Fanfiction for Dummies

I thought it might be a little fun to discuss how we first got started with fanfiction. How were you guys introduced and what made you write your first story?

I got introduced to the whole concept of fanfiction when I was ten, and my best friend at the time actually showed me her notebook, where she had written a Final Fantasy VIII fanfic. It blew my mind! I never thought that was a thing people did.

I eventually learned about Fanfiction(dot)net, and I remember printing out pages and pages of fanfiction to read, because the internet wasn't as ubiquitous then. (I printed in colored ink and the smallest font, back to back, with 0.5" margins--a weird effort to conserve paper and black ink XD)

As for my first story, well, I always had stories running in the back of my mind growing up, but I never bothered to write anything down. It would take a few more years before I finally gathered the courage to write up a story. I remember my first fic was a Fire Emblem 7 story.

It had all the cringy tropes of a fanfic written by a teenager. It had a Mary Sue heroine. It was melodramatic as hell. I used 'orbs' for eyes and hair color for identifying epithets (I still do, YOLO XD). It had a 'disclaimer' in the very beginning and awkward author's notes. Best of all, it stayed incomplete.

I love it. I still read it when I need a good laugh.

So how about you guys?

(Sidenote: this is my first time posting on kbin, so I don't know if I'm doing this right. Feel free to let me know how to post better?)

Scotthomas,
@Scotthomas@lemmy.world avatar

I’m doing the final edits on my first now. At nearly 50.

I’ve been aware of fanfiction for a while. I don’t really remember how I first found out about it, but I’m heavy into remix culture (like fan-edits and mashups). I assume it was somewhere in that mix.

I have some ideas for other fics, but I’m not sure I’ll write another. This one I felt deserved to be written, but the others are just zany ideas.

Potatomache,
Potatomache avatar

That's great! I'm happy you've picked up writing.

I find the craziest ideas to be some of the most enjoyable things to write.

avividtale,
avividtale avatar

I don't remember when I discovered fanfiction exactly. I used to love drawing and much of how I learned was just drawing characters I loved from video games and comics. At some point, I started making my own original comics, and sometime after that when I couldn't quite get the pictures right, I found I could make pictures with words too. But I was shy and didn't share a lot of my original creative writing, nor was it very complete.

Eventually, I discovered a community of people who wrote about stories and characters I loved and extended those stories, or rewrote them in ways I liked better and I was completely sucked in.

Potatomache,
Potatomache avatar

It's great how lots of people who draw end up finding their way into fanfiction spaces :D It's like there's a magnetic quality to all these creative hobbies.

borzoiteeth,
borzoiteeth avatar

I have a hard time defining my first. It's kind of all in some sort of liminal space? My parents met each other at a con and thus, are fans themselves and telling bedtime stories involving characters we love was normal. When I obtained a sibling majority of our playtimes together was roleplaying characters/worlds we loved.

My grasp of language was really bad as a child. It's still not great, but my default of creating notes to remember the stories was doodling. (When I realised I could be making fancomics instead of fanfics- my world very opened up!)

Modern fanfic wise it wasn't until my teens did I get to have easy online access. But at that time I couldn't share my drawings because I didn't have any means to transfer my traditional work (and even if I did, we certainly didn't have the bandwidth to spare!) and had no digital tools to start a work on a computer.

a_mac_and_con,
a_mac_and_con avatar

Trying to remember the start of anything that's more than a couple years back is all in some liminal space, you are totally right.

Potatomache,
Potatomache avatar

Liminal space is a good way to put it. I love the generational nature of your relationship to fan work!

I feel you. I posted drawings and photo manips on deviantart earlier than I did my stories. :D It was risky business uploading on dial-up sometimes. Using a mouse to draw was also some type of hell. I'm lucky I don't have carpal tunnel syndrome. XD

borzoiteeth,
borzoiteeth avatar

Anyone who can draw with a freaking mouse has all of my respect.

a_mac_and_con,
a_mac_and_con avatar

I have two "starts". One was with writing fanfic itself. A friend had started a sequel to a series we liked. She attributed all of the characters (children of the canon characters) to different people, but the character I wanted was her own insert. Because of that, I created her mother character and wrote the prequel to her story. I'm pretty sure the story is lost to time by now. It was only ever on paper.

The other start was finding fanfic online. This had to be at least a year later? I don't remember what I was looking for, because it wasn't fanfiction itself. I stumbled across fanfiction.com and started reading there. It was much later before I actually put any of my own fanfiction online, but I spent at least a couple years reading before I decided to share my fanfiction with anyone again.

Writing wasn't new to me though. Apparently I've been writing stories down since I could hold a pencil. Considerably bad stories back then, but hey. We all start somewhere!

Potatomache,
Potatomache avatar

I think fanfiction communities pre-internet are such a wonder (I heard Trekkies used to mail their stories to one another or create small collections they would send to subscribers). It's wild how a lot of stories will never be archived. I know realistically, I don't have time to read everything, but the option would've been nice.

It's great that you were able to stumble upon fanfiction. Was there anything in particular about it that kept you hooked in comparison to writing your original stories? I also like to think we all start off with bad stories. It fosters that sense of progress. 😅

a_mac_and_con,
a_mac_and_con avatar

Oh, I never stopped! I've probably written more original stories than fanfiction, to be honest. At the moment, I don't have the energy for as much original creation, but I'm far from wanting to stop. I have far too many stories in my head. Fanfiction inspires originality and originality inspires fanfiction.

Potatomache,
Potatomache avatar

Wonderfully said!

There really is a unique sort of motivation and inspiration you can find by simply doing. I think I saw a TED talk about that before. 🤔 The speaker was discussing the struggle of finding purpose in life. I think they said something about how it's only through doing, one can find and build passion. (Pardon my tangent XD)

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