I have two things
to say to you. The first thing is, of course, "Congratulations! You want to
write a fanfic!" There is no hobby that I find more stimulating yet at the same
time more relaxing than writing. And the most relaxing kind of writing that
I do is to write fanfiction. When you get right down to it, it's just plain
old fun. You take the characters from a fictional universe that you already
love anyway, and you send them off on adventures that can be funny, tragic,
dramatic, action-packed, emotional, romantic, or downright heart-wrenching.
How much fun is that? Well, I suppose that if you've decided that you're going
to write a fanfic, it's a safe bet that you fancy the idea yourself...
Of course, the
other thing I need to ask concerning the idea of you embarking upon writing
a fanfic is, "Are you willing to do it the right way?" Are you willing
to do what you have to do to make your fanfic offering the best that it can
be? Are you willing to perhaps learn proper grammar, spelling, and usage, and
are you willing to conform to generally-accepted standards for narrative writing?
Are you willing to construct a plausible and interesting plot that does not
contain plot holes large enough to swallow the planet Jupiter and that does
not hinge upon a single plot convenience, deus ex machina, or random
coincidence? Are you willing to create interesting, original, non-stereotypical
characters and/or are you willing to add or further explore interesting facets
of a previously-established character? Are you willing to acknowledge that many
things in fanficdom are overdone and cliché-ridden, and are you willing
to do your best to avoid those things? Are you willing to submit yourself to
the tedious agony that is line-by-line editing and rewriting?
If you answered
"no" to any of the above questions...perhaps you should rethink your
desire to write a fanfic. I'm serious! Why? Because everything I listed is an
integral part of writing a good fanfic. Sure, you could skip one or more
of the things I mentioned and still turn out a passable fic...but who wants
merely "passable," when it could be great? Who wants to write a fic that
people will probably read ... or attempt to read ... but that leaves those
readers indifferent or, worse, cold? Wouldn't you rather have perhaps positive
feedback than no feedback at all?
Let's face it here.
No one writes and posts fanfic to the Internet/Web just to please only themselves.
Sure, people will tell you that's what they do, but they are generally
lying to you. If people wrote only to please themselves, they wouldn't share
what they wrote with others. They don't share out of the kindness of their hearts.
They're looking for some ego-stroking praise or, at the very least, they're
looking for feedback from readers telling the author what they did and did not
like about the fanfic in order to improve their skills for future fanfics. Writing
is often an ego-driven endeavor. Don't let anyone try to convince you otherwise.
And there's nothing wrong with looking to have one's ego stroked, either. Don't
let anyone try to tell you otherwise about that, either.
And then there
are people who will give you platitudes about how you should really only write
to please yourself and that if you like what you produce, that's all
that matters. They, too, are lying to you. There is enough bad fanfic floating
around out there that the writers themselves no doubt love but that no one else
does. You, my friend, do not need to add to that ignominious stack. Especially
because it is usually easy to transform a bad, cliché-ridden, stereotypical
fanfic that only you like into a good (or great!) fanfic that the majority of
your fellow Transformers fans will like. All it takes is a little time and practice
devoted to the craft of writing. It all goes back to the whole "willingness
to do things the right way" thing. Do things the right way, and the rest,
with a little practice, will fall into place.
So what is
the right way of doing things? How should you go about writing a good fanfic?
Well...To tell you the hard and honest truth, there is no one right way
that will work for everyone. Writing fiction ... fandom-based or otherwise
... is something you have to play with, something you have to practice, something
you have to do to actually learn how to do it. There is no magic formula,
and I cannot wave a magic wand over your head, weaving a spell that will automatically
make you the next Ernest Hemingway. Nor is this little spiel here designed to
be an exhaustive guide on how to go about writing a story, fanfic or otherwise.
That could take up a website in itself. So, going into this, I'm assuming that
you've already mastered some basics of fiction-writing.
I'm assuming, for
instance, that you know what a plot is and why it's important to have one in
your story. I'm assuming that you know what characters and characterization
are. I'm assuming that you know what setting is. I'm assuming, also, that you
know that the most common plot structure of a story follows, basically, this
structure: catchy beginning, development, climax, and then resolution. I'm assuming
that you are capable of converting a story idea you have in your head into a
plot the structure of which bears some resemblance to that basic structure.
