How to Write a Fan Fiction

A Guide to Writing a Fan Fiction
by:: STRIKESTWICE@hotmail.com

 Abstract

This report gives specific advice in the creation, editing, and submitting of a fan fiction using standard approved formats.  It details the common problems associated with fan fiction writing for experienced as well as novice writers and gives helpful suggestions on how to solve those problems.  Finally this report goes into detail on ways to receive feedback on a submitted fic.

 GLOSSARY

Fic                is the a story written in by a fan fiction writer.

Lemons        are a mature fan fiction usually rated at NC-17.  Named after the famous hentai series “Cream Lemon.”

Limes           are a mature fan fiction usually rated as being around R, the milder form of a lemon.

MST            are a type of fan fiction where a story, normally a lemon, is made fun of by a cast of characters reading the fic.                          Named after the TV series that made fun of old movies “Mystery Science Theater 3000.”
 
OOC            or out of character, a circumstance when a non-original character does not act in a normal way defined by the                         original series, they are taken from.

S.I. Fics        or self-insertion fics, this style of writing features a character created in the image of the writer.
 

What is Fan Fiction?

    Ever wondered what happened to a favorite character after the series ends?  How the story would have turned out if something had been just a little different? What the character would have done on a vacation?  Answering these questions, and many more, is what makes up Fan Fiction.  An author using an existing world, created through any medium of entertainment, expands that world just a little more and then shares that expansion with others.   A community of people, embellishing a tale, likes the bards of yesteryear.

    “Fan Fiction has become so popular that cons usually have fan-fiction panels presented by well know authors” (Poitras, 2001, p. 82).  As well as numerous web sites dedicated to posting the fics and reviewing them.  It is a constantly growing medium with its own set of rules and policies.

What is the Problem?

    Today’s fan fiction has been on a downward spiral recently from the easy availability of fan fiction sites and a lowering of the common standards that used to be prevalent in the fan fiction community.  There has also been a deluge of new spam fics, short pointless stories, usually ranging in size of a page or two that are more tokens to authors ego’s then actual stories.  

The Solution

     A standard guide on how to write fan fiction is needed in today’s environment.  A simple how to manual explaining the different kinds of fan fics and detailing commonly recognized standards in the community.

Step 1: Deciding on the Series
Know the series
    
    A particularly common problem for inexperienced fan fiction writers is choosing a series that they know little about.  A good rule for a writer is to never write a fic about a series that the writer has not seen completely.  This helps prevent a number of problems, the most obvious being OOCs or Out Of Character.  A writer is trying to take characters that have already been developed in a series, the readers expect these characters to act in certain ways.  When the characters do not behave in that manner it is one of the quickest ways to have a reader stop reading the writers fic. Even experienced writers have problems with OOC, one of the best ways to really prevent OOC is to have proofreaders specifically check a writer’s fic for OOC.
Know the Audience

    The second part of choosing a series to write is to choose the audience to write for.  A writer who is writing a fan fiction is writing a story about another world and as such the readers must be familiar with that world as well.  A story about a world that is not well known will have a smaller audience.  This rule also works in reverse as a series that is extremely popular and well known will have a large audience but will also have a lot of other fics competing for readers, and may lower the number of times an author’s fic is read.

Step 2: Deciding the Type of Fic to Write
Regular

    Perhaps the most well know the “Regular” fic deals with the characters in their
native environment.  Most often these are stories that continue where the main story left off.  They are also stories that take place during interludes in the main plot, these stories must take in careful consideration character development after the interlude, and as such these stories are usually harder to write.

    On average, regular fics are the most common and easiest to write for the beginning fan fiction writer.  But because of their commonality they also can be one of the hardest to write original stories for, since in most cases the plots have been already done numerous times.  One of the ways to see if the story a writer is thinking of telling has already been written is to look around at other fan fictions on the market.  Another good idea is to check an acronym list (see appendix A), a list that categorizes the most common types of stories and then creates an acronym for them to help reviewers.

Crossovers and Fusions

    The next style of fan fiction writing is the crossover.  The idea behind a crossover is what would happen if a person from a certain series was to meet someone from a different series.  The problem is that merging two series, never meant to be merged, can result in one overshadowing the other, or unintentional OOCs.  A good question a writer should ask before starting a crossover is “can I see these two worlds co-habitating?”  If the writer has a hard time answering that question so will the reader.

