The Amazon Queen Zara Ziti

Frankly, it's insane if any of you are still reading this. You deserve medals of valor, but you'll have to make do with my undying thanks instead.

::cough:: so. It's been more than two years since last I updated. There's good reason; I was kind of out of the world from November 2007 - March 2009, sorting a lot of my RL stuff that desperately needed sorting. Fanfiction, while always lurking in my thoughts, was hardly a priority.

Well, now I'm back. My RL wants/needs have changed quite a lot -- realized culinary school was cool, but studying jazz vocals is the thing that's going to make my heart soar. It's a serious switch, and it's really intimidating. Going after the thing you want can be much scarier in the moment than finding a way to make do with something so-so. I'm putting a lot on the line; in a couple of days I'm moving cities by myself for the first time, and I honestly have very little idea what I'm getting into.

The point of all this? I'm not dead, for those of you who were (legitimately) worried about that possibility. I don't know what my fandom life is going to look like.

I've been reading plenty of fic, and all of it's bookmarked at FFN. Most of it is in my C2, Suitcase Full of Dreams, and some is in my Favorites. I've been reading a lot of Harry Potter fic; a very little Twilight; a bit more of the HP/Twilight crossovers -- I love me some Harry/Edward; a little High School Musical.

I've been brainstorming a lot of fic. Some of that is the rest of "One Whole Star" (HP); some of it is the rest of "Be Who We Are" (HSM). ...No, unfortunately, I have not outgrown High School Musical. You'd think I would have; I'm twenty-one now. (Holy moley. Think on this: I've been in fandom for more than nine years.)

Er. The fic. I've got thoughts of a post-DH EWE HP fic or two; an AU HSM fic, mostly as a way for me to talk about some of what I've been through (gotta love the meta); a weird BtVS/SV X-Over that will probably never see the light of day... You know, the usual. As soon as I have something to share, I'll share it with you.

Thank you for the enduring reviews/comments/questions. You have been incredibly cool. 

Sincerely,

Zara

Be Who We Are is updated at FFN here.

A request: even if you're not a High School Musical fan, would you mind reading Chapter Two of this fic? About half of it is kissing scenes, and I want to know if the logistics work for you, or if it's too technical. (I'd rather know now, before I get to the more explicit stuff.)

On that same note, has anyone noticed that people don't really write all that much drawn-out kissing in fanfic? It's often either smut or nothing. I think that's sad, considering how much fun just making out can be. It's an odd second request, but I'll toss it out there anyway: if you've any fics with good kissing scenes, either written yourself or in your Favorites, would you drop me a link? Research purposes only. Any fandom is all right, although Harry Potter het is preferred.

Also I am back to work on One Whole Star as we speak. Wahoo! I'll have some tidbits for you soon.

Cheers,

AQZZ

Hola to the Friends list. I am so sorry it's been so long since I've updated. Or posted. Or anything. Please believe me when I say I've had a lot going on.

The main thing is -- wahoo! I'm in school! I'm a couple months into the Culinary Arts program at the Culinary Institute of America in NY. This makes my schedule kind of odd and unpredictable, depending on what class I'm in at the time. See, my Meat Fabrication class started at 2:15 and ran until, um, whenever the Chef decided we were done, which was usually 10:00 or thereabouts, but we didn't have much homework. My Fish Fabrication class ran from 2:15 until much earlier, more like 8:00, but the homework load was much heavier. Muy confusing.

Anyway, I'm just starting to get the hang of it, but fanfiction is never far from my mind. I'm still plotting away on One Whole Star, as well as an as-yet-nebulous darker fic. I may have some extra free time coming up soon (more on that in a bit) to get some of that done.

Now, my real confession: a week ago a very dear friend of mine came to visit me at school and had playing in her car the soundtrack to High School Musical. It was kind of downhill from there. She bought me the DVD as a joke, we watched it, I fell in love with Zac Efron, we watched it again, the weekend ended and she went home, I watched it again... Do you sense a pattern?

