Wow. Finished at last.
It's both cool and weird at the same time.
Thinking back to when I was first writing Aftermath, with the idea burning in my head amidst the frenzy of wedding preparations, I feel incredibly gratified that the story has come this far. It was just a little Cloud/Tifa fic. They sooo needed a break from what canon was tossing them. And I had a few ideas for other chapters. So in Oct/Nov last year, I sketched out a rough plan- it looks like this:

9 After                                         4 Honey Wedd/Honey
10 Int                                           5 Taste of H
11 Symb                                      6 Summer Hol Vince? Shalua, Barret, Yuffie, Reeve, Cid?
12 Winter                                     7 PtW
1 Adopt?                                      8 PtW2
2 Valentine's? Planning?               Epilogue
3 Wedd Planning

The final product is obviously different from my original skeleton plan, but I thought it would be interesting to share. There were a few  changes: I was inspired by different things throughout the year and wrote new chapters accordingly (Penance, Triangles, Level Up) and I cut a chapter (PtW2) due not only to its content, but also to keep it within the year. There was also the "update, virgin..." incident that caused a big delay in Promises. :( In retrospect, I prefer the wedding and honeymoon split into two chapters, but man, was I angry at the time. Anyway, I hope I've done each month justice. I think filling in the year gap (and having it actually possible in canon) is pretty ambitious and original, so I'm glad it worked out. I'm proud of it. And I know I've learned so much about writing in the process. :)

My first lesson was in formatting and paragraphs. Aftermath used to be mostly gigantic paragraphs of doom until reviewers pointed out just how hard it was to read. I also was unaware of the "line break" tool, and used the chapter system instead. What a fanfiction n00b, eh?

I think Interlude suffers from sophomore syndrome- I basically just needed to show that lovey-dovey stage (without overdoing it) and set up Symbiosis. But since it does accomplish those two things without being too nauseating, I don't hate it as much as I used to.

Somewhere between Symbiosis and Winter Blaze (I still don't really like that title) was when I started really thinking about writing as a craft. Maybe I could really do this in real life, and not just as a hobby... A big part of that was the feedback I got from kimouski  about the original version of A Taste of Home. Am I a writer or a storyteller? Do I tell instead of show? Is there a flair to my writing? These are questions she brought up that I still ask myself  as I write/edit my chapters. While I won't claim that I'm a good writer now, I think I'm a much better one than I was a few months ago. And like teaching, where you go back over a lesson to see how you could have taught it better, I think that ongoing self-scrutiny is what leads to improvement.

Part of the experiment was also seeing how well I could work with deadlines. The verdict? I did well getting out chapters every month... until I got pregnant. Hey, you try writing when you're falling asleep in front of the keyboard! :P Jonathan Stroud recently wrote in his NaNoWriMo pep talk about how writers have to be dedicated to writing under pressure. A year's deadline is actually only 5 or 6 months when considering all the editing, etc. that a book also needs to go through.It takes dedication and a certain amount of "forcing yourself" to get that first draft out. And since this was supposed to be practice for writing my own novel, I'm feeling buoyant about my future as a novelist. (BTW, I'm not doing NaNo, but I got a peek at the pep talk through somebody in the Bartimeaus community! LJ, I <3 you.)

Another part was keeping it realistic. I did a lot of research, both in my canon sources to make sure my characterizations were accurate, and on scientific things like solar energy. This was actually something Stroud recommended on bartiforums that I read ages ago. Want to make your fantasy story believable? Look it up, and stick in proper details. It's a lot of work for a line or two, but then it no longer sounds like you are just making stuff up. Yes, your readers can tell when you have no idea what you are talking about. And actually, the geeky part of me found this a lot of fun. Bioluminescent creatures are pretty cool!

Another thing I tried was writing in different styles. Could I make it clear who was talking through simply dialogue? What if I had two time-lines? Am I any good at writing an action sequence? (Something I avoided for a long time- until a reviewer mentioned it.) Creating suspense? Making a scene sparkly and euphoric? Maybe. I tried, anyway. You know what they say about practice...

I also experimented with symbology and themes- Square's "wolf" interpretation of Cloud's character, for example. Was I successful? I don't know- honestly, I think I've only had a single reviewer notice the deeper themes. So this probably still needs work. But I don't mind- I like knowing they're there, at least.

In my quest for improvement, I joined the Genesis Awards forum. Not just a forum where the LTD is done to death, but one where fanfiction writers actually talk about writing. It's amazing what sort of tips you can pick up by reading through old threads. And in getting some in-depth feedback from another member, I realized that, for example, my knowledge of punctuation was not up to standard. (It still isn't. Sigh. Double dashes still look weird to me, wheatear .) I also started to read a lot more critically- both my own work, and that of others.

It wasn't until Full Circle got nominated (for which abrogate_nadir  gets eternal gratitude!) that I finally got a beta, though. (Ha! Irony!) It was great to have that second critical opinion of my work. It made me a lot more confident about publishing, and I've actually done few retro-edits to Level Up, Preludes and Full Circle (Epilogue)- something I used to do compulsively for the other chapters.

Actually, I'll still be editing- judging is just around the corner, and I want it to be in the best shape possible before it goes before them. I have no idea when I'll start writing again, but I think "Crucible" will be my next project. A short little 5 chapter fic that will require loads of research. Sounds like fun, right? :)