    Another common problem that a writer looking to write a crossover may have is the audience.  While a reader may be familiar with one of the series in the crossover, the reader may not be familiar with both series, lowering the number of potential readers for a fic.  It should also be noted here that having a cameo appearance of a character or two does not make a fic a crossover, and there are numerous regular fics that make good use of cameos from other series.

    A fusion on the other hand is where the cast of characters is dumped into a different world and forced to follow the plot of that world.  A good example would be the cast of “Star Trek” forced into playing the roles of “Scooby Doo,” and go around solving mysteries.

Lemons and Limes

    Named after the famous adult show “Cream Lemon,” (McCarthy, 1998, p. 42) lemons live up to their namesake by dealing with adult content.  They are the hardest of the types of fan fictions to write well do to OOCs.  Since most entertainment series don’t deal with adult content and leave it either untouched or behind closed doors, almost anything written by a writer could be considered OOC with out careful thought about the characters involved.  The main way most authors attempt to solve this problem is glossing over story resulting in, on average, terrible fics where plot is removed to make wake for the “lemon content.”  Even worse, a number of authors fail to even to do that, creating poorly thought out scenarios, OOC, bad grammar, and a fic that is usually ignored by everyone except MST writers.

    The main key when writing a lemon, is that plot counts.  Too many writers forget this crucial point.  A good plot will help to save any story in any category and that goes for lemon writing as well.  The second major point when writing a lemon is that treat it like any other fan fic make sure it gets proof read, checked for OOC, and finally the “lemon content” should be read for impact.  If all three of these items are observed a lemon can be as good as any other type of fic.

    Lime’s are a milder version of lemons usually dealing with “R” content compared to a Lemon’s “NC-17” crowd.  On average they deal more heavily with romance for their story, then a lemon would, and are usually better written then lemons.

MSTs

    MST stands for “Mystery Science Theater 3000” a show that made fun of old cheesy movies.  In the same way a MST fics makes fun of bad fics.  MSTs are almost always written in script format, basically the name of the character and then their dialog, instead of standard narrative.  This is done for two reasons, the first is it makes it easier to write quickly, and the second reason is that it allows the reader to easily understand what is part of the fic being MSTed and the actual MSTing.

    When writing a MST there are certain rules that should be observed.  The first rule is that when deciding to MST a fic the writer should always get permission from the author of the original fic before MSTing it.  The second rule is never to directly attack the writer you are MSTing, there is a fine line between making fun of a fic and actually being insulting.  This can result in both irritating the author of the original fic, and if the MST is too bad irritating the reader as well.

Spam Fics, Poems, and Song Fics

    That which doesn’t fit in the previous categories is known as a Spam Fic.  These fics range from everything from a top ten list to a poem about a character.  They are usually small short fics with out any real meaning.

Type	Difficulty to Write	Stryle
Regular	Normal	Narrative
Crossovers and Fusions	Normal	Narrative
Lemons and Limes	Hard	Narrative
MSTs	Easy	Script
Spam Fics, Poems, Songs	Easy	Any

Table 1: Types, Difficulty, and Style of Fan Fics

Step 3: Writing the Fic

    At this point the writer should have a good basic idea of the type and style of fic the writer wishes to write.  There are a number of good resources that go into how to write an actual story successfully, as well as a number of plans used to outline and design a story and are out of the scope of this report.  This report though will touch on a few normal problems specific to fan fiction writing, going over the problems of OOC, and the hazards of SI fics, but before reaching that point it is necessary to give the proper header to the new fic.
Header

    Every fan fic should start with a header, identifying specifically the series used in the story and the owner or owners of that series.  It should be noted in this heading that the writer of the fic does not own the non-original characters as well as the world they normally inhabit.

    The header should also contain the name of the writer, the name of the fic and in a longer series the chapter number and chapter name.  Most writers also include acknowledgment to people who helped the writer in this section, such as pre-readers and editors.  

Disclaimer: Tenchi Muyo! is the are property of AIC and Pioneer. Tenchi Muyo! and all its characters were created by Masaki Kajishima. The Velveteen Rabbit was created by Margery Williams. The author of this fan fiction therefore only owns the writings. This copyright is 2001 under Devin A. Brown. The Velveteen Cabbit by Incantrix

Figure 1: Sample Disclaimer (used with permission by Incantrix).