High School Musical is pretty much the definition of fluff. It's cheesy and predictable and I love it. What can you do? (I was briefly worried that my crush on Zac Efron made me a pedophile, but I looked him up on IMDb and he's only a month younger than me, so we can all relax.) Another thing about HSM is that it's the perfect medium for any and all cheesy musical fanfiction ideas you've ever, ever had. Which brings us to this: Be Who We Are, Ch. 1.

I got sick last weekend and had little to do but watch HSM... again. And Be Who We Are is what came of that. I have no idea if any of you guys are loco enough to like HSM enough to read the fic, but if you are I'd love to know what you think of it.

So that's the update. There should be more of both One Whole Star and Be Who We Are soon.

Thanks for sticking with me this long!

~ AQZZ

Okay, all. I realize it has been A ZILLION YEARS since I posted anything, of substance or otherwise, and I have all sorts of excuses, but it boils down to two major issues:

1) Real Life; and

2) I've been trying to write Chapter Four from Xander's POV.

Real Life has steadily been becoming less of an issue, while Xander has been more. I just can't get inside his head. I can write about him just fine, but from his POV not so much. I'm not entirely clear on why, it just keeps coming out awful. And glib -- not in a cute Xander way, in an obnoxious way. So now that I've realized this and will be trying something else, I'll have something for you to read soon.

Just an quick update so you know I'm not dead of having fallen off a cliff or something.

~ AQZZ

I know I haven't replied to your comments from the last post to that, but I'll get to it as soon as I can. In the meantime, I'm taking a mo to address an issue that proftlb inadvertently brought to my attention:

I got the timeline wrong!

What I wanted was for Harry to start Hogwarts in September of 1999 -- i.e., when Buffy and Willow started college at UC Sunnydale in canon. However, this is impossible the way I've set it up, with Harry turning seven in summer 1996.

So here are our options:

1) I go back and edit my old authors' notes and bits of previous chapters to make Harry seven, going on eight, instead, which gives him three years, not four, in Sunnydale. (This makes me gag -- I want Harry to have as much time with Willow as he can!)

2) I go back and edit my old authors' notes and bits of previous chapters to make this the summer of 1995, a full year before Buffy comes, giving Harry four years in Sunnydale but also saddling me with Willow and Xander's first year of high school. On the one hand, this could be interesting, and could also give them extra time to find out about and adapt to the existence of magic; on the other hand, I don't really want to, I'd have to do a lot of revamping, and it makes Willow's level of maturity even more improbable than it already is.

3) I decide to keep Harry's Sunnydale tenure from 1996-2000, which means revamping Season Four and dealing with the Initiative, which kind of makes me want to crawl under a rock and hide. Then again, I could do as many authors do and skimp on the detail, which I'll be doing a bit of anyway as I refuse to rewrite every single episode no matter what. This would make it easier for me to let Willow do fun stuff like, say, get full legal custody of Harry, as she'll be eighteen (otherwise it'll still happen but it'll be complicated and we'll have to cheat on the paperwork with that cure-all, magic), and maybe buy her parents' house. Also I'll have more time to expand on the Willow/Faith I see creeping up on me, and make it more plausibly long-lasting.

4) I ignore the problem entirely and pretend I didn't notice any discrepancy in the timeline.


Previously I was leaning towards 4, but having written it out I find myself favoring 3. Do tell me what you think.

This is in regard to some musing I've been doing, mostly for One Whole Star, but also for HP fanfiction in general.

It pretty much sums up to this:

THE WIZARDING WORLD IS FREAKING WEIRD.

What ways can you come up with in which the wizarding world is incomparably alien to the muggle one?

My favorite is schooling. You realize of course that muggle parents aren't given a tour of Hogwarts? They're just expected to pack their children off and let them go. I tried to imagine what my mother's reaction might have been had I gotten a Hogwarts letter and just about died laughing. Likely she would have said something along the lines of "bitch please", except more long-winded and marginally more polite.

