User talk:Rachel Churcher

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Thanks for becoming a member of the TARDIS crew! If you have any questions, see the Help pages, add a question to one of the Forums or ask on my talk page. Shambala108 ☎  18:20, March 5, 2019 (UTC)

Mars Wilderness
Hi, another admin here. I saw your message to Shambala108 and would ask you for a bit of patience and trust in the process. Other writers may well have teams (on a side note, our policies strongly discourage any staff involved in the creation of a piece to edit related pages), but we also have a community. One of the reason I love Doctor Who is because I can see people making it supporting each other. It's a Doctor Who family more than industry. And while Obverse Books may seem like a distant relative, we do have active editors who are ardent supporters of Obverse, Iris, Magrs, Mars, etc.

So could you trust us, fans, to do you justice and wikify your story for you? If it is something that would make an actual difference, I'm confident we can find editors willing and able to provide a synopsis and all the necessary hooks placing your story within DWU. As someone who has to enforce the prohibition on you editing your own story, I feel responsible to ensure that edits do happen. Please know that we heard you and just need some time. I've already made some inquiries. Just sit back and enjoy. With respect, Amorkuz ☎  15:15, March 6, 2019 (UTC)

Thank you
Hi Amorkuz - thank you for your response! I've replied below - I'm still trying to get the hang of the Talk Pages! Rachel Churcher ☎  15:48, March 6, 2019 (UTC)

Authors and their stories on the wiki
Hi there, Rachel. I'm popping in because I've seen what's been happening with you on the wiki, and have been contacted by another admin to see if I can help with the issue.

Firstly, I want to put forward my own beliefs on this subject, after taking on board what another admin said a few weeks ago relating to the subject. As an author, you will clearly know far more about the story than anyone who could read it and, quite frankly, that's amazing, and should be expressed so that others can read it. The problem with that comes from how it lands on the wiki. Our pages have to stick directly to what's in the story. For example, you may have laid down some intentions in your work where X refers to another work written by Y, but to an outside reader, they might not quite get that, and therefore gives an inaccurate depiction of what happens in the story when compared to the final released product.

I'd like to express another example, which relates to this subject: I have an upcoming short story that will be released in a future anthology (I'm not sure how much more I can say at the moment but that), and since its creation I've been eager to edit the page myself with the ins and outs of the story and how it relates to the wider Doctor Who world. What I've come to realise from recent developments here is that most of my intentions for the story were lost in the various edits of my drafts and the final product doesn't quite express the views I originally intended for the story. While that's not a bad thing for me - I'm pleased with the final product - it does mean that if I was to edit the article for my story and pages related to it, I'd have to be careful to stick to what exists in the final draft, and not what was cut out before I got there.

I'm not sure how much of that went off subject for you, and how much might help, but I hope from my words it will help you understand how the wiki works a little better. I'd like to state here that I find it amazing that an author wants to edit here on the wiki, and don't want anything to discourage that in any way. But of course, like I've outlined above, authors have swathes of extra knowledge that can't always be used on the wiki. I think if an author does want to edit a page, it should be absolutely fine for them to do so, provided that the information contained within the edit sticks to what actually appears on the page, and leaves the interpretation of the text open to the reader.

This whole concept of authors editing pages is very new to the wiki, and I think it will take some time before we establish a proper policy on it. Until then, your input and time would be most appreciated. I'd like to take the time to congratulate you on actually getting the story published in the first place. I hope my input here has helped you in regard to this subject. Thanks. --Revan\Talk 15:19, March 6, 2019 (UTC)

Authors and stories response
Hi Amorkuz, Hi Revan - thanks so much for taking this seriously. I really appreciate your responses, and I'm happy to wait for your decision.

As I explained, there is nothing in the synopsis I posted that isn't on the page - I have been very careful about that. There is no relating the story to the wider DW world - the brief was to write a story featuring Iris Wildthyme that could take place at any time, on any version of Mars, so there's no link to anything else in the DWU. I'm an editor by profession, so I'm very hot on sticking to the text and not straying into irrelevant subjects. If you read 'The Last Martian', I think you will see that the synopsis explains the shape of the story without adding anything or spoilering anything either.

