#violue

Commission I did for the fic Carnival Oasis by @violue and krisham!

It’s hands down one of my favorite fins ever and it was such a pleasure to be commissioned a scene from it! 

I definitely took advantage and re-read the whole thing! 

*

Carnival Oasis (series), by violue & krisham

Summary (for part 1): Castiel is a being that feeds on sin. Lucky for him, Dean has plenty of sin to spare.

Rating: Explicit 

Word count: 43k

🍂

Here's a link to the fic Alex (@pieater69) recommended this week, "The Complete Works of Emmanuel Allen" by @violue.

Chapters: 20/20 Fandom: Supernatural Rating: Explicit Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply Relationships: Castiel/Dean Winchester, Past Castiel/Amelia Novak - Relationship, Kaia Nieves/Claire Novak, brief Castiel/Meg Masters, Ruby/Sam Winchester/Ruby, background Meg Masters/Abaddon Characters: Castiel (Supernatural), Dean Winchester, Claire Novak, Sam Winchester, Amelia Novak, Gabriel (Supernatural), Lucifer (Nick), Kaia Nieves, Ruby's Host (Genevieve Cortese), Ruby's Host (Katie Cassidy), Ash (Supernatural), Hannah (Supernatural), Meg Masters Additional Tags: Castiel 3rd person POV, Misgendering, Transphobia, Castiel thinks he's straight, Bisexual Dean Winchester, Polyamorous Sam Winchester, Military Veteran Dean Winchester, Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder - PTSD, References to Past Torture (NOT CLAIRE), Unfavorable Characterization of Amelia Novak, Alternate Universe, Top Castiel, Top Dean Winchester, Incredibly Light Bondage, Claire is trans, Cis Author, Fictional Town, Trans Female Character, shifting pronouns Summary:

Word Count: 86,779

Summary: There’s no point in mincing words. Sam is dead, and without him Dean is a drunken shell of who he used to be. When he finally pulls himself out of a growing pile of whiskey bottles, Dean finds it hard to go back to his life. With one flippant comment from a friend, Dean thinks he might finally have a way to make peace with the loss; Sam was an organ donor, and Dean’s going to find the recipients, talk to them, and see how their lives are better because of his little brother. For the first six stops on his road trip, things go mostly according to plan, and then he meets the man who has Sam’s heart. Dean had hoped he might find peace on this trip… he never expected to find love.

“Dean left Valencia four days ago, the Impala peeling out of the driveway in the wee hours of the morning, AC/DC blasting away, probably waking up all of Sam’s fancy neighbors.”

9 questions with violue

This week: @violue talks about the difficulties of writing Supernatural characters beyond Team Free Will; what it means to have solid beta readers, and being thoughtful when writing outside of your own background.

What do you most enjoy about writing fanfiction?

Having an idea and seeing it come together. I’m a slow writer, most of my longfics took months of writing in notebooks during long bus rides into town, then typing the story up, then having betas read through it. So, when the story is finally done, when it’s come together into something cohesive that I’m excited to share with people, fuck, that’s satisfying. I only write the one pairing, Destiel, and creating new universes for them to meet and fall in love brings me something I struggle to find elsewhere in life: contentment.

What aspects of writing do you find difficult when you write fanfiction?

Oh man, everything. Coming up with a coherent plot, worrying about whether the characters are in character, asking my betas if they’re available to read, posting, comparing myself to other authors, everything. Writing brings me contentment, but there’s also a big pile of gnawing anxiety and insecurity that comes along with it. It’s hard, wondering if the things you like about your story will resonate with other people. It’s hard writing endings. It’s hard sitting back and thinking “would this character actually say/do this thing?” I write AUs, but keeping them believable is important to me, I want the readers to be able to see the characters as they read. I’ve gotten fairly comfortable with Castiel, Dean, and Sam, but the rest of the characters… not so much. I don’t “know” Benny or Jo or Mary or Kevin or whoever the way I know the main three. I also sometimes get bogged down in details. I spend too much time worrying about inane details of a scene and it stops me from enjoying what I’m doing. It’s why I stick to domestic AUs, when I try to write something slightly more high-concept, the details get away from me and it feels too difficult, too big. As much as I wish world building were my thing, it’s kinda not.

