2021 AO3 Year in Review
Jan. 1st, 2022 12:40 am![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
denimdreamsHello, happy new year!
This is just going to be a semi-structured talk/ramble of thoughts on everything I wrote and published this year on ao3. It's my first time doing something retrospective like this (as in, something actually written down instead of just being thoughts bonking around in my head) for my writing.
I think I'll divide this into sections:
———
Alright, that took fucking forever.
I'm not going to try make any general statements about "oh readers are more likely to leave kudos on [x] type of fics but leave comments on [y] type of fics" because I do not possess the brain cells nor energy to do that. And this is just for fun, I don't plan to change the trajectory of what I write in order to get more hits/kudos/comments/etc. I write what I wanna write, readers will interact with what they want. Sigh.
Anyway, I only wrote 5 fics this year on euphonic so the top 5 is just a shuffle around of those. Actually... the top 5s for jjx are almost like that too. I feel like I'm doing an awards ceremony for my fics now.
(Announcer voice) and congratulations to innocence for days for getting first in all but one of the categories, alas they were beaten by just one bookmark for that final #1 bookmarks position by homesick. grand prize congratulations to euphonic's Lights Out though, it scored #1 in every single category.
Onto the meat of this post.
January 2nd/10th: rosemary [JJX]
ONEUS, Youngjo/Dongju
Ah yes, the one I started at the end of 2020 but only finished after the new year... and then had to sit on it waiting to post on Dongju's birthday.
Placing this fic first chronologically because it was done on the 2nd and I just posted it later.
I don't have too much to say on the process of this one, I think? It started as something I was writing in a private discord chat and then I transferred it to an actual document to write it properly.
The 'rosemary is a demon repellent' thing isn't something I got from looking up flower meanings or anything like that, I took it from Bayonetta. Both meanings, actually, the demon repellent one and the remembrance one.
No other thoughts, I still quite like this fic! And it got #4 for kudos so I'm glad people like it too, especially since xijo fics really were sparse at the time I wrote it and it felt like I was shouting into a void to be ignored.
January 5th: Lights Out [EE]ONEUS, Youngjo/Geonhak
Number 1 euphonic fic of the year what a legend. The fic inspired by the gay that Leedo's Devil concept image gave me. I'm pretty proud of this one.
Titling fics always sucks (haha) but I think this one came pretty quickly?
It's titled after the Hollywood Undead song and I liked that 'lights out' could refer to literally, turn the lights off because this is a horny fic, but the 'lights out' from the song refers to getting knocked out in a fight which is what the setup of the fic actually is.
January 12th: [we've got] innocence for days [JJX]
ONEUS, Youngjo/Hwanwoong
Number 1 jjxneus fic of the year! I'm simultaneously proud that my two top fics were ones from the beginning of the year and they managed to stay top to the end of the year, but also, wow I kinda went on a downhill slope huh? In terms of stats, that is, I think the quality of my writing at the end of the year was still very high.
In any case, I can't remember now what got me started on this fic but I think the song inspiration came later? Scratch that, I remember: I was inspired by another fic and I wanted to write something where Youngjo loves Hwanwoong but then Hwanwoong reveals a more... unhinged violent side and Youngjo realises he's still absolutely whipped for him, maybe even more so. So that's what I wrote :]
The amount of softer build up was important but I still wanted to try and hint at Hwanwoong being more serious in order to lead into the unhinged second half. I think that's where the song inspiration came in, although I didn't really capture the more rowdy feral energy of the song (not that I intended to).
January 20th: What You Doing, Baby? [EE]
ONEUS, Dongju/Hwanwoong
We've got two Jan 20 xiwoongs incoming so lets go with the full fic one first.
Written because of, as said in the notes, Dongju's "what you doing, baby?" in the song. The song itself already has everything there for a sexting/phone sex fic but Dongju's little bit specifically there is so playful? Had to capture it in the form of him being a horny little shit and an absolute menace.
January 20th: insomnia [JJX]
ONEUS, Dongju/Hwanwoong
Originally just something I wrote down in discord when I couldn't sleep but I liked the vibes of it so I decided to post it on ao3. Not much else to it, I just liked it.
This was intended to be a 'let me ramble about how I feel about these fics now' section but most of my feelings towards some of these are just, 'yeah I wrote that, I still like it'. Oops.
I do like this one even if it's barely much of anything, I think it's still good despite the length, maybe even because of it. Also bioluminescence is fucking dope.
January 26th: just an Eternity away [JJX]
ONEUS, Geonhak/Youngjo/Dongju
The idea of Dongju with silver hair and blue lips tending to a garden that represents life is an idea I've had for a while, originating from a seoxiwoong fic idea I have yet to start writing. This fic came about because Ei fucking beat me to starting the OT3 tag and also because the fic he wrote for me just, absolutely consumed my mind and I couldn't go to bed until I'd written and finished this and I just fucking love celestial embodiments. Yeah. Garden representing life and death is just, Yes. I love it. I like this fic.
March 13th: chicken and chick kisses [JJX]
GOLDEN CHILD, Joochan/Youngtaek
First Golcha fic of the year and my first time writing jootaek. I kept it simple, pretty basic college au fluff with some comedy thrown in. I didn't really have a confident grasp on jootaek and I think I still don't but I don't hate this fic. It's just, there . I dunno, it's not a particularly good fic or one that I'd pick if I were to choose a handful of my fics to show off my writing. But it's not bad, and it's nice to have a normal everyday setting in a fic every once in a while.
