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Once upon a time, I started to read fanfic. I had gotten into BtVS by borrowing DVDs from the library, and after I had run through what they had (end of Season 5), I went to a newly discovered resource, Ye Olde Internet, hungry for more.

And Lo, I found some of the most appalling writing on some of the bigger Fic sites. Somehow, I stumbled across a story about Giles and Jenny which was quite beautiful and touching-- though at the time the sexual content was much too high for my innocent tastes. From there, I branched out to websites, mostly Giles-centric, and then to Yahoo groups. This Journal is merely the next stage in my participation in that rich, creative and generous fandom.

Buffy resonated so much for me at the time because Real Life was becoming more horrific than any show. A lot of my coping with the legal system, the social service system, and the business of bureaucracy, involved quite healthy escapism. There was a time when I really thought that a lot of my problems could be solved, if only I could stake a few richly deserving individuals. I retain doubts to this day about the humanity of some of them. A world with horrors laughably easy to deal with, by comparison, and where the good guys often won, was a great place to spend lonely hours in an otherwise empty apartment.

And that led me to take up writing again, for the first time in years. My fic Summer was begun as drabble-like character sketches which took on a life of their own. And the numbing shock and horror of its early installments were not that different from what I was going through in real life. For the first time in my life, I finally got what it took to be a writer. It's trite to call it "experience", and I wouldn't have wished this kind of experience on my worst enemy. But It gave my writing an emotional honesty and depth it hadn't really had before-- because, before, I was writing about things I didn't really understand.

And now, more recently, I've branched off into the Harry Potter fandom, as a reader and writer. I read the first three books previewing them for my son, and it was the first time I got to the end of a book and immediately started from the beginning again because I could not bear to leave its world just yet. I held out against fanfic until right before DH came out, when I stumbled across some wonderful fic and found that there are also some talented and generous writers in this fandom. So you will find some HP fic and recommendations in these pages, as well. And of course, as the mother of a pre-teen boy, there are the adventures of Wee Hob to look forward to.

So that's me. I'm here, and I hope to keep up with people whose interests and writing and ideas I admire, and I hope I can contribute some of my insights, as well. I find the act of reading, and offering comments and feedback to others, often gets my mind in the right place to break through my writing blocks. So I look forward to reading, and sharing.

Hob