School's out, but unfortunately that means I'll be updating less and/or at odd intervals, because my schedule is really discombobulated this summer. I'm going to Banff (before you ask, that's a lake in Alberta, Canada), New York, and New Jersey, but at other times I'll be sitting around at home watching Youtube all day long. Sigh…

Yeah, I can't think of anything to write, so this is a little filler.

DISCLAIMER: I still wish.

I've seen a lot of guides for fanfiction and whatnot, so I want to reiterate some main points: (Oh, and feel free to skip this if you think it doesn't apply to you.)

Characters: When writing an original story or creating an OC, you can spell your characters' names however you want. But, when writing fanfiction, you have to follow how the author has spelled the characters' names.

For example, one of the more commonly misspelled names in the Leviathan section is Lilit. It's not Lillit, Lilitia or Lilith. Lilith is an "apocryphal Jewish demon queen," according to Google, not a badass lesbian warrior-anarchist. L-I-L-I-T.

A few others: Deryn, not Dyren, Darren, or Dereyn. It's Alek, not Alec; and Aleksandar, not Alexander, Aleksander, or any other discombobulated form of their names.

General spelling: One word. SPELLCHECK. I've seen a lot of fanfics with good ideas, but the spelling and/or grammar distracts me from the story. Use capital letters at the beginning of a sentence or when using a proper noun, and always, ALWAYS capitalize "I", as in "I am" or "I will".

Usually, when writing a fanfiction, you first type it out on a word processor, such as Microsoft Word. These usually have a spell-checking tool, and when you misspell a word, a little red line will appear under it, telling you to check it. Even if your word processor doesn't have one, the document manager on this site does. Therefore, it's always a good idea to read over your work a couple times before hitting the "Publish" button.

And yes, I have been guilty of misspelling words in my stories, so I might sound like a hypocrite, but I spell-check and read over my work more frequently than I did in the past. *grins sheepishly*

Reviews/Requests: Have you seen reviews for books or movies? They're usually at least a couple sentences long, and explain what they liked and/or disliked about it. If a reviewer just wrote "OMG I LOVED IT!" or "This was horrible," then they wouldn't be doing their job properly.

Obviously, yours don't have to be as detailed and fancy-schmancy as those, but you want to state what you thought of the story, and then explain why you feel that way about it. And please refrain from using language that you might use in texting or IM-ing. You've got a full keyboard, and plenty of space and time, and it can look like you're being too lazy to write a proper review.

The idea of writing a review is to let the writer know how their writing is, and to help a writer make it even better, so constructive criticism is also appreciated. No writer is perfect, after all. For example, one review I got said: "Your writing is a little choppy. I mean you go from 'metaphorical corner' to 'came forth from the bowels of the Leviathan.' Remember, you asked for constructive criticism." THAT is an example of a helpful review (there are many others as well). (From oraldisaster101)

As for requests, usually a one-liner is sufficient. When writing off a prompt for school, the topic is usually general to allow for variety and creativity. If you have a super-detailed plot outline as your request, then you're better off writing it yourself, because your idea is well-developed, and you're not allowing for a lot of creativity from the author.

Does anyone think the idea of a writing trade would be good? To explain, two or more authors trade ideas or partially written stories and see what the other can do with it, like an art trade.

Hope you found this helpful! (And sorry about my extensive rants.)

For a better guide, see dnrl's "A Guide to Writing Fanfiction," which can be found under my favorites.

Sorry for the lack of stories, the post-school euphoria is still with me. But inspiration is not.

Answer: I think SW mentioned somewhere that neither Alek nor Deryn are dying material, but that a major character would die. Meh…we'll have to wait until September to find out. 3 more months…

Question: If you had the opportunity, what question(s) would you ask Scott Westerfeld?

Review, please? A few seconds of your time makes me so much happier!