Also, huh, I posted this a month before Youngtaek's birthday.
March 26th: summertime (run away with me) [JJX]
ONEUS, Geonhak/Dongju
Another songfic, another fic started in 2020 but not finished until after the new year. As said in the notes, it's inspired by MWM Xido's team name and it made me think of "You can run away with me / anytime you want" from MCR's Summertime.
When I wrote it, the very first parts I wrote were the beginning and the ending (as is the case for some of my other fics too. It's just how I get ideas sometimes, so that's how I start writing.) And I knew I wanted/needed the fic to have that sort of... trailing effect? Where the opening blends into both the main body of the fic as well as directly into the ending. As with how I write in general, this fic first started visually in my head and then I just had to put the vibes of it into words. I'm happy with how it turned out, I think it did turn out how I pictured it and how I wanted it to come out. But I do wish I could've done something... more to the actual train section. It just feels a little bit... meh as a liminal space description.
April 16th: skydive, free fall [JJX]
ONEUS, Geonhak/Seoho
My Fucking Beloved.
I am so proud of this fic. I love it. I think it's sexy as hell, I think it's really fucking good. It should be in the top 5 but it isn't and I'm going to blame my inability to write a good summary for it for that. But it's a damn good fic.
It's a fic I wrote almost as a vent fic, fuelled by the moods where I just want to write someone losing control on purpose and causing destruction around them as a result of their emotions.
It's about Geonhak's grief and regret and twisted yearning causing him to take everything out, and Youngjo not stopping him even though it should have been his responsibility to but he feels it too, so he encourages Geonhak instead. But silently, because he isn't supposed to.
It's victory ringing hollow and empty because you never really wanted to win, you never really wanted your rival to go away, you never wanted to take what they have. It's the parallel between Geonhak waking up with Seoho's powers and Geonhak waking up and using Seoho's powers to take everything down.
I popped the fuck off with this fic.
April 22nd: Cosmic (I'll Make You See Stars) [EE]
WOODZ, Seungyoun/Seungyoun
Denim's first selfcest and the start of my X1 descent, oh how it all started with Woodz, god bless.
Yeah, I mean, this is just pwp except with a small cameo of plot. Not a whole lot to say other than wow I started a new tag and people really liked this fic, it makes me very happy :] It's all because of the Love Me Harder MV, bless, thank you Mr Cho. Yeah, it's a good fic, I'm also pretty proud of the silly little "I'll make you see stars" joke.
May 15th: sugar, won't you pull the trigger (bang, bang) [EE]
X1, Seungyoun/Wooseok
Two Euphonics in a row, not a lot to say about this one either. As said in the notes, this was written because in two of their respective solo songs they both have lyrics related to "pull the trigger" where Seungyoun's is like a command or request, Wooseok's is "I pull the trigger". So I smushed them together. Their personal aesthetics in the fic are based on the aesthetics of their solo albums that had those lyrics and it was really fun to write.
June 16th: empty-handed [JJX]
X1, Seungyoun/Hangyul
Vent fic, depression fic, ventpression fic. Yeah, it's just inspired by the titular H&D song and how I relate to it.
I thought it was kinda fun to put it in the Moments of Happiness series because it's just. depression. It's about the absence of happiness, the memory of it feeling too far away to be real. It's just my emotions, that's the fic. It was sad to write but not in a bad way, that's just how it is. I don't regret it, I don't dislike it, it just is :]
June 26th: Fleeting [JJX]
ONEUS, Youngjo/Seoho
(sound of me scrambling to write an actual happy fic for the series after the previous fic)
I posted quite a few fics on the 26th of a month didn't I. This one's good, I really like it. I love Life/Death embodiments and coming up with how to characterise them and especially in a normal setting like at a cafe. Deciding how their powers and nature of their existences manifests in the environment around them was really fun. The idea that they have an invisible border/boundary between them was very good, I think, it let me do the flower suddenly bursting to life and Seoho's sweater 'dying' and falling apart when it crossed the boundary. It let me write this how I did, I think.
I wrote the ending first, I think, if I'm remembering right. So the whole fic was centred around the idea of them crossing the boundary between them to be together.
July 17th: Tug and Tie [EE]
GOLDEN CHILD, Sungyoon/Joochan
Final Euphonic fic of the year, and surprisingly my first finished NSFW hybrid fic.
I wanted to have something on Euphonic's Golcha pseud and I had this idea for a wajoo fic with this dynamic between them written down for a while so.... I made it happen. Not much else to say about it tbh.
July 20th: violet stars in an empty sky [JJX]
WEi, Daehyeon/Donghan/Yongha
Soul seeing fic, first WEi fic, it sure is something.
Okay I do still quite like this fic, I don't think I could've done a better job. It was fucking painful to write, trying to write each member's section and coming up with the soul colours and how to incorporate them into the fic. I think it was worth it though. It's unpleasant to think about now (probably because I don't WEi anymore) but I think this was a good fic. Not great, but good.
July 25th: homesick (walking on water) [JJX]
ONEUS, Geonhak/Seoho
I also popped off with this, I think. I don't have a whole lot to say about this one either I think? Writing this 'missing scene' and getting to dig my own hands into the sandpit of the dreamscape was really fun and honestly the best part, as it often is, was the reaction/response it got. This one was just fun to write, I love writing weird unreality things and dreamscapes.
