The Examination: Phinnia
Not every author needs a novel to tell a story. With her first fic, Pocket/Change phinnia showed an ability to give us intimate views of House and Wilson with just a few short words -- or, in this case, a few objects: He told himself that with a minibar bottle of gin and a lighter he'd be prepared for anything (like surgeons in Clint Eastwood movies) but really? It was just for the gadget factor.
Phinnia can tell entire stores in just 100 words, or in longer connected fics which tell the story in multiple ways, as in Eight House/Wilson First Kisses which brings the concept of random multiple universes to House and Wilson's relationship.
He tasted like sugar and summertime and endorphins, and the last thought running through his head before Wilson's tongue found its way into his mouth and everything went the white-yellow of blissful making out on a summer's day was why the hell didn't we do this before now?
Find all of Phinnia's fics here.
Your work includes a variety of styles. What's your favorite style of fics? Drabbles? Ficlets? Crackfic? Or does it depend on your mood whenever you sit down to write?
Depends entirely on my mood. I’m a very moody person *laugh* (but not in a bad way) and I have a short attention span - so I’m mostly drawn to short things and my style reflects that. (Plus I have a lot of other, shall we say, distractions and just plain stuff going on in my life - so short is often what I have time to do.) If I had to pick one I’d say ficlets because it’s the most flexible, I think.
Much of the crack is actually my husband’s fault, because he tends to give me plot bunnies of a cracky nature. There’s clearly something wrong with his brain, and probably something wrong with mine, because I married him, of course. He’s trying to convince me to write/co-write a House/Portal (yes, the video game)/about a dozen other fictional villiains crossover crack … uh, thing … and he keeps wearing me down. I fear he’ll eventually manage, and so should you. I think if I do it I’m going to make a precondition that he has to record it as a podfic because he can do all the voices (House, Tritter, Wilson, GlaDDOS from Portal, Gargamel from the Smurfs, etc. etc.) (see, I told you it was scary.) He pulls out mini-sketches from it to make me laugh when I’m feeling depressed, though, and I can’t argue with that.
*steers self back to questions*
You've referred to "Instant Karma" as the fic that wouldn't die. How often do you get a plot bunny or concept that just can't be ignored? Does it make sense to try and ignore it? How often do you get a concept that refuses to leave you alone?
Not often. Randomly. I love it and hate it by turns. Because it DEMANDS writing, and I love writing more than just about anything else in the world - and they almost always turn out well, but they take over your brain and refuse to let you do anything (or much) else until they’re completed. I think the one before that one was ‘ooh ee ooh ah ah’ (the House/Cate Milton from ‘Frozen’ fic) which I still love, and which jumped on my neck at the end of that ep and refused to let go. But ignore it? Can’t. Doesn’t work. I have one right now, actually, for the rarepair fest, that deals with the events of the season finale, and I really don’t want to write serious fic right now because fluff is my way of coping? But I can’t not do it, and so it’s getting written (I’m negotiating with the muse so I can at least write some small fluffy/porny bits between work on this, because it’s also going to be longish, which is not like me either. But the muse insists. I’m just a medium with access to the internet, really.)
How do you approach a multi-chapter fic? Do you prefer to write it all in advance? Or as a WIP?
I don’t do multi-chapters enough to know, really. The ones that end up multichaptered are usually one of those undying plot bunnies, and they’re WIPs but they kind of explode out of my head most of the time so the whole process goes ridiculously fast. (This is the kind of thing that leads my family to look at me and say ‘when was the last time you ate?’ suspiciously. Relates to the above question a lot.)
What drew you to writing House fanfiction?
I actually couldn’t write any kind of fanfiction for years. Honest to god. I wrote original fic ever since I was coordinated enough to pick up a pencil - I have at least a dozen original stories partly told/untold/in pieces in my head and that’s just thinking about it right at this second, I know there’s more - but I couldn’t write fanfiction because I was utterly /paranoid/ about getting things WRONG somehow and I just brainfroze. Plus I’m not a big TV person - I love movies, especially independent and foreign stuff, I’m a huge movie geek - but I don’t watch a lot of television, and when I do I get into nice comfortable ruts. I think the one before ‘House’ was ‘Law and Order’ in all of its various iterations. But after buying the S3 box set of House and just /mainlining it/ - I actually had to stop watching the show during the Tritter arc because Merry Little Christmas tore me apart (that was before my massive doses of anti-anxiety pills that allowed me to survive the latter part of S4 - I literally drugged myself into not worrying to watch the last five eps) - anyway, that was when I started looking for fanfic and reading it, and then it came to writing it. It was easier than some because House and Wilson’s voices come very naturally to me. We have a very snarktastic family. *laugh*
The really weird thing for me now is that I seem to be fairly popular and I’ve only been doing this since last September (2007), and I don’t get that because I still feel very much like I’m only flying by the seat of my pants here. Someone mentioned that they considered me/that I was a Big Name Fan, and I’m like, ‘what? What are you talking about?’ I’m just zis girl, you know? *scuffs toe in dirt* I have a lot of limitations in what I write most of the time (mostly fluff/porn/character pieces, not long insightful plots or heartwrenching angst or whatever) and I wish I could do those things more sometimes .... It’s partly a self esteem issue, I’m working on that. But it still feels very, very odd.
