keiramarcos: (Default)
Keira Marcos ([personal profile] keiramarcos) wrote2012-08-28 09:06 pm

Writing Update

The thing is that I have a bunch of WIPs. Because I write in serial format-- I can juggle a few without feeling all that guilty about keeping readers waiting (sorry) but I do try to live a guilt-free life. Guilt takes up so much energy and often makes you feel miserable both mentally and phsyically. The problem is that I truly am spoiled for choice so I tried to inspire myself by reading my own work. Most of you can get a good idea of what's on my plate based on excerpts from Evil Author Day. I'm very close to finishing That Old Black Magic (HP - Harry/Draco).  I also have a project with LadyHolder (Dangerous and Beautiful Things which is a Sherlock/Sentinel fusion) and a Star Trek/Sentinel project of my own that is fascinating to play with. 

There are a few others: Beckon the Dark (next novel in the Lantean Legacy series), Valor and Honor (next novella in Ring of Fire), and of course my Halo/Sga project that I will start actively pursueing after I wrap up the SGA arc of TTB. As for my major series stuff (spoilers ahead):


Tangled Destinies  (current word count: 144,526)

I read Forsaken  -- that was a turning point fic for me in that series because it's leading up to the final episode in the first arc of the series. Part ten in that series which will be called "Covet" is the final installment of the first arc and it will center around Sam Kirk (his dissertion of his brother, his reported death on Tarsus, Winona's duplicity, etc etc). I thought it was important to address both Spock's brother and Jim's brother at the end of Arc 1 because in many ways both Spock and Jim were indelibly marked by the conduct of their brothers and their emotional/physical dissertation of them.

In Forsaken, we find that Sybok was vicious to Spock when they were children and as a result Spock is extremely distrustful of his half-brother to the point where he deliberately destroyed the familial bonds they shared. This lead Sybock down a very different road (from his canon one in the original series movies) where he tried to embrace the most difficult and far reaching mental discipline on Vulcan. His success or failure isn't particularily relevent to Spock at this point beyond the fact that he'll do anything to keep Sybock away from the family he's created with his parents and Jim on Earth. After I finish up Covet -- I'll start the second arc. We will skip ahead a few years-- Jim and Spock will have finished undergrad and will be preparing for their wedding ceremony on Betazed. Why will I jump ahead? Because frankly-- I'm ready to write porn for this series and I sincerely wish I hadn't made them meet when they were just sixteen. So jumping ahead until their 19 (almost 20) has so much apppeal that it isn't funny. Arc 2 will take place mostly at Star Fleet academy where we will meet more canon characters (Uhura, Chekov, Sulu, etc etc). I'm really looking forward to that.

Ties That Bind (current word count: 330,817)

When I first started writing this story it was a single novel. A novel that turned into 100,000+ words before I ever posted a single word of it on my site. In fact, it wasn't until I'd reread what I wrote for about the tenth time that it crossed my mind that my readers might like it. Truth is that there were plenty in the beginning who DIDN'T appreciate it and I'm sure there are still plenty of people who visit my site who wouldn't touch the series with someone else's severed hand. BDSM is, in its own way, more divisive than slash (or incest) is in fandom. I wrote the series for myself because frankly I was deeply enamored with Xanthe's series (I still am) and like many other writers who've read her work I was inspired to play with the themes. We exchanged a few emails regarding permissions before I posted the first novella in the Ties That Bind series and she did warn me that the work might not be received well by the fandom at large. I thought I was prepared for it. I wasn't. I mean, I really wasn't. I've received more negative feedback and blowback about Ties That Bind than all my other work combined.

A lot of people don't GET it. In fact, there are people who read it and proclaim to enjoy who don't get it. I know this because of their comments and private emails. I've had more than one person so grossly misunderstand my work that I was truly horrified by their interpretation of the material. Though, the less said about that the better, I guess. I can't make anyone get what my words mean to me and I know that everyone gets something different out of it. The series is 3 novellas from being finished. The final three installments in the SGA arc will be called: Time After Time, Broken Road, and The North Star. I have them all plotted out and while I can't promise you won't be shocked, appalled, and furious at certain points throughout the last three stories I will guarentee you a Happy Ending. I don't believe in anything else.