I can understand that the notes may be more problematic, but again, they do not relate in any way to the wider DWU. The brief for the story involved choosing a version of Mars - either something new, or a pre-existing literary or cinematic representation - and throwing Iris into the mix. Unfortunately, this is not entirely explained in the completed anthology, so several readers have missed the references to Ray Bradbury. I'd love to be able to explain my homage, briefly, as demonstrated in the notes I submitted. It gives a non-DWU context to my little slice of Wildthyme - and again, this is the perfect platform to share those notes. It might seem off-topic, but it doesn't impact in any way on the wider DWU, and I'd love to be able to share my inspiration with readers of the Iris Wildthyme stories.

Again, unlike many of the authors represented here, I don't have a team behind me to post on my behalf, and it would be great if you could bear that in mind.

I'll leave you to your deliberations! Thank you for you time, and I look forward to hearing your decision.

Rachel Churcher ☎  15:44, March 6, 2019 (UTC)

Author photo
Hi. Typically when I'm adding a picture of an actor/author/etc, I add them under "promotional images including wallpaper", because it's text says This is a copyrighted image that has been released by an individual, company or organisation [...] to promote their work in the media.. But, to be 100% honest with you, it's probably best to wait until an admin confirms this, as I'm not entirely sure this is the most appropriate licence.

Also, just to help keep things tidy, when adding a message on someone else's page, and it's the first message from a topic (like this message of mine) please add a heading with it. This is done by adding:

before the message, and helps because it makes it easier to find a subject in the middle of the whole page. Thanks OncomingStorm12th ☎  16:35, March 6, 2019 (UTC)

Thank you
Thank you - and thank you for the title heads-up! I feel like a total newbie, and I appreciate your patience!

Rachel Churcher ☎  16:39, March 6, 2019 (UTC)

1 September, 2005
Hey there Rachel! Amorkuz reached out to me to inquire if I had a copy of The Last Martian, and I'm pleased to confirm that I do! And what a lovely story it is. I admit that the Iris Wildthyme series hasn't been super high on my priority list, but I'd be more than happy to soup up The Last Martian's article and create ones for its characters soon. Sadly I'm momentarily bogged down by real-life stuff, but you can expect to see improvement by the end of next week at the latest! Anything I can do to help out a fellow Obverse writer :) – N8 ☎ 00:12, March 7, 2019 (UTC)

The Last Martian
Hi N8 - thank you so much for this! I really appreciate the support. In case you can't see what I posted, here's the paragraph I had entered into the 'Notes' section:

"‘The Last Martian’ by Rachel Churcher is an homage to Ray Bradbury’s ‘The Martian Chronicles’ – one of the author’s favourite books. There are several direct references: the Blue Sail Automotive Company; the comment about cars, suitcases, and hot dogs; the clapboard houses and 1950s fashions; and the physical form of the last Martian. “The opportunity to throw a presence as disruptive as Iris Wildthyme into Bradbury’s small-town version of Mars was too good an opportunity to turn down”, Rachel explained. “The story was a lot of fun to write, and I like to think that Iris leaves Mars a little better, and a little more adventurous, than it was before she arrived.”"

Obviously I'm not expecting you to post my words, but I have seen a couple of reviews of the story where people have missed the Bradbury references, and so the timeline and the setting don't make sense. It would be lovely if the Tardis Wiki page could provide this information - I can't think of anywhere else to post it where readers will find it!

Out of interest, are you reading the story on paper, or Kindle? There was a problem with the initial Kindle file - all my section breaks got lost, so it was really hard to follow the plot. If you're on Kindle, is this still the case, or have they corrected the file? If it is still a problem, it might be worth mentioning this in the notes section.

Thanks again - this is really kind of you.

Rachel Churcher ☎  10:43, March 7, 2019 (UTC)