THE ACID DESK
The Underground XFFanfic Newsletter Vol 1. No. 7

Welcome to THE ACID DESK, a bi-weekly newsletter discussing the latest fics, recs, trends, discussions, and even *gasp* gossip in the X-Files Fanfic Community.

All opinions expressed herein belong solely to the author, CiCi Lean.

Write to me and tell me how wrong I am! CiCi Lean
([email protected])

"The Pen Is Mightier"

THE ACID DESK MAILROOM:

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FROM THE E-BOX:
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From "Madame Evil:"

[I've got a Blind Item for you. I don't know if it's just the PMS talking, but here, take it.]

Why THANK YOU, Madame Evil!

Here, sweetiepuss, have some Pamprin on us.

Or, then again, give it back. We want MORE!

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From "The DebbilMice:"

"Thanks for your mention of us in the Acid Desk. Of course, if you think that this will make us go any easier on you... think again."

Heavens no. I wouldn't even contemplate it.

Oh, BTW...there's a louse on your shorts.

*cough*

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HOT BYTES
Great Authors, Stories & More!

The Fanfiction of "Brighid"([email protected])

Ah, blessed newbies. Just when my old gray head starts yelling "Shoot if you must... PLEASE!" over the lack of good, nay, coherent, XF-fic, along comes a writer like this. Lyrical, sensible, and versatile with dabblings in both MSR and slash. Thank goodness for the open-minded. She's lovely, and she's got the goods. Check her out on ATXC or if you are an XAPEN member, we have some very nice works of hers on our Egroups archive. Good stuff. (To be found on Deja News - alt.tv.x-files.creative and The XAPEN Egroups Archive.)

"Wine 8: Bartlett's Wine Coolers" by Dianora

You know, there -is- an advantage to avoiding most NC-17 PWP MSR's. When a nicely-written smut piece comes along, I can actually enjoy it without rolling my eyes and crying out "been there, done that." I really liked this piece: it has good dialogue, lots of hot sex, and nary a plot to get in the way of all the gruntin' and grindin' between our own Special Agents. Of course, I won't read another one of these for a year or so (well, maybe from Leyla or Karen), so I'm glad I got my annual NC-17 PWP MSR fix from a good source. (To be found on Deja News: alt.tv.x-files.creative)

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GOSSA-PER
Notes on the Archive of Note

Well, The Goss-Monster is up to the July fics, hip, hip, hoary-toads. One good thing? There's no more expectations attached to the updates or the reliability of The Archive, so, things can only get better from here on in.

Right?

*cough*

Luckily, a bit of the hit load will most certainly be relived by the new Ephemeral Archive Scott Miller's ambitious foray into fast-paced UNIX technology. This archive yanks only the stories posted to atxc (threads flagged with the words "NEW" or "REV" in the subject line) thus, no doubt taking some of the pain away from the overload of hits on Gossamer New Stories Update Day.

The shutdown of Karen Rasch's archive and rec page should also help, but God, what a sad day that is. Our Karen has excellent taste, is a wonderful writer, and I loved her site, pretty colors and smushy photos all. It's disappointing that she won't be able to maintain it anymore, even worse that she too has expressed disappointment and discouragement in the wake of the behavior rampant in our "community" lately, which includes TOSing of sites and "real-life" harassment. And, since Karen is one of the kindest, most sensible people I know, to see her growing itchy means that things are getting bad indeed.

Let's hope that with the start of Season Six things will calm down around here, because this long, hot summer has been a Purgatory to forget.

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GOSSIP CORNER
Eat Your Heart Out, Cindy Adams

BLIND ITEM #1: Which cranky denizen of atxc and atxf became infuriated when another member of the cyber-community failed to recognize her by name at this year's eXpo, even though she is, as she so succinctly put it, "-very- famous"? Move OVER Madonna, X-Egodonna is HERE!

BLIND ITEM #2: Which author has astonished myself and everyone else with the shocking information that they are NOT a twelve-year old with a grammar problem, but actually a big ol' twenty-five year old, with a showtune fetish AND their very own HATE page, erected in their dubious honor by an entire group of detractors? (Yes, I've been there, and it ain't pretty...brrr.)

BLIND ITEM #3: Which slash author is their very own best friend, not only casually reccing themselves in the slash chats (under a pseudonym of course,) but also making sure that the topic of conversation always seems to stray back to that very special, oh-so-talented, FABULOUS author -- themselves?

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ATXCARAMBA!
The Latest From The Usenet Front
(alt.tv.x-files.creative -- Deja News )

Same old crap, different day, but there is the new Ephemeral Archive, which is talked about above and below in the Rant. Check it out, I like it.

