Writing Update: 15/11/24
Added 2024-11-15 01:00:06 +0000 UTCStart of week: 33,824 / 5,700
End of week: 34,018 / 8,287
Change: +2,784
Year to date: 198,133
Word count shows the final count for chapter 5 (pre-final edit) and the start of chapter 6 (currently underway). And it looks like next week will be the one where we hit 200k. As glacial as my pace often feels, that still feels like a pretty solid milestone to me.
On another note--brace yourself--minor ramble incoming:
For as long as I can remember, I’ve had an interest in writing (and reading) TG-flavoured fiction. As a young teenager, I wrote an isekai fantasy (before I knew there was a name for it, or it became a Scribblehub/AO3 thing) where the protagonist found themselves female in a fantasy world. I also plotted out a long D&D campaign revolving around an aging warrior and their cursed blade that slowly and inexorably made them younger and more feminine with every use. (The campaign didn’t get far. The PCs immediately killed the warrior and moved on.)
This inclination was doubtlessly influenced by books read at an impressionable age, things like The Identity Matrix or Crewel Lye or A Planet Called Treason and I’d track down any fantasy or sci-fi with even a hint of transformation.
Now, I often find myself inspired by mainstream stuff I read into considering how it could be—tweaked—according to those inclinations. A few years back I read Warhammer 40k / Hunger Games fanfiction Red Rising (I’m being a little facetious here) and immediately wondered why no one had written Pink Rising. Reading Murakami fantastic early collection of short stories, The Elephant Vanishes, inspired a host of TG-flavoured short story ideas.
I even broke ground this week on a couple of short story fragments, inspired by some stuff recently read: one, a high school bully story inspired (rather obliquely) by Orwell's Shooting an Elephant, and the other, a Gothic-flavoured short about a drifter trapped in a haunted house on a stormy night--the resident ghosts being female, of course, and out for a very specific form of revenge. Nothing more than a sketch and a few paragraphs each, but fun to consider something other than Constant.
It's this tendency to find TG potential in fiction that’s ultimately undermined any serious effort at writing and publishing on my part, I think. Any insecurities I have (and wow, I do have them) are amplified by the—definitively non-mainstream—flavour of what I feel inclined to write. Online forums like FM and TGS—and older arenas like Nifty or Alt.stories.sex.tg—and now contemporary platforms like Patreon enable reaching an audience; and that’s amazing. But a constant fear I’ve had is this: even if have the talent to write something of sufficient quality for professional publication (certainly a big if!), can I carry a work of fiction through to a conclusion without deviating into—well, what’s generally seen as deviant fiction.
I mean, my brief weekend away cosplaying at professional writer showed me that—yes, absolutely, this is something I’d love to live. (I mean, who wouldn’t?) I find far greater satisfaction in the money earned from Patreon than in my real working life; but one pays the bills and the other doesn’t. It's a constant frustration that real life doesn't leave more time for writing fantasy, that exhausted, it can be a real struggle to squeeze out a measly five hundred words on a weekday. First world problems, I know: I guess, like Julia getting her revenge, having had a taste of that thing I wanted so desperately--I want more.
If there was a living to be made in writing fiction in the style of Constant, I’d embrace that in a minute. Sadly, I don’t think there is. The mainstream’s shifted considerably over time, and LGBTQ+ concerns are far more visible and accepted than ever before. But the kind of fiction I'm writing here is always going to be pretty fringe, I suspect.
But maybe I'm wrong, and there' s a larger market for this stuff than I thought. I've started collating the many various chapters of Constant into larger documents in preparation for final editing and organising. Once ready, I'll try my hand at self-publishing and who knows? It'll be interesting to see what happens when the final version hits the open market.
For now though, here's what's up for next week:
Monday: sneak peek from Chapter 6 for all paying members.
Wednesday: completed chapter 5 released for Constant-tier members and above.
Thursday: another fine piece of fanart by Fraylim
Friday: weekly update for all members.
Comments
Ah! I missed the "province" reference - apologies; though sad to hear parts of your country are also veering into intolerence. It's sad, I guess, that the culture war is both baffling, and entirely predictable - targeting the "other" - whether based on religion, race, or sexuality and blaming them for... everything and anything, I guess, is just so cheap and for some reason, politically effective. It's just sad that people seem to forget that real human beings exist under that bullseye, and that so many people feel so invested in denying others their happiness and identity. I guess it's just important to remember that for everything that's shit in the world, there's so much that's awesome--that we live in a period of unprecedented peace and productivity, that's in western nations, you're more likely to die of old age than violence, or of obesity than starvation. Hopefully, we don't screw it all up through climate change or AI or something bonkers. Anyway, I guess I should stop my rambling! I don't think it's possible to actually write sci-fi without getting at least a little political, but I'm guessing it's not what people have signed up for here....
