Gacked from yahtzee63,

1) The basics -- edit as you go, or get it out and fix it later? How come?

It depends on the length of the piece. If it's something short (under 3K words, for example), I'm going to just write and only after I'm finished do some polishing up and send it off for beta. For a longer piece/a story with multiple scenes/chapters, I start out with a pretty rigorous outline, have the main developments, the scenes, even fragments of dialogue pretty well mapped out before I do anything else. A long story is also not the work of a single day/writing block of time. So I'll write an entire scene, stop, and then when I resume next time, look over what I've written previously and make a few edits, then go on to write the next scene. Repeat. After a while, it becomes wieldly to keep starting over from the beginning for 'polishing' before writing new material, so I try to pick up only from one or at most two scenes prior to where I've left off. Or, since I'm working from an outline, I may (depending on how I feel that day) decide to write a later scene first and then come back, or realize a later scene requires some set up from an earlier already written scene, or rearrange some of the scenes or decide to introduce/delete a scene to make things flow better...But despite all this the story will be finished--a complete first draft--before it gets the thorough going over/edit/polish and sent off to beta. Then, depending on what the almighty beta says (smooches to seemag *g*), there is minor revising to do or else some major rewriting.

2) Death to adverbs? Use in moderation? Sprinkle liberally? At the author's discretion?

This touches on a very delicate balancing act all writers must employ. Adverbs are important; when we write we are painting pictures in the readers' minds and so it's important for us to convey *how* an action, or a speech, is being done. Is the character mocking? sad? angry? weary? resigned? On the other hand, it's all too easy to fall into the trap of overuse. When you've got too many -ly words coming one right after the next, it's overkill. (Don't be afraid to let your readers do a little interpreting). Worse, with too many adverbs all bunched up together, the pacing can falter or the writing starts calling attention to itself at the expense of what's going on in the story. (Or at least I find it that way). On the other hand, reduce your adverbage too sharply, and your cure may just be worse than the disease: you've fallen prey to the dreaded 'book-saidism.' Characters start snarling, chortling, remarking, interrupting, screaming (and ejaculating, in the non-NC17 sense *g*) like there's no tomorrow. There's got to be a balance between the two evils, and at different times my writing pendulum has swung first one way and then the other.

3) Do you start with a whole story, usually, or a spark of inspiration that turns into something else? If it's a whole story, does it change as you go, or stay solid?

Usually between the moment of inspiration and when I can finally sit myself down at the computer, enough time has elapsed that the basics of the story, its plot, its structure etc have already started taking shape. If it's a 'short' (or what I think will be short, though sometimes stories have surprised me), I'll sit down and just start writing. If it's longer, my first step is to make up an outline/sketch what I think will happen or why. My flashes of inspiration, aside from striking at inconvenient times like showering, driving etc, usually come as opening or closing lines (anyone familiar with my fic knows I pride myself on my endings *g*) so immediately I start thinking how/why the situation would support that line, what led up to it, what the premise is and how the characters arrived there.

4) Do you believe in One True Characterization in fanfic, or do you think there's a spectrum? How broad is the spectrum?

I believe in One True Characterization, more or less. In past musings on the topic, I've said that a character is like a blank screen on which we project our image of what s/he is. Obviously, not everyone is going to have the same interpretation even though we're all allegedly working from the same canon material. (Another rant for another day: fanfic writers who purport to write without having seen or experienced the source material first hand, or have insufficient exposure to the seminal canon events). My Janeway is not the same as kellychambliss's Janeway, for example, or even seemag's, but they have enough in common as to be immediately recognizable. But what I absolutely cannot stand and have zero patience with, is a Janeway who acts more like an adolescent teenager than the mature 40-something year old captain with years of Starfleet service under her belt. There's room for Angsty!Janeway, Playful!Janeway, Sexy!Janeway (always room for *her*), My-Way-Or-The-Highway!Janeway, but she has to make sense both in context of the story and the way she's portrayed at that particular point of canon. Bad characterization will throw me out of a story each and every time.

5) You're wandering away from fanfic into the hallowed-yet-terrifying world of profic. What do you miss the most? The least?

Hah. Ain't never going to happen, trust me. But if by some strange quirk it did, I'm guessing I'd probably miss the 'insta-feedback' that (most of the time) appears within a few hours of posting a story. I'd miss the give and take with readers discussing what worked and what didn't work for them.