I've been into fan fiction for well over ten years -- take of that what you will. As a teen, I read a lot of Star Wars fics (oh Luke and Han, just get it over with and kiss already!) Then I moved on to anime (GW and FMA, in particular). Something about the Gundam Wing Internet fandom in the early 2000's caught my fancy.
Was I obsessed? A little. I don't care. I was also in love.
Now, I wrote before I tried my hand at fan fic. I wrote really terrible wannabe literature that sucked donkey balls. I was young, and it was bad. Really, really bad. We shall never speak of it again.
But Gundam Wing opened up my imagination and made me want to tell a story about these wonderful, complex characters. So I did. I wrote a romance (2/4, if you must know. I'm not going to explain the number jargon), and people liked my story. I got several reviews. Cool. I could do that.
So I wrote some more -- built up a fan base and won some awards.
200,000 words later I had two full length novel fan fics. Several novellas and several more shorts. That's a lot of words.
The thing about fan fiction that's different from most other kinds of writing is the instant feedback from your fans. If they liked something, they reviewed it or emailed me for more. I learned how to build a story, write myself into (and out of) corners and how to write believable dialogue -- all by using someone else's characters and world. But most of all it gave me the confidence I needed to pursue my own non-fan fic writing.
If I could write a 60,000 word novel about GW characters, why not my own characters? I realized I could.
Not only that, but fan fic introduced me to genre writing, romance and gay fiction. Funny how things come full circle, huh?
Without the boost I got from fan fiction, I wouldn't be where I am today -- you know, an awesome full-time writer.
So, thank you G-boys for all your wonderful help.
And I suppose Ed and Roy helped a little too. (It was way too hard to find a pic of these two not kissing!)
OMG, talk about time warp! I stumbled across your blog and saw your GW fanfiction post and fell off my chair. Why? I used to write 3x4 fanfiction way back in 2000 - 2001.
ReplyDeleteHoly cow. And here we both are, publishing professionally. You're indie, which is fantastic, and I'm trad pubbed with a small press. :D
I'm so tickled to meet another GW fanficcer who's published. Not only that - a GW fanficcer who wrote *yaoi*.
Well met, "stranger"! :D
Best,
Hayden
That is so totally cool! I'm so happy other writers from the GW fandom are doing this. It's great!!!
DeleteI can't believe you write LGBT YA! I love YA, both reading it and writing it. I'm so checking out some of your books. I also can't believe you write about gay superheroes. I'm swooning a little bit. I have a major thing for DC slash -- especially Teen Titans slash.
What's the market like for gay YA stuff? I have a few YA novels I wrote years ago and I was wondering what to do with them.
Oh, heavens, there's no such thing as having too many gay YA books. :D The trend nowadays is to expand the market, too, to include escapist fiction like fantasy / horror / sci-fi / historical - nothing to do with coming out or bullying or other real issues, even though issues-based fiction is still necessary for gay kids to read. That's where I've always been and hope to be for as long as I have the inspiration.
DeleteI say publish your work! I'm dying to read more gay YA books, self-pubbed or otherwise. I buy my books largely from Smashwords because that's where all the indie writers have their stuff up, and I don't like purchasing from Amazon.
BTW, do you have a Smashwords page? I'd like to check out your books, too.
Also, be warned - my superhero novels were written back in 2008 and are very newbie-ish in style. My contract with Prizm will expire next year, and when it does, I'm taking them back, re-editing them, and re-releasing them through JMS Books. So, yeah. Not quite the best I've got.
Where are you on Twitter? I'm over there, too, and I can follow you if you don't mind. I *was* thinking of deleting my account there, but I changed my mind about it.