Someone on FIM Fiction sent me a message earlier today and asked me why I continue to write stories. Currently, I'm in the middle of my third adventure with Shadow Chaser and I haven't received a ton of views or comments or even a lot of thumbs ups but I just keep writing the character. And this person wanted to know why I continued to write Shadow when I didn't get much recognition out of it.

My response was that: I don't really care about recognition. I wrote my first fanfic on a whim. I told a friend about it and they said it would be a good idea and, since I have experience with writing in the past, I figured I'd give it a shot. Not only that but I wrote it in 1st person-Limited which is something I used to hate doing. Because writing like that limits what you can talk about. Your character just has to guess and the reader is left to do the same. But I figured if I was going to write the kind of story I was going for, 1st person was the way to go. And so I wrote that whole story, all 15k words of it, in maybe a week.

And what surprised me was how much fun I had. How much I loved my own character. How much I cared about the relationship that I had thrown him into completely by accident. That first story sits with about 1k total views across all chapters and maybe 12 thumbs ups with no thumbs downs. And all of that is good. I'm glad it was received well, but by the time I had finished that story, I knew I was going to write another.

And I did. Shadow and Co. had one heck of an adventure in the second book. I explored more of my own characters past and I think I made him a well rounded character. Even after the second story, I was still enthralled with him. My motivation to write him has waned from time to time but I always come back because I want the few loyal followers I have to know the stories I have in my head. But more than anything, I want documentation of Shadow's life. It's just fun to develop my characters in such profound ways that I never thought possible.

Anymore, I'm glad I was given the encouragement to write that first story. And even more glad that I was given the ability to write well to take others on that journey with me. I may not be the most popular author and I'm certainly not the best, but anyone who's willing to come alone with me, I'll take you on a pretty awesome journey. Just as long as Shadow gets to lead the way.