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egelantier: Comment on this entry, and I'll give you three themes along the lines of "username and [some idea or concept or thing]". You then post what you have to say on these themes in your own livejournal.
She gave me:
wordsofastory and new york
I love New York. I've lived here for almost eight years now (I arrived at the end of August in 2006) and would very happily stay here for the rest of my life. I've lived in three neighborhoods in two boroughs, so there are huge swathes of the city that I know too little about. Or that I haven't even seen, considering that I've still never been on Staten Island other than at the ferry dock or on the highway across it.
I like the physical conveniences of the city – subways and a bus system that actually works; every store or movie or restaurant you could possibly want; access to trains and airports and people who are more than willing to visit you just because of the city. But I also like more intangible things: the feel of the people, the rules of social interactions, the smell of a pizza place or bakery or, on occasional windy days, the ocean. I like the anonymity of it – like any big city – but also learning to recognize or be recognized by the people at few favorite places. The only thing I don't like is the price of rent; whyyyyyy is it so high? Okay, I know why, but it still pains my soul.
Also, I've gotten to the point where I can claim to be a real New Yorker, because I can give people directions. (Well. Usually.)
wordsofastory and dreams
I actually don't dream very much! Or perhaps I just don't remember them. On the positive side, that means I almost never have nightmares either; the last one I remember having was years and years ago (and was about an elephant chasing me down stairs, which for some reason was TERRIFYING).
I wish I did have more memorable dreams. I'm always a little jealous when people recount theirs, and they have dramatic plots and fannish characters and cool settings or whatever. I must be happy when I'm unconscious though, since I've been told I giggle in my sleep fairly often.
wordsofastory and favorite narrative tropes
Ah, so hard to choose! I think I tend to respond to stories almost entirely based on how I feel about the characters, rather than the narrative. But some of my favorite tropes are traveling (road-trips or post-apocalyptic search for survival or traveling circuses or finding the MacGuffin or anything like that; traveling just for tourism is much less interesting to read about) and things to do with cons or trickery; if we're going to have a straightforward good vs evil narrative, I prefer our heroes to be underdogs who have to work through less-than-straighforward methods (spying, assassinations, lying, stealing, disguises, etc) instead of meeting on the field of battle, so to say. I'm much more into friends-to-lovers than foe!yay or antagonist pairings. I like people who are broken in one way or another (usually emotionally, but it's all good) not getting better, but getting on with their life, having relationships that manage without healing. I tend to be waaaay more interested in the stories of an established relationship than a first time – like, great, now you know you're interested in each other, that's important, but what I really want to know is about how you work out differences and make compromises and decide where to live or who sleeps where or who does what, when you tell the other about some important backstory or future goal, how you come up with routines or nicknames or inside jokes, how you fight and make up, little things that didn't seem important at first which become obstacles. I feel like there's so many stories after the first time, and they tend to get less attention, alas. I also almost always tend to write characters in relationships that are at least open to some degree, if not explicitly polyamorous. I don't know why; I guess jealous is boring and petty and I just want to explore all of the characters with all of the other characters. ...This has sort of devolved into talking about character tropes again.
ANYWAY NON-ROMANTIC NARRATIVE TROPES: I really adore retellings, reversals of tropes, fairy tales and mythologies. I love taking an old story and twisting it, doing something different with it. (Which is one of the reasons I like fanfic so!) I like lovingly described settings that are really important to the plot, so historical AUs and cyberpunk and things like that really work for me. The protagonists Saving The Day is obviously awesome, but I am also fond of bittersweet or mixed endings. I can even like a bit of grimdark, depending on how it's done.
Hmm, I'm sure there's a ton more I love, but I can't think of them. I'm so bad at plots, really! I go to look at what I've written, and it's all slice-of-life or relationship details or little ordinary moments. People actually doing things, pshaw.
egelantier: Comment on this entry, and I'll give you three themes along the lines of "username and [some idea or concept or thing]". You then post what you have to say on these themes in your own livejournal.She gave me:
wordsofastory and new yorkI love New York. I've lived here for almost eight years now (I arrived at the end of August in 2006) and would very happily stay here for the rest of my life. I've lived in three neighborhoods in two boroughs, so there are huge swathes of the city that I know too little about. Or that I haven't even seen, considering that I've still never been on Staten Island other than at the ferry dock or on the highway across it.
I like the physical conveniences of the city – subways and a bus system that actually works; every store or movie or restaurant you could possibly want; access to trains and airports and people who are more than willing to visit you just because of the city. But I also like more intangible things: the feel of the people, the rules of social interactions, the smell of a pizza place or bakery or, on occasional windy days, the ocean. I like the anonymity of it – like any big city – but also learning to recognize or be recognized by the people at few favorite places. The only thing I don't like is the price of rent; whyyyyyy is it so high? Okay, I know why, but it still pains my soul.
Also, I've gotten to the point where I can claim to be a real New Yorker, because I can give people directions. (Well. Usually.)
wordsofastory and dreamsI actually don't dream very much! Or perhaps I just don't remember them. On the positive side, that means I almost never have nightmares either; the last one I remember having was years and years ago (and was about an elephant chasing me down stairs, which for some reason was TERRIFYING).
