Discussion FanficRecs / Ptitlemxi508a6

You Could Always Edit It Yourself.

Fast Eddie admitted that he made a coding screw-up. All reviews have to be found and reattached.

All of the reviews are gone for me, with the exception of maybe one or two fics. What is going on?

See above. Basically, we have to hunt down all the reviews and re-attach them.

It technically is, in that there's no rule saying not to, but it's still not cool. I've added it back.

If you have something to write about, then do so. Just remember - if you're the author, it's generally considered a bit gauche to add subjective tropes to the page like Moment Of Awesome and so on. The idea is to provide a catalogue of tropes, not a great big 'read this' for your own stuff.

Oh we do it all the time. Go for it.

A GMH page? Sounds great!

Great... I don't know how to make a page yet but I shall figure it out.

Yeah I made a page for and Ace Attorney fan fic the other day.

If the fic is by a troper use the namespace Troper Works/[[title]]

Except don't, because we seem to be phasing out Troper Works these days. It's ideally used as an index rather than a namespace now.

Well then use Fan Fic/[[Insert Title here]]

Just wanted to let people know: she got permission from her publisher to associate her professional works with her fanfiction (i.e., to give us fanfic readers information about her original series without jeopardizing the deal). The first book is called Restoration Book 1: Awakenings and will be available on Amazon next week.

Ah ha! I have done it! Guide Me Home now has a page... but it could do with some more love.

Okay... that doesn't work.

https://tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pmwiki.php/Fanfic/GuideMeHome

Does anyone know what they're doing and can tell me where I stuffed up?

You have to type it as Fanfic, forward slash, Guide Me Home. That way, you get a link like this: Guide Me Home.

Guide Me Home...

Yay! Thank you!

No biggie.

Here here! This is a non-pairing specific website; don't delete examples just because you don't agree with the pairing. If you don't agree with the ship, don't read the fic— that's why the pairing is listed in the summary.

This section exists so tropers can share their favourite fics; don't bring your silly little shipping wars here.

Would it be helpful in any way shape or form to create a folder for fics that specificaly are Zutara? Or is that blowing everythign out of proportion?

Or we could just ask one of the mods to add a note.

Sure! Just made a basic page, with a little blurby summary and a few tropes: Water Tribe. Feel free to add more as they come to you.

"And frankly, Vathara's interpretation of the Avatar world is so intrigueing, and the secondary characters, including O Cs, so well written that you won't even care about Sue-like tendancies. "

Clockworkchaos: Obviously some people do, otherwise we wouldn't be having this discussion would we? Also 10,000 thank you's to whoever moved this. It was bordering on discusion on the main page.

I'm going to second that thanks for moving bit.

Also, I'm seconding the YMMV like woah. Zuko went from a lovable Scrappy to Canon Sue so fast I got whiplash. I used to check if this fic updated daily, now I can't even read it anymore. The derailing of Katara and Aang... it burns!

The author's style of writing makes it really hard to figure out what is going on until the characters talk about it — which only encourages more people to talk about how fabulous and powerful and victimized Zuko is. Also, Zuko now behaves like a jerkass 90% of the time, so his appeal has long worn off. He rages like a teenager who just discovered the world doesn't revolve around him. Except it does, because the author forced it too. The Lost in Translation plot device is long past expiration.

This trouper found that unless she enjoyed Canon Sue and the frustration of reading 100,000+ words of people talking past each other for no reason but the drama, it behooved her sanity to pretend this fic died when they all left Ba Sing Se.

Deadpan29

The overall writing skill is excellent and what the author is trying to do with the setting and story is very worthwhile. However, I see three areas that keep the story from being as good as it could be.

1) Katara: The author has many solid arguments for his position of why a girl this age from this culture and this social position within that culture would realistically act and react like this. However, this is not the same as convincing the readers that the character of Katara, as established in Book 1 and most of Book 2 of canon, would behave this way. As the AU includes those events, largely unaltered, Katara’s more over-the-top moments in this story feel forced for the sake of the story. Then again, her sudden sympathy with Zuko in the caves in the canon timeline also felt forced. Something between the two would be better.

