À propos de rein, I love it when people tell me they are telling me the G-d's honest truth. Does that mean they are lying to me at all other times?Let me ask you: what kind of fic is MSR?
What kind of fic is an in every way ordinary girl's life? I mean, for real.
An every day, ordinary girl does what, day-in and day-out. Wake up. Potty. Go to school. Eat lunch. Potty. More school. Go home. Supper. Homework. Brush teeth. Bed.
Lather, rinse, repeat.
"But, geophf, I don't wanna read about boring. I wanna read about vamps!"
Boring. Hm. Well, okay.
The "Mirror, Mirror" chapter is day two of Bella's imprisonment. On day two of anything, is one blowing up the Brooklyn Bridge? No, on day two of anything, one is adjusting to life at school or on the job.
And Bella's life, now? Boring? Having just nearly died, what? Four times in the last twenty-four hours?
Um.
Now, let me argue from your side, if I may.
"GOD! Bella's period is taking FOREVER! AND I JUST WANT TO SCREAM AT HER AND GOD! AND ..."
Okay, Rosalie, settle down there, GF!
Rosalie hasn't been able to say a peep for this whole time AND IT IS DRIVING YOU AND IT IS DRIVING HER CRA-a-a-a-a-a-ZY! Remember that scream in the forest at "The Promise"? Remember it?
In a chapter or few, Rosalie will begin to be able to talk again.
And Bella, finally, will get her wish, eh? FINALLY, they'll be able to have a conversation, right?
What kinds of conversations have they had when Rosalie could talk?
Hm.
Fireworks ahead.
But please do note. MSR is NOT Twilight. Vampire baseball is right out. And if it is in (which it's not), there's not going to be a plot-derailing James that's going to show up, because that's being handled by a very different plotty plot line (yay! geophf admits there's going to be plot development eventually), off-scene entirely from MSR (read future chapters of 13ways for the entire Laurent, James, Victoria debacle).
MSR is NOT "Terminator 27: the reunified destructinization!" MSR is much more like "Out of Africa." MSR is chick-flicky, and not chick-flicky like "Thema and Louise" but chick-flicky, like, well ... MSR.
Sigh.
geophf, writer of chick-flicky fan-fiction.
So, if you're looking for Edward to come crashing into the party tomorrow ... well, there's Bonne Foi (it even stars plot-derailing James). But fireworks do happen in MSR. Why? Because it does star vampires. But the last set of fireworks was at "A Swim," right? And the next set is at "Lillian, Arise!" (sort of), and the following set is at ... well, it depends. Is Bella's escape fireworks, or the visit of unexpected company to the cabin fireworks? or ...
Talk-talk-talk. That's what MSR is. Along with vampires, and near death experiences. And misunderstandings. And UST.
You know: "Pride and Prejudice and Vampires." Hey, somebody ought to write a book like that!
(YES, I KNOW! Okay? I already KNOW!)
But you already know all this about MSR right?
MSR has zero sex appeal on ffn. It's not an AH AU ExB smutfest (previously mentioned). It's a slice-of-(un)life story. You know? The everyday ennui and horror of life. The everyday hope of it.
It doesn't gloss over the dull and dreary and dreadful details of the person standing right next to you all day every day. But it also doesn't gloss over the nobility of that self-same person.
Be that person an inept cowgirl, or a stunning socialite of a vampire.
Repetitious? Yes. Does your life have a plot advancement every two days? If yes, then, have a cookie and why are you reading boring old MSR, when you're going skydiving today, and yachting tomorrow?
I think boring old MSR is so very much more exciting than Bella ever dreamed her life would be, even though that includes a regular trip to the potty.
I think boring old life itself, you know, the one most people live? Is way more exciting than ever anyone would have ever thought it would be, if only they opened their eyes to look up from their desk to see the rain storm outside, or the person right beside them.
MSR doesn't do that. Both Bella and Rosalie absolutely refuse to see the other person as she is, instead they try to see the other person as how they think the other person should be.
But MSR tries.
It takes an awfully lot of tries even to begin to see the other person as something other that an echo of 'it' - the way I want them to be. And its so hard, maybe even too hard, for most people even to try to do that. I mean: it's boring and unrewarding work, to see the other person as a person, and not an it that I can just use and then discard, so I can move onto the next adventure.
This is the curse of the Buddha, you know. That unrelenting search for happiness beyond the next hill. You know what the redemption is, however? Finding happiness, right here, right now, in the small, little, ever repeated, everyday grind of life; the task at hand.
Not fun. Not exciting. Not adventurous.
But, when one finds satisfaction in it: peace and happiness.
Maybe even joy.
Maybe hope.
Is MSR self-satisfied? I don't think so. I think MSR is a very unsatisfied work. I think I put every ounce of quality I can into every chapter I publish.
But does that mean you have to like MSR? Nope, of course not, there are many excellent pieces on ffn. And do they agonize over the final things, like MSR does? Most don't. They're well-written and a rip-roaring read.
What do you come out of those stories with? What did you come into MSR expecting? But now that you are here ... is what that MSR is, in its quiddity and hæcceity of it, worth a continued read of it? Do other fan fiction pieces make you work at them? Sure! Some really great works do (medicine wheel) ... don't they, also, consider the final things?
Like 'hope' and 'friendship'? And 'I and Thou'? Or, more properly, 'Ich und du'?
What is MSR?
To most, it's boring; plotless.
What is it to you?
Oh, one more thing. Rosalie is — surprise! — a vampire, and Bella is just a plain old human. Still with me?
If you dislike the imbalance of their relationship, Bella likes it perhaps less so than you. But you know who hates it the most? Rosalie (cf RLT). Finding a "balanced" relationship? TRULY balanced, that is, right down to the marrow, not just on the surface? Hm. MAKING a truly balanced relationship where one is an invincible goddess (literally from Ancient Greek times: read Hymn to Aphrodite by Sappho and tell me that she's not describing a twivamp) and the other's a plain girl of no breeding nor bearing?
That, truly, is an adventure.
In my book, anyway.
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