fire and rebirth

Reading ship fic has taught me more about writing romance than reading origfic romance, because ship fic:

♥ Can be long, like a single title can be hundreds of thousands of words long = lots of space to explore the characters, their dynamics, the ups and downs in their relationship

♥ Has steamier sexy times; the emphasis on consent is sure nice

♥ Sometimes places the conflict that results in the temporary break like seven or five chapters away from the ending, or there's more than one such conflict = higher suspense while the characters have more time to heal and to consider the situation with cooler heads (more logical)

I'm the sort of writer who has to finish a story first before sharing it. That's not a method that really fits serialized fiction, which is what goes in both fanfic and origfic today. The Indonesian publishing industry has been hit hard by the pandemic, and online serialized fiction is how lots of Indonesian readers consume their fiction. I'll try to slowly adapt to that, writing a story chapter by chapter rather than finishing it first before posting.

So this draft might not get finished in March. It's okay - I already know what to do in April, and I don't need to start it all on April 1. But that had better not get postponed, either.
ETA: I finished it! Now I can start April with a clear conscience.

Writing is a profane, irrational, imperfect act on terribleminds.com. That's pretty much how I feel about putting ideas down on paper (on the screen?).