God, I’m rambling horribly. BACK TO THE QUESTIONS.
How does a story start for you? A specific scene? A plot? A snatch of conversation?
Yes. Usually conversation or a visual or an idea; sometimes a plot. Rarely plots. I’m not so great with plots. *laugh* I guess you call what I do character pieces. Sounds nicer than ‘plotless fluff’, doesn’t it? Sometimes I write stuff just to challenge myself (that’s how the femmeslash started, and some of the more recent Cuddy pieces, too - I’m still a bit worried that I don’t have a handle on her character, she’s not as easy to read as House or Wilson are for me.) Sometimes it’s a line from someone else’s work, or an idea that springs from that, and sometimes it’s just pure self-indulgence, because I’m all about the self-indulgence. I write to amuse myself. I throw random bits of information in, and movie references, and write the characters in certain settings, because it makes me happy, it makes me laugh. I like that other people like it of course, but that’s not the main thing.
What's the hardest part of writing for you?
Plots! *laugh* Anything with chapters; I really respect a lot of people who have the overarching large-plot-gene, because I don’t generally have that at all. And not screaming with rage when people and small animals INTERRUPT ME with things like requiring food or shelter or playing with or pettings or things LESS IMPORTANT AT THE CURRENT SECOND, SERIOUSLY. I have an icon from xkcd (xkcd.com) that has a child saying ‘mom, I’m hungry’ and the mother says ‘hush, I’m coding, you ate yesterday’. That’s how I feel about writing. Unfortunately the six year old can’t use the stove. Which is probably a good thing, really. *laugh*
What's the easiest?
Dialogue, because it just flows and it’s natural for me. Certain types of images. And writing about food. I often have people say that my fics make them hungry.
You've written NC17 stuff for both male and female characters. Does the gender of the characters impact how you write sex? Should it?
No. And it shouldn’t other than the obvious mechanical differences. I hate the whole gender disparity/divide thing because it’s all socialization anyway, there’s very little inbuilt about a woman or a man that makes them think differently about sex (or anything, really). There’s a whole rant about that that I just don’t feel like getting into. But I like playing with the expectations that people have of gender because I adore screwing with people’s heads and making them think. I do that a lot more with original stuff though, mostly because I haven’t found a way to work it in in fanfic.
Do you ever find yourself at the end of an episode absolutely needing to write fic to help explain that episode's impact on you?
I don’t think I’ve ever done that? Sometimes I’ve gotten plot bunnies from things in the episode but I don’t think that’s what you mean here. I have some niggling … things … about the season finale, but I think everyone does. I find that I more write fic to offer an alternative way of looking at events. Unfortunately the only examples I can think of where I did that are still very rough WIPs.
What is there in House and Wilson's canon relationship that keeps bringing you back to them in fic?
I actually had that discussion with purridot at one point. And it’s kind of Hamlet-esque, isn’t it? The tortured hero and his faithful companion. I’m a huge Shakespeare nerd and there’s a lot of Hamlet/Horatio parallels in House/Wilson. (I’d write Hamlet/Horatio fic but I wouldn’t be happy with it unless I could do it at least in proper period English, you know, and that’s the kind of thing you have to work up to.) And the banter. I’m always one for the banter. Love banter. And how their damage kind of compliments each other … they’re very deep, and I like that.
(does that make Amber Ophelia? Huh. Probably not.)
(Oh great, now I’ve got this weird idea for an alternative ending of ‘A Midsummer Night’s Dream’ wherein the two girls and the two guys get together instead of pairing off into het couples. Hmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmm. File that one in the ol’ prompt bucket, I think.)
What do you look for in fic that you read?
