My thing with Card: He has great ideas for stories, and writes them rather well, to start. And then he gets impressed with himself, and suddenly, turns pedantic and didactic, and, well, boring.

I can't help but wonder how the my experiences writing fic will help or hinder my efforts when I finally get of my ass to write something original (which may or may not happen.)

I think the most obvious problem is short-cutting the characterization rather than the world-building. Micole noted that the two characters in Rachel Caine's novels that bear a striking resemblance to Daniel Jackson and Jack O'Neill are the two whose characterizations she found the thinnest--and that was before I told her where they came from. It wasn't a problem for me, because I recognized them right away, and filled in the missing bits. It's the sort of thing the writer herself may not notice, because she knows them so well, you know?

It's exactly the perspective people are coming from when they claim fanfic isn't good practice for professional writing. One presumes they're not 100% wrong on that front; I know that within fanfic, it's easy to rely on fanon to do your work for you, so the same must hold true outside fanfic.

Personally, I find that I seek fanfic and published fiction for totally different reasons, so that when I come across something that feels fanficcy in a published novel, I count it as a demerit, despite its being something I would like in fanfic. I've read a couple of first novels where I can tell that the writer comes from fandom, and is still working out how to write for a non-fannish audience.

I'm gonna mark this for deletion or editing when you've read it, Nutty; I suspect she doesn't really want the word to get out.

Go for it.

There is NO frelling evidence that Lewis Carroll was a pederast or a pedophile.

A man with a really weird emotional life, yes. Somebody who couldn't cope with post-puberty women, yes. But there's no evidence that he ever laid a hand on any of his little friends, many of whom spoke fondly of him in after years.

The original novel I'm working on is directly based off a fic in another fandom. I may need to change the heroine's name (even though she's an OC) because anyone who's read the fic will immediately go "Hey!"

Always assuming, of course, that the thing gets finished, much less published.

Way past the Card discussion, but I just finished his latest book, Magic Street and I was underwhelmed. (In spoilerfont for those who plan to read and don't want to be tainted) His attempt to write in an African-American voice made me cringe so many times. He tries to affect the tone of a middle-class black community with his characters attempting but failing to be "street", but it just comes off as badly written and sometimes downright racist. In his afterword, he apologizes for much of this, and I don't think he was, in any way, trying to be offensive yet I couldn't help being offended. I am interested in what others thought of it if anyone else has read it.

As others have said, his ideas for the book were excellent, but in the execution he comes up very short. More and more of his later novels are heavy-handed with thinly disguised Mormon morality, but I keep reading hoping to see a glimmer of The Worthing Chronicles or Ender's Game or even Treason. Politically, he's gotten so far to the right it's frightening. Yet it's hard to condemn a man who loves Firefly and Serenity so much.

Yet it's hard to condemn a man who loves Firefly and Serenity so much.

Why? I don't see what one has to do with the other.

Or did I miss tone?

Yet it's hard to condemn a man who loves Firefly and Serenity so much.

I was going to say. You weren't in the Veronica Mars thread for the "Hitler was a vegetarian" discussion?

I don't think he was, in any way, trying to be offensive yet I couldn't help being offended.

Intent to offend needn't be present for offense to be rightly taken. The endeavor you're describing sounds downright embarrassing, so offense may be the absolutely appropriate response.

Why? I don't see what one has to do with the other.

You're right, it doesn't. I just find it so weird that a man really, really gets what Joss is trying to do, and then can be so obtuse with regard to tolerance and the current administration. And I did skim over that discussion in VM, but Hitler being a vegetarian seems a little different than Hitler being a card-carrying member of PETA. The latter would freak me out much more.

Intent to offend needn't be present for offense to be rightly taken. The endeavor you're describing sounds downright embarrassing, so offense may be the absolutely appropriate response.

Oh it was. Not being African-American however, I feel strange judging how offensive his prose actually was. Which probably sounds silly. Like when non-Jews try and explain how anti-semitic Mel Gibson's film is but then say if they were Jewish they'd be really offended. I mean, it should be easy enough to determine if a film or story is objectively offensive, yet for some reason it isn't so easy. I don't think I'm explaining this well.

There is NO frelling evidence that Lewis Carroll was a pederast or a pedophile.

That he was a pedarast no, a pedophile (which deals with desire rather than neccesarily actions) - there is evidence. He maintained a secret stash of photos of nude little girls. That he took the photos, kept the photos, and kept them a secret, seems fairly strong evidence of at least the desire.