Temporary Site Maintenance

Hey all,

I've been using SugarSync to host all of the ebook files I've created, but unfortunately, they switched away from free accounts and I'm not willing to pay for an account that I don't really use all that much. While I work on an alternative, I'm going to deactivate my downloads page. I hope it have it back within a week.

Also, I'm having some technical difficulties with That Which is Greater: Winter Break. I'll let you know when Chapter 8 will be out.

Stay sexy!
Frea

Because I made a promise

I promised everybody I would let them know when I'm working on a new That Which is Greater story. It's not a new story, technically, but I am writing steadily in that universe right now. When I know a posting date, I'll let you know.

Keep an eye on this blog, by the way, for some ebooks and some links to things I've written in the past few weeks. There are a lot of things. I went a little crazy cleaning out my Tumblr prompt box in anticipation of a new year.

Hope everybody's having a wonderful end of the year! Stay sexy!
Frea

Trick or Treat

Doing this a little bit earlier this year...

In honor of All Hallow’s Eve, I’m inviting trick-or-treaters to my ‘door.’ Comment “trick-or-treat” to this post and…well, you know the drill. Treats can be anything that strikes my fancy (pics of fave actors or pairings, one sentence fics, graphics, a few words why I’m glad to have you on my flist, etc. etc.). The more “houses” to visit the more fun it’ll be, so go ahead, open your journal and help spread the fun!

I've enabled anonymous commenting. If you could let me know who you are, I can tailor your treat—or your trick!—just for you (aka sign your comments if you can! Or just tell me what you like if you don't feel comfortable leaving your name).

Monday Gazette

Hello, lovelies!

I’m a little more recovered than I was last week. I love jetlag. Some important announcements! We’re up to chapter 9 of My Girl Sarah, and that chapter’s a pretty important one, as it kicks off the second half of the story and things are only going to get twistier from here on out. You can read that on my ff-net account. Please keep in mind that though we’re posting it under my name, mxpw is my co-writer on this, and not just in name either. He did half the writing and half the plotting but only one third of the whining. Trying to guess who wrote which chapter is a useless task because our co-writing doesn’t usually work like that, though you have been amusing the two of us greatly with your guesses, so thank you for that!).

Other announcements: I’ve gone through and updated my FAQ page, which you can read here. It has more answers about That Which is Greater stories in progress, and even more importantly, a new page I’ve added to my blog: My Transformative Works Policy.

Yes, I have one of those now (for the record: it’s a statement saying it’s okay to make stuff based on stuff I make). This was not something I ever thought I needed, as I’ve stated before that I would love to see sequels/prequels/meta of my work, as long as it’s credited. But I got approached by somebody wanted to podfic one of my stories, and I realized that I probably needed one of those. You know, officially. So I’ve posted that here, on my LJ, and on my Dreamwidth that I don’t really use. I hope you find it amusing, at the very least.

There are some more tiny fics. Good old Steampunk.Chuckster (who will not be writing the rest of Curtain Call—that was a joke) was having a bad day the other day so for every anonymous message she received, I wrote a new snippet of Chuckfic. And then I opened up my inbox for prompts for the night. So here’s a list:

• Incoming (Greater)
• Medaling in Pop Culture (Set, Spike, Dive!)
• Trailer of Tetris (Curtain Call)
• Y: The Last Graphic Novel (Fates)
• Sarah adopts a dog (Orphan Black)
• John Casey is asked to be a Godfather (Chuck)
• How to Piss Off Frea O’Scanlin (Chuck, canon compliant)
• The Rocketeerman (Avengers/The Rocketeer)
• Girls’ Night (Avengers/Chuck)
• The Magic of Tumblr (Avengers)
• The Horrible Hawkeye Essay (Hawkguy)

They haven’t been added to my archive yet, but they will be soon. In addition, I’ve gone through and added summaries to all of the fics on my archive. You just need to hover your mouse over the title.

Hope everybody else’s weekend was productive or relaxing, whatever you needed it to be!