David Sanders
2024-11-20 12:12:45 +0000 UTCThank you for the long reply. :) I'm a bit of a pessimist and a student of history so this time line seems early similar to the 1920s. I mean we are missing coming out of a world war but a lot of other things track. Coming out of a pandemic a lot of centrist / liberal governments getting booted out after they're typical poor reaction to economic strife. It worries me that fascism might be raising it's ugly head again. I'm also not American, as discussed, but I spend way too much time paying attention to it and I would say your assessment is correct on the situation. Honestly, at this point if American gets a female president it's going to be a Margret Thatcher type or possibly even worse. With two female Democrat candidates defeated they aren't running another woman unless there is overwhelming popularity behind her. As a trans person, I will never understand the culture war around us. I'm too young to have lived through the culture war against gay men and I can only read that it's similar to now. We can only hope that the conservatives move on from us but I'm not hopeful. Thank you ❤️ I appreciate your saying that.
Sarah P
2024-11-20 10:45:21 +0000 UTCPlease--don't apologise! I can only imagine how recent events have impacted so many different communities. I set Constant in a near-dystopian future because that setting was an easy way to create additional tension for the protagonist; but also because--well--it's more than a little believable, isn't it? I don't -think- America will become Atwood's Gilead (though individual states might cleave horrifically close to it) - and I hope the democratic infrastructure remains robust enough to avoid the easy claims of sliding into fascism. I'm not living in America, so I'm wary of outsider commentary, but in my limited understanding it feels like the country's experiencing a number of simultaneous shocks: a pushback, after two terms with a (left?)-centrist president; lashing out, in reaction to challenges to the countries dominance on the world stage; insecurities over gender roles; the waning importance of religion; growing population diversity over the past forty years (from 24% to 40% non-white); economic shocks from Covid and international conflict; all fed through a social media slurry of disinformation... I mean, it's no wonder things are messed up, and political leadership on the left seems to struggle to control the narrative. In editing chapter five, I had to tweak one paragraph in Julia's past, where she said she did a minor in Women's Studies (rebranded as Feminist studies) because it felt meaningful coming after a two-term female president. I changed that to one-term - even though realistically, I don't think that within the timespan of my story, we'll see a female president. But just as America saw racial tensions rise after Obama, I think we'd see gender tensions rise after a female president (especially if she was on the left) - which makes a fantastic setting for a novel like Constant; but dear God, I wouldn't want to live in that world! The culture war in America (and elsewhere) around trans issues specifically is baffling to me. Polling in the UK shows that the majority of the population is either broadly supportive, or just doesn't really care; it's not a major issue for them. And yet it somehow dominates so much of the cultural dialogue - though I -feel- (and may be very wrong) that the British right has finally picked up it's not a vote-winner and are shifting away from the topic. Maybe the same will happen in the States, now that the election's over? I suppose all I can say is - I'm sorry, that your home feels hostile to who you are. (And apologies for the long, rambling reply...)
David Sanders
2024-11-20 09:43:27 +0000 UTCMaybe it's because of my age and the time in which I grew up but it feels like our current culture, at least in North America, is mirroring your story and opinions on LGBT and women's rights are actually getting worse. Also being the T, seeing rights we had 10 years ago getting stripped away is scary, I'm not going to lie. Polling on acceptance of gay marriage is actually declining in the US. Whether this is attached to the economy getting worse or we are actually having a conservative turn to the culture his hard to say for sure. The US election certainly didn't help my opinion and seeing talking heads and dem politicians saying it's the to ignore trans rights is disturbing. I mean the first trans woman got elected to Congress, she hasn't even been sworn in and there is already a bill to prevent her from using the women's bathroom. I know this was a pretty small part of your ramble but it's the part that means a lot to me for obvious reasons. You are absolutely right that we are a lot more visible now but I feel as like the acceptance is getting worse. Anyways, sorry for my long ramble, I've had a lot on my mind about this topic this year especially with what's going down in my province. I didn't listen to Sinclair Lewis and didn't think, it can happen here and this all has taken me by surprise.
Sarah P
2024-11-20 08:30:45 +0000 UTCIt's a fun concept to consider--certainly possible, though I wonder what might get lost along the way? I suspect a good edit could achieve what you're getting at, though - one that streamlines a lot of the story (which needs to happen anyway, I think) - removing the prologue, and paring back a lot of the attention to feminine detail, the clothes and so on, though perhaps keeping some of the observations about gender differences. Emphasis, as you say, the thriller aspect while pulling back on the femdom and humiliation stuff. I think it's in the second half the editing would be most difficult - Julia's role would have to fundamentally change. There's not actually a whole lot of smut in the first 200k words or so - a little action with K and Harry Longman, but nothing much; it's after Julia shows up that the more explicit details start to creep in, and I don't feel that's very mainstream. Like, the Sally Roony stuff I'm reading (Normal People, etc) gets highlighted for its frank depiction of sex, but it's mostly pretty tame, and even the bondage stuff in Normal People is more about expressing the damage to one of the protagonists rather than exploring the kink lifestyle or anything like that. So I guess a revision of Constant for mainstream audiences would have to clear a lot of that out, too? It's a fun thought experiment - thanks for the comment/suggestion. It'll be something to consider once I get closer to the end - now in sight! - but still some distance away....