I'd like to take this AU into different fictional worlds eventually -- Sherlock and Criminal Minds to be specific. I don't know if I will but it all strikes my fancy. Who would I pair in those worlds -- well Sherlock should be obvious (Sherlock/John). Criminal Minds, I'm actually a Morgan/Reid shipper but if I wrote TTB for that show-- it would be Hotchner/Reid. Not to be rude about it, but suggestions for other fandoms to explore for this would not be appreciated. 

Sentinels of Atlantis (current word count: 206,927)

This series was rather unintentional. I started writing it on a whim because I was inspired by Ladyholder's series The Unlikely and Unwilling. I wrote The Gathering and I posted it. The response was really positive so I thought, okay, I can work with that. Then I wrote twenty episodes over a period of six months. I hesitate to talk about this even now because I was so devastated! My harddrive had a failure and I hadn't backed up in more than a year. I lost almost all of the episodes I'd written for SOA and THREE professional projects in the moment that harddrive failed. Recovery was impossible. I spent several hundred dollars trying to recover data because of my professional work. Deadend. I was done. It was horrific.  What was worse? I couldn't rewrite what I'd written for SOA. I tried to make myself do it and I was so disillusioned and bored that I had to back up and start over. I replotted the entire first season from what I had posted on my site forward. 

What did this do? Well, John gained a brother he wouldn't have had otherwise (Matt) and Andrew Sheppard appeared. Some readers don't like Andy -- I had one (lol) tell me she thought the kid was creepy. Well, he IS creepy. He's meant to be. In many ways, Andy is a mirror of John. An online Sentinel at a very young age who is powerful beyond measure -- he hears things he shouldn't, is deeply connected with the psionic plane in ways that many simply don't understand and has been under the unknowing guidance of an ascended Sentinel/Guide pair since he came online. Things will get creepier on the Andy front. Just wait until you meet his Guide! 

Episode 20 (The Search) will be the final episode in Season One of the series. It will be long -- easily longer than the first episode (The Gathering) of the season. We'll tie up some loose ends both on Atlantis and on Earth as we prepare for some major changes (mostly on Earth) as they gear up to face the threat of the Wraith and the Ori.

The first five episodes of Season Two are titled: The Pride, The Sacrifice, The Return, The Lifeline, and The Seige -- I'll be honest I get extremely excited just thinking about these episodes! It's going to be so action packed and fun and scary and some of you may end up sending me slightly threatening emails. Don't worry I'll make you a perfect subject line on my contact form!

Aside: I have no idea when any of that will be posted. Just FYI.

---



can't wait!

[identity profile] reddeathherself.livejournal.com 2012-08-31 07:34 pm (UTC)(link)
I'm really looking forward to reading your updates as i'm never disappointed by them! I am sorry that you've received negativity over TTB though. I've never understood that - if they don't like bdsm, or TTB itself, then why read it? If someone doesn't like a fic then fine, that's hardly unusual, but why feel the need to tell anyone that? Like they care!
Anyway, good luck with your writing
:)

[identity profile] magda-666.livejournal.com 2012-09-01 02:33 pm (UTC)(link)
When i read your Sentinels update i could not help but jump to a young Sherlock Holmes (BBC) in my mind, as the Guide to Andy. Exentric, Socialy inept, rude (because it is a waste of his time to be nice to people) and somehow solitary, because.. any Guide strong enough for andy could read minds like others read their daily newspaper, and lets face it: or minds are dirty ;) and he does not care for people at all because a lot of them call him Freek (even in their minds), once they realize he is something else.
But no mater what my mind jumps to, i bet you come up with something even better and totally awesome.

Over the last few years i realized not a lot of readers think to what they are reading, they do not realize that you are writing Fiction/Fantasy, wich in no way reflects your political, social, sexuell opinion or standing or anything else, but what can you expect from people who do not read the big, fat warnings on top of a story*shrug*

I wait patiently for anything you post and praise what i like, crtic what i do not like and keep my eyes of stuff i do not want to read. I love the old Star Trek Movies, seen them all at least 10 times each, but i am more of a Next Generations girl and do not get the hype around Kirk/Spock, and just can not get exited or interested in the fics. I have read yours and it is well written, interesting... but somehow i can not get in to it. That does not mean i go and write you an angry mail, that you wrote such shit and i do not like you and your other fiction anymore and that you are a bad girl and blablabla. People are Assholes. :P

Sorry i wrote so much, in reality i wanted to say:

keep going, love your work, i am looking forward to your next Posts. :D
Edited 2012-09-01 14:36 (UTC)

