Moon Scrolls
Rotoli della Luna

What is Moon Scrolls?

Moon Scrolls, or Rotoli della Luna, is a message board devoted soley and only to Specs, poems and other original works, and the discussions, comments, and critisisms of those works. It is not for discussion of things like Lestat's attitude in TVL, or Tom Cruise's acting in the movie. For discussions of that sort, please go to Blood Tears

  • Who keeps the message board?
    The message board is maintained and operated by the Moderators. Questions and concerns may be addressed to any of them, but spec specific questions should be addressed to The Black Rose.

    • What are Specs?

    "Spec" is short for "Speculative Fiction" - in other words, fan fiction. And in this case, the fan fiction is for Anne Rice's books - The Vampire Chronicles (Interview with the Vampire, The Vampire Lestat, The Queen of the Damned, The Tale of the Body Thief, Memnoch the Devil and Pandora), The Mayfair Witches (The Witching Hour, Lasher and Taltos), or any of her other unassociated books. (Cry to Heaven, Feast of All Saints, Belinda, Servant of the Bones, Violin and the Beauty Trilogy) In short, anything by Anne. We also accept original works featuring unassociated vampires, or just general dark and gothic poetry.

    How do I post Specs? And where?

    If you've written a Spec or poem then you can post it in one of two places - the Alt.Books.Anne-Rice newsgroup, or here on Moon Scrolls. To post here on Moon Scrolls, I usually find it easiest to copy and past the text of your Spec into the Message box of the "Post a Message" form on the board. Please note that extremely long messages are difficult to read! If your Spec is ten pages long in your word processing program, it might be nice if you broke it up into two sections of five pages each and posted it that way. Just post one message after another.

    Also - for those posting to ABAR - my newsfeed from ABAR sucks. I don't get half of what is posted there. And since I haven't seen alot of Specs there recently, I've stopped checking very often - maybe once a month, now. So if you want your Spec in the archive, you'd have a better chance if you posted it to Moon Scrolls in addition to on ABAR. Either that, or e-mail it to me - ash@eskimo.com

    What are the requirements for Specs?

    There are several things which every posted Spec needs:

  • Spoiler Warnings - This can not be stressed enough. You are writing a story based on books by Anne Rice... but other people reading this board might not have read all of the books that you have. So PLEASE put a warning right at the top of the first part of your Spec - something to the effect of "This Spec contains spoilers for all books up to and including (insert name of book here)". Also, if there is an excessive amount of things like sex in the Spec, please put a warning for the fainter of heart.

  • Disclaimer - All Specs should come with a disclaimer at the top of the first posted Spec. Something that says "This is a piece of non-profit fan fiction and is not meant to infringe on the copyright of Anne Rice or her publishers".

  • Spec label - Please put the word "Spec" somewhere in the subject line of your posts, so that everyone knows it's a Spec. If it's a silly Spec or an RPG, please make a note of that too.

  • Critiquing - The question has come up of how and when to offer in-depth critiques of things like grammar, punctuation, spelling, etc. When an authors posts a spec it is expected that replies to it shall offer comments about the plot and characters and such. However, if an author includes the word "CRIT" in the subject line, then they would also appreciate comments about the technical part of their writing. Feel free to offer more in-depth editing then.

    • What about poems?

    Poems also need a label in the subject line - please just put the word "poem" somewhere in the subject line so that everyone knows what it is.

    Archieving - or - What happens to posted Specs?

    The Spec Archive was begun in 1995 because I am one of those people who thinks it is a crime against nature for someone to write some lovely story, post it to a newsgroup, and then have it vanish, never to be seen again, a scant two weeks later. It's tragic. So I started the Spec Archive - the place where every Spec and poem ever posted can find a final home, there to be stored for anyone to read and admire. After a Spec is posted to Moon Scrolls or ABAR it is slated to go into the Archive. When all of the pieces of the Spec are posted they will be collected, threaded into one file, and the Spec will then be listed in the Archive under category and author name. The Archive currently has over two hundred Specs and poems in it, and is pushing 60+ MB of space for text files alone.

  • How do I get my work into the Archive?
    Post it. Either to ABAR, or, preferably, to Moon Scrolls. If you're feeling paranoid and want to guarantee that it gets in, e-mail it to me as a plain text document.

