Come on—you know you want to write rock band slash.

xmas_rocks, the annual rock band slash fiction exchange, opened for pairings nominations yesterday. Go forth and suggest some. (Nominating pairings does not commit you to participating in the exchange, but it’s nice for those of us who are participating to have more pairings to choose from, and if you do decide to participate after all (which you should, because omg so much fun), you’ll have gotten your favorite pairings on the list.)

Visit the archive to read stories from years past.

To say that I am loving writing The Underneath, or whatever I’m calling it this week! I’m finally done with the beginning, and rather than finding myself going “Oh shit. Middle….” I’m happy to be here!

(Don’t rub my face in these words when I come crying to you about the middle later on, okay? Ta!)

Well, just a tiny bit near the end. I was one of several people interviewed for a recent Seattle Sound article on band fiction. The issue is available in digital format online; the article starts on page 54 (or you can use the TOC button to go straight to the “Slasher Girls” article). You’ll need to use the red buttons in the middle to make the text large enough to read—and then you’ll still need good eyes or good glasses.

The intro bit that makes it sound like band fiction evolved out of media fandom (first came Kirk/Spock, then came stories about musicians!) is disappointing. Yes, some parts of bandom (popslash and the current Fueled By Ramen/Decaydance fad) do have large numbers of people involved who come from media fandom, but other parts of bandom have existed and still exist apart from media fandom. Many of us discovered media fandom after bandom. F’rinstance, my first bandslash effort¹—starring Charlie Sexton and a-Ha’s Morten Harket—was written in 1985. It wasn’t till 2002 that I discovered fan fiction for D.C.’s The Authority. The only thing in between those two dates was bandslash in my head. Lots of bandslash in my head….

¹My first bandfic was het—a Mary Sue in journal format, revolving around Billy Joel. It was written in 1982 in a little composition book I’d grabbed from school, one of those thin, smooth-manila-cover jobbies teachers used to sometimes hand out for projects. Back when schools had money to hand out things like small composition notebooks and scratch paper.

You’ve heard of NaNoWriMo (National Novel Writing Month), right? (If not, hang out—I’ll tell you all about it come October.) Last March on Rockfic.com, we started BFNoWriMo: Band Fiction Novella Writing Month (further shortened to “Biffno” ’cause it was funner to say). It was a blast! So we’re doing it again, only we’ve moved it to a different site.

The goal of Biffno is to write at least 25,000 words on a single band fiction story—at the end you either have a novella or you’re well on your way to a novel. (I actually intend to keep writing through the end of Biffno into April and May, and the Biffno forums will stay open so others can finish what they’ve started, too.)

To “win” at Biffno, all you have to manage is 807 words a day for 31 days. With a bunch of other people doing it, you’ll get plenty of support.

Biffno starts March 1, 2008. Signups begin today. To sign up, first register and log on to the Rockfic site—message board access is completely free, then go to the Biffno signup thread and sign up.

This year I’m writing an original bandfic horror novel called Beneath—what are you going to write?

I finished reading Old Man’s War (John Scalzi) late last night. Enjoyed the hell out of it. (I couldn’t find it anywhere as an ebook, though. That’s not right. Every sf book should automatically come out as an ebook edition, no questions asked.)

This morning I read a novella-length bandfic¹ AU² that took place in an open, integrated cell block system reminiscent of the one on HBO’s Oz. Featured bands were Queens of the Stone Age, Eagles of Death Metal, Nine Inch Nails, Mastadon and Zico Chain. I devoured the story. It had angst and gay smex and dark pasts (and dark futures) and did I say angst? Lots of angst. Angst is my guilty pleasure. If you’re into that sort of thing (bandfic, gay sex, angst, prison AUs), check out duffnstuff’s “Misfit Love“.

In addition to reading, I installed a mod on the Bandsmut message boards that allows users to get syndicated feeds of any or all of the forums and topics there. (ETA: Now if only the feeds would update in Google Reader…. *sigh*)

In and amongst all that, I retitled the novel I’m working on—it’s Rot now. I’m also playing around with its structure (in my head), how I can pull off doing in other-than-chronological order. I’m thinking back on William Goldman’s Control, though…differently.

Finally, an idea for a new novel popped up in my imagination today. I don’t know where it’s going yet, but I’m interested to find out. It’s not bandfic, though, so I won’t be doing it for Biffno in March, but that’s a’ight—I’ve already got a bandfic horror story to write for that (with fictional bands ’cause real ones don’t work for this….). It’s tentatively titled Below.

¹”Bandfic” is short for band fiction. Learn about bandfic on FanHistory.com.
²AU is short for “alternate universe.” Learn more about AUs on FanHistory.com.