I've been writing both original fic and fanfic for as long as I can remember (my mother still has a comic book I made at about five years old based on the American Tail movie). Fanfic has two major plusses for me. First off, I'm primarily a short story writer--I have a couple of original novel ideas floating around in my head, but my adult ADD makes it difficult. I think a lot of the original stories I've written are pretty good and possibly selling-worthy, but short stories are damn hard to sell. With fanfic, though, I can zap off a story, post it, and there it is. That is-this-good-enough stigma is gone, because I can't sell it.
The second plus is that your characters don't have to be introduced, nor does the setting. I am admittedly terrible at introducing original characters, and that's undoubtedly my weakest point in writing. But with fanfic, I can put some blah blah in the header about Lucius and when the story starts in first person with the character in jail and scared of something circling around him, people already know exactly what's going on. Granted, in a way it's lazy writing. But there have been times when spending an evening on a fanfic and being quite pleased with the result has opened up my writer's block to writing more.
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timeasmymeasure
no subject
Date: 2004-05-27 07:06 pm (UTC)The second plus is that your characters don't have to be introduced, nor does the setting. I am admittedly terrible at introducing original characters, and that's undoubtedly my weakest point in writing. But with fanfic, I can put some blah blah in the header about Lucius and when the story starts in first person with the character in jail and scared of something circling around him, people already know exactly what's going on. Granted, in a way it's lazy writing. But there have been times when spending an evening on a fanfic and being quite pleased with the result has opened up my writer's block to writing more.