August 6th: heart-wrenching [JJX]
GOLDEN CHILD, Bomin/Joochan
The beginning of my August rush of fics. Another unhinged-adjacent fic, as a treat. Love mad scientist Joochan. Also can you tell I had just finished an anatomy unit and I simply had to incorporate that new knowledge, also I just. I just like writing stuff like this. It's fuckin fun.
Making it bojoo didn't... really have much thought behind it? I don't remember. This is when I really did a dive back into Golcha though and I think bojoo's Singing in the Rain probably contributed to my first re-goldennessification fic being a bojoo.
August 12th: what it means (to you, to me, to us) [anon]
GOLDEN CHILD, Joochan/Donghyun
Oh this one's good. This one's just.. this is good. Writing in second person is fun. It's so much fun. This fic was just.. it felt good to write, it made me shake in my seat as I was writing it, as I was developing it. I am an absolute sucker for childhood friends to lovers and repetition over time, writing this made me aware that I am, in fact, a good writer. It's not the only fic to do that but second person writing is a different ballpark for me. This fic's also one that was... never meant to be long. 1k, maybe 1.5k at most, but no it reached 2k words. Dongchan brainworms really got to me.
August 23rd: Graveyard Whistling [JJX]
GOLDEN CHILD, Bomin/Joochan/Donghyun
Good song, good songfic. This is one I wrote on my phone initially while having the titular song playing on loop to infuse me with the ~vibes~
I'm happy enough with this fic, I think. It's nothing spectacular but it's not bad for what it is. The small amount of worldbuilding/lore I put in there is something I'd really like to explore in another fic though but it might be a bit wasted being in this one.
August 28th: From Now To Forever [JJX]
GOLDEN CHILD, Sungyoon/Joochan
My wajoo magnum opus. All my Moments of Happiness series fics live in the same doc and are ideas I have jotted down specifically for the series. All they need is to be written. This one wasn't initially meant to end with the implication of marriage/a marriage proposal but I'm very happy that's where I took it. The original idea was just 'Sungyoon wakes up and realises that yeah, this is what he'd like the rest of his life to be like', it was meant to be very focused on his thoughts and satisfaction and happiness with his life and the domesticity with Joochan and I'm very happy with how I wrote it.
August 29th: if you wait long enough [JJX]
GOLDEN CHILD, Joochan/Donghyun
I contain multitudes, the two genders: dongchan getting together and dongchan breaking up. It turns out, I quite like dongchan as exes.
This was another Nothing But Thieves songfic but it's not really based on the whole song, just the titular lyric. So more of a lyricfic? Really happy with the paralleling/bookmarking lines in this, it's something I love doing and I think that's very sexy of me.
August 30th: the aftermath is secondary [JJX]
GOLDEN CHILD, Bomin/Donghyun/Youngtaek
Holy fuck I wrote and posted a fic 3 days in a row. This one is actually a semi-vent fic, I came up with the summary line while I was sitting at dinner lmao. It was originally Joochan though, but then I decided that Donghyun would be more fun to write in this vent/expelling of emotions fic. I like the fanon Killjoys universe and, again, I love writing weird unreality shit. So the implied time loop/reincarnation aspect(s) of this fic were very fun to fuck with.
September 14th: you're my ice cold night [JJX]
GOLDEN CHILD, Donghyun/Youngtaek
The last of my 2021 Golcha fics. This was inspired by something I read? Maybe?
This and the previous fic were the culminations of my big ol' dongtaek era, they were my Two Big Golcha Biases during this re-nessification period of time, like wow. Wow. Yeah. I like hurt/comfort, I like punk/not-punk AUs, so this fic came to be.
November 11th: Terminality [JJX]
WEi, Donghan/Yongha
This was finished earlier than the 11th but I don't remember when. I changed the post date on ao3 to match the day it was revealed as part of the WEi Shooting Star fic fest. Overall, I'm really proud of it. I wish I could've written the liminal space-ness of the airport more and come up with more scenes that would really explore that but I'm really happy with the fic as it is. It's an excellent note to leave on with my exit from the fandom sdljflskdjf
November 12th: if you start floating away (got the universe on your side) [JJX]
ONEWE, Hyungu/Giwook
I wanted to write at least one thing for 2021's wevember and I love space themes so of course day 11: Swimming Through the Cosmos immediately called to me :']
I've tagged this as 'long title oops' and yeah wow, having to type it into this post was. Yup that sure is a long fuckin fic title, past me. But that's just how it is when you choose to use song lyrics for a title because this was a songfic... But for two songs. ATL's Ground Control is a song I've been wanting to write a songfic for for a very, very long time (and I have an ONF fic idea for it actually but that's another story) and also I went and actually looked up a lyric video for Cosmos and god that song hit me hard.
Writing weird fantasy/sci-fiy space boy Giwook was a huge fuckin treat, from me, to me, by me. It's another very visual based fic which I think is.. maybe pretty clear? from how I described Giwook's space appearance. I love found family stories and the idea that everyone has a little piece of space in them and with space being Giwook's home linking to his home being in the other members too.