There -has- been an interesting batch of threads written about "Peeves" and "Rules of Writing" which is stirring up some debate, even some heat from the younger writers on the discussion of "maturity in writing."

Now, I might be wrong, but maturity has little to do with age, especially in art. I've read some DREADFUL sappy-silly immature works (in particular, a huge, horrible never-ending series that will go unnamed here) written by folks whom I KNOW are adults, often older adults with children, hubbies, wrinkles and bridge work in their mouths. I've also read some stuff that veered very close to publishable by writers of 14 and 16.

To paraphrase Mae West, "age got nuthin' to do with it, honey."

So, that simple misunderstanding aside, I think these threads are a boon to atxc, and while I don't agree with all of them, better to have than not.

Besides, the intelligent tone of it might keep Fester under her rock for a little while longer.

[evil smirk]

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THE SLASH CAFE
Reviews From The Wild Side
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Slash Rant
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Well, my love affair with slash is cooling slightly, due in no small part to a furious debate a short time ago on SlashX which really opened my eyes to a few things.

I discovered that slashers are (or have suddenly become) -intensely- rigid in their pairings and preferences, many of them more so than even the most vehement *shippers I know. Unusual pairings are often scoffed at publicly, and discouraged privately, even up to the point of what I'd call harassment. As expected, I've gotten some toasty heat for my Pendrell slash from Day One, but that was always balanced out by the folks who seemed to enjoy it and I took the flames in stride figuring they'd eventually go away.

However, since Pendrell-slash, along with LoneGunman slash has now actually become a staple of the genre (how the HELL that happened, I have no idea) with stories written by more than a few talented writers, we are seeing a loud backlash from readers who are demanding more "traditional" slash, ie, M/Sk and M/K and wishing the rest of us would stop writing that god awful stuff about guys whom they Just Don't Like.

Of course, since 90% of all fics posted to the lists and archives are still M/Sk and M/K, I'm at loss as to what the hell they are talking about, unless it's a fear that Geekslash (tm) is taking over and M/Sk - M/K will soon be going the way of the passenger pigeon (something that will never happen as long as XFSlash exists, believe me.)

It's very disappointing to see readers that I'd always championed as mature and flexible, turn out to be not quite as open-minded as I once thought them to be. And that's a shame, because even though most XF-slashers are insulated from genfic completely, many of them unaware of the scorn and hatred that's heaped upon them outside of slash circles, it's a cruel world out there, one that is bound to intrude and sticking together -- publicly defending all slash, even the stuff you won't read or Just Don't Like, is, IMHO, the wisest route to go.

Even if Frohike's in it. [grin]

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TALK, TALK
Discussing The Discussion Lists

XFCreative -- Since the List Mom submitted this to the Acid Desk, I will publish it here this week.

FROM LAURIE HAYNES - ADMIN/XFCreative

Not gossip, I guess, but maybe a bit of tooting my own horn. ;) Callit news.

I took over the XFC list when Jeannine decided it was too time-consuming. Ruby_phile and I have set up an archive, Xemplary, for the fiction posted on the list. My design, my coding, my space (in name) for the archive, and Ruby's space and work to put the stories on the pages and in her storage space.

Oh yeah, the archive is at http://www.pnx.com/shannara/xemplary

FICTALK: Some recs, still old as the hills, with The Book Club disappointingly quiet. I'm going to delurk methinks with some recs, hopefully encouraging others to follow suit. If you have recs, or want to talk the talk, why not join?

FANFIC JUNKIES: Sloooooooooow. Hey, ladies! Get cracking on some recs there! Are y'all at Sherrie's house again drinking, uh, iced tea? Huh? Make it snappy, gimme some noise. Remember: I'm still lurking....

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GRATUITOUS PENDY MENTION OF THE WEEK
(A.P.I.G.P: All Pendrell is Good Pendrell)

"Heat & Decay" by Abree Brand -- This WIP (Work In Progress) is making me chew my fingernails to the nub wanting to know what happened to Pendy and the world, as everything on Earth, including our Labboy's memory, has become an empty, dangerous wasteland. Our intrepid Labmouse must find out what happened to his world, and to him, with only a mesmerizing, emerald-eyed Alex Krycek as his guide. *sigh* PLEASE ABREE -- give us more! Wah!

To be found on the Pendrell-Fic egroups archive, Parts One and Two. To join, E-mail [email protected]All ages welcome.

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RANT-O-RAMA: Ravings From The Acid Desk:
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EPHEMERAL FOLLIES:
(or "How To Go From 2 to 48 in 2.9 Seconds")

Don't get me wrong, I like this new archive.