S.I. Fics

    One of the more common failings when writing fan fiction, is the S.I. fic or Self-Insertion Fic.  An S.I. fic is where the author adds a new character to the world he is writing about that is an avatar of the author.  These characters are usually much more powerful then the main characters in the fic’s world, they are perfect in everything, and easily over shadowing the other characters.  On average, they ruin a fic, quicker then anything else that a writer can do.

    There are a few ways to make a self-insertion fic successful.  The first and most important is that the S.I. character can not be more powerful then the other characters in the fic.  Remember that the readers are reading the fic to read about their favorite characters in action again.  They are not reading a fic to read about the writer.  

Another good idea for a writer doing an SI fic is to make sure that an SI character has a defect, this is actually a good idea for any character.  No one loves a perfect person, the same goes for fictional ones, try to make a personable character with a convincing back story, and a reason for existing.  A good SI character should have all of these properties, reasonable abilities, a weakness, and a background story, before a writer should even consider writing an SI fic and even then it is not recommended for new writers.

Preventing OOC

    There is really only one way to prevent OOC.  The writer must at each point in the fic stop and think, is this what the character would do, given these circumstances.  The writer must be aware that his interpretation of a character may not be the same as the next persons, so even what the writer feels is not an OOC, could very well be in the opinion of the readers.

Step 4: Editing

    Now that a writer has the story written the next stage of writing begins, attempting to make the story readable to the readers.  The first thing that a writer should do is put the fic through a good spell and grammar check.  The writer should also repeat this step after every edit until a final version of the story is ready.

Pre-readers and Editors

    Pre-readers are a writer’s last defense against OOCs.  They carefully read the fic examining it for OOCs and when they locate one bring it to the attention of the writer.  A good writer will take these suggestions and thank the pre-readers and either fix or in some cases disagree politely with their pre-reader and continue on.

    After pre-readers, editors are also a good idea before a fic is finally submitted.  A good editor will double check over the writers editing and fix anything that escaped them.  Finding editors, can be a rather hard challenge for most writers, and the best suggestion that this report can give is that networking is a must.  Anyone can be an editor, and the more editing that a fic gets the better that a fic will be.

Step 5: Submitting the fic

    When the fic is finally finished, the next step is submitting the fic to sites.  To receive feed back on a fic the writer should submit the fic to as many sites as possible.  Normally, that is a generic fan fic site such as “fanfiction.net” and a specific fan fiction site that is specializing in the world in the fan fic is set in.  There are two basic types of sites on the web.  Automated sites, where once the fic is submitted it is immediately added to the site or manual sites that depend upon the operator of the site to add the writer’s fic.  

Tag Lines

Both sites though, give tag lines to allow the writers to give a short summary of their fic.  Most tag lines are just about two sentences long, giving a brief description of the world, the main character being explored and the brief summary of the plot.  If a writer is looking to receive reviews, it is best to make their tag line very descriptive and concise, it is also a good idea to ask readers to review the fic in the tag line.

After Submitting

    After a writer submits a fic, the writer should immediately check the fic to confirm that there weren’t any formatting problems with the submitted file. A quick way to make sure that a writer’s fic doesn’t get read is multiple page lines, created by the .txt format.  Most sites now will accept an HTML version of a fic instead of a .txt file, alleviating this problem and allowing the writer a chance to exactly format their fic before submitting it.

    A standard format used by most writers when submitting fics using HTML is to add an empty space after each paragraph.  This makes the fic easy to read and helps show where each paragraph ends and begins, especially with the problem that most paragraph indention is removed while using the HTML format.

Step 6: Getting Reviewed
Local Reviews

    Reviews that are on the actual site where the fic is posted are known as local reviews.  They usually help other readers choose whether or not to read the writer’s fic.  A few good reviews can insure that the writer’s fic will be well read.  The main way to ensure that the writer is reviewed in this manner is covered in the section on “Tag Lines.”

Remote Reviews

    Remote Reviews are reviews of a fic done on a remote site by a group of fan fiction reviewers.  The sites are usually designed in either a formal literary review style or a shortened MST style.  A large fan base usually reads these sites and a good review, secures that the writer’s fic will be read, conversely a bad review may have the opposite effect.  The best way to get reviewed on these sites is to ask the reviewer, though some sites don’t do requests, most would be happy to help out writers.