2) Zuko: Given some of the people and entities in the world he inhabits, I don’t think Zuko has quite reached the level of being an over-powered protagonist in regard to the difficulties facing him, though some may consider making him the main protagonist overshadowing Aang to be over-powered. On the other hand, he does hug the edge of over-powered more than is good for the story, and he’s pulling power from a few too many places. As of chapter 30, he is a dragon-blooded, fire-healing, moon-touched waterbender, drawing on the memories and skills of a past life. One of these could be the basis of a good story. Having all of them in play at once is rather silly at times.

3) Fire Nation: Giving the Fire Nation some admirable cultural values and historical reasons behind its actions is good, adding depth and realism to the simplistic cartoon conflict of canon. Having Zuko, Iroh, or who ever is arguing from the Fire Nation position get the last word in every argument concerning honor, history, or cultural understanding is not so good.

Agreed. It's a possible interpretation of Katara, but not the only possible one. The author's notes make it sound like they think it is the only sensible interpretation, which is bound to cause problems.

Making the Fire Nation and Dai Li look better is fine, as part of the world building, but should have been done without making everyone else worse, and it has been overblown.

There are wider problems with the world building too. The southern water tribe lost most of their population over the previous century, a stress that ought to have drastically impacted their culture. They simply don't have enough people to maintain their old customs, many of which will have been lost anyway when people died without heirs, and yet Vathara writes as if their culture is essentially static, Katara and Sokka viewing the way things are as the way things have always been. In practice, the entire older generation would be continually telling them how much had been lost, and it would be clear that the culture was sill struggling to adapt to the changed circumstances. A hundred years isn't that long, after all, barely beyond the horizon of living memory (and not even that, in some places.)

True, canon falls down here too, but had Vathara put the same amount of effort into the Southern Water Tribe as they have for the Fire Nation, he would have addressed this issue. That they haven't is telling.

I could go on, but the overall picture is clear. The story is well written, but flawed. If you agree with the author's biases, you'll love it. If not, the deck stacking will grate.

Total YMMV. I initially liked the story, but Zuko eventually began heading into Gary Stu-dom and the story is pretty much fellating the Fire Nation. It's great to see an author attempt to humanize baddies and dig into a possible reason why the war started in the first place besides a mad man wanting to conquer an entire world, but the execution leaves a bit to be desired. As well, I gnash my teeth every time I read Katara, Aang, Zuko, and the amount of incredibly unnecessary OCs. There's a difference between placing canon characters into an AU setting and completely gutting those characters to suit your AU's needs. It's obvious that Vathara's strong point is world-building and characterization takes a backseat to it. The other strong point of the story was the action, but less effort has been put into it as the story continues which has led to the plot dragging. It doesn't help that the chapters run 17K on average.

The story has its definite pros and cons, and the world-building is what keeps me reading, but with the recent dip into the Air Nomads culture and the author's biases, it's almost become a chore to read.

This story is definitely YMMV.

While it is certainly very well written, the characterization ruins it for me and others. The fact that Zuko has become an all powerful figure, one more capable than the Avatar, and the fact that he is always Right and anyone against him (which is Aang at this point) is always Wrong is extremely irritating. Allowing Aang to have valid points and to be right would definitely fix this but in thirty-one chapters, this has yet to happen. Hopefully it will happen eventually but it won't change the fact that the first thirty-one chapters are filled to the brim with worship for Zuko at the expense of Aang's character.

Secondly, fleshing out the history and culture of the Avatar world is a fantastic idea but the way Vathara does this isn't. The bias for the Fire Nation is rather off putting, to be frank.

Also, the sinking of the two Official Couples (Aang/Katara and Mai/Zuko) in the story will probably make one section of the fanbase rather pleased and anger the other. Fangirls, be aware of the direction this story seems to be heading in.

All in all, the story is extremely well written but should really only be read by massive Zuko fans. Fans of Aang and Katara won't be nearly as happy with it (evident by this review).

