Fan-Fiction: Write or Wrong?

The great Fan-Fiction Debate rages on. Some of the original authors are flattered, some are horrified, there is also the scattered between them that are just plain tired of even having to deal with it anymore. Has Fan-Fiction and the liberties taken with ‘someone else’s world, characters, etc.’ gone too far, gotten out of hand?

Good question. I’m not certain there is a good and complete answer. I have done Fan-Fiction, first simple pen and ink stories done as a teen (I’m old enough that the home computer was still science fiction, okay?). Eventually I was writing on fan websites, in printed fan-zines (that one had the author’s permission, with guidelines and restrictions.) and just for the exercise of it. I have always wanted to write my own stories, create my own worlds and I have found that some of what I did has helped me do that.

That said though I am still uncertain if the current trend in Fan-Fiction is not crossing lines that it never was intended to cross. More and more often I see websites popping up for television series, books, movies, every form of literature presentation that allows the fan to log in and load up their version of how something ‘should have gone’ or what happened when the scene faded to black. With some of the television series I often wonder if the writer is aiming for the characters or the actor when a character is portrayed as doing something that would be completely ‘out of character’.

As I have expanded my own work into focusing much more on my own original writing I have found that having studied the characters, having practiced forming stories that I am more confident in my storytelling. I have also come to realize that I can create characters just as real and solid as the ones from someone else’s world if I simply apply as much effort to my original work as I did to creating the situations and reactions in my Fan-Fiction.

I have read some works of Fan-Fiction that are tremendous and I would happily but books by the writer if they were publishing their own work. I think that if more of them could be convinced to do original work that the field of fiction literature would be greatly benefited. Taking my own advice on that point I am still in the process of editing and expanding a story that is completely original. Once I have reached the golden 100,000 word minimum that I have seen in new writers’ guidelines for some publishers I will start my official trolling for rejection letters as is customary for a new writer.

Would I allow for Fan-Fiction based on my story, truthfully I don’t know how I would react to that yet. I hope to have reason to contemplate it seriously at some point. I’ll let you know if it happens.