Writers' Salon!

[isana]

All right, guys, let's get this started.

This is a post for members to post their burning questions to each other. They can be simple, like "when is Character X's birthday," or not so simple "how would you define the relationship between Character X and Character Y?" If there's a story you want that author to talk about, throw in the title (and some points you'd like covered!) and if said author's willing, they can write their answer in a separate post, since I have no idea what the comment word limits are.

Here's how it'll work: an author who's up for answering questions/writing commentaries about stories will leave their name in a comment. Readers who want to ask questions or request stories reply to that comment, and hopefully we'll have some good conversations going!

If you guys request stories, it may be best if you limit them to rainbowfic for the time being, unless the story you've got archived outside the comm is in a public entry.

EDIT: If it's not already obvious, you can ask authors more than one question in however many comments you like. The point is to have a discussion, and it wouldn't be very lively if it stopped at one question per author! Just give the author a chance to finish answering your previous questions, of course.

Comments

[shadowsong26]

How did you come to start writing about the Hennessys? (If I misspelled that, I'm sorry. I'm never sure how to pluralize names ending in 'y')

[bookblather]

It all started with Charlotte. Originally it was a romance novel, where Charlotte was living much poorer than she actually is-- that plotline hasn't actually changed, though her reasons for it have-- and fell in love with Daniel's precursor, who flipped his shit when he found out she was rich, typical romance novel misunderstandings, etc. Then Miranda (originally named Siobhan) and Jack (originally named Ryan, and it may still be his middle name) showed up, Miranda via getting stabbed, and the story built from there.

Interesting fact: the Hennessys were Irish Catholic until I realized that I could not write a story about classism in America without also addressing racism. Hence their Hispanic origins. Still Catholic though (nominally).

[shadowsong26]

::nods:: cool.

Did you think the (nominal) Catholicism was an important aspect of their lives to keep? ::curious::

[bookblather]

No. In fact, I doubt if anyone besides Isobel will ever bring it up. The kids have all been baptized and confirmed, but they don't use their saint's names and Miranda at least never bothers going to church. Of all of them, Charlotte may be the only one who still goes at all, and not with any regularity.

[shadowsong26]

Right. Is there any particular reason you decided to give them Hispanic origins when you realized you had to address racism in the story?

[bookblather]

Multiple reasons. I wanted the kids to be able to pass for white, for story-related reasons you will see later. I wanted to contrast Isobel's upbringing with Christopher's, both financially and emotionally. And finally, kind of shallowly, I had never written a Hispanic character before (that I knew of) and wanted to give it a try.

Then there's this: racism is overtly addressed with Daniel, Alicia, and Benjy, of course. Hispanic people tend to get a slightly more subtle version of it. I wanted to work with that as well, insofar as I could being a pasty white girl.

I feel like I need to stick a disclaimer on all the stories. "Warning: Written by pasty white girl. If you see a fuckup, please alert the author ASAP."

[shadowsong26]

That makes perfect sense. The shallow reason and the deeper ones.