Scott Miller's Auto-Archive of ATXC, Ephemeral is a very well thought-out, neatly planned, kinda nifty site, efficiently updated, and without a lot of hassles. In there, you will find the stories, and *only* the stories, posted to atxc, usually within a few hours of their appearance on the newsgroup. A great place for people who *really* can't stand the heated little "discussions" whilst tripping down the road to Wonderland, and want "just the fics, mam'."

But the section of the archive that kinda cracks me up, is the "Hits" and "Recommendations" areas, where, with just a flick of the mouse, you can be the most popular kid in Wonderland, bar none. Sure, I'd suppose it's on an honor system, but what writer in their right mind could POSSIBLY resist making themselves Queen For A Day, especially since there was little or no way anyone could find out about it.

As a small prank, a friend of yours truly heard me bemoan my lack of love in general, and decided to make me Miss Popularity, just for a laugh. And, after it was done, we did laugh, but it was a hesitant sort of laughter, the kind you croak out when someone makes a joke about their two broken legs.

I have to be very honest when I say that I NEVER know which fics of mine people like, and which they don't, if I go by the information on download stats, recs pages or even feedback these days. I've been rec'd on The Doghouse approximately six times under a few different names, and for only one of those fics did I get more than five letters of feedback from atxc and the lists. I've seen works of mine downloaded from Gossamer, over ONE THOUSAND times, and received no letters for them. I've gotten tons of feedback for fics that have never made it to any recs page or bulletin boards, and that I personally didn't think were all that good (actually, I knew very well that they stunk of dead skunk,) but posted them anyway, because I don't get paid to do this, and I'm just having a laugh. One of my favorite cases is a fic that I received NOT ONE letter for personally, but was gushed and raved over on Feedback Friday on the XAPEN, which utterly astonished me.

I thought no one had even read the thing.

So, I've come to the sad conclusion that after two years of contributions to XFFanfic, I haven't a clue as to what works and what doesn't in my writing, or even what the readers want. Luckily, I'm not cynical enough to try to cater to or design my fics to please any particular batch of readers (okay, I did try it twice, but one worked and the other one sank like a rock) or write my fics to adhere to any given formula, because, honestly, there appears to be none.

I've heard that slash got you tons of feedback, NC-17 MSR's get you all the love, case files with UST is where it's at -- honey, I've heard it all. And none of it seems to be true, or, conversely, ALL of it seems to be true. Posting has become a real coin toss into this reading public, and that's a disappointing realization, especially if you're here to improve your writing, or if you feel that your best work is being ignored in favor of your throwaways. Fanfic readers are fickle, of unknown tastes, and don't seem to be very willing to give us balding and nervous authors a single clue as to what they'd like to see more of.

Or even what they'd like to never see again.

I may be alone, but the only consistent factor I've noticed is that the amount of feedback I get is always directly inverse to the amount of time I've spent on a fic, writing and editing combined. For an eight minute fic, which I timed as an experiment in speed-writing, I received over a hundred letters. A six-month fic... five. Which I find, well... rather scary. My "Inner-Beast" is drawn to the idea of cranking out endless throwaway fics and getting tons of ego-rub for them, but my id wants to show the world the best I have, praise be damned.

How can a poor writer win?

Finding that balance is nearly impossible, and, without the proper reader-clues as which way to go, I'll bet I'm not the only writer lost in Wonderland without her hot-air balloon or her Ruby Slippers.

CiCi Lean, 1998

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NEW!
DO YOU HAVE A LITTLE "ACID" IN YOUR BOOTIE?

I'm now opening up the Acid Desk to contributions!

If you have a batch of reviews, some good gossip, a rant you just HAVE to let out, why not send them in to me, and have the whole world know about it?

Contributions must be short, concise, have an irreverent, objective attitude (ie, no gushing, mushing or back-scratching) and are published at the editor's discretion.

So, don't by shy. Send some ACID my way!

CONTRIBUTIONS TO: [email protected] with the word "ADSUB" in the subject line.

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That's it for this edition. THANKS to Alicia and Zoot for their beta reading, to "Madame Evil" and "The Wicked Kick" for their Blind Item contributions and good luck to Laurie Haynes on her take-over of XFCreative.

Come again next time, and I'll have some more snarky rants, squealing raves, gratuitous Pendrell Slapping, filthy gossip and a whole lot more!

THE ACID DESK is, hopefully, a bi-weekly newsletter, written & created by CiCi Lean. All opinions expressed within belong solely to the author.

This newsletter may NOT be copied, forwarded or posted to any other list, USENET news group of web page without express permission of the author, CiCi Lean ([email protected]). In short, if you sneak it around, I'll catch you and eat you alive. (And I chew 100 times per bite, just like Mama Lean taught me to.)

All comments are welcome.

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