Have you ever received hateful comments on your fic and how do you deal with it?

Just a couple of times. Some were incomprehensible gibberish, not worth acknowledging let alone “dealing with”, but one incident stuck with me. I wrote a scene where Dean and Castiel’s friends give them a bunch of ideas for dates. One of the ideas was “go to a fair and get henna done”. I didn’t consider the idea that having two white characters use henna for recreation would be cultural appropriation. My betas didn’t either. We’re all American, Americans can be irreverent and thoughtless about other cultures. I got a scathing comment from someone, well two someones, since they sicced their friend on me as well. They implied I was a white devil appropriating cultures, and that I had better not ignore their comment, and just nastiness that in my opinion was unwarranted. I’m not white, so they didn’t actually get that right, and of course I didn’t ignore their comment. I don’t want to offend anyone, and cultural appropriation is a real and persistent issue. I removed the line, changed it to something else. I told them ‘I’m not white, and btw you don’t have to be an asshole, of course I’ll get rid of the line.’ or something like that. Not a big deal, I suppose, in the grand scheme of things… but it did leave a mark on me. When I post things, I’m terrified I’m going to have a repeat of that experience. When I wrote a short AU where Sam was a trans woman, I was so scared that I would mess up, that I’d offend someone and they’d come barreling after me. I was worried my witch!Cas AU would upset practicing witches. I’m an emotional person, and my writing means a lot to me, that kind of shit is hard to stomach.

Conversely: what’s been some of your favorite feedback on your fanfic?

Any feedback means a lot to me. I don’t respond to all my comments, I worry about being repetitive and sometimes I just can’t think of a reply, but I read every comment left on my stories and they always give me the good feelings. Sometimes people tell me something I wrote had an effect on their life. Someone once told me that one of my fics made him finally have a conversation with his boyfriend about moving in together, that was huge. Sometimes people tell me I made their day better, that they’re still thinking about my story days later, that they’ve read it many times. That kind of feedback always kicks my ass, the idea that I had an actual impact on another person through something I created. I think actually my favorite feedback is the feedback I get from my betas. They’re commenting in a GoogleDoc with my story in it, making corrections/suggestions if needed, but also leaving reactions. There are little moments that most readers aren’t going to comment on because they’ve forgotten them by the time they get to the end of the chapter/story, but my betas are commenting on the side of the doc as they go, so the little jokes or references I make in a story, my betas comment on them and it always makes me feel warm and fuzzy and acknowledged.

How do you handle writer’s block?

I don’t. Seriously. When I have writer’s block, I can’t move forward until inspiration makes it pass. I’ve tried to force it and it results in a lot of frustration and agitated tweets. For some people, just writing anything is a great way to combat writer’s block, that’s not my experience. Sometimes I can force-defeat my writer’s block. If something in the story is causing me to stumble, sometimes if I just knock a few blocks down, that helps. Like say I’m on chapter 14 and hating it, but I was really happy with chapter 13, starting over on chapter 14 might help. I had that happen with The Complete Works of Emmanuel Allen. I was in the writing-in-my-notebook stage of penning the story, and I had stopped enjoying it and I couldn’t figure out why until I realized that for whatever reason I just wasn’t feeling the direction I’d taken the story. So I ripped out a good twenty pages and started from the last point I was happy with. The story flowed much better, and I was so much happier.

Which Supernatural fanfic of yours are you most proud of and why?

Gosh, I’m proud of different stories for different reasons. I’m proud of Spirit of Lawrence High for being the first fic I wrote, I’m proud of The Way to a Man’s Heart is Through Chlamydia for being my most popular story, I’m proud of the Carnival Oasis series because I was able to convey the mood I was going for when I wasn’t sure I could. But I guess I’m proudest of The Unwavering Heart of a Winchester. I researched for that story, when usually I’m too lazy. I spent months in a depressing headspace and kept going. It was hard, the whole story’s premise is that Sam is dead, and I missed him so much it was such a damn relief when I moved on to a story where he was alive. And I was proud that my story had humor in it. I don’t like sad stories, despite me writing one that’s thousands of words with Dean grieving. I didn’t want it to just be a wall of unrelenting misery, and going by comments people leave, it wasn’t.

