poll-time!

[asimplechord]

Last night why_me_why_not reminded me about the vampire!Jon fic that's sitting unfinished.

It's languishing partly because I'm a slacker, but also because it was originally started as a back-and-forth comment fic, and the POV switches between Brendon and Jon.

Now, personally? I hate back and forth POVs within a scene. It's okay if it's a clearly marked, between-scene change, but I find it off-putting to read one paragraph in one person's head, and then the next paragraph is someone else's POV.

But if I put all the fic in one POV, I lose some details. Or more dialogue has to be added, something has to be done to get the reader to see the other character's POV without actually, you know, head-skipping.

Then it occurred to me: maybe I'm just anal about this. Thus, A POLL! (Well, also because I was in the mood for some ticky-boxes.)


[Poll #1254298]

Comments

[shutyourface.livejournal.com]

I'm mostly okay with them if they're marked and the shift is even. Don't write 95% of the story from the POV of Character A and then throw in like, three of Character B's thoughts. >:(

[asimplechord.livejournal.com]

Urgh, no 95%A and 5%B just doesn't work at all. If it's going to be like that, I'd rather just work around the alternate POVs, do little outtakes that can be read separately from the overall fic!

[inkandchaos.livejournal.com]

Like anything that's "against the rules", it can be made to work if it's done RIGHT. *How* to do it right isn't as simple as paint-by-numbers, just a matter of wrestling with it until the end scan works.

Good luck. :)

[asimplechord.livejournal.com]

:) Thanks!

Have fun w/ the girls and FRANK!

[why-me-why-not.livejournal.com]

I know I told you that it's your fic and you can do what you want, but that's b/c I'll read it either way. But when I'm actually reading fic, I hate Hate HATE alternating POVs unless it's clearly distiguishable.

[asimplechord.livejournal.com]

Tabby, I am work and I am bored. BORED. Don't want to start anything new, don't feel like reading papers. Tell me something good?

[why-me-why-not.livejournal.com]

Um... Brendon is shiny? :P

http://sunsetmog-fics.livejournal.com/31469.html <-- TO BE READ (for you obviously; I already read it)

You can write fic for Crystal for me so I can finish typing up real fic, lol. She asked me for Tom and Travie and Drew and IDEK. haha.

[asimplechord.livejournal.com]

I was just looking at the bit that I wrote in chat that was Drew/Travie. I don't really know what to do with it. I sorta just want to fill it out enough to hit 500 words and post it as a Warped drabble.

[why-me-why-not.livejournal.com]

Do it! *encourages* She didn't say Tom/Travie/Drew, so I'm leaning towards something in the tom/cassie/jon 'verse that has apparently taken up residence in my head.

[asimplechord.livejournal.com]

Posted.

Mm, Tom/Cassie/Jon. So, what happened after Jon told Tom he was a fucking idiot?

[why-me-why-not.livejournal.com]

Sex

[asimplechord.livejournal.com]

Well, yeah, obvs. DETAILS, WOMAN!

[why-me-why-not.livejournal.com]

I CAN ONLY DO ONE THING AT A TIME! :P

(Also, my kid is out in the front yard singing I Kissed a Boy. *hides*)

Brendon/Spencer first, b/c I written nearly everything except their sexytimes and the ending.

Tidbit in the meantime:

Cassie's hands are soft, her touch gentle and just a little uncertain, and it's not enough; it's a tease, like promising something that can't be fulfilled because Jon is nowhere near Chicago and there’s only so much they can do without him. But here In this bed, it's easy enough for Tom to close his eyes and imagine it's the three of them, and it's automatic that both their names slip off his tongue godCassieJonfuck as he arches into Cassie's touch.

“Fuck, Tom.”

Tom's eyes fly open at the sound of Jon's voice. He had forgotten about Jon being on speakerphone.

[asimplechord.livejournal.com]

Hahahaha! YOUR KIDS WIN! THEY WILL BE SCENE KIDS BEFORE THEY KNOW WHAT SCENE KIDS ARE!

:D Brendon/Spencer is even better than Jon/Tom/Cassie.

(There's still a little part of my brain that wants Brendon/Tom. I can't even begin to explain it, except to say that it would make for hi-LAR-ious conversation when Jon gets all freaked out b/c he knows how Tom is - and didn't Tom learn his lesson after the William debacle? - and he knows how Brendon is, especially when he's been bouncing from girl to guy and wants something stable. Jon doesn't know who to give the stern talking-to, so he tries to get Spencer and Ryan to do it, and they just laugh in his face and tell him they're both adults. I just. MY BRAIN WON'T STOP WITH THE RANDOMNESS, OK?)

[why-me-why-not.livejournal.com]

Dude, I am totally okay with Brendon/anyone, seriously. And I'll totally encourage (or help with) Brendon/Tom after we get some of our other stuff cleared off, okay? B/c yeah, JON. Ohhh, we can write it from Jon's POV! :P

My kids are CRAZY! Did I tell you that Davey got into an argument with my brother when we were at Magiquest b/c Davey wanted a purple unicorn as his prize?