In-character characters, always - I can’t stomach out-of-character fics. Can NOT. Ugh. I like fluff and lighthearted things because this is my escape - fandom in general - and really heavy angst takes over my brain and it’s just not pretty. I can’t read deathfics either. Other than that anything goes. If the writer can make me believe it, I’ll give it a read. I’m pretty easy that way. Well-written crack is always a plus, too.
Has writing fic changed the way you watch the show?
No. But that’s probably because I was a film major a long long time ago and I deconstruct and analyze everything I watch anyway. Some people find that hugely annoying, but I can’t help it.
What would you change on the show if you had that power?
More character-driven stuff, less ‘omg big bad guy’ or ‘external forces’ stuff. I love character exploration. And well, I’m holding out for a House/Wilson/Cuddy/Thirteen foursome with Chase videotaping? But that’s because I’m shameless and pervy.
What do you look for from a beta?
I like getting a variety of opinions; I like someone who isn’t afraid to nitpick, because I want nitpicks to be picked up on. I like knowing what works and what doesn’t for a person.
And since we're now heading into the summer, how do you work with fanfic when there are such big issues hanging out there that canon won't provide answers to for a few months? Do you write what you feel could happen, figuring it'll be superseded come September? Or do you write fic that's not tied to moments with so much fic potential, merely because we don't know how the powers that be will deal with it?
I write whatever I feel like writing, or whatever the muse throws at me and insists that I write. What happens, happens. I write what I’d like to see happen.
Do you have any other challenges you've laid out for yourself for future writing projects?
During the process of writing the AU femmeslash piece (‘Ripples in Still Water’) (which I am insanely, stupidly proud of) I would probably have thought you were insane for asking that question. But the answer is yes, of course. Always.
Over the summer jane_hidell and I are collaborating over at stuffonmywilson on a combined art and fic project. It’s going to be fun and awesome and y’all should go over and request something! Because it’s fluff and it’s summertime and we all need some of that after that season finale, wouldn’t you say? (end shameless pimping).
I have the sequel to ‘Blackout’ partly in my head, where House gets his fantasy of Wilson over his desk with the blinds open in the middle of the night, from Wilson’s POV this time: silence on Wilson’s part, anyway, and the things he hears (and is freaking out about, because OMG they might get CAUGHT) and how he deals with that and sex at the same time. It ends happily, of course, it would almost have to. But the process of getting there should be interesting.
I’m trying to do more things that don’t rely so heavily on dialogue, mostly just to see if I can?
Experimenting with different pairings, different points of view - again, just to see if I can. I like to mix things up and see what happens.
Thanks a lot! Feel free to chime in with questions of your own.
Phinnia can tell entire stores in just 100 words, or in longer connected fics which tell the story in multiple ways, as in Eight House/Wilson First Kisses which brings the concept of random multiple universes to House and Wilson's relationship.
He tasted like sugar and summertime and endorphins, and the last thought running through his head before Wilson's tongue found its way into his mouth and everything went the white-yellow of blissful making out on a summer's day was why the hell didn't we do this before now?
Find all of Phinnia's fics here.
Your work includes a variety of styles. What's your favorite style of fics? Drabbles? Ficlets? Crackfic? Or does it depend on your mood whenever you sit down to write?
Depends entirely on my mood. I’m a very moody person *laugh* (but not in a bad way) and I have a short attention span - so I’m mostly drawn to short things and my style reflects that. (Plus I have a lot of other, shall we say, distractions and just plain stuff going on in my life - so short is often what I have time to do.) If I had to pick one I’d say ficlets because it’s the most flexible, I think.
Much of the crack is actually my husband’s fault, because he tends to give me plot bunnies of a cracky nature. There’s clearly something wrong with his brain, and probably something wrong with mine, because I married him, of course. He’s trying to convince me to write/co-write a House/Portal (yes, the video game)/about a dozen other fictional villiains crossover crack … uh, thing … and he keeps wearing me down. I fear he’ll eventually manage, and so should you. I think if I do it I’m going to make a precondition that he has to record it as a podfic because he can do all the voices (House, Tritter, Wilson, GlaDDOS from Portal, Gargamel from the Smurfs, etc. etc.) (see, I told you it was scary.) He pulls out mini-sketches from it to make me laugh when I’m feeling depressed, though, and I can’t argue with that.
*steers self back to questions*
You've referred to "Instant Karma" as the fic that wouldn't die. How often do you get a plot bunny or concept that just can't be ignored? Does it make sense to try and ignore it? How often do you get a concept that refuses to leave you alone?
