I'm no author, but she is

Do you know something? I've struggled for a long time trying to discern the difference between being a writer and being an author.

Anyone can be a writer, all it takes is an idea, and the will to put enough words on paper to make that idea something tangible. Granted, there are certain levels of being a writer. Depending on your grasp on technical details and the language you're writing in, there are certainly good writers and not-so-good writers, just as there are good ideas and not-so-good ideas. I won't get into whether the craft of good writing is an innate skill that some have and others don't or if it's simply a technique that anyone can become good at through practice or whether its really some mixture of the two, because that's not important. Being a writer i merely being someone who has the good enough sense to put ideas down on paper.

But an author is someone completely different. An author is not merely someone who puts ideas, whether good or bad, on paper. An author is a storyteller, and no matter how good a writer is and no matter how good their ideas, those ideas will remain simply that, ideas on paper, until they happen to be the specific sort of writer who has a deep enough grasp of emotion and the human experience to craft a story, something that really connects with its audience.

That's why I would like to submit that I am no author. You may protest, and point to my collected works here on FiMFiction to say that I am, and that whatever I'm saying right now is a load of self-degrading nonsense. And you may be right. I will digress and say that the true distinction between an idea and a story (and thus between a writer and an author) lies in the perceptions and the opinions of the listener, the reader, and not the writer. But, in my own humble opinion, my own fics remain largely a series of disconjointed ideas held together by a bit of decent prose and a natural penchant for suspense.

I think all of my best-recieved fics ("Shattered", "To Fix You", "What If?") and even my very favorite one of mine ("Keep the Earth Below my Hooves"), were only so well-recieved and well-read as they were because they are, in essence, tragedy porn. The central theme to each revolves around something (rape, suicide, abduction/abandonment, and cancer) that are universally and unequivocally considered tragic events when they occur in real life. By using such events in my fics, I am literally handed the conflict. There's no need for subtlety, complexity, or creativity. The conflict presents itself as readily apparent, and whether the characters solve it or not become trivial. That's why I call it tragedy porn, because it requires little creativity on my part. The only creativity employed by me is in the execution of the idea, and (if I am to believe those who enjoy these fics so much) that execution is, thankfully, well-done.

Even my own characters (recall Cider, if you will), come of as flat, one-dimensional, and boring. I know full well that I can't come near the complexity and reliability and brilliance of the characters crafted by the show, which is why the writing of fan fiction offers so much solace to me. I don't need to spend energy (energy I might not have) crafting characters that the audience falls in love with, because my audience already loves the characters I use.

So, therefore, I'd like to humbly submit that I am no author, at least, not yet. I'm working on it, and I will continue to work on it. And good thing to, because in my own weird little way, I consider being an author, nay, being a storyteller, the be one of the absolute highest callings achievable in life. To be able to tell a great story is to be able to bring people together, transcending space and time. It's a goal of mine.

But, the whole reason I bring all this up (I swear, it's not self-degredaiton or me seeking pity from my readers) is because there is someone who I humbly consider to be a true author. She is probably more so than I can hope to be right now. And I'll tell you why, and hopefully make this entire long-winded post seem like it has some sort of purpose.

You all likely know that I personally like to write, and even read, mostly Appledash. After all, it is my favorite pairing, and for reasons I don't fully understand, that seems to weigh fairly hard on my decision to read something or not. But not always.

Recently, I took a foray off the Appledash reservation and came to read The Homesteading, by the absolutely marvelous bookplayer. You've probably heard of her, I'm certain we share much of the same fan base and I'm also somewhat aware that I've probably sung her praises in another blog post some time ago. So, yes, for the sake of one of my favorite authors, I embraced a Twijack story, which is a bit out of my comfort zone.

I'd highly recommend not only the story, but the stepping out of your comfort zone as well. For one reason and one reason only.

She tells a story, and she tells it well, too.

She tells a story in all the ways that I don't consider myself able to. She sweeps you in and makes you want to know whats happening to the point where the little details like the Twijack relationship and whatever else simply fall away. They don't matter. It's a mystery story every bit as gripping and omnipotent as any you could read, and yet its so much more than that. Twilight and Applejack, despite being the shows characters, take on a whole new aura, as if they are no long the show's characters, but have somehow become bookplayer's characters. At least, they feel like they're hers. Not only that, but at some point along the way, you'll feel like you're simply one of bookplayer's characters, simple getting pulled along and immersed in everything and thrown around every twist and turn like she's early been controlling you this whole time.

At least, that's what it felt like for me. I shouldn't try to speak for you, so I should only suggest that you read it. Read it, because it's a story that she felt had to be told, and she tells it beautifully. Read it because being a storyteller is one of those few rare, yet brilliant gifts or talents or skills or whatever you want to call it that has to power to move you even through a computer screen. Read it, because there is nothing more noble to be than one of those few storytellers.

In my humble opinion, bookplayer is one of those few.

Follow you anywhere, m'am.

Comments

[ThePhantomAssassin]

That is was to long a Blog Post. But it said something about reading a ship fic that is really good. So I'm ago read that now. Because I love shipping so much, I'm going to school to become the CEO of FedEx or UPS. (Not really. But Shipping in any shape of form is usually awesome. So yeah. Gonna go check that out. Already faved and liked because you think so highly of it.)

[CaveRave]

There can be no blog post "way to long".