November 15th: cold hands (wilted bloom) [JJX]
SEVENTEEN, Soonyoung/Minghao
I put a lot of effort and care into this fic, I mean I do into all of my writing but this fic just... felt very personal. It.. isn't really all that personal but emotionally I put a lot into it. As my first SVT fic it's... certainly a choice but I have no regrets. I knew this wouldn't get much in terms of interaction and yes, that is always going to be upsetting to feel like I'm writing for an empty void, but with this fic I... don't mind as much? Okay that's a lie, I put a lot into this fic and I think it's a great fucking fic and it makes me a little bitter to get so little response but, what can ya do?
I'm still happy with it and proud of it regardless. Death is a very important and interesting topic to me as well as mourning and grief and I think my favourite part of the fic is the "The afterlife has perfectly preserved him as he was— immortalisation [...]". It's something I kind of touch on in if everybody's letting go but that one is about time and people changing and people having layers to them and having past selves mourned and preserved in memories. It's the idea of immortality and finality that comes with death. cold hands (wilted bloom) is very important to me.
November 16th: smoke smudge [JJX]
SEVENTEEN, Vernon/Minghao
Another fic where I had the idea written down for a while (that's. a very common thing for most of my writing. I write the idea down then don't write it for months because I have too many in progress wips x_x). This idea came from both the Rock With You MV and a fic I read that had punk biker Minghao and boy was that a combination. I actually didn't realise verhao was a... decently big ship in the fandom until after I wrote this. And now I have a sequel 'planned' -- meaning the idea is written down but has yet to be started.
I kinda struggled writing it because I don't read Vernon or Vernon ship fics and I didn't feel confident in my writing of him. Putting him as the perspective character helped with that though, I think, or maybe I did a better job than I thought? I'm probably just being too hard on myself for this one, I tend to do that since I have high expectations for myself and my writing. But this fic is good, I think I ultimately did a good job on this one and it came out well.
December 20th: so ravns been talking about nfts [anon]
ONEUS
exactly 69 words. nice.
nothing deep about this one other than fuck nfts.
December 31st: if everybody's letting go, let's do it with both hands [JJX]
SEVENTEEN, Soonyoung/Chan
Snuck in a final fic on the last day of the year that I had started and finished on that day. God, 17hols really got to me. I caved in and amassed a list of prompts I wanted to potentially write a fill for the night before and I managed to narrow the list down to 3 that I had snippets in mind for already. The first thing I had written for this fic was the summary "Chan is the first casualty. [...]" bit and that just gripped me when I started writing the next day. Like, that and the idea that this fic would be formatted as a list of things Chan learns was what made me go 'okay. this is the one I'm writing first, this is the one I'm writing right now'
I specifically alluded to the snowy winter outside a restaurant soonchan story because it's something that's very important to both of them irl and I wanted to include it in this -- both as a memory and then when Dino gets his tattoo one snowy winter dawn and Hoshi is there with him, that was meant to parallel the past instance of it and further the idea that Chan's Soonyoung is still there inside Dino's Hoshi. If you want to get even deeper with it, it represents how our past selves are still important and present in our current selves even if we've changed. They may be gone and we may mourn them but they still played a part in shaping who we are, even if we aren't fully aware of it.
My favourite tag on this fic is the one about mourning the death of past selves. Again, death (and mourning) is a very important topic to me and I love writing about it. if everybody's letting go is a fic I'm proud of and a fic I'm very glad I wrote even through all the self doubt and wavering confidence I felt while writing it.
I'm also quite proud that I managed to finish it before the new year. For the last month I've been unable to finish any of my wips -- I've been making progress on them but most of the time I just haven't had any energy to write. But this fic really just... started and never stopped and I was having so much fun writing it. It's what I think I'd been needing to write -- this sort of universe, this sort of story structure, this sort of plot and development, and I'm glad I found it, I'm glad I could come up with it. I'm really proud I wrote it.
I hope I can continue having this feeling towards my writing in 2022.
-Jeans
This is just going to be a semi-structured talk/ramble of thoughts on everything I wrote and published this year on ao3. It's my first time doing something retrospective like this (as in, something actually written down instead of just being thoughts bonking around in my head) for my writing.
I think I'll divide this into sections:
- Total word count
- Stats — top 5 for hits, kudos, comments, and bookmarks
- Thoughts & Process Talk — going fic by fic (in chronological order) and just giving my thoughts on what it was like to write, how the process went, how I feel about the final product, etc.
———
Totals
| jjx | euphonic | |
| word count | 41,656 | 9,705 |
It's not a surprise that I wrote more on jjx than on euphonic this past year, especially since the only reason my word count total on euphonic in 2020 got as high as it did was because of the xiwoong relay fic I was a co-author on.
I didn't even expect to break 40k this year since I was at 39k for a month with a few main wips I wanted to finish before the new year but no actual finish point in sight for them. But then, of course, I caved and looked through the 17hols prompts (I still have a window open with 17 different prompts I want to write a fill for) and wrote if everybody's letting go. I still didn't expect that to reach 2k though.
This is also making me realise that I absolutely do not have the energy to reread 50k of my own writing fic by fic when I do my thoughts/process section.