Take a while and think about it, and get back to me with ways you and your friends/family would find the wizarding world incompatible with your lifestyle and expectations.

To warm you up, here's a plotbunny I've been favoring: Harry gets his Hogwarts letter. Willow's not going to send him there without seeing it for herself and learning more about it, as any parent would. So they reply to the letter requesting a tour. See Willow's disgust grow as she finds out there is no tour, there is no school handbook for general distribution, there is no proper course guide for the upper years, there's only one professor per subject, and on top of all that, Hogwarts teaches magic only -- i.e., no math, biology, art, music, literature or writing classes, which are all part of the education you'd expect any child to get.

Huh.

Mmmkay. My previous post is Friends-locked, just because a ton of my brainstorming and planning is in there and I don't know that I want it just free for all on the web, but I've Friended everyone who's Friended me so far, so you lot are set. If you want to be added as a Friend just drop me a line letting me know, because I can't guarantee I'll notice you've Friended me otherwise.

-- That's important because in the previous post I explained my excuse for having animagus forms plotted out for everyone, because we may end up knowing what they are even if folk don't all actually do the transformation.

I think it's fun picking forms out, because the way I figure the animal needs to match the person, so it's not about what sounds best or looks most impressive, but about what is true. So.

Your only clues are 1) Xander is a dog -- it's the breed that matters; and 2) anybody who is a magical creature in their natural form is also a magical creature in their animagus form. Slayers count as magical creatures.

So, on the count of three, guess! If you have a convoluted reason, tell me -- you might change my mind. The same goes for names. (Of course all credit will be given where it's due.) And if enough people actually guess this time, I'll post the answers.

( One... two... three!: )

Well, then?

I realize I'm getting ahead of myself in this story, but I had to get this down before I forget it.

I'm musing on One Whole Star of course, as I always do, and have been thinking about how I'm going to integrate Harry and the Scooby Gang into the world of Hogwarts once Harry turns eleven (though there will be some overlaps before then). And also I've been reading a lot of Indepentdent!Harry and Manipulative!Dumbledore fics recently, which is no help at all.

So... At some point Harry discovers his British wizarding heritage, and he and Willow investigate his Gringotts accounts and find ( The Last Will and Testament of James Simon Potter and Lily Ash Evans Potter. )

Obviously I know absolutely no legalese, and beg pardon from those of you who do.

I've got more of this scribbled away somewhere -- provisos for child support, access to Harry's trust fund, etc., and also one last bit about the prophecy, but I thought the custody issue was the most interesting bit.

I cannot imagine that Lily Potter at the very least would be so lacking in common sense as to neglect to write a serious will. Honestly.

I more than likely will not use all of that blather in the actual fic, but I had it in my head and it's part of how I'll write some of the other characters so I wanted to set it down properly. I hope it didn't bore you out of your skulls.

... Anyway, that's it for tonight, but expect more soon in the way of actual story-snippets because I am officially on vacation! In England, no less. I'm staying with some family friends in Birmingham, but I want to make it into London of course, and if I do I'll go to King's Cross and visit Platform Nine and Three-Quarters and think of all you lot. *g*

... and you know what happens when I get impatient: I post sooner than I told you I would.

If you'd rather read the story chapter-by-chapter, or catch up or something, I have posted at Twisting the Hellmouth, HPFandom, Skyehawke, and FFN. The usual.

Cheers, all. And definitely get back to me about the animagus thing.

Mkay, I'm stalling while y'all read and tell me what you think.

I have Harry's animagus form! (You won't be seeing it for a while, I don't think, but it will come. Oh yes, it will come.) Also I have Willow's, and, just to amuse myself and not because I'm going to go crazy and find a way to use them all (probably), I have Buffy's, Xander's, Giles', Cordelia's, Jenny's, Amy's, Devon's, and Oz's. Oh, and Faith's, but I'm very doubtful about what I've chosen, so...

