's interests and lead them to read-

ing the following books. John Flanagan cap-

tured my interests immediately as a fantasy fa-

natic and I was not disappointed.

Book one follows the main character,

Will, as he goes from being the underestimated

boy at Castle Redmont to apprentice to the leg-

endary Ranger, Halt. The conflict here in The

Ruins of Gorlan is that an old enemy, Mor-

garath, is rising and imposing a threat upon the

people of Araluen. The Ranger Corps must rise

to eliminate the danger and it appears that Will

couldn't have found a worse time to become a

Ranger.

Will is a brilliant character who some of

us can relate to, I'm sure, and Halt is the smart,

witty, dry-humored leader. As mentioned be-

fore, this book is amazing and I would always

give it a five out of five. I, Des Verita-Rising,

totally recommend it.

Ranger’s Apprentice

Book Two: The Burning

Bridge

(review written by Aventine Hill)

There is only one thing I am able to find

unsatisfactory in The Burning Bridge: There are

nowhere near enough Halt scenes. This is ex-

plainable, however, because book two sees

Will, Horace, his best friend, an apprentice war-

rior, and Gilan, Halt’s previous apprentice, trav-

eling to the neighboring country of Celtica to

warn the Celtic king that Morgarath is stirring.

Upon their arrival, however, it is apparent that

the Celts don’t need warning: Morgarath has

invaded Celtica and is taking Celtic miners.

Gilan, Horace, and Will run into a myste-

rious girl in Celtica, an Araluen named Evan-

lyn, who tells them of the invasion. Although

she claims to be a servant, they sense there’s

more to her story. That’s pushed aside, howev-

er, when they learn why Morgarath is taking

miners, and his forces and Araluen’s come to a

confrontation that results in one, final combat—

single combat, in which Morgarath himself fac-

es against the most unlikely opponent, with all

the odds stacked in his favor.

In fact, throughout all this, with a story-

line that has so many opportunities to simply go

totally wrong, everytime Flanagan manages to

play it out so that you’re not left asking, Really?

He just did that? Desperate much? Somehow,

he always manages to know what he’s doing

and then does it exactly right, and it shows.

15

Critic Corner: Book Reviews Critic Corner: Book Reviews

Ranger's Apprentice, The

Icebound Land (review written by Willful De-

struction)

The Icebound Land is the third book in

the series and probably in my top three for fa-

vorites. In this book the Araluens have a battle

against Morgarath's army and in the end Evan-

lyn (a character introduced in the second book)

and Will are taken hostage by the Skandians

and meant to be sold as slaves in their land of

Skandia.

The Skandians are among my favorite

characters. They are vicious, sea-raiding, loot-

hoarding, fighters who live in their cold, cold

land of Skandia. In them John Flanagan has,

once more, given us wonderful characters.

In book three Halt is kicked out of the

Ranger Corps – gasp! – and Horace, a warrior

friend of Will's, leave Castle Redmont and his

own apprentice training to ride out and help

Halt save Evanlyn and Will. Chaos ensues.

Book three is brilliant, interesting, amaz-

ing, wonderful, awesome, and a fantastic addi-

tion to the Ranger's Apprentice books. It is

worth it to read every book up to The Icebound

Land simply to read it. It is among my top

twenty favorite books this year, and I recom-

mend it to everyone.

Ranger’s Apprentice

Book Four: The Battle

for Skandia (Review written by Aventine Hill)

Book four picks up just a few weeks after the end of book

three, and almost immediately shows Will and Evanlyn and

Horace and Halt reunited. But even though they’ve finally

found each other, a bigger problem fast comes into play: the

Temujai warriors, virtually undefeatable riders from the

Eastern Steppes, are invading Skandia with their sights set

on conquering the Western world. Their superior battle tac-

tics will allow them to easily overthrow the Skandians, and

then to take control of their raiding ships, making every-

thing else, including Araluen, susceptible to takeover.

Next thing they know, Halt has agreed to assist the Skandi-

ans in defeating the Temujai by organizing their battle tac-

tics, using his prior knowledge of the Eastern raiders, and

Will, Horace and Evanlyn are leading a troop of archers into

battle, with odds of three or four to one, in favor of the

Temujai.

While books two and three were amazing, they were both, in

my opinion, building up to the end of book four, and I was

not disappointed. The entire second half of the book is im-

possible to put down. John Flanagan comes up with the

most amazing battle scenes, yet they never become so abso-

lutely full of technical jargon that they’re impossible to un-

derstand. The Battle for Skandia was probably the best of

them all, and that’s saying something. Why only two million

copies of this series have been sold as of book nine, I know

not.

16

HOW TO NOT BE KILLED BY NANOWRIMO Storm’s guide to surviving November.

So I know that there are a few of you out there doing NaNoWriMo. Which begins today. This is why you should not be

seeing me around much in the coming month.

I greatly admire all you brave souls who’ll be taking the plunge with me this year. The water isn’t as cold as you

think.

However, it is a rather large block of time. So, some words of advice:

Have an outline. At least know where your story begins and ends. Since today is November 1st, or should

be, anyway, it’s already too late if you don’t. So keep this in mind for next year.

Try and get ahead on the first day. That would be today. So what are you doing, reading D23? The beginning is hon-

estly the easiest. You’re at the beginning, you have the I’m-a-novelist rush. Last year I think I wrote 3000 words on

the first day— though it was a weekend day last year. But it’s always good to be going into Day 2 a few hundred

words ahead.

On that note, it’s always good to be ahead. If you can set your daily goal count to be 1600, instead of 1666, you're

good. Because if you got extra on the first day, you’ll soon have a full day’s worth of word padding. Always try and

have a buffer. That way, if you have one of those evilkillerdaysofdoom when you have ten hours of homework, a la-

crosse game, and a caffeine crash, you won’t be doomed. It’s a lot more stressful to be trying to come back than it is

to try and pull ahead.

Don’t edit. I repeat. Do not edit. Want to change your main character’s gender in the middle? go ahead. Do that. But

don’t go back and try and change all the other references. Want to add some mystery that has been alluded to previ-

ously, even though it has not, in fact, been alluded to previously? Whatever. That’s what December, January, March,

April, May, June, July, August, September, and October are for.

If you have writer’s block, just have a character blow up Macy’s. If you’re having trouble with character develop-

ment, put two characters in Macy’s and see how they react. Even if there is no Macys in your universe.

Update your word count on the website whenever you're stuck. Even if it’s only ten words. Then you’ll feel like

you’re making progress.

DO NOT GO ONLINE UNTIL YOU’VE REACHED YOUR TARGET WORD COUNT. I cannot stress this enough.

Because once you get on, you’re trapped. And writing at 2am is not as fun as it sounds, especially if it’s a school

night.

Use Write or Die, but remember that their word counter is different. 2000 words on writer or die is about 1700 words

on Microsoft word.

Before you start writing, write the word count you need to reach on a notecard. That way you can just check and see

how far you are without doing the math every time.

Don’t be afraid to write crap. Seriously. Don’t worry about spelling mistakes or character flaws. go into this expecting

it to suck, and at the end, you’ll be pleasantly surprised. Trust me. It’s not going to be perfect. It might not be any-

thing you want to show your friends. You just have to get the words down. If you have a passage you hate, or a scene

that you want to delete, just put it in italics and get rid of it later.

Give your character a name like Mary Alice Ellen Smith Johnson, and have people refer to them by their full name

often. :)