Since this is my first year doing this, I don't have a previous year to compare my word count to (because I don't want to go through 2020 stats). So we'll see how much I write this year :]
I didn't even expect to break 40k this year since I was at 39k for a month with a few main wips I wanted to finish before the new year but no actual finish point in sight for them. But then, of course, I caved and looked through the 17hols prompts (I still have a window open with 17 different prompts I want to write a fill for) and wrote if everybody's letting go. I still didn't expect that to reach 2k though.
This is also making me realise that I absolutely do not have the energy to reread 50k of my own writing fic by fic when I do my thoughts/process section.
Since this is my first year doing this, I don't have a previous year to compare my word count to (because I don't want to go through 2020 stats). So we'll see how much I write this year :]
———
Stats
| hits | jjx | euphonic | kudos | jjx | euphonic | comments | jjx | euphonic | bookmarks | jjx | euphonic | |||
| #1 | innocence for days (444) | lights out (456) | #1 | innocence for days (51) | lights out (49) | #1 | innocence for days (9) | lights out (9) | #1 | homesick (8) | lights out (14) | |||
| #2 | summertime (343) | what u doing (407) | #2 | chicken and chick kisses (45) | what u doing (34) | #2 | an Eternity away (6) | what u doing (8) | #2 | innocence for days (7) | cosmic (13) | |||
| #3 | an Eternity away (292) | sugar (251) | #3 | an Eternity away (36) | cosmic (26) | #3 | Fleeting (6) | cosmic (7) | #3 | chicken and chick kisses (6) | what u doing (11) | |||
| #4 | From Now to Forever (278) | cosmic (219) | #4 | rosemary (32) | sugar (24) | #4 | Terminality (6) | tug and tie (4) | #4 | summertime (5) | sugar (5) | |||
| #5 | chicken and chick kisses (260) | tug and tie (179) | #5 | summertime (31) | tug and tie (16) | #5 | summertime (5) | sugar (4) | #5 | an Eternity away (4) | tug and tie (4) |
Alright, that took fucking forever.
I'm not going to try make any general statements about "oh readers are more likely to leave kudos on [x] type of fics but leave comments on [y] type of fics" because I do not possess the brain cells nor energy to do that. And this is just for fun, I don't plan to change the trajectory of what I write in order to get more hits/kudos/comments/etc. I write what I wanna write, readers will interact with what they want. Sigh.
Anyway, I only wrote 5 fics this year on euphonic so the top 5 is just a shuffle around of those. Actually... the top 5s for jjx are almost like that too. I feel like I'm doing an awards ceremony for my fics now.
(Announcer voice) and congratulations to innocence for days for getting first in all but one of the categories, alas they were beaten by just one bookmark for that final #1 bookmarks position by homesick. grand prize congratulations to euphonic's Lights Out though, it scored #1 in every single category.
Onto the meat of this post.
———
Thoughts/Process/Explanation
January 2nd/10th: rosemary [JJX]
ONEUS, Youngjo/Dongju
Ah yes, the one I started at the end of 2020 but only finished after the new year... and then had to sit on it waiting to post on Dongju's birthday.
Placing this fic first chronologically because it was done on the 2nd and I just posted it later.
I don't have too much to say on the process of this one, I think? It started as something I was writing in a private discord chat and then I transferred it to an actual document to write it properly.
The 'rosemary is a demon repellent' thing isn't something I got from looking up flower meanings or anything like that, I took it from Bayonetta. Both meanings, actually, the demon repellent one and the remembrance one.
No other thoughts, I still quite like this fic! And it got #4 for kudos so I'm glad people like it too, especially since xijo fics really were sparse at the time I wrote it and it felt like I was shouting into a void to be ignored.
January 5th: Lights Out [EE]
Number 1 euphonic fic of the year what a legend. The fic inspired by the gay that Leedo's Devil concept image gave me. I'm pretty proud of this one.
Titling fics always sucks (haha) but I think this one came pretty quickly?
It's titled after the Hollywood Undead song and I liked that 'lights out' could refer to literally, turn the lights off because this is a horny fic, but the 'lights out' from the song refers to getting knocked out in a fight which is what the setup of the fic actually is.
January 12th: [we've got] innocence for days [JJX]
ONEUS, Youngjo/Hwanwoong
Number 1 jjxneus fic of the year! I'm simultaneously proud that my two top fics were ones from the beginning of the year and they managed to stay top to the end of the year, but also, wow I kinda went on a downhill slope huh? In terms of stats, that is, I think the quality of my writing at the end of the year was still very high.
In any case, I can't remember now what got me started on this fic but I think the song inspiration came later? Scratch that, I remember: I was inspired by another fic and I wanted to write something where Youngjo loves Hwanwoong but then Hwanwoong reveals a more... unhinged violent side and Youngjo realises he's still absolutely whipped for him, maybe even more so. So that's what I wrote :]
The amount of softer build up was important but I still wanted to try and hint at Hwanwoong being more serious in order to lead into the unhinged second half. I think that's where the song inspiration came in, although I didn't really capture the more rowdy feral energy of the song (not that I intended to).
January 20th: What You Doing, Baby? [EE]
ONEUS, Dongju/Hwanwoong
We've got two Jan 20 xiwoongs incoming so lets go with the full fic one first.
Written because of, as said in the notes, Dongju's "what you doing, baby?" in the song. The song itself already has everything there for a sexting/phone sex fic but Dongju's little bit specifically there is so playful? Had to capture it in the form of him being a horny little shit and an absolute menace.
