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Even newer questions to ponder

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Sakabelle:

--- Quote from: RokofAges75 on July 24, 2017, 09:55:36 PM ---For those of you who write slash and have a favorite pairing that you always write about, how do you keep it fresh from story to story?  I'm talking stand-alone stories about the same couple, not stories in a series.  This is not a criticism, just a curiosity.  In my very limited experience writing in this genre, I feel like I put everything I had into developing the relationship between Howie and Nick in SAMS and its prequel, so the thought of writing a completely different story with that Howie/Nick pairing doesn't appeal to me at all, anymore than taking a het couple from one of my romances and writing a completely different, unrelated story about them would.  How are you able to keep it new, different, and exciting each time?

--- End quote ---

I feel like I can answer this because I have written... 17 stories about Niall/Harry in 1D. (Wow that's a lot! I thought it was more like 10 until I actually went and counted LOL) Anyway. I guess it's possible to do it in two ways. First, by having the romance not be the only portion of the story. I don't think it should be this way anyway, but when writing about the same characters over and over again it's important to have outside elements that affect the plot. The slashy bits should come as secondary.

Another thing that helps is twisting their character traits differently. Out of those 17 stories I've written, I think only 5 of them are AU. The AU portion definitely helps because I can change the extenuating circumstances a lot more than when keeping it in canon. A lot of the canon stuff is me just writing a short story based around something that actually happened. Even within the canon, I think I only did the "oh god I can't believe I might be gay" plotline once with that pairing. After getting that out of the way there were other, more interesting ways to twist their characters... like for instance most people in that fandom go with the sterotypical Harry's a womanizer character trait and Niall is pining for him. I switched it around. No one has to have an identity crisis, they can still be themselves, just the situation I threw at them was different.

But yeah, changing the extenuating circumstances and making the romance part of the story secondary I think is key to writing about the same characters multiple times.

RokofAges75:
Mare, that is interesting what you said about everything you like involving bromance.  I agree about ER - the characters and thelr (not just sexual) relationships with each other are what set that show apart from every other medical drama I've tried to watch and haven't gotten into because it's just not as good as ER.  I gave Grey's Anatomy another chance this summer and actually made it to Season 2, and I can see why people like it, but it's still no ER.

Baseball, too - I've never thought about it that way, but I can see what you're saying with that.  I think of the story Between the Lines, and how the author Carrie used the Boys as members of a baseball team and how well that worked as an AU because the dynamics were definitely similar.  The mark of a great team in any sport is how the players get along with one another.  I would love to see a movie made about the 2016 Cubs because they had it all - the bromance, the drama, the highs and lows, overcoming the odds, all of it.

RokofAges75:
That makes sense, Steph.  I think the AU thing would definitely help, as well as different subplots  outside of the romantic storyline.  I also think it's easier for people who regularly read and write slash to just accept that the characters are gay right off the bat without feeling the need to show the characters coming out or struggling with the fact that they're gay.  I think that's the stuff that I wouldn't want to have to write over and over again.

FrickingKaos:
As a slash convert it was really hard at first to write Frick and Frack in a romantic sense and not a bromance. I'd been writing their friendship forever so to change to romance took me  a while to adjust. I've also written Nick/Kevin slash as well. I think getting ideas for me comes from music usually or something I read, depending on my mood. I also take ideas from things happening in the boys lives (like in One Phone Call).

mare:
Between the Lines was a great baseball AU. I think the key to any winning team is the bond they all seem to have. The same with the Royals who had won the year before. The neat thing is no matter where the players end up going after that World Series win, they will still be forever bonded because of it. Those 86 Mets are always together for things. Two of them actual do the broadcasting for all the Mets games together. It's awesome!

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