The hard sell
Nov. 28th, 2025 10:20 am![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
baroque_mongooseI put a lot of stories on AO3. In fact, I've got 100 of them up there now; most of them are, of course, fanfic, but a few - especially the most recent - are original work. AO3 allows original work as long as it can be deemed to be fannish in some way, and, honestly, that's pretty much anything. You don't write in a particular genre unless you are, at least to some extent, a fan of that genre. Very few writers are so original as to be completely sui generis, and I'm certainly not one of them. I don't have a problem with that; it's entirely possible to have original ideas within a set context, and that's one of the reasons why I'm quite happy to write fanfic.
Anyway, my most recent story is about a woman who's had enough. She's not an especially nice woman, and a lot of the difficulty she's in is her own fault, but nonetheless she has been badly treated. Specifically, while she was still married to someone else, she had an affair with a certain man, and this man persuaded her to get her husband to divorce her so that they could marry. Her husband was reluctant to do that, but in the end she got him to divorce her by dint of permanently moving out. She then, naturally, expected her lover to marry her; but he delayed and made excuses, and then eventually dumped her in favour of a much younger woman, leaving her high and dry. In desperation she tried going back to her former husband, only to find he'd now married someone else and they were about to emigrate.
So she decides she's not taking this lying down, and she shows up at her ex-lover's wedding, fully determined to make a public scene... which she does. I won't tell you how the story ends; I'll just say it wasn't what I was originally expecting, which is often the way with stories. Characters are inclined to do their own thing, once they've been properly established, and what happened with this story was that someone who was originally intended to have an essential but minor role in the proceedings unexpectedly became the hero of the story. And, because of that, there's a very welcome note of hope I hadn't anticipated.
This story has gone down very well, and obviously I'm delighted about that. However, it also set off a chain of events I didn't quite expect. I got a comment from someone who said she had some creative ideas about some of my characters, and could she talk?
So, of course, I thought she was interested in a writing collaboration. I mean, you would. And I'm always happy to do those, as long as I'm satisfied that my co-writer and I are on the same wavelength, as was very much the case with Magda. It's frustrating for both parties when you're not, and one person writes a character and the other one then takes that character off in a totally wrong direction. I thought, OK, let's hear these creative ideas, and if they fit with the characters as they've been established we can take it from there.
As it turned out, she wasn't a writer at all. She was an artist. And, don't get me wrong, she was a good artist; she specialised in fantasy character drawing. If you need a D&D elf monk or a Shadowrun catgirl, I'd be delighted to put you in touch with her. But... and it is quite a big "but"... you'd better be very certain you want to commission her.
What she wanted to do, it turned out, was to illustrate a particular scene from my story; but she wanted me to commission her to do it. I said the idea was great, I liked her art style, and I'd be delighted to recommend her to other people, but... no, thanks. The thing is, if I were publishing a book, it'd be reasonable to pay an illustrator; but I'm not paying someone to do an illustration I don't need for a story I'm letting people read free of charge.
"Oh," she said. "Is there an issue?"
"No, there's no issue. I just don't want to commission an illustration. Thanks all the same."
"Ah, but my prices are probably a lot more affordable than you think. And I can do an easy payment plan. Let me show you my prices."
"No, thank you."
"The payment plan is in three stages. You won't even notice it."
By this stage I'm quite glad we're talking on the Internet and she can't see me rolling my eyes. This went on a bit longer, with her trying to insist and me very politely digging my heels in and refusing to move, until finally I said, "No. I really don't see how I can possibly make that any clearer."
To my enormous relief, that worked. The conversation closed on quite amicable terms, which means that, despite her best efforts to botch things up, I've still got a good fantasy artist I can contact if I need to.
But only if I need to.
Anyway, my most recent story is about a woman who's had enough. She's not an especially nice woman, and a lot of the difficulty she's in is her own fault, but nonetheless she has been badly treated. Specifically, while she was still married to someone else, she had an affair with a certain man, and this man persuaded her to get her husband to divorce her so that they could marry. Her husband was reluctant to do that, but in the end she got him to divorce her by dint of permanently moving out. She then, naturally, expected her lover to marry her; but he delayed and made excuses, and then eventually dumped her in favour of a much younger woman, leaving her high and dry. In desperation she tried going back to her former husband, only to find he'd now married someone else and they were about to emigrate.
So she decides she's not taking this lying down, and she shows up at her ex-lover's wedding, fully determined to make a public scene... which she does. I won't tell you how the story ends; I'll just say it wasn't what I was originally expecting, which is often the way with stories. Characters are inclined to do their own thing, once they've been properly established, and what happened with this story was that someone who was originally intended to have an essential but minor role in the proceedings unexpectedly became the hero of the story. And, because of that, there's a very welcome note of hope I hadn't anticipated.
This story has gone down very well, and obviously I'm delighted about that. However, it also set off a chain of events I didn't quite expect. I got a comment from someone who said she had some creative ideas about some of my characters, and could she talk?
So, of course, I thought she was interested in a writing collaboration. I mean, you would. And I'm always happy to do those, as long as I'm satisfied that my co-writer and I are on the same wavelength, as was very much the case with Magda. It's frustrating for both parties when you're not, and one person writes a character and the other one then takes that character off in a totally wrong direction. I thought, OK, let's hear these creative ideas, and if they fit with the characters as they've been established we can take it from there.
As it turned out, she wasn't a writer at all. She was an artist. And, don't get me wrong, she was a good artist; she specialised in fantasy character drawing. If you need a D&D elf monk or a Shadowrun catgirl, I'd be delighted to put you in touch with her. But... and it is quite a big "but"... you'd better be very certain you want to commission her.
What she wanted to do, it turned out, was to illustrate a particular scene from my story; but she wanted me to commission her to do it. I said the idea was great, I liked her art style, and I'd be delighted to recommend her to other people, but... no, thanks. The thing is, if I were publishing a book, it'd be reasonable to pay an illustrator; but I'm not paying someone to do an illustration I don't need for a story I'm letting people read free of charge.
"Oh," she said. "Is there an issue?"
"No, there's no issue. I just don't want to commission an illustration. Thanks all the same."
"Ah, but my prices are probably a lot more affordable than you think. And I can do an easy payment plan. Let me show you my prices."
"No, thank you."
"The payment plan is in three stages. You won't even notice it."
By this stage I'm quite glad we're talking on the Internet and she can't see me rolling my eyes. This went on a bit longer, with her trying to insist and me very politely digging my heels in and refusing to move, until finally I said, "No. I really don't see how I can possibly make that any clearer."
To my enormous relief, that worked. The conversation closed on quite amicable terms, which means that, despite her best efforts to botch things up, I've still got a good fantasy artist I can contact if I need to.
But only if I need to.