If you don't know or understand these and other basics of fiction writing, this
"guide" probably isn't going to help you much. I suggest a creative writing
course. Many of them are offered at a very low cost on a non-credit basis by
local community colleges. (I know; I used to teach two a year. ;) ) I suggest
you find one. :)
However, if you
do know those basics, you may (or may not!) learn something here. I've
been writing fanfic for about thirty years now, for various "genres," ever since
I wrote a Winnie-the-Pooh "fanfic" when I was six. I'm also an English and creative
writing teacher. I'd like to think that I have some minor tidbits of wisdom
that I can impart upon you, a beginning fanfic writer. So what I've tried to
do here is gather together the best advice I can give you as to how to go about
writing or improving a first fanfic. (Or a first serious fanfic, at least.)
You are free, of course, to pick and choose amongst my advice. As I said, your
own personal method of writing is something with which you have to experiment
in order to discover and then perfect. It's not the same for every person. Still,
if you follow my general guidelines as a basis for a method and then
add your own bells and whistles as you discover them, you should be all right.
So let's just dive
right in, shall we?
Before
You Write
What you do before
you write your first fanfic is perhaps more important that what you do while
you're writing your first fanfic. Yes, I'm serious. With fanfic writing, in
particular, preparation is half the battle. And the best part is that, once
you do the stuff I'm going to advise you to do here, you will never have to
do it again! Why? Because these are things that, once done, will automatically
apply to every fanfic you subsequently write, so they only need to be done once.
After this, it's only a matter of coming up with more story ideas and then converting
those ideas into plots. And doing the stuff I'm going to suggest to you here
will even help you with that. So here's my fanfic pre-writing checklist:
You've probably
done this already. In fact, it's because you've been reading fanfic, I'd
wager, that you've been inspired to write one of your own. And that's wonderful!
But now you need to read other fanfics with perhaps a different eye, one
that's critical, analytical, and appreciative all at once. Gather some fanfics
onto the hard drive of your computer or print them out or just find a website
that has a lot of easily-accessible Transformers fanfics of different styles.
(Right here at Lexicon is a great place for this particular purpose!) However
you choose to do it, devote a good block of time ... Several hours at
least, though not necessarily all in one session ... to sitting down
and really reading some fanfics. What do I mean by really
reading them? Well, I mean that you should read them with an eye to the
following:
In other words,
know the canon Transformers material inside and out. Be able to recite from
memory some dialogue from the cartoon or the comic which is spoken by the
main character(s) in your planned fanfic. Get to the point where you can
actually hear those characters in your mind all the time, to the
point where you think all the time about how they act or how they might
react to certain things. Be obsessive about it. (Yes, I'm actually recommending
obsession here.) Why? Well, for several reasons, actually...
They will love
the feedback and will probably be all-too-willing to offer you, as a beginning/aspiring
writer, some specific advice. The great thing about the Internet/Web is
that it usually allows instant access to a fanfic's author. Most authors
will attach their email address to a fanfic or to their website in the hope
that someone will write and tell them how much they loved their story. Make
use of that! Really! If you read a story, the plot or style of which you
really like and you're thinking that you might want your story to
be of similar style, zap an email off to the author. Don't be shy! It takes
literally seconds to do. Stroke their ego by telling them how much and
why you liked their story. But more than that, ask them specific questions
about how they came up with the story idea, or what their inspiration was
for making Character X act the way they did. Ask about some little detail
that attracted you to or impressed you about the story in question. If you
ask specific questions about a fanfic, more often than not you will get
a reply back from the author and then you can unselfconsciously pump him
or her for advice. And you would be surprised at the number of story ideas
you can generate and develop just from idly chatting with another fanfic
author! It happens to me all all the time when I'm talking with other
writers!
Yes, I'm serious!
If you do not know how to speak English properly then, to be perfectly blunt,
you have no business writing a piece of fiction in English, even "just"
a silly Transformers fanfic. Period. End of story. Good grammar in a piece
of fiction, even just a little old fanfic, is of the utmost importance.
