The shipit journal6/22/2023 It's a story that relies on the reader's familiarity with the works of both Arthur Conan Doyle and HP Lovecraft. Published, Hugo award-winning fanfiction, but fanfiction nonetheless.)Īctually, Study in Emerald is a very good example of a story that wouldn't work as original fiction. Neil Gaiman's A Study in Emerald is fanfiction. (Apart from possibly the plot, I categorise anything that borrows character and/or setting from somewhere to be fanfiction. Some fanfic (fusions) even borrow the plot from another source. A lot of fic is also written in the canon setting (or close enough). Most people read fanfic for (and as a consequence most fanfic is written about) the canon characters. I'm tempted to say the combination of the two is what makes "voice", but we have talked about the part where I have no formal writing training, yes?) (Themes and tone are pretty much always personal. In fanfiction, at least one of the three is from outside. The difference between fanfic and original fic is that all three of characters/settings/plot come from you, not from outside. So, (character + character) + setting = plot, basically. I always phrase it as "characters/settings/plot", in that order, because that's how I build stories: plot happens at the intersection of character and setting and at the intersection of character and character. Characters/settings/plot are concrete, so I'm going to talk about those. But 'theme' and 'tone' are very 'subjective'. Now, in my head, I conceive this as the three vertex of a triangle that provides the base for two pyramids with a triangular base, the last two vertexes of which are theme (below) and tone (above). On a storycrafting level, though, you are also all alone.Īs far as I'm concerned, stories have three 'objective' elements: characters/settings/plot (order deliberate, btw). Because my original fiction writing is novels and my fanfic writing is short stories, it takes a lot longer for me to be done with a piece of original fiction, so I do sometimes end up feeling like I'm the only person invested in it. Like with fanfic, I write original fic in a draft-zero that no one will see but me (this allows me to actually write, because only I will see if I fuck up and need to scrap a whole scene or whatever) which I then clean up and send to beta as a (finished) first draft. I mean, maybe it would be different if I actually let anyone look at my draft-zeros as I write them, but I don't. Or you added that character at the last second and you'll go back to edit their subplot in any day now. Or you're trying not to spoil a specific plot point. Because half the worldbuilding only exists in your head. No, what I mean is that, much like when you and your fandom friends find yourself in different fandoms, your friends are missing some of the context. (You know who you are and you're all amazing. I don't know if I would have written those three novel first drafts without support from people in fandom. In case phrasing it that way makes it sound like I'm saying fandom doesn't support people original ventures, I will just say that is a filthy lie. That's part of it, but not even the most of it. I don't mean that just in the way of "fandom is a community that will support you and brainstorm with you and beta read your fic and a thousand other little things to help you write and post your fanfic". The biggest difference between the two, imo, is that for original fic, you're alone. Dhampyresa cherrytide : And/or the difference between writing fanfic and original fic?
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