(Sidenote to others: Vathara is female, not male)

Hi, Jadesparda here! Personally, I liked this story a lot... Vathara's put a lot of thought into all her works and the depth shows. As for the sinking of one Official Couples, with both Aang/Katara and Suki/Sokka still up in the air, it makes sense to me. You really think that Azula wouldn't have made plans to ensure that she would be the next ruler, going so far as to arrange a dirty secret that she could unleash when the time was right to wreck Zuko's chances of becoming Fire Lord...? And neither Aang nor Katara know that much about the other person's culture... It may still happen that they'll end up together, but they'll need to find some middle ground and compromise!

On Aang's truce-breaking; Zuko may not have minded it at first, since he may have thought that it was only because Katara and Sokka showed up that Aang'd decided to make a break for it. But Zuko's found out that Aang had never planned to honour the promise he'd made at all and that he was just biding his time to make a break for it! That act implies that Aang thought Zuko had no honour himself and that would be a real slap in the face, especially for any person who takes their personal honour seriously... And Zuko is that kind of person!

As for Katara's darker nature then canon, here's my take on trying to explain it... Katara's occasionally bad behavior in canon can be seen as a few rough spots on an otherwise nice girl. However, Vathara was not seeing them as a just surface issue, or one time outbursts, but she's rather showing us that Katara has some deep-seated mental issues <i>(this is from losing her mom when she was still quite young and maybe seeing it happen in front of her or hearing enough for her mind to replay it on her darker days)</i> that will only get worse, if she doesn't get some closure <i>(like she did in canon, when Zuko helped her track down the guy who did the deed and that she had the chance to bring him to justice)</i>! Zuko has tried to understand how she's feeling, since he didn't mean to rip into her as badly as he did, which resulted in her family and friends keeping her at a distance and he's now given her a chance to hunt for the guy who turned her life up-side down legally in Fire Nation terms. This would also give him the chance to carry out his plan to create a new domain without interfernce from Aang and the others... But Aang just doesn't seem to get the fact that sometimes, you might have to do some things that you may find morally disgusting for the greater good <i>(like fighting to kill your foes)</i>. And since Jet never was so badly hurt that he ended up slowly dying in front of Aang; this version of Aang has yet to learn that some of his actions do actually have consquences that might end up badly affecting his friends...

Not only that, but he doesn't seem to realize that what he considers to be perfectly nomral, e.g. Airbenders giving up their kids to be raised by the community, is freaking out his own allies! In short, Aang has a lot to learn about the other cultures to help restore balance, yet he's been clinging like a leech to his roots! I know he doesn't want to let the teachings of his people die out, but he also needs to adapt to what the others have been trying to teach him...

I don't think you're quite getting it with Aang. What many people are alienated by is that Aang is basically being turned into a complete little childish moron in the story. To many people, this simply doesn't fit - Aang has shown that while he's a little airheaded, he is NOT the naive idiot Vathara is portraying him as.

Giving away children? That makes sense to Aang. Even so, the author makes it sound as though Aang has absolutely no empathy for other POV, that he doesn't understand why it isn't right to them. Air Nomads are like Buddhist monks - they are perhaps the ONE culture that actually TRIES to understand other points of view! The best, that is. Aang doesn't know the concept of 'parents' as those who directly took care of him, but to so blatantly imply that he has no concept of familial affection borders on arrogant to the WORSE level. Aang's reaction to seeing Gyatso's skeleton was quite clearly that of a kid whose whole world was gone - of COURSE he knows what it's like to have a father-figure. Not a traditional father, but he was CLEARLY able to relate to Katara on her having lost her mother.

The revenge issue? Gah - he was NOT so mule-headed in canon! Aang does think revenge is wrong, I agree with that - but to make him react as though Zuko is the worst monster in the world?

