Ask the Author: rivers bend
| Interviews by Fans | |
|---|---|
| Title: | Ask the Author: rivers bend |
| Interviewer: | |
| Interviewee: | rivers bend |
| Date(s): | Novmeber 5, 2009 |
| Medium: | online |
| Fandom(s): | Supernatural |
| External Links: | interview and comments are here, Archived version |
| Click here for related articles on Fanlore. | |
rivers bend was interviewed for Supernatural Roundtable.
Some Excerpts
I am a late-comer to fandom and to writing fiction, as I didn't really discover either until 2005, at which point I was into my *cough*thirties*cough*. It was as close to love at first sight as is possible. I've been a slasher from the very start; the first fic I ever wrote was for the movie Highway, and the second, for Brokeback Mountain. My first fandom, however, was House. When H/W and I broke up, I moved on to writing in tigertrapped's Tiger Trap universe. Then I discovered SPN fandom. My first hit was kittyfisher's awesome Synthetic verse, and I had to google Jared and Jensen so that I would know who I was reading about. Then I got wind that one of the ITV channels was airing the first three episodes of S1, so I watched them to get more of a live action picture of the boys. I liked the show, but didn't fall as in love with it as I had the porn fic. I wrote some fic, and read lots more, and then finally watched the whole of seasons one and two in the summer hiatus before season three started. I was officially hooked.
I wrote my first SPN fic in May of 2007, and posted my 96th last week. To say I'm obsessed with writing about Sam and Dean might be a little bit of an understatement. *g*
This fandom also seems to have broken down the last of my RPS walls, and I've even written a few RPS stories.
I am a schmoop lover at the core, which makes SPN fandom an odd choice for me. I blame Jared and Jensen for being so hot and having such amazing chemistry, and the amazing, amazing writers and friends in this fandom in pretty much equal measure for keeping me here in this place where the canon is pretty much an avalanche of angst. As the show has gotten angstier, I've moved farther from current canon, and now pretty much stick to writing pre-series fic, though I would be stoked if I could find a place to write in canon again this season.
I had written a few RPS fics as gift fics, because I'm generally biddable, but I just posted them flocked. The first RPS I wrote that wasn't a specific request was a tiny little drabble thing that popped into my head completely unbidden while I was standing at a bus stop. It wasn't even slash!I'd say that was the start of a slippery slope, but really, pretty much all of my RPS has been written on someone else's request through memes or whatever. If I recall correctly, the thing that prompted me to finally unlock all of it was sadcypress asking if she could do a podfic of Punch Drunk. Which is just about the only story that I wrote just because the plot bunny bit my ankle.
I have been reading RPS almost from the time I first found SPN fandom (as opposed to just the first few authors I read). At the time I was writing Tiger Trapped, because the only authors in the fandom were me and tigertrapped, if I wanted to read fic, it was outside "my" fandom. At the time most of what I was reading was Daily Show slash. This is what I attribute with priming the pump for me to move on to CWRPS. When I started out reading RPS I almost never commented on it, because I had this crazy fear that the "characters" would be reading the fic. Also, I had no interest in writing DS/CR slash, so I wasn't really "in" the fandom. but once I was in SPN fandom, I felt too guilty not commenting, so I did. Which I guess, is a way of saying that there isn't really so much of a difference between reading and writing from the standpoint of my embarrassment about it all.
I LOVE J2 AUs. but I don't really ever feel called to write them. I'm not sure I really have the talent for it. Or if I do have the talent for it, I'm applying it to the stuff I'm writing for school. There is only so much in my well of original fiction, and I don't tend to dip into it for fan fic. It's also possible I'm a little intimidated by the incredible talent we have in this fandom. :)
the main difference in my process is that Jared and Jensen don't really talk to me the way Sam and Dean do. I tend to go in with an idea, like Jensen having to fix the mess Jared has made of their DVDs, and then I write it. with Sam/Dean I'm more likely to have only the kernel of something and I find the story as I go. Punch Drunk is the exception to that rule; I heard the first sentence in my head, and then Jensen told me the rest of the story from there. And obviously, especially with some of the kink meme stuff, I have also written Sam/Dean stories the way I usually write J2.