Anyway. If it tickles your fancy, try a guess! Or make a case for a form you think makes sense. Neither Willow's form nor Harry's is magical. If you guess right, you'll get a cookie, and if you make a profound suggestion that changes my mind, we'll come up with something interesting to add to the story in your honor. And of course you'll get credit where it's due.

Thoughts?

Well, I don't know about you, but I've been waiting for-bloody-ever. I'm so glad I sucked it up and kept working on this properly.

I would regale you with tales of my soul-searching and whatnot, but actually most of it isn't very interesting, so without further ado, I give you ( Harry and Willow's first full day together. )

I hope you know I dusted off my old Watcher's Guide to look up Willow's canon address for you. I could have made it up, but did I? No I did not. (Forgive my feeling smug about that.)

Well. I'll be posting this around and about soon -- pending your approval, actually. What do you think? What can I fix? Large or small, I want to know. Did you feel a tug on your heartstrings? Because that's what I was going for. *g*

I haven't a decent snippet kind of update for you at the moment, my pretties, for which I must apologize from the bottom of my heart (I've been in the middle of a lifestyle-choice-career-identity-crisis thing -- it's complicated. Good, but complicated), but do not lose hope. Particularly when it comes to "One Whole Star". That fic is like the default setting my brain returns to when there's nothing bright and shiny to distract it -- you know? I ponder and puzzle over this thing constantly. So it may be coming slowly, but it's definitely coming.

And that is part of what I wanted to talk to you about. Some spoilers: Harry is going to begin his magical education earlier than I expected at first: at this point, probably by the end of his first summer in Sunnydale. His first contact with the Wizarding community will not be with Hogwarts, but with American -- Southern-Californian -- Sunnydaleian wizards, who have a very different take on, well, everything, than J.K. Rowling's wizards.

Oh, and this is almost irrelevant because it's coming up so far in the future of this fic, but Severus Snape will be the first Hogwarts type of wizard Harry and Willow meet. And though I promise I won't make him into some crazy supervillain, it doesn't look like I'll be any more kind than I have to to Dumbledore.

To the actual point of this post, which is (yay!) reader participation. If you were a (possibly muggle-born) wizard, settling the first magical community on the Hellmouth, and keeping the peace (between muggles, wizards, magical creatures, the not-entirely-deceased, and demons) was a top, top, top priority for you...

... what kind of, well, Code of Ethics would you draw up for all your people and not-quite-people to secure as much cooperation as possible? I guess it's the same principle as the Ten Commandments. If it were up to you, what would be some rules you'd put down first?

Be as simple or as complicated as you like. Feel free to give me a long-winded explanation (I just love those). And I promise that any, erm, commandments used in the fic will be attributed to their true authors.

( Here is my sloppy and unfinished Code of Ethics. Help me. )

Okay, I just went back and re-read my last post on the stuff I plan to do about the Sorting process and um, yes, it was confusing. I think it's my inability to be concise that's part of the problem. Anyway.

If you would, because you love me, read it again? (Skip the lists of House assignments if you like, I know they probably only make it worse.) And just... tell me what you think of the idea of J.K. Rowling's Sorting in general. Does it make perfect sense? Do you think it could be better? Do you think it's very very silly?

I'm in the middle of rewriting the next part of Long Hot Beautiful Summer, which is frustrating -- I wrote it first maybe two years ago, and it's kind of like writing from scratch but worse when I take into account both spoilers and my own changes of ideas. I think hearing some of what other people think might help me out a little.

So: In the name of AUs, and crossovers, and in the name of Willow being both a Gryffindor and a Slytherin (a bit of everything, really), tell me what you think.

Okay. I've been fiddling around with the second chapter of Long Hot Beautiful Summer for a bit, doing some rewriting, and I wanted to run an idea by you guys just to see how it'd be received. (I'm afraid I like this idea so much I won't change it even if you hate it, but I find I'd like to know what you think all the same, if that makes any sense.)