• Head, meet wall*

What I'm getting at is, there are several major things which turn people off:

1) Alternate Characterisation. Vathara is writing the characters in a realistic manner. What she doesn't get is that the 'realistic manner' she's using is NOT the same as in the cartoon universe. Whatever the reasons - cartoons have to be lighter - the fact is that Katara, Aang, Zuko and the rest have CERTAIN characteristics. Vathara's alternate character interpretation alienates people because of how she treats them by her own standards, NOT by the standards presented in the show. That wouldn't be so bad if it weren't so EXTREME. All of a sudden, Aang's pacifist nature has been flanderised; suddenly Katara's personal tragedy (the loss of her mother) has turned her inexplicably into an isolated girl who doesn't get right from wrong, to the point that she tried to mindbend CHILDREN! These are realistic mannerisms, but they don't FIT with the characters as they were SEEN.

2) Following on from 1), I've noticed the idea of 'Only One Reaction'. What this means is that if someone - in this case Katara - is put into a certain situation, they will ALL react the same way. Basically, Vathara gives the impression - intended or not - that anyone growing up with Katara's EXACT lifestyle will react the same, develop the same, etc. This is in DIRECT conflict with human nature. Vathara does not seem to consider humans being instinctive creatures in the idea of difference at birth. In other words, she is willing to believe that everyone is capable of the same characterisation under an exact circumstance.

The way I'm seeing this with Katara is that, by seeing her mother die, she was INEVITABLY brought into herself by the events following that. Vathara insists that ANY child who went through something like that will develop those morals; or at least, develop them in that way. The author is thus disregarding the STRENGTH of Katara's character. Some children WOULD be negatively influenced and become Woobies as a result of it - Katara in canon was not. She would have angst, but unfortunately the author takes it completely out of proportion.

3) The ultimate issue which Vathara presents in this story, in regards to characterisation, is that she's basically turned the Avatar world into a character study for Sociologists. While they would have a field day here, for many people, it turns them off. It's over-analytical - despite Vathara's claims that humans DO have instinctive reactions to things, she tries to apply rationalisation to EVERY. SINGLE. THING. For characters, that takes away their autonomy - they no longer breath as they did in canon, but are dictated to react in CERTAIN ways due to their society, their upbringing, their life events, etc. They become emotive machines with a single mindset.

This is very subconscious, and I doubt that the readers turned off by this may realise immediately the points I'm making. By trying to do one thing - which is extensive world-building - Vathara has edged away from a major one which many people also care about. Alternate Character Interpretation is good - Alternate CHARACTERISATION is often painful.

While Vathara's intentions are good, I strongly feel she would have been better off writing this as her own novel. So much as I consider this a work of art personally - for the thought that it puts into the world of 'Avatar' - I find the ways that canon characters have been largely adjusted (to fit the world-view(s) which Vathara is implying) is not very easily to read without cringing. I find myself liking the OCs, but the canon characters, I feel, have been damaged by the extensive characterisation, some more than others - Zuko (Mary Sue), Aang (Idiot-Ball-carrying Hero), and Katara (Jerkass Woobie) are the worst offenders.

While I will LIKELY be able to continue reading, the further along I get, the more I find myself treating this fanfic with a grain of salt.

To include my own $0.02 on this subject. The alternative character interpretation would probably have worked if Vathara had started from episode one, showing that these characters are different from the cartoon from the beginning. However, her alternate universe includes all the events of Book One, happening pretty much as they did in the cartoon except for some of the PG-rated violence having more PG-13 to R-rated consequences. (Hypothermia at the south pole, lots of bodies in the water after the siege of the north, etc.) Almost all of Book Two canon is also Embers!canon, at least the parts that don't directly involve Zuko. This means all of the characterization for Aang and Katara established in the cartoon up to that point should be considered Embers!canon and they should BE those canon characters at that point in the story.

To reiterate one of Caellach Tiger Eye's points, Vathara has done a lot of research and put together logical arguments on the subject of how a character of a given age, from a given society, from a given social position within that society, and with a given set of childhood experiences could be expected to act and react in certain ways under a given set of circumstances. However, this is not the same as showing that these particular characters with the history and character development seen in the show up to this point would act this way. People are shaped by their origins and experiences, but are still free to make choices and are more defined by those choices than anything else. In Book One and Book Two, we see Aang and Katara making a lot of choices, and so their characters are defined.