Stay sexy,
Frea

Fixing An Error

Hey all,

Just a quick post to say that I goofed last week. I said something big was supposed to happen today, when I got my dates wrong and really, it's happening on Monday.

So...you know. Monday. Big stuff. Big...things. Awesome stuff.

This has been an announcement. You may continue about your day.

Stay sexy!
Frea

Not Dead, Just Busy

Hello, wonderful people!

I don't want to take up too much of your time, but I thought I would update you on some things. First off, I'm still going through and updating links on my ebooks page because I want to divorce myself from MediaFire in general. I've updated the coding for malamoo's Chuck vs. the Second Chance and the Authors Intersect's Chuck vs. the Terrible, Horrible, No Good, Really Bad Day*. And best of all, I've added the wonderful Chuck Versus The Con Game by the even wonderfuller Steampunk.Chuckster to the downloads page. You can get that here and don't forget to leave a comment and tell her she's wonderful and she should get crackin' on taking over Curtain Call for Max and me.

Anyway, now that I've made Karen flee the country, other news. I haven't worked on the Greater!Carina story, so sorry about that. Other projects, including life, have taken priority. I will have a new fic out on August 20^th called Counterfeit and Counterpart, which will include the ebook for your downloading pleasure. Hopefully I will have a fic out at the very beginning of September, and next week or so, I will try to remember to post a link that you're going to want to watch.

I have updated my FAQ page to answer a question about Guide Us Home and to update my answers about Greater and some other things, so if it's been awhile, head over that way and take a peek. If you have any other questions, you can leave them here as comments, or hit me up on my Tumblr Ask Box, as I'll usually get those right away. I will be out of touch for half of next month, just so you know, as I'll be traveling. More to come about that, actually, later on.

Anyway, that's the news. Hope you're having a wonderful day!
Frea

*SERIOUSLY, IF YOU'RE GOING TO BASE A FIC TITLE ON ONE OF MY FAVORITE CHILDREN'S BOOKS, GET THE TITLE RIGHT.

New ebook, new colors, new stories, new chapter

You probably saw the new layout changes last week, but I wanted to let you know that there’s still some construction going on*. I went out and gathered a bunch of intel on different stories (guys, I’m not going to lie: this was not easy. It’s come to my attention that I write a lot) and put them on the fic page, which means that the most comprehensive list** of my stories you’re going to find on the internet is on this blog. I’ve sorted it by fandom, for the most part, first the series and then the alphabetical order.

I also went ahead and tossed Nobody Puts Dummy in the Corner onto the downloads page.*** I haven’t put anything new on that page for a while, so it felt strange.

In writing news, Camp Nano is going on and I’ve been sort of half-heartedly following along, which means writing a bit. I wrote a bunch of prompts on Tumblr this weekend from a myriad of different fandoms, including Arrow, The Avengers, Captain Marvel, Community and Fringe, Dresden Files, Middleman and New Girl, and Orphan Black. Actually, there were a lot of New Girl stories in there. Huh. My friend may have a fixation. I’ve got one more prompt sitting in my inbox that needs to be penned, and it’s fantastic (think classic comic book character + Sarah Walker).

Oh, also, I finished the eleventh chapter of That Which is Greater last night, so. Yeah. Not sure where I’m going to end that story, but it’s one step closer to removing one “WIP” status from my fic page.

Frea

* I still need to update the colors on the Fates Guide.
** but not exhaustive.
*** Links to the Fates Guide, the Downloads page, etc., are now in the sidebar on the right. Cheerio!

Pardon the Dust Yet Again!

As you probably noticed right when you arrived, Fauxlivia is gone and now we have a bright new header with 100% more clones (and still the same amount of doubles). I was feeling a little blue/green last time I designed the blog and now it’s time for an infusion of pastels, apparently.

In other news, some stuff is underway and whatnot, and I’m working on things that might make people happy, which is possibly the vaguest way I could think of to say that. I have a fic definitely coming out in August that’s about 30,000 words long. Yesterday I posted a fanfiction about the books in Maria Hill’s apartment called For a Rainy Day. Also, if you’re a fan of Arrow and The Avengers, you might like Bad Altitude, which I posted last week for the Into A Bar challenge over on Livejournal.

