new author seeking advice by ebfiddler

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new author seeking advice

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POSTED BY: EBFIDDLER
UPDATED: Monday, May 9, 2011 09:57
SHORT URL: http://bit.ly/jCx0eq
VIEWED: 2247
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Friday, May 6, 2011 8:59 AM

Hello.

I first saw Firefly about a year and half ago and have been quite taken with it...so much so that I've been working on my own Firefly fan fiction.

Well, I have some stories, more or less ready to post. I've never done this before, and I guess I need a bit of hand-holding to figure it out.

I have really enjoyed reading some of the high-quality fiction in the Blue Sun Room, and would like to emulate some of my favorite authors there. I'd like my own postings to reflect a similar standard of care and craftsmanship.

So here are some of the things I don't know:

*Chinese words with roll-over translations.
These are so cool. How do I put them into my texts?

*Formatting
Anything special I need to do to format my fics, or will copying and pasting from Word do it? Will I lose special features like pinyin/Chinese characters if I do it this way?

*Advice on size of postings
Is there a limit? Most of my stories are about 10,000 words or more. I figure these should be broken up into smaller segments, say about 3000 words. Anyone want to advise on where I ought to make the breaks in the story?

*Should I get a beta reader before posting for the first time?
If so, how do I get one?

Thanks for advice.

EB

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Saturday, May 7, 2011 5:17 AM

BYTEMITE

I've seen those roll over Chinese translations advertised on some fic, but I've never gotten them to work. So unfortunately on that point, I'm not sure.

You won't lose accented or special characters, but you'll lose bold, italics, and underline. You'll also lose formatting unless your paragraphs are memo-style.

But don't worry about size limits for a story. You could put up a 50,000 word one shot if you wanted, as far as I know, though I'm not sure if the posting field for BSR has any limit.

There was an old agreement about not posting more than two stories/chapters a week, so that everyone else gets a fair chance at being seen on the main page, but it was never enforced much because we're browncoats. Nowadays, generally it seems no one minds more than two posts anymore, and it helps the BSR be more active.

Ask around for betas. Normally I'd try to volunteer, but I haven't had enough time lately. Have fun writing and posting. :)

(Sorry about the double notification, there's sometimes a glitch posting, I recommend you make a copy of your posts before you put them up so they don't get lost. You can avoid the glitch by going over to the 2.0 beta version of the site. http://beta.fireflyfans.net/main.aspx)

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Sunday, May 8, 2011 4:03 PM

RIONAEIRE

Beir bua agus beannacht

You can also post on fanfiction.net, that's where I read and review, I'm wellknown there as a Firefly fanfic reviewer and I give very thorough constructive reviews. I don't have time to also read on Blue Sun Room, but there are lots of people who do read there, so it can be a great place to post. There are certain things I won't read, but no matter what you choose to write someone out there will enjoy it, even if it isn't me.

"A completely coherant River means writers don't deliver" KatTaya

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Monday, May 9, 2011 9:57 AM

MAL4PREZ

Hi EB! Got your PM. I bumped the formatting thread. As I posted there, many things no longer work because of security changes, but mouse overs and basic formatting (italics, bold) still do. Links are iffy, and I'm not quite sure why. Sometimes mine are fine, but then stop working. I think last time I posted it was all good.

A beta is a great idea. Sorry though, I don't do beta reading anymore. I believe there are options to connect with beta readers on fanfiction dot net. Which was a good suggestion from Riona. I cross post there, and get lots of good readers from that site. Formatting rules are completely different though!

Any more questions, just drop me another PM. Good luck!

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hmm-burble-blah, blah-blah-blah, take a left

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