[asimplechord.livejournal.com]

Well, obviously purple unicorns would be the awesomest prize. Why would anyone want anything else?

OK. I'll finish the teamnakedpics fic this weekend, and maybe some Brendon/Shane/Regan, and see what else I can get cleared. Then Jon can panic over his two best friends being, you know, not just friends. :)

eta: Hahahaha! Jon totally didn't know they were even thinking about each other like that. Like, Brendon is always friendlier when he's drunk, and he's known Tom since Panic's early tour days, so it didn't seem weird at all that they'd been hanging out at the afterparty together. Cassie'd distracted him, and then in the morning he just figured Bden'd found a cab back to their hotel. He was not expecting to open the door to their supposedly shared hotel room (Jon actually spent the night at Cassie's place) to find Bden sprawled over Tom's chest. It would have been okay if Bden was the only naked one -- he strips down at the least excuse -- or even that Tom was there, because when he was drunk enough, he crashed wherever he landed. But Tom was naked, too, and there were shadows on his neck and chest that looked suspiciously like hickies, and Jon just wnated to turn around and close the door and pretend like he dreamed - is nightmared a word? - this.

[why-me-why-not.livejournal.com]

hahaha, oh JON WALKER!! *hearts*

H!! Think Brendon/Spencer! Arguing and counter sex! And forgetting that they have Pete on speakerphone!

[asimplechord.livejournal.com]

I am at work. I'm deliberately not thinking about Spencer lifting Bden up onto the counter, pushing himself into Bden's space. DELIBERATELY. Because if I do that, I will not finish my experiment and I will NEVER GET HOME, I'll just stare into space with mental porn playing.

[why-me-why-not.livejournal.com]

boo. It's past quitting time! On a Friday! How much longer is your experiment going to take?

[asimplechord.livejournal.com]

DONE! LEAVING RITE NOW!

[escherzo.livejournal.com]

I in general don't like them but... *sigh* When I'm cowriting my cowriter is not good at not being the person whose POV it is so I end up cowriting it a lot.

[asimplechord.livejournal.com]

Sometimes part of my confusion comes from cowriting - we text things back and forth in opposing povs, and when we want to write it all up, we need to find some way to switch it all into one pov!

[channonyarrow.livejournal.com]

Shifts are great as long as they're clearly marked - I prefer them at section and chapter breaks, but as long as they're not in the middle of a paragraph (or a sentence) I think they're fine.

The bigger (much, much, much, much) bigger turnoff to me in bandom is first person. I cannot read it, and I won't even try. It doesn't work well for me. And I think it's bandom-specific, as I used to read HP and had no problem with first person there.

[asimplechord.livejournal.com]

Oh, man, don't even get me STARTED on 1st person fic. Can't handle it at all in this fandom. I'm not a fan of it, generally, and I have not yet found a good example of in bandom at all.

[siubhlach.livejournal.com]

Oh, what a question. POV changes can work but they're difficult to pull off - the mystery behind the fic gets a lot more difficult to maintain when the reader becomes omniscient and knows what everybody is thinking. The best exaples I have seen involved POV shifts coming at very clear 'new scene' points, usually when the characters are in different places. The worst ones happen mid-scene with a sudden shift from describing character A's emotions/thoughts to describing character B's. That's just confusing and jarring and breaks me right out of the fic.

But if I put all the fic in one POV, I lose some details. Or more dialogue has to be added, something has to be done to get the reader to see the other character's POV without actually, you know, head-skipping.

Viewpoint character interpretation? If the fic is from B's POV, then the reader gets to see B's interpretation of J's actions/expressions, which can work. It also gives lots of opportunity for misinterpretation and misunderstanding and that's always fun.

Final point, which I always have to mention in any POV conversation (even when it's not hugely relevant). Third person is good. First person and second person on the other hand are creepy. Switching POV doesn't work at all in anything other than third person, because it just gets confusing as all hell and makes me feel like I have some kind of multiple personality disorder. Not good.

[asimplechord.livejournal.com]

The whole 1st and 2nd person things just boggle me. I know that logically there's probably some good fic or books written them, but I just can't put myself into the right frame of mind when reading them, so they don't work for me as a reader at ALL. Even media like TV or movies with "you" as the person behind the camera sort of wig me out.

See, I couldn't even decide which POV I wanted to use, I was so torn between the two sides of it. At first I thought Jon, because he was the one I started with, and Brendon's so transparent sometimes (not always) to him, but the idea of Brendon's confusion and misinterpretation of Jon's motives appeals too.

[siubhlach.livejournal.com]

I found one once that kind of worked for me, but it very much emphasised the idea that I was sat listening to someone tell me a story. But, as a general rule, I want to be divorced from the story. I don't want it to feel like it's about me (so second person really freaks me out!)

I generally find it works better if you work from the POV of the character who knows the least. He is the one who has the most in common with the reader and they end up finding things out together. Your protaganist can have all the answers, but it makes it more difficult to construct opportunities for him to share that information, whereas when he doesn't know, he tends to ask the questions that readers want to know the answers to as well.