What I've Learned Writing Fanfiction
Jun. 22nd, 2022 10:19 am![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
annavereSince I began writing fanfiction over two years ago, I've come a long way toward being the kind of writer I want to be and feel like this is a good time to figure out what I've learned so far. I began with exactly one project: a sequel to Jeremiah, begun to accommodate my need for closure with the characters. Since the act of writing was so incredibly cathartic and entertaining that all my other hobbies took a backseat to the project, I've been piling up fresh ideas in various fandoms to prolong the experience.
When I began writing, the sequel was purely in dialogue form and I kept expecting the novelty to wear off and the project to be abandoned (story of my previous creative life, right there). The dialogue was fairly easy, mostly brought on by obsessive rewatching of the show, and when I was still working on it two months later, I realized I had to go back and try to write actual narrative prose to flesh out what I had. This was much, much harder, but since it was only the connective tissue around the dialogue I persevered and slowly, painfully improved at the task, writing thousands upon thousands of words that were basically all rubbish - but they make a pretty good storyboard for what I want to write and were excellent practice.
There were also matters of plot, character motivation, timelines and plot holes (oh joy) to sort out. Eventually I also learned about thematic integrity. The original ending for my massive sequel (which I never got anywhere close to actually writing, thank goodness) was basically a violent blowout - something I channeled from the Buffy/Highlander idea of season arcs "having" to end in epic battles, even though that idea doesn't fit Jeremiah as a show at all. Both seasons of Jeremiah ended in a "calm before the storm" kind of way, with much of the drama and violence coming from good and bad choices made by individuals rather than the need to chop someone's head off or blow up a building (yes, this is an oversimplification of Buffy/Highlander episodes I truly love). Once I realized this, I finally came up with a structure I'm satisfied with. Whether I still am when I finally get to that point is another matter but having no one to bounce ideas off of or request advice from, plot mechanics come together very slowly at times.
So, all the material I wrote at the beginning is in need of considerable overhaul before I get anywhere close to finishing or letting it see the light of day. Then I joined ArchiveofOurOwn, because writing fanfic led to reading fanfic and led me for the first time in years to no longer want to be a lurker on the internet. So I joined purely to leave nice comments on other creators' material, but then it gnawed at me that I had nothing to post of my own. I wanted to contribute to my ghost town fandom. That led to one story, to actual human feedback which I am everlastingly grateful for and thus being inspired to continue writing for my one reader. It's been an enormously helpful experience, hence this document so I can keep track of what I've learned so far.
She Moved Through the Fair. Gen, one chapter, 3,313 words.
Erin's viewpoint, two speaking characters.
Learned: How to complete a story. How to say, "it's as good as I can make it; I'd be happy to read it if someone else had written it" and let it go.
How to write a one-shot, beholden to nothing else. I then unlearned this in a hurry and it became the first part of a series.
Fencing terminology.
Weaving a motif (in this case, music).
Seeking hidden depths in a character it is way too easy to write off as a sociopath. This became the connecting theme of said series.
Rudimentary HTML.
Posting!
Trust. Gen, four chapters, 11,615 words.
Lee's viewpoint, ten speaking characters.
Learned: Chapter structuring.
Weaving material in and around the entire canon rather than picking a single gap to fill.
Discovering word counters, which helped me in some ways, although I spent a lot of time trying to pare things down because I felt ridiculous writing 11,000 words about a fairly unpopular secondary character in this fandom. Let's just say I got over this.
Refusing narrative shortcuts. If a character was important enough to feature in a scene, he or she deserved dialogue. I switched a lot of straight recaps into conversations for this one, hence the exploding word count.
How to depict the inner workings of a conscience and emotional attachment in a man whose major character trait on the show was hostile stoicism. I overhauled endlessly on this story, trying to get the tone right. Prior to Trust, Lee Chen was the character I found hardest to write, so I'm kind of amused I did this to myself.
Vantage Point. Gen, four chapters, 14,376 words.
Theo's viewpoint, nine speaking characters.
Learned: Not to obsess over word count because brevity just isn't my strong suit. This was supposed to be two chapters when I started. Total fail.
