cornerofmadness

Welcome to the WIP SUPPORT GROUP FICATHON

After listening to the grumblings of others, after seeing it happening to me, I decided to create this ficathon as a little bolster to all those works in progress languishing on our hard drives. How many of us have set aside one of our babies to work on a challenge or signed ourselves up for a dozen ficathons before realizing our addiction meant there was no time for our own ideas? Raise your hands. Ah, yes, just as I thought, there’s a sea of you.

What makes this ficathon different? Glad you asked. For one, there’ll be no exchanging of assignments, no worrying ‘what if I get a character I just can’t write?,’ no worrying about disappointing the person you’re writing for. In this ficathon you make a pledge to finish one of your OWN works in progress by the end of the ficathon. That’s right, go back to one of those ignored stories and set yourself a deadline to get it done. Now obviously if you know that the story will require way too much work to do well by the middle of August (Hyperion’s Son, I’m looking at you, my bad boy), then don’t pledge to do that story. Ditto for one you know you’ve totally lost the spark for.

But if you have a story you love, one that you know you can finish if you just cleared out those few minutes in the day to work on it, take the pledge. You will get it done by mid-August. You will give it the attention it deserves. (Obviously this isn’t meant for ficathon or other challenges. You already HAVE a deadline for those. This is for your own stories, deadline free, that just need to reel you back in from all those other commitments).

How will this work? You sign up and tell us WHICH fic you’re making a commitment to (hey if you’re adventurous, sign up two). It’s as simple as that. If you have a link to part of that story, please, let us have a look. It can be any fanfic (barring those centered on real-life people. That makes me nervous, and those forbidden by their authors. If you’re not sure, ask me). It’s as simple as that. Sign ups will run until June 10th and you have until August 15th to get this done.

But there’s more, if you want there to be. You can stop with the above, make the pledge and just show us your fic in the middle of summer. However, as anyone who’s ever tried a diet or tried to keep up an exercise regime knows, it’s easier when you have a partner. Anyone interested in helping to prod their fellow authors with a stick can participate in part two (this is not mandatory). What does this entail? Well, you can give a list of fandoms and/or characters you’d be comfortable reading and which you aren’t (go hog wild, if you can’t read it and help then it wouldn’t be worth it to bother you). And let’s be fair about this. We can’t expect to wade through YOUR 100 page story while trying to finish our own so if you are working on a long wip and get stuck, please just summarize and give a snippet of the problem scene.
If you can offer help, if you know something about a certain time period, medical knowledge, history, have that special something with weaponry, you get the idea. Sometimes it’s very helpful to have outside eyes on a story. If you want someone to have a look at your story or listen to an and give you suggestions (this is NOT a beta. Hopefully you’ll all have one of your own, this is just a fresh set of eyes doing a quick read), you ask ME and I’ll match you up with someone willing to help. Like I said, this part is totally voluntary and you don’t have to do it to play in this sand box.

Name
LJ (Not necessary to have one)
email
Story you will finish-
Story rating - (no minors reading NC-17 stuff or writing it please)
Fandom of story -
Link to story (If you have one)

Redux Section

are you willing to have a look at/listen to someone’s ideas and give suggestions?
If so, what fandom/characters are you comfortable with?
What WON’T you read?
Are you willing to give moral support if needed?
Have any areas of specialty that you’d be willing to share with your fellow authors if needed?