What/who has had the biggest influence on your writing?

There are a lot of people that influence my writing. Writers I enjoy (Scaramouche, Xylodemon, LoversAntiquities, etc), friends that cheerlead me and my writing (Dani, Kris, Lydie, Jojo), people that comment on everything I write... but I think my friend Heather (aka Casfucker) was the biggest influence on my writing. She’s not really in the fandom anymore, but she’s the reason I started writing fic, so everything I’ve written is because of her. She encouraged me to pursue my story idea with The Spirit of Lawrence High, and that was big. For a long time she was always the person that read my stories first, and I honestly don’t know if I would be writing at all now if we hadn’t become friends.

What are you currently working on?

I have several things I started writing but lost interest in. Right now I’m working on one fic that won’t be ready for months, because... slow writer. It’s a Destiel AU, of course, but the start of the story is about Castiel and Claire packing up their lives and moving after Claire comes out as trans. Trans issues are not at all my wheelhouse, so it’s definitely something I’m going to be scared about when it’s time for posting. Claire isn’t the focus of the story, but the beginning is very much centered on what she’s going through, experienced through her father’s POV. As I already mentioned, that angry/offended comment left an impact, and although I’m really enjoying writing this story, I’m so worried I’m going to upset someone. But that’s no reason not to try, and that’s an issue for when the story is actually done. For now I’m just scribbling Destiel fluff in my notebook and having a good time. There’s a timestamp to The Way to a Man’s Heart is Through Chlamydia that I’ve started. I’m calling it “Year of Firsts”. I wrote a list of silly “firsts” in their marriage and I’m kind of going from there. Not too far in that, because I really have not been writing much since the US election, but I’ll get back to it. So far it’s Cas learning that Dean is unbearable when he has a cold.

If you could give one piece of advice to a new and/or struggling writer, what would it be?

Oh shit, I’m the wrong person to give advice about anything. Write a story you would want to read, that’s my advice.

I think we need a list like this. I know I need it because there are so many talented author’s working in our fandom and I thought that I have to make a rec list for them too.

It’s working the same way as the fanfic rec list. But in this post I will rec you all the fantastic authors we have. They are the writers who never gonna disappoint you. :) I’m not gonna praise every one of them in the list, I’m doing it right here because I don’t want to repeat myself and make you bored. They have marvelous stories and their fics are so in-character (not OOC) and/or their stories are so unique and special and epic.

Yeah, this list is a bit based on my own preferences. But I already told your why I respect and love these authors. Oh, and their kudos and numbers of comments won’t lie too. :)

I’ll give you just the links to their most known works and the “must-read” ones. :) (Sorry if I haven’t read aaaaaall their fics yet but, well, I’m working on it. I have 2600 saved fics on AO3 and only have read half of them.

So, let’s start it in alphabetical order :)

PS: two of them are fantastic Cockles writers too, so I post their best and well loved Cockles fics too.

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almaasi    

Her most known works and the ones everybody should know and read:

Foxfire Blossom

Roost

Sam Accidentally Sees the Whole Picture

Sharing the Rain Dog 

Snow Place Like Home (But My Home Is With You)

Nine Times We Met (And One Christmas We Parted) (MCD!)

Shadows Across the Camera Lens 

Try-Something Tuesday

Angelhawke

~~~

betts (her old name was Betty Days - sadrobots)

Her most known works and the ones everybody should know and read:

Dean Winchester Is a Gay Virgin

Sex 101, or: That Time Castiel Asked Dean to Teach Him How to Have Sex

He Came in Through the Bedroom Window

Big Hands, I Know You're the One

Mile-High Club

Detention

Second Take

Standing There

~~~

Chiyume

Her most known works and the ones everybody should know and read:

Hot Water

Damn You Auto Correct!