I wish I did have more memorable dreams. I'm always a little jealous when people recount theirs, and they have dramatic plots and fannish characters and cool settings or whatever. I must be happy when I'm unconscious though, since I've been told I giggle in my sleep fairly often.
wordsofastory and favorite narrative tropesAh, so hard to choose! I think I tend to respond to stories almost entirely based on how I feel about the characters, rather than the narrative. But some of my favorite tropes are traveling (road-trips or post-apocalyptic search for survival or traveling circuses or finding the MacGuffin or anything like that; traveling just for tourism is much less interesting to read about) and things to do with cons or trickery; if we're going to have a straightforward good vs evil narrative, I prefer our heroes to be underdogs who have to work through less-than-straighforward methods (spying, assassinations, lying, stealing, disguises, etc) instead of meeting on the field of battle, so to say. I'm much more into friends-to-lovers than foe!yay or antagonist pairings. I like people who are broken in one way or another (usually emotionally, but it's all good) not getting better, but getting on with their life, having relationships that manage without healing. I tend to be waaaay more interested in the stories of an established relationship than a first time – like, great, now you know you're interested in each other, that's important, but what I really want to know is about how you work out differences and make compromises and decide where to live or who sleeps where or who does what, when you tell the other about some important backstory or future goal, how you come up with routines or nicknames or inside jokes, how you fight and make up, little things that didn't seem important at first which become obstacles. I feel like there's so many stories after the first time, and they tend to get less attention, alas. I also almost always tend to write characters in relationships that are at least open to some degree, if not explicitly polyamorous. I don't know why; I guess jealous is boring and petty and I just want to explore all of the characters with all of the other characters. ...This has sort of devolved into talking about character tropes again.
ANYWAY NON-ROMANTIC NARRATIVE TROPES: I really adore retellings, reversals of tropes, fairy tales and mythologies. I love taking an old story and twisting it, doing something different with it. (Which is one of the reasons I like fanfic so!) I like lovingly described settings that are really important to the plot, so historical AUs and cyberpunk and things like that really work for me. The protagonists Saving The Day is obviously awesome, but I am also fond of bittersweet or mixed endings. I can even like a bit of grimdark, depending on how it's done.
Hmm, I'm sure there's a ton more I love, but I can't think of them. I'm so bad at plots, really! I go to look at what I've written, and it's all slice-of-life or relationship details or little ordinary moments. People actually doing things, pshaw.
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no subject
Date: 2014-08-01 08:46 pm (UTC)since I've been told I giggle in my sleep fairly often
awwww ♥
but what I really want to know is about how you work out differences and make compromises and decide where to live or who sleeps where or who does what, when you tell the other about some important backstory or future goal, how you come up with routines or nicknames or inside jokes, how you fight and make up, little things that didn't seem important at first which become obstacles
yesssssssssssss. i adore stories that start off with the established relationship and go from there, because this is usually where all the interesting stuff lurks.
(on the side note, i love how milan's series always show glimpses of previous books' protagonists in the later books, so we can know how they go on. usually they go on awesomely).
no subject
Date: 2014-08-01 10:31 pm (UTC)What I love most about New York is the "only in New York" factor. Also the hilarious readiness of random passers-by to call out spontaneous wisecracks. I thought that was a movie thing until I experienced it on every single visit.
no subject
Date: 2014-08-01 10:44 pm (UTC)YOU BET.
(highline was so prettyyyy. and all the red-bricked buildings. and random lgbt flag winking at me from one of the windows. and the river. and all the people, and crazy hair, and this one dude who promised to dramatically read shakespeare on request).
no subject
Date: 2014-08-01 10:49 pm (UTC)If you come to LA I'll drive you all over the city. You need a native chauffeur to get the full experience. Our public transportation is weirdly inadequate. (Terrible bus system that goes everywhere; excellent subway/train system that only covers small parts of the city.)
no subject
Date: 2014-08-01 10:51 pm (UTC)i loved kansas! not in a sense of wanting to live there, probably, but it was so green and pretty and quiet.
the car-oriented nature of american cities is one of the greatest cognitive dissonance points for me. it's just so - weirdly inefficient for a country built on the idea of the efficiency.
no subject
Date: 2014-08-01 10:56 pm (UTC)It did not help that an initial attempt to build a subway system was very literally sunk when the city gave the contract to the lowest bidder, who screwed up some basic safety issues and caused one of our main roads, Sunset Boulevard, to sink three feet. Good times, good times.
no subject
Date: 2014-08-02 02:52 am (UTC)Ha, this does happen! Just last night my girlfriend and I were leaving the apartment to go get dinner, and our landlord was sitting out on the sidewalk in a lawn chair in front of the bus stop, as he sometimes does (SPEAKING OF "ONLY IN NEW YORK" THINGS) (there's no lawn or anything, I feel I should emphasize, we live on a major avenue, so he's just sitting on the few feet of sidewalk between the front of the building and the street) and as we walked by he called out in his hilariously stereotypical Brooklyn accent: "Good evening, ladies". And then some other dude, a stranger who happened to be walking by, repeats, "Good evening, ladies". And then some third guy did it! I felt very popular for about ten feet.
no subject
Date: 2014-08-02 02:54 am (UTC)Yes, that's an excellent point! Her "first times" usually occur sort of in the middle of the book rather than at the end, too, so you do get to see some of how the characters develop together. I wish we got more of people in subsequent books, really; the tiny little glimpse are just enough to be frustrating, for me.