Conclusion

    The Fan Fiction community is a large growing group.  That is always glad to welcome a new writer who is willing to follow a few basic conventions with their writings, writers that are willing to take a close examination of their writing and constantly on alert for OOCs.  Who know the basic rules that are involved with fan fiction writing and willing to continue a good story.
 
Works Cited
Incantix.  “The Velveteen Cabbit.”  2001.  
<http://www.fanfiction.net/read.php?storyid=505710> (28 Feb. 2002).

Little Masa-Ohki, Irresponsible Captain T, & Ken-ouki.  “The Taffy List.”  Fic Talk.  
< http://www.fictalk.dragonsanime.com/acr.htm> (28 Feb. 2002).

McCarthy, Helen & Clements, Jonathan (1998).  The Erotic Anime Movie Guide.    
Woodstock, NY: The Overlook Press.

Poitras, Giles (2001).  Anime Essentials.  Berkley, CA, Stone Bridge Press.

 Appendix A: Sample Acronym List
Used with Permission from http://www.fictalk.dragonsanime.com/acr.htm.  The full version of “The Taffy List”, can be found at that site.  This acronym list is for the Tenchi Muyo Fan Fiction community.

KAY: Katsuhito Always Yosho. Referring to when everybody calls Katsuhito Yosho. Technically they might, but he's left that life behind.  He's Katsuhito now.

SIRRA: Saintly, Insightful Ryoko Rides Again. 'nuff said. Ryoko is kind and sagely, understands that fighting leads to nothing, and understands exactly what Tenchi needs to do to move ahead in his life, which always (surprisingly) includes him choosing her.

DEBARA:Damn! Evil Bitchy Ayeka Rides Again. Yup, Ayeka has either become a total
scheming bitch, an evil super villain, or both.  Just remember, when you're reading a bad fic, chances are you can sigh and say "KAY SIRRA, DEBARA"

DESRRA: Damn! Evil Slut Ryoko Rides Again. The rarer, but just as evil, counterpart to
DEBARA.

ARK: Always Ranting Kiyone. Ever seen a fic where Kiyone wakes up, does nothing but
complain all day, then goes to sleep and probably complains some more in her sleep. Well, that's an ARK arc.

SMACK: Stupid Mihoshi Always Crimping Kiyone. Aptly named because you want to SMACK the author. The name says it all, and these are normally paired with ARK.

SAC: Sasami Always Cooking. Explains it all, so let's SAC the author.

KOKIRI: Kagato Or KAIN Inevitably Resurrected Indiscriminately. No, it's not Link, it's one of these two overused villain coming back with no explanation

RATTA: Ryoko And Tenchi Together...AGAIN?! For a reference to all those pointless Ryoko and Tenchi pairings, done through inane plot events that have been overdone.

AATTS: Ayeka And Tenchi Together...Stupidly! Much less an affront than RATTA, these are just as lame, but not as frequent.

SMART: Stupid Mihoshi, Ayeka, Ryoko, and Tenchi. We give this ironic title to any fic where the entire cast all act like morons.

SILO: Self Insertion Loved by Others. I think this one explains itself. Some new guy comes in, is welcomed by all, normally beats Tenchi, and has at least one of the girls fall for him.

BRAY: Bitchy Ryoko/Ayeka Yelling. Aptly named, this one refers to Ryoko or Ayeka laughing like a donkey at the others misfortune after winning the Tenchi Sweepstakes.

GAYHAP: Go Away You Hentai Abnormal Pedophile.

NEH: Nothing Ever Happens. Ever read a fic that was like ep 7 of the OVA's without the jokes? If you have, just shrug and say "NEH"

HEYNEF: Hello?! You're Not Even Funny. Probably the most important award, this goes to all those fics that THINK they're funny, but aren't.

WARFIELD: Warning! Ayeka and Ryoko Fight In Extreme Levels of Destruction. Masa's personal favorite TAFFY. This is for all those fics where Ayeka and Ryoko are each a U.N. recognized Nuclear Power and routinely fight each other and blow up the house, the fields, or Hiroshima before breakfast.

ISP: Innately Stupid Plot. No it's not a webaddress. It's just a lame plot arc which has probably been done at least a million times. And if it hasn't been done before, there's a reason.

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