Ariana (fan)

Fan
Name:	Ariana
Alias(es):
Type:	Fan writer, OTW volunteer
Fandoms:	Star Trek: The Next Generation, Star Trek: Deep Space Nine, Space:1999, Randall and Hopkirk (Deceased), Blake's 7, Buffy, Heroes, Star Trek Reboot, UK Political RPF, Sherlock, The X-Files
Communities:
Other:
URL:
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Ariana is a fan writer. She is also a volunteer with the Organization for Transformative Works.

Star Trek

In 1997, several fans nominated Ariana for the ASC Award for best writer.

Ariana is, in many ways, a woman after my own heart. She's prolific, she's written in more than one series (TNG and DS9), she's as comfortable with 'canon' pairings (P/C, G/B) as she is with *truly* original pairings (Quark/Ziyal, Sisko/Dukat), and she's willing to experiment with different styles, be they character studies ("Plaisir d'Amour"), action/treknobabble ("Babylon"), outrageously witty PWPs ("Wow"), slash ("Voices of the Prophets") or high romance ("The Agreement", of which Ariana was a co-writer). What Ariana is probably best known for is her work in the K/Du genre, a relatively recent addition to fanfic (at least on the 'Net - I'm not sure how long K/Du has been around in the 'zines). Eva Enblom was the first to give us a peek at the simmering passions in the K/Du dynamic in "Cardassian Heat", but it was Ariana who was the first to really force us to take a look at the complex love-hate history between the former Resistance fighter and the former Prefect of Bajor in "Halfway". Since then, K/Du has virtually exploded onto the fanfic scene, treating us to the creative imaginings of Marlissa Campbell, Ariana Lilcamp, Emily Salzfass, et al. A year ago K/Du was just a burr in somebody's britches; now it's its own romance genre, along with such stalwarts as O/K and G/B. And we have Ariana to thank for it. What I like about Ariana's writing is that, although she maintains a certain consistency to her characterizations, with each story recurring figures react appropriately to the imaginative surroundings she gives them. In "Halfway", Dukat is facing a long and lonely road of piracy, and his demeanor is somewhat subdued, even while he is relentlessly pursuing Kira. In "Babylon", he is aloof and self-assured, remaining calm even as Kira and Garak are plotting his demise right in front of him. "Wow" gives us classic Dukat, with all his verbosity, arrogance and egotism - using nothing but dialogue. "Voices of the Prophets" also shows us a melancholy Dukat, but this time it's a Dukat altered by madness and grief, a Dukat who seeks comfort not in Kira's arms, but rather those of his other worthy adversary, Captain Sisko. Ariana is a master (mistress, rather <G>) of the small detail. She uses language to her advantage, most notably in "Babylon", where the universal translators fail and we find Garak speaking halting Standard, Dax stumbling over her h's, Dukat slipping easily between Kardasi and Bajoran, and Sisko orating in ecclesiastical Bajoran. She uses it elsewhere, too, such as in "Halfway", where Dukat is unable to think of certain words as he speaks Bajoran to Kira (and where his much-rumored given name is a rude word in Bajoran <G>). Naprem is another recurring element in many of Ariana's stories, so much so that the Naprem who actually figures in the mirror universe "How the Other Half Lives" is immediately recognizable as the same only hinted at elsewhere. Above all, Ariana, more than any other Dukat writer I know, has captured Dukat's *style* of speaking. She can give you a page-long speech, and the way the words are strung together is so *true* to him that I can actually hear his voice in my head (hmm...). Her attention to detail is evident in her non-Dukat stories as well; "Plaisir d'Amour", which gives us a Picard and Crusher many years younger than they were in "Encounter at Farpoint", is rich with detail highlighting their age differences, Picard's Frenchness (and middle-aged melancholy), and Crusher's not-yet-fully-developed maternal instincts. This Picard and Crusher are familiar to us, but they are nevertheless different than what we've seen on the screen.

Ariana has a wonderful ability not only to write, but to HEAR dialogue, to visualize situations in her mind and then set them down on paper (or on screen) with vivid detail - after reading her DS9 stories, I find it impossible to get them out of my mind (not that I'd WANT to!) There are scenes and bits of dialogue that I remember constantly and with great fondness, and the wonderfully sensual quality she brings to the love scenes is neither cliche'd nor overdone, just - incredible. I like every single thing she writes, and I *LOVE* almost all of it.

When I first began reading ASC, this spring, I might not have stayed... had I not wondered what this thing was that said "Ariana" and I sure hadn't posted it! Well, "this thing" was "Halfway", and as I got deeper into the story, I started wishing I *had* thought of it... and then I realized it was better that some-other-Ariana had, because she had carried it off SO WELL... Since I had come vaguely hoping for (but not xpecting) K/Du, I didn't really begin to see the variety of Ariana's work for quite a while. Only after I'd been thoroughly convinced of her writing talent by her K/Du works (quite varied in themselves -- from "Wow" with it's brief humor and 'placelessness' to "Halfway" and "Babylon" with their length, complexity, attention to detail, and gathering in of the environment) did I begin to go back and read her other stories. She's also paired, with equal skill, Dukat with Sisko and Ziyal with Quark, despite the inherent difficulties of those couples -- even more unlikely than Kira and Dukat? Maybe not. She made Quark and Ziyal *intensely* believable, to the point where the reader was left with the feeling that she had *not* written the only way the pairing could come about, but rather just pointed up the obvious, like writing a simple P/C encounter -- the couple was already there. In turn, she took P/C in a different direction, working with them in an unusual part of their history and delving deep into their internal conflicts as they focused on each other. I could enjoy it and I don't even like much of P/C! <heads for the fallout shelter beyond her sheer talent for writing, Ariana has also done more than her share of "writer public service", encouraging and providing crit and more general feedback for other writers. She's brought the K/Du writers together, now in a mailing list, and always is waving a bundle of ideas in each hand and happily discussing everyone else's. She's good enough to not only do her own work, but give the rest of us the benefit of her talents as well. Ariana is one of those rare authors where I don't even look at the codes on the subject line to know -- I want to read this story. She is prolific, versatile, and a total delight at every turn. Just my two slips' worth...

Organization for Transformative Works

Ariana has been a staffer on the Accessibility, Design & Technology (AD&T) Committee since 2012. She serves as the cross-committee liaison from AD&T to Open Doors and as the Open Doors Technical Staffer.

In February 2015, Ariana developed the API that Open Doors uses to import works from at-risk archives into the Archive of Our Own.