This story did not originally feature Libby at all, but adding her created the running theme which allowed me to link all three stories together and thus create a series.
Utilizing a viewpoint character who completely disappeared from the show. Unlike with Erin and Lee, where I had a canon ending to aim for, writing Theo required me to find my own conclusion for her and hope it meshed.
Loads of character development, in comparison with the more static Lee.
Creating a timeline for events when the only hard data I had to go on was a single episode set at New Year's.
Trying to depict pregnancy and the mental stress of motherhood. This is not a storyline I would have chosen for personal reasons, but I did my level best to do it justice.
Ship tease. I got carried away and did Theo/Jeremiah, Theo/Markus, Theo/Erin, Erin/Markus, Lee/Markus, Jeremiah/Markus, Jeremiah/Kurdy, Jeremiah/Libby, Erin/Libby, Sims/Libby and Kurdy/Elizabeth. Writing actual shipping content is a whole different kettle of fish and I'm still working up to that, but teasing the idea from a distance ended up being a lot of fun, even if something like half of these ships were sunk by the end.
Season two of Jeremiah is a massive emotional downer (hence the whole "I need a sequel" concept) but since my first two stories ended on melancholy notes, I tried very hard to counteract that with the final chapter of Vantage Point and tweaked almost every scene to emphasize human connection.
Wrapping up the story in a way that felt concrete (since most of these characters will not feature in the final installment) while also obliquely pointing the way to said finale.
So what's next?
Life in Death. Mostly Gen, but also F/M. Should be 2 chapters. Currently at 8,849 words and nowhere close to finished.
Learning: To finish a series. Each story has inched forward in time and this one will take me right up to the final credits rolling.
Nonlinear structure.
The usage of supernatural elements and canonical ambiguities. Going way out on limbs of personal interpretation while making sure nothing I include actually contradicts the canon.
The main challenge will be writing actual physicality, something I have heretofore chickened out on. I can stupidly agonize over two characters platonically holding hands, so depicting a sexual relationship in even G-rated detail is a recipe for unproductive staring at the keyboard. This also goes for pain and injury, which this story requires rather a lot of.
Finishing this up will take me off the edges of the board, unless I can think of any other missing scenes to write. After that, it's back to work on the sequel, brainstorming other material and I also have some plans to try writing for something other than Jeremiah (just to see if I can, and if the experience is still fun).
When I began writing, the sequel was purely in dialogue form and I kept expecting the novelty to wear off and the project to be abandoned (story of my previous creative life, right there). The dialogue was fairly easy, mostly brought on by obsessive rewatching of the show, and when I was still working on it two months later, I realized I had to go back and try to write actual narrative prose to flesh out what I had. This was much, much harder, but since it was only the connective tissue around the dialogue I persevered and slowly, painfully improved at the task, writing thousands upon thousands of words that were basically all rubbish - but they make a pretty good storyboard for what I want to write and were excellent practice.
There were also matters of plot, character motivation, timelines and plot holes (oh joy) to sort out. Eventually I also learned about thematic integrity. The original ending for my massive sequel (which I never got anywhere close to actually writing, thank goodness) was basically a violent blowout - something I channeled from the Buffy/Highlander idea of season arcs "having" to end in epic battles, even though that idea doesn't fit Jeremiah as a show at all. Both seasons of Jeremiah ended in a "calm before the storm" kind of way, with much of the drama and violence coming from good and bad choices made by individuals rather than the need to chop someone's head off or blow up a building (yes, this is an oversimplification of Buffy/Highlander episodes I truly love). Once I realized this, I finally came up with a structure I'm satisfied with. Whether I still am when I finally get to that point is another matter but having no one to bounce ideas off of or request advice from, plot mechanics come together very slowly at times.
So, all the material I wrote at the beginning is in need of considerable overhaul before I get anywhere close to finishing or letting it see the light of day. Then I joined ArchiveofOurOwn, because writing fanfic led to reading fanfic and led me for the first time in years to no longer want to be a lurker on the internet. So I joined purely to leave nice comments on other creators' material, but then it gnawed at me that I had nothing to post of my own. I wanted to contribute to my ghost town fandom. That led to one story, to actual human feedback which I am everlastingly grateful for and thus being inspired to continue writing for my one reader. It's been an enormously helpful experience, hence this document so I can keep track of what I've learned so far.
