Happy New Year!

It is 2013! Wow. I have been a registered member of this site for nearly a decade and that is scary. This is the first update to my profile since 2008. New year; new decade, new profile. I've been having an on-and-off love affair with this website for the past ten years, and most recently the past few months. I just signed up to be a betareader, also. Apparently I'm not busy enough as it is...

I like reading amazing romance stories or extremely humorous ones, and only from the Books or Games genres. I like romances that begin as either pleasant acquaintances or mortal/trivial adversaries, get slightly awkward and too close for comfort, and then turn into something physically and emotionally devastatingly passionate. They must be well-written and not cliched. I'm usually not a fan of canon romances. No reason; I just like variety.

The few stories/authors that I have favorited have been favorited for a very good reason (either the story was extremely enjoyable to read, tapped into the depths of my soul, left me breathless, or, in the authors' case, has consistently done these things for me with multiple stories of theirs). Please check them out and give the authors their due; they deserve it.

What I've been reading lately (as of 2012-2013):

Final Fantasies XIII and XIII-2...I like Hope/Lightning, but my all-time favorite fanfiction couple EVER is Serah/Noel. They have such a beautiful relationship. It might even end up being canon; who knows. I sure got that feeling toward the end of the game. Their journey together (literally and figuratively) is pretty much EXACTLY how I like my romance stories.

Harry Potter...Hermione/Draco. That's pretty much all I'll read from there. I think they are the perfect complement to each other and would make fantastic babies. However, I am constantly on the lookout to avoid the cliched "ferret/Mudblood" banter.

Kingdom Hearts...I used to like AkuRoku but that was a phase. Axel/Kairi, however, has some serious potential. There is no denying that. I mean, who knows what happened between the cutscenes? I love the whole adversaries-turned-uncertain-turned-lovers bit.

My Stories:

I haven't written anything decent in awhile.

1. Same Ol', Same Ol' -- Circa age 14. Tamora Pierce's Alanna, Daine, and Kel quartets. I make fun of the typical stories that everyone writes about them. It's not bad for the then-14-year-old me, if I do say so myself. Some of it is written in script form. I really ought to update it, or at least edit it. I updated it once a few years ago and had a great time laughing at it.

2. Entertaining Notions -- Circa age 14. Random scenes straight from Tamora Pierce's novels, tweaked a little bit. I take scenes from the books, but change them to make them hilarious in my strange mind. [UPDATE: This was funny when I was 14; not so much now. I cringe.]

3. Behind the Cutscenes -- Ah, my first Kingdom Heart fanfic! My attempt at being funny. I make up my own little scenes from the game that happened (or could have) in between what was shown on the cutscenes, such as the story behind "Pence and Olette's favourite couch", or how Demyx's first week at Castle Oblivion went.

4. Psyche -- Circa age 18. This is not an all-powerful-gorgeous-Mary-Sue-gets-sucked-into-Kingdom-Hearts-and-becomes-a-sorceress/Keyblade-wielder-ZOMG story. This story is deeper than that. [UPDATE: I never got around to finishing this...I had some great chapters lined up :( Maybe someday.] With this story, I hope to entertain a powerful idea of mine that goes beyond the mere attributes of the characters and storyline and delves deeper into the raw, dog-eat-dog psychological motives of human nature..because good guys can be bad, and vice versa. No one is a hero. I need to update it, I know, I know. I think I'm going to change the title to "Hubris".

5. Dive -- Circa age 18. As in, dive into the characters' minds, dive into the story. Mainly to improve my writing skills, I am taking scenes from Kingdom Hearts 1 and 2 and putting them into words, incorporating the characters' thoughts and feelings behind their actions. I actually like this a lot; it's nothing that you haven't seen before, since all the scenes are from the game, but it's well-written, if I do say so myself. So give it a shot, please. I like to think I'm doing a decent job. I try really hard.

6. Fragment -- Circa age 20. It's Dive again, but Death Note style! This is a series of oneshots consisting of bits and pieces of the anime, whether it's a scene in the manga/show or a psychological session in the characters' thoughts. I really like this one; so far, it's probably the best one that I've written for this site.

7. Jealousy -- Written as a 24-year-old. I felt so bad for Noel being a third wheel in Sunleth Waterscape, so this is a one-shot about what happened afterward.

Thanks! Read! Review!