January 20th: insomnia [JJX]
ONEUS, Dongju/Hwanwoong
Originally just something I wrote down in discord when I couldn't sleep but I liked the vibes of it so I decided to post it on ao3. Not much else to it, I just liked it.
This was intended to be a 'let me ramble about how I feel about these fics now' section but most of my feelings towards some of these are just, 'yeah I wrote that, I still like it'. Oops.
I do like this one even if it's barely much of anything, I think it's still good despite the length, maybe even because of it. Also bioluminescence is fucking dope.
January 26th: just an Eternity away [JJX]
ONEUS, Geonhak/Youngjo/Dongju
The idea of Dongju with silver hair and blue lips tending to a garden that represents life is an idea I've had for a while, originating from a seoxiwoong fic idea I have yet to start writing. This fic came about because Ei fucking beat me to starting the OT3 tag and also because the fic he wrote for me just, absolutely consumed my mind and I couldn't go to bed until I'd written and finished this and I just fucking love celestial embodiments. Yeah. Garden representing life and death is just, Yes. I love it. I like this fic.
March 13th: chicken and chick kisses [JJX]
GOLDEN CHILD, Joochan/Youngtaek
First Golcha fic of the year and my first time writing jootaek. I kept it simple, pretty basic college au fluff with some comedy thrown in. I didn't really have a confident grasp on jootaek and I think I still don't but I don't hate this fic. It's just, there . I dunno, it's not a particularly good fic or one that I'd pick if I were to choose a handful of my fics to show off my writing. But it's not bad, and it's nice to have a normal everyday setting in a fic every once in a while.
Also, huh, I posted this a month before Youngtaek's birthday.
March 26th: summertime (run away with me) [JJX]
ONEUS, Geonhak/Dongju
Another songfic, another fic started in 2020 but not finished until after the new year. As said in the notes, it's inspired by MWM Xido's team name and it made me think of "You can run away with me / anytime you want" from MCR's Summertime.
When I wrote it, the very first parts I wrote were the beginning and the ending (as is the case for some of my other fics too. It's just how I get ideas sometimes, so that's how I start writing.) And I knew I wanted/needed the fic to have that sort of... trailing effect? Where the opening blends into both the main body of the fic as well as directly into the ending. As with how I write in general, this fic first started visually in my head and then I just had to put the vibes of it into words. I'm happy with how it turned out, I think it did turn out how I pictured it and how I wanted it to come out. But I do wish I could've done something... more to the actual train section. It just feels a little bit... meh as a liminal space description.
April 16th: skydive, free fall [JJX]
ONEUS, Geonhak/Seoho
My Fucking Beloved.
I am so proud of this fic. I love it. I think it's sexy as hell, I think it's really fucking good. It should be in the top 5 but it isn't and I'm going to blame my inability to write a good summary for it for that. But it's a damn good fic.
It's a fic I wrote almost as a vent fic, fuelled by the moods where I just want to write someone losing control on purpose and causing destruction around them as a result of their emotions.
It's about Geonhak's grief and regret and twisted yearning causing him to take everything out, and Youngjo not stopping him even though it should have been his responsibility to but he feels it too, so he encourages Geonhak instead. But silently, because he isn't supposed to.
It's victory ringing hollow and empty because you never really wanted to win, you never really wanted your rival to go away, you never wanted to take what they have. It's the parallel between Geonhak waking up with Seoho's powers and Geonhak waking up and using Seoho's powers to take everything down.
I popped the fuck off with this fic.
April 22nd: Cosmic (I'll Make You See Stars) [EE]
WOODZ, Seungyoun/Seungyoun
Denim's first selfcest and the start of my X1 descent, oh how it all started with Woodz, god bless.
Yeah, I mean, this is just pwp except with a small cameo of plot. Not a whole lot to say other than wow I started a new tag and people really liked this fic, it makes me very happy :] It's all because of the Love Me Harder MV, bless, thank you Mr Cho. Yeah, it's a good fic, I'm also pretty proud of the silly little "I'll make you see stars" joke.
May 15th: sugar, won't you pull the trigger (bang, bang) [EE]
X1, Seungyoun/Wooseok
Two Euphonics in a row, not a lot to say about this one either. As said in the notes, this was written because in two of their respective solo songs they both have lyrics related to "pull the trigger" where Seungyoun's is like a command or request, Wooseok's is "I pull the trigger". So I smushed them together. Their personal aesthetics in the fic are based on the aesthetics of their solo albums that had those lyrics and it was really fun to write.
June 16th: empty-handed [JJX]
X1, Seungyoun/Hangyul
Vent fic, depression fic, ventpression fic. Yeah, it's just inspired by the titular H&D song and how I relate to it.
I thought it was kinda fun to put it in the Moments of Happiness series because it's just. depression. It's about the absence of happiness, the memory of it feeling too far away to be real. It's just my emotions, that's the fic. It was sad to write but not in a bad way, that's just how it is. I don't regret it, I don't dislike it, it just is :]
June 26th: Fleeting [JJX]
ONEUS, Youngjo/Seoho
(sound of me scrambling to write an actual happy fic for the series after the previous fic)
I posted quite a few fics on the 26th of a month didn't I. This one's good, I really like it. I love Life/Death embodiments and coming up with how to characterise them and especially in a normal setting like at a cafe. Deciding how their powers and nature of their existences manifests in the environment around them was really fun. The idea that they have an invisible border/boundary between them was very good, I think, it let me do the flower suddenly bursting to life and Seoho's sweater 'dying' and falling apart when it crossed the boundary. It let me write this how I did, I think.