She Moved Through the Fair. Gen, one chapter, 3,313 words.
Erin's viewpoint, two speaking characters.
Learned: How to complete a story. How to say, "it's as good as I can make it; I'd be happy to read it if someone else had written it" and let it go.
How to write a one-shot, beholden to nothing else. I then unlearned this in a hurry and it became the first part of a series.
Fencing terminology.
Weaving a motif (in this case, music).
Seeking hidden depths in a character it is way too easy to write off as a sociopath. This became the connecting theme of said series.
Rudimentary HTML.
Posting!
Trust. Gen, four chapters, 11,615 words.
Lee's viewpoint, ten speaking characters.
Learned: Chapter structuring.
Weaving material in and around the entire canon rather than picking a single gap to fill.
Discovering word counters, which helped me in some ways, although I spent a lot of time trying to pare things down because I felt ridiculous writing 11,000 words about a fairly unpopular secondary character in this fandom. Let's just say I got over this.
Refusing narrative shortcuts. If a character was important enough to feature in a scene, he or she deserved dialogue. I switched a lot of straight recaps into conversations for this one, hence the exploding word count.
How to depict the inner workings of a conscience and emotional attachment in a man whose major character trait on the show was hostile stoicism. I overhauled endlessly on this story, trying to get the tone right. Prior to Trust, Lee Chen was the character I found hardest to write, so I'm kind of amused I did this to myself.
Vantage Point. Gen, four chapters, 14,376 words.
Theo's viewpoint, nine speaking characters.
Learned: Not to obsess over word count because brevity just isn't my strong suit. This was supposed to be two chapters when I started. Total fail.
This story did not originally feature Libby at all, but adding her created the running theme which allowed me to link all three stories together and thus create a series.
Utilizing a viewpoint character who completely disappeared from the show. Unlike with Erin and Lee, where I had a canon ending to aim for, writing Theo required me to find my own conclusion for her and hope it meshed.
Loads of character development, in comparison with the more static Lee.
Creating a timeline for events when the only hard data I had to go on was a single episode set at New Year's.
Trying to depict pregnancy and the mental stress of motherhood. This is not a storyline I would have chosen for personal reasons, but I did my level best to do it justice.
Ship tease. I got carried away and did Theo/Jeremiah, Theo/Markus, Theo/Erin, Erin/Markus, Lee/Markus, Jeremiah/Markus, Jeremiah/Kurdy, Jeremiah/Libby, Erin/Libby, Sims/Libby and Kurdy/Elizabeth. Writing actual shipping content is a whole different kettle of fish and I'm still working up to that, but teasing the idea from a distance ended up being a lot of fun, even if something like half of these ships were sunk by the end.
Season two of Jeremiah is a massive emotional downer (hence the whole "I need a sequel" concept) but since my first two stories ended on melancholy notes, I tried very hard to counteract that with the final chapter of Vantage Point and tweaked almost every scene to emphasize human connection.
Wrapping up the story in a way that felt concrete (since most of these characters will not feature in the final installment) while also obliquely pointing the way to said finale.
So what's next?
Life in Death. Mostly Gen, but also F/M. Should be 2 chapters. Currently at 8,849 words and nowhere close to finished.
Learning: To finish a series. Each story has inched forward in time and this one will take me right up to the final credits rolling.
Nonlinear structure.
The usage of supernatural elements and canonical ambiguities. Going way out on limbs of personal interpretation while making sure nothing I include actually contradicts the canon.
The main challenge will be writing actual physicality, something I have heretofore chickened out on. I can stupidly agonize over two characters platonically holding hands, so depicting a sexual relationship in even G-rated detail is a recipe for unproductive staring at the keyboard. This also goes for pain and injury, which this story requires rather a lot of.
Finishing this up will take me off the edges of the board, unless I can think of any other missing scenes to write. After that, it's back to work on the sequel, brainstorming other material and I also have some plans to try writing for something other than Jeremiah (just to see if I can, and if the experience is still fun).