Oh! And I quasi-wrote Chuck fic again! It’s Pitch Perfect, but as a Chuck AU. The link to that is here.

Under the read more, I’ve put two Bingo cards that I’m working on. The first is my Trope Bingo card and the second is my Ladies Bingo card, so if you have any ideas for things I could write for the different squares, please let me know! Any fandom except Downton Abbey and no finale fics because those are the worst.

Kindle Worlds and My Take On It

You may not have heard, but Amazon released something that's shaking up the world of fanfiction a little this morning. It's called Kindle Worlds and it means you can download fanfiction in certain genres straight to your Kindle...by paying for them. The low-down is that WB has given up some of the creative licenses to things like Gossip Girl and Pretty Little Liars, which means that writers can professionally publish fic based on those shows. It will be content controlled, it looks like, but there haven't been any guidelines released yet (no pornography is one of the guidelines, but this is also the publisher of 50 Shades of Grey, so take that with whatever boulder of salt you find necessary).

And on the surface, it looks great, right? Getting to pay your favorite writers for fic that they write! The chance that other fandoms may follow in suit! WB has rights to Chuck and Fringe, after all, so some fandoms close to our hearts might be involved very soon!

Except...well, John Scalzi puts it way better than I can about why this might not be such a good idea for writers. Plus, when I wrote Fates, W11, W&T, SSD!, and my other fandomly works, I didn't write those for pay but for love of the characters/show/writing itself. Providing these for free wasn't taking any money from anybody else (except for lucky47, who used to buy internet on a cruise ship to read Fates), which is the way I ethically justify playing with characters that are not my own.

So, in the future I might change my mind, but currently, I won't be doing this with any new Chuckfic or other genre, should the opportunity arise. But I appreciate everybody that has pointed me to it! It warms me all the way down to my soul that you're looking out for me like that.

Sincerely,
Frea

PS - It's been a crazy couple of weeks, so there hasn't been much fic from me, but I did manage to write a really short piece about Steve Rogers acclimating to the future over on my Tumblr. You should check that out. And get ready for a long fic from me soon!

Chuck vs. the Recruits ebook!

Good news! I have completed the ninjaVanish collection of ebooks here on the blog! That’s right, you can download Chuck vs. the Recruits now for your ebooking pleasure. It’s available, along with the rest of his works, here on the downloads page. Happy reading!

In other news, I reorganized the ebooks page. I’ll have the graphics back up eventually, but for right now, it’s all ebooks.

Thanks,
Frea

New Ebooks!

Hello, dear readers!

So I realize it’s been awhile since I released some ebooks, which is my fault. I’ve been making them, but I haven’t been going through the process of uploading them and making them available for public consumption (seriously, though, my Kindle is triiiicked out), and I thought I’d get on that. So I’ve got three new ebooks for you today, one in each of my fandoms. That’s right, you can get The Bank Job, The Woman in the Crosshairs, or The Abbey. Two have complicated scenes inside of banking buildings, the other one makes up for the lack with aliens, I think.

Also, if you subscribe to me on AO3 or fanfiction.net, you may have noticed that I have a new story out. The title is really strange, I know, because it comes from a Disney ride, and the concept is even stranger. The Avengers are pirates in the 18th century. But it’s not like they woke up one day thinking, hey, I want to be a pirate. They’ve all got backstories that explain how they got to where they are, and there’s a long and shared history between them. I don’t want to tell you the plot because that’ll give too much away, but let’s just say you’ll recognize quite a few elements.

Anyway, that’s up on fanfiction.net and AO3, and I’ll be posting a chapter a day. Yes, it’s already finished, so no need to worry about me abandoning this one mid-story.

Oh, speaking of my stories (and abandoning some), I’ve organized my list of stories, where to find them, where you can download the ebooks, by fandom and then by series (Greater and Fates are in order). You can check all of that out here. They’ve all got statuses now that tell you where I’m at with them (Comp.=complete, WIP=work in progress, Hiatus=will come back to it someday, Aban.=orphaned), too. I’ll add to the list as I write more.