When they leave Ba Sing Se it would make sense for Katara to be suspicious of the Fire Nation characters, and for Aang to be naïve, as these are established character traits for these characters. It defies suspension of disbelief for Katara to freak out to the level seen in this story and for Aang the world traveler to become completely clueless regarding other cultures of the world as these just don’t mesh with the established characterization. That Zuko and Iroh spend this period lecturing the others on matters of honor, history, and cultural understanding is also jarring, but not as much.

Alternative Character Interpretation only works if it can be reconciled with the actions and behavior of the character that are seen on screen or on the page. It changes what the character is thinking, but not what the character does. If it changes the character to the point that you can’t see them behaving as they do in canon, it doesn’t work. I can't see Embers!Katara of chapter 30 making the same choices as canon!Katara in the established story.

Going beyond Alternative Character Interpretation and changing a character in an alternate universe is an acceptable plot device in fanficiton, but it has to be established that the character is different from the very beginning, or the changes need to be made incrementally. The changes to Aang and Katara seem to suddenly happen just for the sake of maintaining barriers between Zuko and Aang’s group.

(Edit, spelling)

Exactly my point, Deadpan29. Vathara is reading FAR too much into the characters, trying to insert/see into things which just aren't there.

Of all these, Katara and Aang are easily and by FAR the worse. I've already commented on how she's Flanderized Aang into the Idiot-Ball-carry, Conflict-Ball-flinging moron of her story, so I'll comment on Katara here.

I will admit that of the main players in the story - Aang, Katara, Sokka, Toph, Zuko, Iroh and Azula - she is my least favourite character in canon. Dont' get me wrong, it's not because she's a BAD character - she's actually one of the best-developed fantasy heroines I've seen on Tv in, quite frankly, my whole LIFE. It's just that everyone else - yes, even Aang - is more interesting to me.

The problem with 'Embers' is that while canon Katara was a bit confrontational and had trouble forgiving personal grudges - Jet and Zuko betraying her trust, Yon Rha killing her mother (though he proved what kind of man he was by offering to let her kill his OWN mother as a peace offering!) - she is nontheless a very STABLE character in canon. Katara might struggle a lot - being the one who always gets Aang out of the Avatar State, keeping her head while in the desert, etc. - but she's nonetheless a strong individual. Besides exagerrating the girl's OCCASIONAL insecurities and bad temper - she didn't snap at, or about, Zuko HALF as much in canon as she does here - Vathara has toned down Katara's compassion and empathy to the point of trying to mindbend. That in particular was the point in the story where she turned into The Scrappy for me. Vathara also thinks that she casn be Rescued from the Scrappy Heap by suddenly Taking Up to Eleven Katara's isolation and insecurities. For me, and many others, it just makes the story even worse. Personally, it doesn't do a THING to Rescue Katara from the Scrappy Pile.

The story has potential, but to me, it's not Avatar anymore. Everything is overanalysed, Zuko is becoming a Wesley and a God Mode Sue who everyone either Shills or Criticises in EVERY conversation, the Fire Nation - despite being the attackers in canon - ALWAYS get the last word.

Chapter 32 confirmed it for me - I'm out. No longer reading - don't even want to. A crying shame as well, considering how the OCs were such likeable characters. Especially the Professor's family, and Shirong.

A couple things I'd like to toss out, and yes, I do like Embers:

Canon!Aang shows both utter defiance of and outright derision for other cultures. Which makes sense in one light: he's a *twelve year old boy*. Forget the buddhist-expy raising, he's still a child. Albeit one that picks up bending moves when he wants to like most people breathe, but I digress slightly. For utter defiance of another culture (and toss in ignorance, though corrected, and he *still* defies it) re-watch the episodes at the Northern Water Tribe. He's a *student* and he starts *teaching* and worse he's teaching some who the culture of his own master requires *not be taught those forms!* Anybody who has never had martial arts training will not understand even the first part of the massive insult this is. For edification, please seek out any martial artist who has a master's ranking (and that does not mean just a black belt! most arts with belt rankings don't grant the title "master" until at least 4th rank...which can take at least fourteen years to reach in some schools). Ask the master what his reaction would be if one of his new white belts ran off and started "teaching" the martial arts the master had tried to teach him - in complete defiance to the master having told him not to.

