Faceclaim (ONC 2022, Completed, Shortlisted)

End Notes

Thank you for reading this wackadoodle story all the way to the end!

This was a very fun story to write, as I could truly lean into the weirdness and explore the situation for a very narrow scope. I know the story is a bit uneven at times though, and if time permits, I will go back and fix up some stuff to make it flow better. Especially the Prince Ramon parts are very unpolished and unplanned (perhaps that fits their purpose though).

Some questions that I would love to have some reader replies on:

- How did the Prince Ramon parts work? My thinking is that there are more parts to it but that those parts aren't part of this story (because I couldn't write two full stories, and having Daniel act out the scenes would soon get boring).

- Does Daniel's decision to in the end walk away from the role of Captain Universe make sense? It was always my plan to in the end have him realize that the fame wasn't worth the trouble, but I know some readers rooted for him to take the part.

- Is it a cop-out to end the story with having Daniel waking up and suddenly being free? This does let the author go free, but I feel that somehow revealing their identity wouldn't really serve a dramatic purpose. And in the end, they do seem to have been punished by losing the rights to their story (if they even existed to begin with, it might still all have been a very real dream).

- What did you think of the romance with Ramon in the end? My thinking was that Daniel's experience playing out the Prince Ramon story here would start to bleed into his real life and actually guide him toward a love story of his own. But I did worry that readers would start to suspect Ramon of nefarious purposes (I don't think Ramon wrote the story, he's just a guy who happens to look a lot like Prince Ramon).

Now, I intend to try to finish my other ONC story as well!