Not often. Randomly. I love it and hate it by turns. Because it DEMANDS writing, and I love writing more than just about anything else in the world - and they almost always turn out well, but they take over your brain and refuse to let you do anything (or much) else until they’re completed. I think the one before that one was ‘ooh ee ooh ah ah’ (the House/Cate Milton from ‘Frozen’ fic) which I still love, and which jumped on my neck at the end of that ep and refused to let go. But ignore it? Can’t. Doesn’t work. I have one right now, actually, for the rarepair fest, that deals with the events of the season finale, and I really don’t want to write serious fic right now because fluff is my way of coping? But I can’t not do it, and so it’s getting written (I’m negotiating with the muse so I can at least write some small fluffy/porny bits between work on this, because it’s also going to be longish, which is not like me either. But the muse insists. I’m just a medium with access to the internet, really.)
How do you approach a multi-chapter fic? Do you prefer to write it all in advance? Or as a WIP?
I don’t do multi-chapters enough to know, really. The ones that end up multichaptered are usually one of those undying plot bunnies, and they’re WIPs but they kind of explode out of my head most of the time so the whole process goes ridiculously fast. (This is the kind of thing that leads my family to look at me and say ‘when was the last time you ate?’ suspiciously. Relates to the above question a lot.)
What drew you to writing House fanfiction?
I actually couldn’t write any kind of fanfiction for years. Honest to god. I wrote original fic ever since I was coordinated enough to pick up a pencil - I have at least a dozen original stories partly told/untold/in pieces in my head and that’s just thinking about it right at this second, I know there’s more - but I couldn’t write fanfiction because I was utterly /paranoid/ about getting things WRONG somehow and I just brainfroze. Plus I’m not a big TV person - I love movies, especially independent and foreign stuff, I’m a huge movie geek - but I don’t watch a lot of television, and when I do I get into nice comfortable ruts. I think the one before ‘House’ was ‘Law and Order’ in all of its various iterations. But after buying the S3 box set of House and just /mainlining it/ - I actually had to stop watching the show during the Tritter arc because Merry Little Christmas tore me apart (that was before my massive doses of anti-anxiety pills that allowed me to survive the latter part of S4 - I literally drugged myself into not worrying to watch the last five eps) - anyway, that was when I started looking for fanfic and reading it, and then it came to writing it. It was easier than some because House and Wilson’s voices come very naturally to me. We have a very snarktastic family. *laugh*
The really weird thing for me now is that I seem to be fairly popular and I’ve only been doing this since last September (2007), and I don’t get that because I still feel very much like I’m only flying by the seat of my pants here. Someone mentioned that they considered me/that I was a Big Name Fan, and I’m like, ‘what? What are you talking about?’ I’m just zis girl, you know? *scuffs toe in dirt* I have a lot of limitations in what I write most of the time (mostly fluff/porn/character pieces, not long insightful plots or heartwrenching angst or whatever) and I wish I could do those things more sometimes .... It’s partly a self esteem issue, I’m working on that. But it still feels very, very odd.
God, I’m rambling horribly. BACK TO THE QUESTIONS.
How does a story start for you? A specific scene? A plot? A snatch of conversation?
Yes. Usually conversation or a visual or an idea; sometimes a plot. Rarely plots. I’m not so great with plots. *laugh* I guess you call what I do character pieces. Sounds nicer than ‘plotless fluff’, doesn’t it? Sometimes I write stuff just to challenge myself (that’s how the femmeslash started, and some of the more recent Cuddy pieces, too - I’m still a bit worried that I don’t have a handle on her character, she’s not as easy to read as House or Wilson are for me.) Sometimes it’s a line from someone else’s work, or an idea that springs from that, and sometimes it’s just pure self-indulgence, because I’m all about the self-indulgence. I write to amuse myself. I throw random bits of information in, and movie references, and write the characters in certain settings, because it makes me happy, it makes me laugh. I like that other people like it of course, but that’s not the main thing.
What's the hardest part of writing for you?
Plots! *laugh* Anything with chapters; I really respect a lot of people who have the overarching large-plot-gene, because I don’t generally have that at all. And not screaming with rage when people and small animals INTERRUPT ME with things like requiring food or shelter or playing with or pettings or things LESS IMPORTANT AT THE CURRENT SECOND, SERIOUSLY. I have an icon from xkcd (xkcd.com) that has a child saying ‘mom, I’m hungry’ and the mother says ‘hush, I’m coding, you ate yesterday’. That’s how I feel about writing. Unfortunately the six year old can’t use the stove. Which is probably a good thing, really. *laugh*
What's the easiest?
Dialogue, because it just flows and it’s natural for me. Certain types of images. And writing about food. I often have people say that my fics make them hungry.
