Another Thing Thats Cool About Fanfiction: Its As Long As It Needs To Be.

Another thing that’s cool about fanfiction: it’s as long as it needs to be.

Well, sometimes it’s longer than anything on God’s green earth needs to be, but my point is that there’s really no rules about fic length.  In traditional publishing there’s this awkward middle where nobody wants to print a novella that’s too long for a short story collection but doesn’t really fill out a book.  Ebooks have changed that somewhat but it’s still a convention that a book is about 75,000 words.

Fanfic is not bound by this standard.  If your story takes 25,000 words to tell, then you can do that, and there are readers for whom that’s a sweet spot.  If you just want to keep going and going for 350,000 words and beyond, nobody’s going to say “only famous authors with grand ideas get to do that”–text is low bandwidth and there are readers who will love the feeling that your story is a home where they’re invited to stay as long as they like.

Sometimes restrictions breed creativity, and some writers need to be forced to edit themselves.  But some writers know exactly what they’re doing when they make a story a certain length, and it’s awesome that the Internet has created spaces that put no limits on that.

by Boris Groh

Savoyarde de naissance et champenoise actuellement, j’appelle ça un pain au chocolat

Bon, j’ai besoin de savoir. Si vous êtes Français, rebloguez d’où vous venez et comment vous appelez ce truc:

Promis je ne me battrais avec personne.

Je commence: je suis parisienne de naissance et bordelaise d’adoption (depuis un an et demi), et j’appelle ça une chocolatine.

The beginning of a new story. Follow me for more, maybe?

The Secret Knots - Boarding School p.1

Victoria Schwab Tweets:

“This just in: you can love writing and also find it hard.

“I was once on a panel and another author essentially said, ‘if you don't enjoy every moment, then why are you here?’ and I was...exasperated. Creativity is a complicated beast. You don't have to love every second to be a valid participant.

“I love the ideas. I love brainstorming, and problem-solving, and I love making this better, fine-tuning language.

“I also hate drafting, claw my way through self-doubt, crawl on my hands and knees through the frustration of the unrealized.

“I'm not here because I love every second.

“I'm here because the parts I love are worth the rest.”

Art by Minna Sundberg