Love in the Morning 

White Noise

Teach Me

And in the Dark, I see Your Light

Eyes on the Road, Hands on the Wheel

~~~

Elizabeth1985

I have to say something about her (and emwebb17 too). These two author’s fics are not just good. They are masterpieces. And it’s true about their Cockles fics too. So Elizabeth1982 and emwebb17 are both fantastic Destiel AND Cockles writers. :) For me, they are the bests. :)

Her most known works and the ones everybody should know and read: DESTIEL

Breathe In | Breathe Out

Some Things are Brighter in the Dark

Misha's Not in Vancouver Anymore (Destiel&Cockles fic. Trust me, you don’t have to ship Cockles to love this one.)

Sometimes All You Need is Kinky Smut

It's Hard to Fool Around in a Tent

The Twelve Days of Cheesemas by Dean Fucking Winchester

As Seen On TV

Yellow

Can't Breathe Without You

Healing Dean

Her most known works and the ones everybody should know and read: COCKLES

Misha's Not in Vancouver Anymore (Destiel&Cockles fic. Trust me, you don’t have to ship Cockles to love this one.)

Cockles oneshot series  (10 fics so far)

~~~

emwebb17

I have to say something about her (and Elizabeth1985 too). These two author’s fics are not just good. They are masterpieces. And it’s true about their Cockles fics too. So emwebb17 and Elizabeth1982 are both fantastic Destiel AND Cockles writers. :) For me, they are the bests. :)

Her most known works and the ones everybody should know and read: DESTIEL

Ad Interim

I Wanna Get Outside (Of Me)

Tropes You Love

Unintended

Her most known works and the ones everybody should know and read: COCKLES

Off the Reservation series

The SPN RPFiles series

Nothing If Not Observant

The Mightiest Monster...The Mightiest Melodrama of Them All!

Negotiation

A Lesson in Inflection

Precautionary Measures

The Doctor (You Mean Guru) Is In

It's Not Like I'm Trying to Watch That or Anything...

Tropes You Love

The Pie Saga

Displacement

Misha's Lips

Jensen's Back

Misha's Eyes

Jensen's Voice

Misha's Thighs

Jensen's Hands

Inappropriate Behavior

Personalized Attention

Unwind

The Acceptance Speech

Pound Cake is Not a Sexual Reference

Chocolate Milk

~~~

NorthernSparrow

Her most known works and the ones everybody should know and read: 

A Room Of One's Own 

A Winter's Tale

A Close Shave  epilogue for “A Winter’s Tale”

Into The Fire

Forgotten series

~~~

riseofthefallenone

Her most known works and the ones everybody should know and read: 

Out of the Deep

A Little Patience

Beneath the Surface

To Raise A King

Hunting for Faith

Ride 'em Cowboy

Angel's Wild

Unfamiliar

The Graveyard Shift (WIP)

Patience: The Companion Piece (WIP)

~~~

strangenessandcharm (x)

Her most known works and the ones everybody should know and read:

The Melting ’Verse

Kissing It Bitter Trilogy

Thursday’s Child

Three’s A Crowd 

Hummingbirds

~~~

thepinupchemist

Her most known works and the ones everybody should know and read:

Into Your Hideaway

Pick It All Up

Tempest of Oblivion

A Story for Every Corner

Cas and Dean’s Excellent Kink-venture

~~~

Unforth

Her most known works and the ones everybody should know and read:

I Dream of Deanie series

Order 243

SextersAnon.com

Get Knocked Down, Get Back Up

One More Fare to Make Your Night

Hitchin' a Ride 

Let's Call The Whole Thing Off 

Take Care of Yourself

Don't Get Your Hopes Up

The Highest Bidder

Fight Fire With Fire

A Hundred Days

Pitchers and Catchers (Dean/Castiel/Jimmy)

All For One, One For All (Dean/Castiel/Jimmy)

~~~

violue

Her most known works and the ones everybody should know and read:  

The Way to a Man’s Heart is Through Chlamydia series

The Unwavering Heart of a Winchester

Carnival Oasis series

The Spirit of Lawrence High series

Bourbon and Grace

The Complete Works of Emmanuel Allen series

Here's the link to this week's fic, "The Way to Man's Heart is Through Chlamydia," by @violue