Anyway, that’s the news. I’m off to go destroy mxpw so horribly, he begs for mercy in his sleep go do my usual things.

Frea

A Change to the Blog

Hey all,

 Previously I had the entirety of Curtain Call and Romeo and Juliet But Without Teenagers or Death...Well, Okay Some Death posted under the fanfiction tab, but that was messy. Instead, you’ll find links to those in the fanfiction chart. I have added Previous and Next links to each chapter in the blog to enable easy navigation. Of course, it’s probably easiest to just download, you know, the ebooks from the page.

In addition, I have completed the Ultimate Fates Guide with color coded table cells, listed by date. That is located underneath the fanfiction tab.

And if you’re curious about how I’m doing with Nanowrimo, the answer is completely ambivalent and about 5k behind, so good times all around!

Happy Monday!

Frea

Monday Stuff

First off, same address, new blog. If you missed it, I’ve made some changes around here and here’s why.

Secondly, and more importantly, College Years is back. That’s right, Wepdiggy is going through his archive and finishing out everything he’s left incomplete, which is a treat for me especially because I’ve always adored CY. He’s already recently completed his awesome fic where Sarah and Anna pull a Freaky Friday, so if you didn’t catch that, be sure to go read Sarah vs. the Switch right now. It’ll make your day.

And speaking of Chuck fanfiction, we’ve lured my pal Michael over to the dark side. WITH CARINA. Carina vs. the Bartowskis can be read here.

Seth MacFarlane is going to host the Oscars. Make of that what you will. Nervert and I are holding out for the Muppets.

Dexter premiered for its seventh season, now with extra awesomeness in the form that is Yvonne Strahovski. What’d everybody think of the premiere? I’m genuinely curious, and I’m also told that the lack of a wind machine on her entrances puzzled people.

If you like Avengers fic/Darcy Lewis, she blinded me with political science will have you laughing for about six hours. Warning: it’s a long read, so do not undertake lightly. That said, the author really writes an excellent Tony and an even better Darcy.

And this has been your Monday update. Fingers crossed that I'll remember to do exactly the same thing next Monday.

- Frea

The Dust Has Mostly Cleared

Here we go. I have made most of the major cosmetic changes (you’ll probably see some minor changes happening over the next few days if you keep a sharp eye on the blog) so we have a new theme that is very, um, bluey-green. But whatever. I like bluey-green.

One of the biggest changes is that I've cut down on the number of pages on the blog. That's right, I've shoveled Curtain Call, RaJ, and the Guide to Fates into the same page (with handy navigational links because holy mother of pearl, that's a LOT of text).  I'll work on making sure that's a full archive in the coming days.

Another major change is that I've sorted everything into labels, much easier to read.  Handy navigational tips:

• The Chuckfic tag is any posted story on the blog, be it story preview, ficlet, chapter, or outtake.  If it's tagged with Chuckfic, there's actual fanfiction inside the post, as opposed to the fanfiction tag, which is the umbrella tag for anything to do with fanfiction.
• I have a minions tag, which is where you'll find posts written by anybody not named mxpw or Frea.
• I have a Columns tag, which is where you'll find all of the old columns like Chris's Why We Write, the short-lived MST3K column, my Roundup posts, and all of my Vonnegut posts
• The writing tag is writing advice, pure and simple.
• Fates has its own tag, but if you're looking for something on other Fatesverse stories, you'll have to go to the Fatesverse tag.

The pages at the top have been bumped up to actual tabs. FAQ and Home are fairly self-explanatory, but you also have Downloads, where you can find all of the ebooks I've made public. Feast and enjoy!

- Frea

Pardon Our Dust

I got bored with the layout.  We'll be seeing some changes going on over the next little while (the one I've chosen is temporary).  Right now, I've thrown up a Fauxlivia header because it's Friday and that means Fringe.  My plan is to update this blog in tandem with my Dreamwidth blog and my LJ blog (thank bob for clients that cross-post), which means this is definitely moving away from being a primarily Chuck fanblog.  Truth be told, I'm a little amazed that didn't happen sooner, as the proprietor of said blog isn't entirely a Chuck fan anymore.  But this is CI.  We don't let details get in our way!