David Sanders
2024-11-15 14:31:30 +0000 UTCI was thinking about the differences between TG fiction and more main stream fiction and particularly how Constant sits between them. Main stream fiction can have a TG element but it is not necessarily centred on the TG. After my comments about editing things down, I idly wondered if and how Constant could be edited into a mainstream non TG genre novel. Was that even possible? There are certainly other themes involved and invoked which are more about aspects of gender and sexuality - and of course control and coercion and the book has interesting things to say about all of these. And it is at its heart a thriller after all.. So I would say yes it would be possible to edit it for a completely different audience. Just imagine if you didn't have the flash forward prologue and you weren't expecting TG fiction - reading that novel would be a totally different experience...
Asklepios
2024-11-15 13:01:08 +0000 UTCNo, it's very helpful - thank you. The subscription model is fascinating, and I wonder how far it'll reach into daily life. We've already taken it on for music, tv and movies - and for some, reading I guess. It lends itself well to entertainment. Awhile back I edited in some near-future references to fashion-be-subscription: monthly wardrobe updates for the secretarial set. But an interesting aside of the model is that it is directly competitive. I don't know if anyone buys a book thinking, well, because I bought this one I can't buy that one. But I feel - I could be wrong - that people subscribe with a much firmer idea of a budget in mind, and so if someone signed up to Constant, it might be in lieu of something else (or vice versa). And, as you allude in your comments, I don't know if I'm writing in a subscription-service sort of way. I'm much more traditional in how I view the story - ie, as a novel, and what I'm publishing here are early drafts. I don't think that's how I started - early Constant posted to FM was very much serial in flavour. But after the long break, I came back to it and gradually shifted into more of a "novel" mindset - that for it to serve as practice for 'real' writing, I needed that experience of final editing and crafting the overall thing into a final narrative. (Although, coming back to it I initially estimated another 100k words, at most - and here we are, approaching half a million....) What I think I'm getting from your comment is that the more successful patreons are consistent, and quick - perhaps favouring quantity of quality? Visuals add a lot - Fraylim's art definitely did wonders for attracting more readers! - but AI-fuelled visual storytelling isn't really my thing, I guess. I've toyed with the idea of CYOA-style polls; maybe something to trial in the new year? I've been focused on reaching a natural pause-point in Constant (the end of chapter 6), so maybe then it'll be worth stepping back and reassessing what I can do here.
David Sanders
2024-11-15 10:23:12 +0000 UTCYeah one thing is for certain , the online/Patreon model is a lot more direct model than old school publishing. So long as the management doesn't feck you over at a moments notice. Whether you can make a living with subscription writing it I guess is down to seeing what sells and deciding if you can do that. I only have 3 other TG Patreon subscriptions (I say only, not knowing if that a lot or not many, I have literally no data). Two are 3D rendered ongoing graphic novels. The other a TG story writer. Very much one hand fiction with little plot, just fan service. The 3D stories have 600 and 1,200 paid members respectively based on one 20 to 40 page post a week with occasional extras. They are hard to follow, I sometime think the authors gave up proof reading as an unnecessary overhead and the stories seem as likely to reach a final act as Coronation Street. And yet they both hit my own personal yum's with pin point accuracy. The cumulative numbers in niche taste seems to work well with a global online audience. The writer has just hit 200 paid members based on about 2-3 short chapters a week posted in one go and a few ongoing commissioned bits. A typical post, in word count would be a bit under yours actually. A couple of those accounts have their on going stories with open polls after each post so the whole thing becomes a communal CYOA fap fiction. Which sounds a lot worse than it is. - BHFun is the writer in case you want to see the sort of stuff. They are on FM and TGS and that where I saw the Patreon info. So business model wise, you're not far off in output, just they are speed running the stories plots such as they are to focus on weekly money shots. Oh and they use AI art that looks like a parody of AI art. It's fucking awful,..but apparently not a hindrance to their growth. I guess there's a huge gear shift to go from creating your own vision in finely crafted, genre rooted, erotica. Compared to literal paid by the word crowd sourced erotica. You're right though that modern gender politics being what they are, our particular taste has become sadly more underground than it ever was. I wonder if the occasional non sexual gender swap movies of the eighties and nineties would ever make it out of a table read without the feminist alliance and a men's rights group uniting to curb stomp the Trans loving, Holl-E-Wud elites writers for un-Murican conduct. 1991's Switch is not getting a 2025 reboot is all I'm saying. Don't know if all that falls into Too Much Information, but there it is, for what it's worth.
Julia
2024-11-15 07:52:01 +0000 UTC
