In the mid-1990s, I was what Lucy Lawless coined a "hardcore nutball" of the television series Xena: Warrior Princess. I was fortunate to contribute a few articles to a fanzine called "The Warrior Princess Press", which was distributed to interested readers in the mail. Contributors did not have pay for the publication, which was nice. The publication only last for a year or two, then the publisher had to quit without much explanation, (my suspicions are that he was printing the books where he worked and got caught and lost his job, but I will never know for certain).
For five years, I, like many people across the globe, got hooked by the series Lost. The brilliance of that show was that the writers left the episodes up to interpretation and speculation, and that made it a fan fiction writer's paradise. By that time, many fan fiction authors had found a new home for their work - the world wide web, where their stories could be discovered internationally. I wrote several and collaborated with my long time childhood friend, Kelly on one, which were uploaded to the Lost fansite, "Dark Ufo". This past week I went back to see if I could find them. The site is still there, but unfortunately, the links are broken. I am happy I printed them out and put them in a binder that I titled "The Lost Lost Stories."
I recently reached out to other fan fiction writers to find out what inspires them to write and whether plot or character were more important to them. One of my cousins, Melissa, reached out to me to let me know that she enjoys writing Harry Potter fan fiction, and that she has collaborated with her best friend on several stories. Her best friend's mother, who is an author, has encouraged her to write fan fiction. For Melissa, creating plot and story flow are her strong suits, and she admits that although character is important, it is more difficult for her to write. She publishes her stories to fanfiction.net, which is a cornucopia of fan fiction that contains hundreds of genres and stories based off of television shows, movies and plays.
My daughter, Rachel, has written some short stories based on the child characters in Lost who grow up and find themselves stranded on the island. She has also collaborated with My Little Pony: Friendship is Magic fans online with ideas and her own character creations and short stories. In her writing, she states that plot is more important for her than characterization, and she is inspired by the many fans who contribute to the series.
My friend, Vel, a long-time fan of Star Trek, told me that she has uploaded several of the zines she published over the years to fanlore.org. She advised me that fanlore.org is a part of the University of Iowa's mammoth fanzine library. People throughout the world send copies of the fanzines that have been written over the years to the University of Iowa to be archived for future generations.
Fan fiction opens a worlds of possibilities from crossover stories (like The X-Files meets Star Trek), to alternate endings of series (many Lost fans thought they could do it better). Some creators and actors of television series even like to read or write their own fan fiction. Recently, Gates McFadden (Beverly Crusher of Star Trek: The Next Generation), had a contest for fan fiction authors. The top ten stories are going to be performed on stage in Los Angeles and the winners receive a copy of the winning stories (and fan artwork) autographed by Gates McFadden.
If you have always been curious about fan fiction, there are thousands of web sites dedicated to it. Some have large collections, and others focus on a particular television series. It is a great way to spend a rainy afternoon, but what is even better, at least for me, is writing it.
Until next time, I am,
SciFi Fan FL
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