[identity profile] healer-twilight.livejournal.com 2012-09-02 08:21 am (UTC)(link)
I can't wait for the next Lantean Legacy novel (I’ve gone back and reread book one about ten times), and I am hopelessly addicted to your Tangled Destinies series.*G* I'm really interested in the possibilities that your fantastic new star trek 'verse bring up... Do you plan to follow the movie closely (you know, Spock-Prime, Nero showing up and destroying Vulcan, etc...) or do you plan to go somewhere else entirely? I'd really be interested in reading Spock Prime's reaction to a non-psinull Kirk who's been all but married to his counterpart since he was sixteen, if you do decide to follow that bit of the movie...

I also really like your Sentinels of Atlantis series. I'm fond of pretty much any SentinelAU (despite never having been able to see any of the TV series*G*) and yours stands out among the crowd.

And I REALLY adore your cast pages! I love when people give actual pictures to what their original characters look like, since, for me at least, having a good picture of the person you've pictured as you have written enhances the reading experience.

I will admit that I cannot read your Ties that Bind series because I am majorly squicked by BDSM AUs, but I pretty much love everything else you've ever written.

(If any of this is incoherent, sorry. I’m writing this at 4:00 in the morning, and I’ve been up since around 3:00AM yesterday. There was a snake in my kitchen. An actual, big enough to eat my dogs, snake. Haven’t been back to sleep yet.)

[identity profile] basilio-the-cat.livejournal.com 2012-09-02 06:50 pm (UTC)(link)
Looking forward to the time when you actually get to post some of these! :D

[identity profile] influ-bad-ence.livejournal.com 2012-09-03 09:03 pm (UTC)(link)
Seriously, I am in love with all of this. And I personally vote for your ST/Sentinels fusion- but then you know that. Not being picky I'd gleefully take it all. Especially after some days at my non-profit job. Which I love, but one word CONGRESS and I want to bang my head on the desk. Sighs. I honestly, can't see why you get bad comments about TTTB, now some of the professional BDSM stuff that is out their, that is worrisome.... your DOMS all care about their subs and don't punish them for bringing up the fact they they have reached their limits.

Andy is awesome, I honestly don't find him creeppy. But then I regularly read Urban fantasy and regular fantasy. He is just awesome.

[identity profile] inu-spockya.livejournal.com 2012-09-04 06:41 am (UTC)(link)
yayyyy!! *the crowd goes wild* writing update!!! *does the Happy dance*

buggered if I know why folks as didn't like BDSM would read TtB in the first place, much less why they'd then go ahead and diss something wi' that much wonderful and intricate work put in it and as for Shades of Gray -- just, no. it's from Twilight, we're done here.

me, I *adore* TtB, Sentinelfics, TD, all your stuff. I love that you pair Harry and Draco, cos goddamn, that just jumps off the screen and bites me from the first movie onwards.

so, for me to see these updates are en route -- yep, ya made mah day again. plus my regular fix of KeiraSnark (it's a prescription, see -- gotta have mah Snarkfix, that's all there is to it. And you, mah dear, can Snark with the best of them, and send them home crying for their mommies. heheheheh...

may thy Muse be ever generous with thee, milady. *doffs his cap, grins*

[identity profile] carla888.livejournal.com 2012-09-04 10:02 pm (UTC)(link)
Hi. I don't think I have commented before before. I am a lurker and truthfully, feel there is something kind of invasive to give critique of someone's freely posted, freely given work.

I would just like to thank you for TTB series. I am an almost 30 year old lesbian who relates to what you have written in that series. I have read up a lot on sub/dom dynamics and have played with prevous partners, however I always gt the feeling I was doing it wrong. It was actually your Matt that helped me to see my dynamic for what it is.

I am aware you didn't write this as a teaching tool and I am not treating it as such. Instead I used this series as a way to accept a part of myself that I always thought was strange.

Your writing is provocative and imaginative. Your characters so well fleshed out that if I met them in a club I would not be surprised in the least.

So, as one reader who started uncomfortable and ended beyond happy, I say thank you for taking the chance to post and not letting the naysayers have their way.

Kisses.

PS: It dosen't matter if it takes you two weeks or two years to post, you have loyal readers who (im)patiently wait for you with no regrets.
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[identity profile] chris-king-2005.livejournal.com 2012-09-05 09:02 am (UTC)(link)
Yes, yes, late as always....my pc has been sitting in pieces all over my kitchen counters while I worked on my home office renovations.