  • Where is the Archive?
    The Spec Archive can be found at http://www.eskimo.com/~ash/archive.html

  • Who keeps the Archive?
    The keeper, maintainer and updater of the Spec Archive is Heather Meloche, The Black Rose, who can be reached at ash@eskimo.com

    • Rumors - or - An Equal Opportunity Archive

    There have been rumors to the effect that the Archive is censored. This is not true. The purpose of the Archive is to preserve every piece of writing, no matter what. It doesn't matter if I, the archiver, personally hate you, the writer's, guts and we've had a blood feud going since the days of our great grandfathers - if you write a Spec, it goes in the Archive. Likewise, it doesn't matter if I happen to personally think your writing isn't that great - you're still a writer, and therefore deserve a place in the Archive. I do not censor what goes into the Archive, nor do I read everything that does. As much as I'd like to, I just don't have the time.

    If your Spec can't be found in the archive, there might be several explanations:

  • I don't have it. - Wherever and whenever you posted it, I didn't get it. Or I did, but due to technical error on the part of my computer, I lost it. Try asking me in e-mail to be sure if I have it or not.

  • I don't have all of it. - If you posted the Spec in pieces, it's possible I just didn't get one portion of it somewhere along the way. Again, e-mail me and inquire.

  • I haven't updated the Archive. - I update the Archive more or less quarterly. That's once every three month - MAYBE. I don't have as much time to devote to it as I'd like to, so it doesn't always get done promptly. And I'm ALWAYS working through a backlog of Specs. I try to go in order, so it may be that while I have your Spec, I just haven't had a chance to put it in the Archive yet. It never hurts to inquire to make sure I have it, but don't be surprised if it takes awhile to get into the Archive... my last update was in April of 1998, and I was still putting in long lost items from 1995. I'm not saying it's going to take 3 years, but it might take a few months.

    • Can I help the Archive?

    Bless you, my child! A thousand blessings upon you... YES! Please! There are a few things that writers/readers of Specs can do to make the archive run more smoothly and to keep your archive Keeper from lagging so far behind in her duties:

    Threading

    "Threading" a Spec means to take all of the portions of a completed Spec and make it ready for the Archive. Strip the headers and footers from the pieces and string them into one large document - keep the spoilers, spec title, author name and disclaimers at the very beginning. If the writer hasn't provided it, please put some sort of "The End" note at the bottom. Then send it to me, either as the text of an e-mail message, or as a plain text attachment.

    Example Format:

    MY SECOND SPEC
    sequel to "My First Spec"
    by Jane Doe, 1998
    JDoe@anonymous.com

    Disclaimer: This is a work of non-profit amateur fan fiction and is not meant to infringe on the copyright of Anne Rice or her publishers.

    Spoiler Warning: This spec contains spoilers for all of the VC up to and including Tale of the Body Thief.

    (Insert text of completed spec here)

    The End

    Summaries

    In the Archive you may have seen under some of the Specs a little note that looks something like this: "Armand, Daniel * QotD". That means that the main characters of that Spec are Armand and Daniel, and it has spoilers for Queen of the Damned. Unfortunately, quite a few of the Specs in the Archive don't have that little note - like I said, I don't have the time to read through everything that goes into the Archive. It would be tremendously helpful if the readers of the Specs, or the writers, would drop me just a very quick e-mail telling me that little bit of information for various Specs - the main characters, and what book it's set after.

    Feeling more ambitious? My ultimate goal is to set up a search engine for the Archive - so that you can type in the name of an author and receive back a list of all of the Specs they've written, or type in the name of your favorite character and get a list of all of the Specs where they're a main character. AND... I'd like to include a quick synopsis of the specs. So if you'd like to help the Archive, and you happen to be reading through a few Specs in your spare time... if you could write a really short, quick synopsis of the Spec (i.e.: "Pilgrimage: Marius and Daniel go to the church in New York and confront Dora after Memnoch the Devil.") and then send them to me - remember to include the name of the Specs! - that would be wonderfully helpful.

    Everyone who contributes to the running of the Archive gets mentioned on the main page of the Archive when I update. Plus, you'd get the pleasure of seeing the Archive become a more efficient, faster updated, easily searchable page. So come on... help make our Spec Archive the best fan-fic archive out there!

    Go to Moon Scrolls

    FAQ © Heather Meloche, 1998

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