30-Day Fanfic Writing Meme, Day 18

[geri_chan]

18. Where do you get the most inspiration for your fics (aka "bunnies") from?

Generally, story ideas come from me wondering "what if?" My Snupin series comes from me wondering, "What if the reason why Snape was always spying on the Marauders when they were kids was because he was secretly in love with Lupin?" My Haru fic The Prince vs. the Groupie was inspired by me wondering what would happen if the main character from the Groupie manga started hitting on Kikuchi in front of Onozuka.

Along the same lines, bunnies also come from me wondering about characters and plot points that aren't fully explained in canon. When I first started writing my Always series (pre-HBP), Lupin was the only werewolf that we saw in the Harry Potter books, and I started wondering what other werewolves were like, so I created the werewolf pack led by Lukas Bleddri in Phoenix Rising: werewolves who were even less fortunate than Lupin, who had been unable to go to Hogwarts, and had to resort to thievery and smuggling to stay alive. They're naturally hardened and bitter, and Lukas contemptuously refers to Lupin as "a tame dog" in comparison.

And in Haru, as I mentioned before, I started wondering what happened to Kikuchi after he left Katou's movie, which led to me writing Comeback and started off my Kikuchi/Onozuka series of fics. And wondering why Onozuka is so devious and manipulative (and why his real personality is so different from his public image) led to me speculating that he grew up in a strict, repressive family situation where he had to act out the role of the perfect son.

Occasionally, plot bunnies come from outside influences, like a song or movie. In fact, my OC werewolf character Lukas was inspired by the werewolf Lucien in the Underworld movie. And Sanctuary was inspired by the song "Viva la Vida" by Coldplay--originally, the lyrics reminded me of Kikuchi's situation as a fallen star, but all the Christian imagery inspired the plot bunny where Kikuchi takes refuge in a church to hide from the paparazzi. Also, I wrote that Kikuchi starred in a lot of detective TV series and movies in his heyday mainly because I love Japanese detective dramas! ^_^

But a huge amount of plot bunnies come from my readers and fellow writers--mainly Bronze Ribbons and Snapelike! Sometimes I'll write a scene because of a specific request from a reader--someone asked for an explicit Theo/Blaise love scene when I was writing Aftermaths, and eventually my muse obliged with a bunny so I wrote it. (And I'm still working on that Asano/Urushizaki sex-on-a-motorbike bunny, nursedarry!)

More often, it's a casual remark or even someone else's fic that will inspire a bunny. My Yoshizumi/Kenzaki pairing in Unmasked came about because Snapelike made a joking remark that Yoshizumi needed to get laid, maybe by one of the host club guys from When a Man Loves a Man. Realism (Hamlet Done Haru-style) was inspired by and written as a follow-up to Bronze Ribbons' drabble More Than Kin and Less Than Kind. Actually, Bronze Ribbons and I have been bunnying each other back and forth--she writes gift fics for me, such as Present Understanding, and I ended up working the details of that fic (such as Yoshizumi's gift of a kimono to Kenzaki) into Unmasked, while she wrote a couple more fics based on my portrayal of Yoshizumi and Kenzaki (Just Dessert and Flattered and Insulted)*! And Snapelike's Mochimune/Miyasaka fics inspired me to write that pairing, too--so far, I've only hinted at it in my current fics, but I do have a major plot bunny for them planned in the future. And I have so many other bunnies just begging to be written--I really should collect them all and write them down in one place, but I'll save that topic for the next day's meme.

*Commenting on the Youka Nitta IJ Asylum is restricted to members due to problems with spam. If you would like to leave a comment but don't have an IJ account and/or don't wish to join the comm, both fics are also available here and here on AO3.

Previous days:
Day 1
Day 2
Day 3
Day 4
Day 5
Day 6
Day 7
Day 8
Day 9
Day 10
Day 11
Day 12
Day 13
Day 14
Day 15
Day 16
Day 17

(You can find the full meme listed at the end of Day 5).