I wrote the ending first, I think, if I'm remembering right. So the whole fic was centred around the idea of them crossing the boundary between them to be together.
July 17th: Tug and Tie [EE]
GOLDEN CHILD, Sungyoon/Joochan
Final Euphonic fic of the year, and surprisingly my first finished NSFW hybrid fic.
I wanted to have something on Euphonic's Golcha pseud and I had this idea for a wajoo fic with this dynamic between them written down for a while so.... I made it happen. Not much else to say about it tbh.
July 20th: violet stars in an empty sky [JJX]
WEi, Daehyeon/Donghan/Yongha
Soul seeing fic, first WEi fic, it sure is something.
Okay I do still quite like this fic, I don't think I could've done a better job. It was fucking painful to write, trying to write each member's section and coming up with the soul colours and how to incorporate them into the fic. I think it was worth it though. It's unpleasant to think about now (probably because I don't WEi anymore) but I think this was a good fic. Not great, but good.
July 25th: homesick (walking on water) [JJX]
ONEUS, Geonhak/Seoho
I also popped off with this, I think. I don't have a whole lot to say about this one either I think? Writing this 'missing scene' and getting to dig my own hands into the sandpit of the dreamscape was really fun and honestly the best part, as it often is, was the reaction/response it got. This one was just fun to write, I love writing weird unreality things and dreamscapes.
August 6th: heart-wrenching [JJX]
GOLDEN CHILD, Bomin/Joochan
The beginning of my August rush of fics. Another unhinged-adjacent fic, as a treat. Love mad scientist Joochan. Also can you tell I had just finished an anatomy unit and I simply had to incorporate that new knowledge, also I just. I just like writing stuff like this. It's fuckin fun.
Making it bojoo didn't... really have much thought behind it? I don't remember. This is when I really did a dive back into Golcha though and I think bojoo's Singing in the Rain probably contributed to my first re-goldennessification fic being a bojoo.
August 12th: what it means (to you, to me, to us) [anon]
GOLDEN CHILD, Joochan/Donghyun
Oh this one's good. This one's just.. this is good. Writing in second person is fun. It's so much fun. This fic was just.. it felt good to write, it made me shake in my seat as I was writing it, as I was developing it. I am an absolute sucker for childhood friends to lovers and repetition over time, writing this made me aware that I am, in fact, a good writer. It's not the only fic to do that but second person writing is a different ballpark for me. This fic's also one that was... never meant to be long. 1k, maybe 1.5k at most, but no it reached 2k words. Dongchan brainworms really got to me.
August 23rd: Graveyard Whistling [JJX]
GOLDEN CHILD, Bomin/Joochan/Donghyun
Good song, good songfic. This is one I wrote on my phone initially while having the titular song playing on loop to infuse me with the ~vibes~
I'm happy enough with this fic, I think. It's nothing spectacular but it's not bad for what it is. The small amount of worldbuilding/lore I put in there is something I'd really like to explore in another fic though but it might be a bit wasted being in this one.
August 28th: From Now To Forever [JJX]
GOLDEN CHILD, Sungyoon/Joochan
My wajoo magnum opus. All my Moments of Happiness series fics live in the same doc and are ideas I have jotted down specifically for the series. All they need is to be written. This one wasn't initially meant to end with the implication of marriage/a marriage proposal but I'm very happy that's where I took it. The original idea was just 'Sungyoon wakes up and realises that yeah, this is what he'd like the rest of his life to be like', it was meant to be very focused on his thoughts and satisfaction and happiness with his life and the domesticity with Joochan and I'm very happy with how I wrote it.
August 29th: if you wait long enough [JJX]
GOLDEN CHILD, Joochan/Donghyun
I contain multitudes, the two genders: dongchan getting together and dongchan breaking up. It turns out, I quite like dongchan as exes.
This was another Nothing But Thieves songfic but it's not really based on the whole song, just the titular lyric. So more of a lyricfic? Really happy with the paralleling/bookmarking lines in this, it's something I love doing and I think that's very sexy of me.
August 30th: the aftermath is secondary [JJX]
GOLDEN CHILD, Bomin/Donghyun/Youngtaek
Holy fuck I wrote and posted a fic 3 days in a row. This one is actually a semi-vent fic, I came up with the summary line while I was sitting at dinner lmao. It was originally Joochan though, but then I decided that Donghyun would be more fun to write in this vent/expelling of emotions fic. I like the fanon Killjoys universe and, again, I love writing weird unreality shit. So the implied time loop/reincarnation aspect(s) of this fic were very fun to fuck with.
September 14th: you're my ice cold night [JJX]
GOLDEN CHILD, Donghyun/Youngtaek
The last of my 2021 Golcha fics. This was inspired by something I read? Maybe?
This and the previous fic were the culminations of my big ol' dongtaek era, they were my Two Big Golcha Biases during this re-nessification period of time, like wow. Wow. Yeah. I like hurt/comfort, I like punk/not-punk AUs, so this fic came to be.