Upcoming Changes I'm hoping to make:

• A set of regular graphics to denote what type of post each will be (aka, each post will be framed with icons similar to LJ and DW)
• A better, more comprehensive tagging system
• A unified theme throughout my blogs
• More cowbell
• A directory of junk I'm up to, which includes the free short story I will be releasing to celebrate Halloween next month, under my official pen name
• More posts on writing, as that has really fallen to the wayside. Maybe I'll even finish that Vonnegut series.
• An unprecedented show of unholy narcissism, aka more personal "What is Frea doing?" posts, including cross-linking to other stuff I'm doing on the web (*coughNiceGirlsTumblrMyOtherPenNamecough*
• Fan Recs/Vid Fridays/Suggestions

Just for the time being

So Blogger, our platform for CI, is being a pain in the butt. They introduced threaded comments the other day, which is an idea I'm excited to see.  I love Wordpress's threaded comments option, as I feel it leads to more natural conversation.

However, here, Blogger has decided it's going to glitch pretty badly.  So until this problem is resolved, I'm switching from embedded comments to a popup. Sorry for any inconvenience this causes.

I stole the gif from Grace, also known as Miss Couch Potato on Tumblr. If you want some amusing graphics, check her out here.

Thanks!

Frea

Where the Frak is the CIA?

Subtitle: What's going on with the blog?  And, oh yeah, that one story?

One of the following is true:

A)  Frea was kidnapped by aliens, who forced her to watch Cowboys and Aliens and give them her honest opinion.  Unfortunately, it didn't end so well.  For the aliens, that is.

B) Frea and Maximus (and other assorted members of the CIA) got smacked in the face with real life.

Frea is in the process of launching her own business, taking classes, and working full time, on top of maintaining a strict gnome-grooming schedule and being at the mercy of the alien space overlords—oops, she means Boston Terriers.  She was found crushed under one last week; thankfully somebody commissioned a Freabot to try and finish Fates by Chuck's birthday, who has kindly been filling in for her.

Maximus just came off of a very difficult semester full of classes that he's mostly been using to taunt Frea, including naming half of the muscles in Sarah's back during random Fates betas (to be fair, that only happened once).  His final exam involved dead bodies.  And much to Frea's disappointment, not the scattered corpses of his enemies.

Chris, as far as we can tell, has joined the Navy SEALs and is on a personal vendetta against Conan O'Brien (we didn't ask) having to do with some band Frea has never heard of.

Crystal has been eaten by a gru.  In Hawaii.  She will be missed.

Wepdiggy has been eaten by a gru. In Chicago.  He will be mocked.

So that's what's up with the blog lately.  Scheduled entries into Curtain Call and What Fates Impose might be late for the foreseeable future.  We appreciate your patience.

Sincerely,

Management

Pardon Our Dust

Frea just can't leave a good thing (Sarah's T-shirt) alone, apparently.

Things will be changing on the blog over the next couple of weeks, so please ignore any construction crews that track mud through your office and home in the meantime.

Thanks!

Management

...


Oh, fine, here you go:

Frequently Asked Questions

Good news, everybody!

So the other day, somebody asked for what seemed to be the millionth time, what SWP means. Perfectly understandable, mind you, as what is more important than SWP? I can't really think of anything. But it got Frea and myself to thinking (always a dangerous thing). As enjoyable as it is to proselytize to our readers about the glories of SWP, it is terribly inefficient. I mean, wouldn't it be better to just have an explanation everybody can look at whenever they want for what SWP stands for, than to have to explain it every time somebody asks?

The answer is yes, yes it would be better.

A Special Thanksgiving Day Message*

Love,

The CIA

*This is assuming you're, you know, in the States. If not, have a wonderful Thursday and we'll be back on Saturday with your regularly scheduled Inanity.