You've written NC17 stuff for both male and female characters. Does the gender of the characters impact how you write sex? Should it?
No. And it shouldn’t other than the obvious mechanical differences. I hate the whole gender disparity/divide thing because it’s all socialization anyway, there’s very little inbuilt about a woman or a man that makes them think differently about sex (or anything, really). There’s a whole rant about that that I just don’t feel like getting into. But I like playing with the expectations that people have of gender because I adore screwing with people’s heads and making them think. I do that a lot more with original stuff though, mostly because I haven’t found a way to work it in in fanfic.
Do you ever find yourself at the end of an episode absolutely needing to write fic to help explain that episode's impact on you?
I don’t think I’ve ever done that? Sometimes I’ve gotten plot bunnies from things in the episode but I don’t think that’s what you mean here. I have some niggling … things … about the season finale, but I think everyone does. I find that I more write fic to offer an alternative way of looking at events. Unfortunately the only examples I can think of where I did that are still very rough WIPs.
What is there in House and Wilson's canon relationship that keeps bringing you back to them in fic?
I actually had that discussion with purridot at one point. And it’s kind of Hamlet-esque, isn’t it? The tortured hero and his faithful companion. I’m a huge Shakespeare nerd and there’s a lot of Hamlet/Horatio parallels in House/Wilson. (I’d write Hamlet/Horatio fic but I wouldn’t be happy with it unless I could do it at least in proper period English, you know, and that’s the kind of thing you have to work up to.) And the banter. I’m always one for the banter. Love banter. And how their damage kind of compliments each other … they’re very deep, and I like that.
(does that make Amber Ophelia? Huh. Probably not.)
(Oh great, now I’ve got this weird idea for an alternative ending of ‘A Midsummer Night’s Dream’ wherein the two girls and the two guys get together instead of pairing off into het couples. Hmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmm. File that one in the ol’ prompt bucket, I think.)
What do you look for in fic that you read?
In-character characters, always - I can’t stomach out-of-character fics. Can NOT. Ugh. I like fluff and lighthearted things because this is my escape - fandom in general - and really heavy angst takes over my brain and it’s just not pretty. I can’t read deathfics either. Other than that anything goes. If the writer can make me believe it, I’ll give it a read. I’m pretty easy that way. Well-written crack is always a plus, too.
Has writing fic changed the way you watch the show?
No. But that’s probably because I was a film major a long long time ago and I deconstruct and analyze everything I watch anyway. Some people find that hugely annoying, but I can’t help it.
What would you change on the show if you had that power?
More character-driven stuff, less ‘omg big bad guy’ or ‘external forces’ stuff. I love character exploration. And well, I’m holding out for a House/Wilson/Cuddy/Thirteen foursome with Chase videotaping? But that’s because I’m shameless and pervy.
What do you look for from a beta?
I like getting a variety of opinions; I like someone who isn’t afraid to nitpick, because I want nitpicks to be picked up on. I like knowing what works and what doesn’t for a person.
And since we're now heading into the summer, how do you work with fanfic when there are such big issues hanging out there that canon won't provide answers to for a few months? Do you write what you feel could happen, figuring it'll be superseded come September? Or do you write fic that's not tied to moments with so much fic potential, merely because we don't know how the powers that be will deal with it?
I write whatever I feel like writing, or whatever the muse throws at me and insists that I write. What happens, happens. I write what I’d like to see happen.
Do you have any other challenges you've laid out for yourself for future writing projects?
During the process of writing the AU femmeslash piece (‘Ripples in Still Water’) (which I am insanely, stupidly proud of) I would probably have thought you were insane for asking that question. But the answer is yes, of course. Always.
Over the summer jane_hidell and I are collaborating over at stuffonmywilson on a combined art and fic project. It’s going to be fun and awesome and y’all should go over and request something! Because it’s fluff and it’s summertime and we all need some of that after that season finale, wouldn’t you say? (end shameless pimping).
I have the sequel to ‘Blackout’ partly in my head, where House gets his fantasy of Wilson over his desk with the blinds open in the middle of the night, from Wilson’s POV this time: silence on Wilson’s part, anyway, and the things he hears (and is freaking out about, because OMG they might get CAUGHT) and how he deals with that and sex at the same time. It ends happily, of course, it would almost have to. But the process of getting there should be interesting.
I’m trying to do more things that don’t rely so heavily on dialogue, mostly just to see if I can?
Experimenting with different pairings, different points of view - again, just to see if I can. I like to mix things up and see what happens.
Thanks a lot! Feel free to chime in with questions of your own.