First off, to warm you up, I will say this: I think that the idea of the Sorting into Houses is just this side of ridiculous. ( Read more... )

So... am I absolutely crazy? Would you buy it if I packaged it up all pretty? Is it arrogant of me to say I really like all this insanity? Is it too confusing (give it a day to gestate and then tell me if it still twists your brain in knots)? Is there some detail I should give up on, or something to add, or some stuff that's irrelevant? Tell me all.

Cheers.

So I realize what we have here is a collection of Harry Potter fans and Buffy the Vampire Slayer fans and some of you crazy insane people like me who are bonkers about both.

But have we any market for Gundam Wing? I've got this BtVS/GW crossover I turn over once in a while, you see, that I'll probably finish when I'm like fifty or so (to clarify this timeline, I'm eighteen now). I'd like to have some people to bounce it off of, but I also realize that not that many people may be nuts about two such... unusual... shows at the same time.

The point of all this being, any takers? Would anyone be interested in my posting some of this pet project of mine? Or should I just hoard it and cackle over it and coax it into a monster and then use it to take over the world when I'm fifty?

This last bit of Chapter Two picks up after Harry's bath.

( The last scene. )

If you'd prefer to read the whole thing all the way through, it's up at SkyeHawke, Twisting the Hellmouth, and Fanfiction.Net. (FFN has all of the html trappings, like bold and italics.)

I hope you enjoy! Let me know what you think. And also let me add, I am so sorry it's been so long. October was a lot more... hectic than I thought it would be. It was hard to, um, get in the groove. As it were.

Anyway, hopefully this is a cracking of the writer's block.

All right. Here's another draft-a-tilla. It's only a thousand words long, and I'll add more and edit it later (hopefully with the assistance of your very helpful and very welcome comments), but here's what I've got so far.

Scenario: After Harry and Willow have been shopping, and to the library, and to the playground, Harry tries to find a way to say thank you. ( Harry paints a picture. )

If there are any other crossover-friendly automated archives anyone frequents, I'd like to know about them... I want to try posting in a few new places.

Links, anyone?

So I posted a different version of this a few weeks ago: Order members come to 4 Privet Drive to escort Harry away. This is on a different time scale -- it's at the beginning of the summer, and they're going to Hogwarts, not 12 Grimmauld Place, and the people coming for Harry are different. Also it's a completely different ending to the scene, with a little bit of Willow and Harry coming to an understanding. It's continued from the end of this scene, by the way.

It's a snippet, you said you liked snippets, and I needed to get this typed up anyway. This is closer to the version I think I'll probably use, although I'm not sure I'm going to have extra Scooby members join the cast quite so soon (though I do think that Buffy and Harry would get along splendidly, don't you?).

Feedback, as always, is appreciated. Thoughts on characterization? Grammar? Where the hell you think I'm going with this? Bring 'em on. Think how much power you must have! *g* ( We intimidate the Dursleys and discover the cupboard under the stairs. )

Okay, I know what you're about to say: if this is part four, where are parts one, two and three?

My answer is this is my LJ, I can screw around a little if I want.

See, I've had this written for quite a while -- I tend to write scenes seperately as they come to me, so I don't forget them -- and I'm worried I've been sitting on it for too long. Let me warn you that it is a very rough draft, and it's in Snape's POV, which I've never done before, and I worry that Willow is a little too attitudinal, even for a post-S7 Willow.

So: here is the premise.

Willow and Spike are preparing to teach at Hogwarts. Charlie Weasley and Tonks are there, too, as teachers' assistants. The four become good friends. Willow, being herself, has managed to garner the ill opinion of one Severus Snape (be fair, it doesn't take much). When the professors take a trip to Diagon Alley, Snape decides to try playing a prank... ( Willow in Knockturn Alley. )