*does a little dance*

Squee!

My pom poms may be bedraggled and covered in plaster and paint, but I'm still waving them with shameless abandon!

Keira and WIPs

[identity profile] sgafan33.livejournal.com 2012-09-08 02:06 am (UTC)(link)
Of all your WIPs, I love "If Your Heart's Not In It" the best. Stargate Atlantis, Sentinels and Criminal Minds - what's not to love? I don't know how many times I've re-read your 2 installments.

You are the mistress at writing relationships and I look forward to anything you write, whenever you get to post them.

Upcoming Works

[identity profile] drkbella.livejournal.com 2012-09-08 03:52 am (UTC)(link)
I am really looking forward to the Halo/SGA fiction... I just love the way you write. You have sucked me in with your fiction and now I read your updates on Livejournal religiously. When do I get my membership card and decoder ring in the mail? ... hrm, feel awkwardly like a creeper...

Writing Update

[identity profile] jpangels.livejournal.com 2012-09-08 05:52 am (UTC)(link)
I absolutely love Tangled Destinies; I've read the series maybe 5 times. I don't really come on your LJ often so I did not know that TD would be multiple arcs. *Happy Dance for ETERNITY* I love them as 16 but I can't wait for the next arc!! I don't suppose you will tell us if you eventually plan to implode Vulcan? I hope not. I can't imagine losing any member of the House of Surak, especially Amanda. Anyways, I've rambled enough. Thank you for creating Tangled Destinies!!

[identity profile] seliki.livejournal.com 2012-09-08 10:57 pm (UTC)(link)
OK first you saying the word "update" is basically being a cock tease you know that right? Its mean and not nice and yes I know you aren't nice...I have a shirt that says that "No I don't do nice". Anyhoo as to Tangled Destinies this is the bomb but yes I see your point and I am also looking forward to the smut but the story and characters that you create is such a wonderful thing to read. No I don't mean to stroke your ego...well yeah I do if it means you post faster but anyway ;). You are one of the most talented writers that I have read in a long time both in fanfic and professional so love you just for that. A good and enjoyable writer is a hard thing to find.
Moving along Ties that Bind, I don't pretend to understand the idea of being...restrained and all the other things that happen in this story or in Xanthe's whom I worship for all sorts of wonderful reasons. I do however again enjoy how you, represent...hmm not quite right, your personal viewpoint of that lifestyle, that's the ticket. Again not my thing the idea of the lack of control terrifies me but I can see the appeal based on what you write. I hope that came through alright, not to horrify you or anything *grins* no scarring the Keira.
Andy isn't creepy, he is different and interesting and way more mature than a child that age should be. He is adult and aware on a whole level that no child should be but he handles it with a dignity that is a joy to read. I truly like and love how he and the rather bewildered adults around him handles all this. I can't wait for more on all of your stories but that is my take on these three. Wow that was long winded lol.

[identity profile] that-carlygirl.livejournal.com 2012-09-13 10:38 pm (UTC)(link)
I'm a big fan of most of your writing. I've got your e-books on my i-pad, and I've made my own of some of you stories that don't have them. (I haven't shared them with anyone, they are just for personal use.)

I'm also a fan of Xanthe's BDSM stories, so much so that at one point I made a master list of all the stories I could find set in the same universe. That was a few years ago though, and before I found your writing.

Since then, I've drifted away from BDSM lifestyle stories, mainly because I've always had issues with some of the aspects of it, but also because my tastes have changed.

My point it, as a person who no longer reads BDSM like Xanthe's and yours, I still respect your right to write and read it, and the right of everyone who does. I read all of the work you write in the fandoms I'm in, except for you TTB series. It's not my cup of tea, so I simply don;t read it.

I just wanted to let you know that I think you're an amazing writer, and that not all of the people who don't enjoy BDSM are going to condemn you for it. I love your work, and the universe's you create. I hope you never stop writing :P

PS. Did you get around to watching Teen Wolf?
Edited 2012-09-13 22:40 (UTC)

[identity profile] silvarbelle.livejournal.com 2012-09-19 04:48 pm (UTC)(link)
.....Ties That Bind is my FAVORITE of your series! I don't understand how anyone can't not see how beautiful this is.

Sentinels of Atlantis is a VERY close second favorite.

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