Aang is canonically ignorant of the other cultures in his world, not just what they are in the "present" but even mostly what they were in the "past." Remember, Avatars historically are only told they are the Avatar at 16. Aang was twelve. Which heavily implies that up to that point, the only culture he'd been really exposed to was that of the Air Nomads. He had a firebender friend, true, but that's the limit of "other nation" exposure Aang seems to have had. He outright lies about it too in a later episode just to get what he wants between two antagonistic groups. Frankly, I didn't really start liking Aang's canon character until we actually got to book3 and started seeing what the war looked like from the Fire Nation side. That's a separate issue, but it still underlay Aang's ignorance. Give the kid whatever, but he's a stubborn little thing - his holding so tightly to the codes he was taught as a child all through the series proves that he can be stubborn as a mule, and he's constantly doing whatever he wants to get what he wants, no matter what happens behind him and showing no concern for it. Yes, I think Vathara nailed that part of his personality clearly.

My two cents on Zuko:

An sorry, but I have to address this one directly - "...he is a dragon-blooded, fire-healing, moon-touched waterbender, drawing on the memories and skills of a past life. One of these could be the basis of a good story. Having all of them in play at once is rather silly at times. "

Dragon-blooded: let's see, gives him fingernails that can claw through solid rock, increases his fire-bending power, and - oh yeah! - gives him a temper so bad that he loses the ability to communicate on anything other than a completely primal ID level.

Fire-healing, moon-touched waterbender. Vathara's recent foray into all bending styles having a healing component make sense. True balance cover the full spectrum, and if your power can divide, they should have a way to unite as well. Becoming a moon-touched waterbender nearly killed Zuko, both when it first happened and second in the weeks following; Vathara clearly states in her story that getting a second element when you're not the Avatar involves a fatal spiritual wound that must be healed to keep you alive longer than a few months.

Drawing on the memories and abilities of a past life: first, Zuko doesn't know about it. Second, he doesn't have personal memories (unless he's out of his mind with fever, and then he's completely the past life, not Zuko, and remembers nothing that happens while in that state) he has bits of knowledge, and third, the one time we see a guaranteed ability manifest out of nothing he's nearly out of his mind with rage.

All in all, my YMMV definitely doesn't place Zuko in Stu territory. If it did, I'd expect Zuko to have flattened Azula like nothing and everything would be going his way. It's not.

I didn't say he was a Stu. I specifically said, "I don’t think Zuko has quite reached the level of being an over-powered protagonist." My main complaint is that it's gotten SILLY and unnecessarily complicated. It reminds me of this strip from Phil Foglio. Past a certian point, additional power sources for a character just complicate things without adding anything to the story. Zuko could have pulled off most of his stunts so far with just creative application of fire-healing and hot-water-bending. Hence, "One of these could be the basis of a good story. Having all of them in play at once is rather silly at times."

Edit: To express this another way, dragon-blood Zuko is an interesting idea worth exploring and developing in a story. The same is true of moon-touched Zuko, and reincarnated Zuko. I think trying to explore and develop all of these ideas in the same story was a bad choice on Vathara's part. They are distracting from each other and from other aspects of the story. I think only Vathara's skill as a writer has kept this from turning into a total train wreck so far, but the effort and attention she has to use in juggling all these elements could have been put to better use focusing on a smaller number of concepts.

Which, Embers?

My god, just how many reviews this fic has gotten?

Since Embers has it's own page, and is't classified as a work, reviews can be written for it. Since it's pretty clear that some thought has been put into these opinions, my suggestion is that they could be recycled as reviews in the Embers page. They'll be more visible that way.

I and most of the people making comments here, on the trope page, or on other sites also "sort of like this fic." If it were just a bad fic, it wouldn't be worth our time and attention. You generally get arguments like this over works which had tremendous potential that drew people in but then went in a direction a significant number of those people didn't like. This leaves them/us feeling betrayed, but also hopeful things could get better.