November 11th: Terminality [JJX]
WEi, Donghan/Yongha
This was finished earlier than the 11th but I don't remember when. I changed the post date on ao3 to match the day it was revealed as part of the WEi Shooting Star fic fest. Overall, I'm really proud of it. I wish I could've written the liminal space-ness of the airport more and come up with more scenes that would really explore that but I'm really happy with the fic as it is. It's an excellent note to leave on with my exit from the fandom sdljflskdjf
November 12th: if you start floating away (got the universe on your side) [JJX]
ONEWE, Hyungu/Giwook
I wanted to write at least one thing for 2021's wevember and I love space themes so of course day 11: Swimming Through the Cosmos immediately called to me :']
I've tagged this as 'long title oops' and yeah wow, having to type it into this post was. Yup that sure is a long fuckin fic title, past me. But that's just how it is when you choose to use song lyrics for a title because this was a songfic... But for two songs. ATL's Ground Control is a song I've been wanting to write a songfic for for a very, very long time (and I have an ONF fic idea for it actually but that's another story) and also I went and actually looked up a lyric video for Cosmos and god that song hit me hard.
Writing weird fantasy/sci-fiy space boy Giwook was a huge fuckin treat, from me, to me, by me. It's another very visual based fic which I think is.. maybe pretty clear? from how I described Giwook's space appearance. I love found family stories and the idea that everyone has a little piece of space in them and with space being Giwook's home linking to his home being in the other members too.
November 15th: cold hands (wilted bloom) [JJX]
SEVENTEEN, Soonyoung/Minghao
I put a lot of effort and care into this fic, I mean I do into all of my writing but this fic just... felt very personal. It.. isn't really all that personal but emotionally I put a lot into it. As my first SVT fic it's... certainly a choice but I have no regrets. I knew this wouldn't get much in terms of interaction and yes, that is always going to be upsetting to feel like I'm writing for an empty void, but with this fic I... don't mind as much? Okay that's a lie, I put a lot into this fic and I think it's a great fucking fic and it makes me a little bitter to get so little response but, what can ya do?
I'm still happy with it and proud of it regardless. Death is a very important and interesting topic to me as well as mourning and grief and I think my favourite part of the fic is the "The afterlife has perfectly preserved him as he was— immortalisation [...]". It's something I kind of touch on in if everybody's letting go but that one is about time and people changing and people having layers to them and having past selves mourned and preserved in memories. It's the idea of immortality and finality that comes with death. cold hands (wilted bloom) is very important to me.
November 16th: smoke smudge [JJX]
SEVENTEEN, Vernon/Minghao
Another fic where I had the idea written down for a while (that's. a very common thing for most of my writing. I write the idea down then don't write it for months because I have too many in progress wips x_x). This idea came from both the Rock With You MV and a fic I read that had punk biker Minghao and boy was that a combination. I actually didn't realise verhao was a... decently big ship in the fandom until after I wrote this. And now I have a sequel 'planned' -- meaning the idea is written down but has yet to be started.
I kinda struggled writing it because I don't read Vernon or Vernon ship fics and I didn't feel confident in my writing of him. Putting him as the perspective character helped with that though, I think, or maybe I did a better job than I thought? I'm probably just being too hard on myself for this one, I tend to do that since I have high expectations for myself and my writing. But this fic is good, I think I ultimately did a good job on this one and it came out well.
December 20th: so ravns been talking about nfts [anon]
ONEUS
exactly 69 words. nice.
nothing deep about this one other than fuck nfts.
December 31st: if everybody's letting go, let's do it with both hands [JJX]
SEVENTEEN, Soonyoung/Chan
Snuck in a final fic on the last day of the year that I had started and finished on that day. God, 17hols really got to me. I caved in and amassed a list of prompts I wanted to potentially write a fill for the night before and I managed to narrow the list down to 3 that I had snippets in mind for already. The first thing I had written for this fic was the summary "Chan is the first casualty. [...]" bit and that just gripped me when I started writing the next day. Like, that and the idea that this fic would be formatted as a list of things Chan learns was what made me go 'okay. this is the one I'm writing first, this is the one I'm writing right now'
I specifically alluded to the snowy winter outside a restaurant soonchan story because it's something that's very important to both of them irl and I wanted to include it in this -- both as a memory and then when Dino gets his tattoo one snowy winter dawn and Hoshi is there with him, that was meant to parallel the past instance of it and further the idea that Chan's Soonyoung is still there inside Dino's Hoshi. If you want to get even deeper with it, it represents how our past selves are still important and present in our current selves even if we've changed. They may be gone and we may mourn them but they still played a part in shaping who we are, even if we aren't fully aware of it.
My favourite tag on this fic is the one about mourning the death of past selves. Again, death (and mourning) is a very important topic to me and I love writing about it. if everybody's letting go is a fic I'm proud of and a fic I'm very glad I wrote even through all the self doubt and wavering confidence I felt while writing it.
I'm also quite proud that I managed to finish it before the new year. For the last month I've been unable to finish any of my wips -- I've been making progress on them but most of the time I just haven't had any energy to write. But this fic really just... started and never stopped and I was having so much fun writing it. It's what I think I'd been needing to write -- this sort of universe, this sort of story structure, this sort of plot and development, and I'm glad I found it, I'm glad I could come up with it. I'm really proud I wrote it.
I hope I can continue having this feeling towards my writing in 2022.
-Jeans