Nothing ruins an otherwise good story quite like awful ... or
even mildly bad ... grammar can ruin it. If nothing else, bad grammar
and poor sentence structure interrupt the flow of your narrative. They force
the reader to snap out of your story's (hopefully!) carefully-constructed
"world" in order to try to figure out what you are trying to say. You do
not want that! Your ultimate goal as a fiction writer is to suck
your reader into your story, to paint for them a picture from which they
cannot look away, a picture that is "drawn" with well-chosen words and well-constructed
sentences. Bad grammar is guaranteed to force them to look away from
your narrative picture! Yes, basic grammar is not exactly the most exciting
subject in the universe. I'm the first to admit that. But it exists for
a reason! Good grammar is vital to writing a good story.
However, I'm
not going to go into graphic detail about grammar here. Why? Because I already
started to do so elsewhere... Even if you think you know your grammar,
I highly recommend that you skim through my grammar mini-guide (You
can find it on my website at www.transfan-asylum.org, in the section entitled
"Writing Workshop") and that you grab an exhaustive grammar
guide at your local bookstore and thoroughly reinforce your grammar
skills before you embark upon writing your story. Yes, it's boring,
and you will no doubt hate it. But it's for your own good. Trust me. Your
reader(s) will thank you! And you will no doubt be surprised at the number
of things you don't know about grammar. More than that, unless you
are a Grammar Guru in your own right, you will probably be surprised at
the things you are doing wrong in your writing without realizing it. That,
my friend, is a promise.
You will be
... or at least you should be ... using it often as you write.
But you should also make use of it before you write, too. Knowing
many different synonyms for the same word and knowing how to use those many
different synonyms within the context of a sentence will vastly improve
your story and it will make the process of writing a heckuva lot
easier. You'll be able to avoid ambiguity and lazy writing in your narrative
if you know the exact word to use to convey your meaning. And, of course,
variety in word choice is one of the basics of writing interesting fiction.
No one wants to read the same words over and over again, after all.
Writing
Your Story
OK! You've read
tons of fanfic. You've watched your canon cartoon episodes or read your canon
comic issues or both. You have some canon dialogue memorized. You know the difference
between an independent and a dependent clause, and you know when to use a semi-colon.
You now have a mental list of at least fifteen synonyms that you could substitute
for the word...say, "loud," for example. Perhaps you've written some "fan mail"
to a fanfic author or two, and maybe they've even answered you and you've since
been having a nice conversation with one of them about what a weenie Optimus
Prime is... You have a vague idea of the type of story you want to write and
an idea of the characters you want to use in that story...
So now what? No
doubt, since it first entered your mind that you wanted to write a fanfic, you've
had a plot in your head. Perhaps your pre-writing footwork that you just completed
has not deterred you from actually writing that original plot. Now, my friend,
the time has finally come to begin to write your story. Some suggestions
on where to go from here:
Oh, not a formal
outline, necessarily, unless that sort of thing floats your boat. You don't
have to dredge up your memories of elementary school when you were taught
how to make detailed outlines. You just need a sketchy one to which you
can refer as you're writing your story. As you developed your plot in your
head, you no doubt noticed that there are logical breaks in the action of
the story. There should be places where the focus changes from the Autobots
to the Decepticons, for instance, where, if your story were a G1 cartoon
episode, there'd be one of those flipping-faction-symbol scene bumpers.
Or, on a smaller scale, there are places in the plot where the perspective
should switch from talking about what one character or group of characters
is doing to talking about what another character or group of characters
in another part of the story is doing. Make a note of these breaks. Number
them. Make a list of what is going to happen in each section next to each
number. It doesn't have to be anything resembling narrative. Just a brief
note of what you want to happen in each section is fine. Keep this outline
handy when you're writing.
Depending on
the size and scope of the story you're contemplating, you may need a subplot
or two. A subplot is a secondary plot running concurrently with the main
plot. Sometimes the subplot is related to the main plot, and sometimes it
isn't. Sometimes the subplot is comic relief if your main plot is unrelentingly
dramatic or dark. Whatever the subplot's function, though, for a first fanfic,
I'd suggest that you limit yourself to one subplot. Even better, none at
all. You'll make your life so much easier...
If you have
to have a subplot or subplots, though, break them up in an outline as you
did with the main plot and then inject the outline of the subplot into the
outline of the main plot, detailing the sections in which you're going to
further the subplot and those in which you will detail the main plot. When
that's done, you are finally ready to commit some actual words to
actual paper. (Or at least to your computer screen...) Woo hoo!
You don't!
To me, there is nothing more intimidating than a blank computer screen staring
back at you, the little cursor blinking cheerily at you, mocking you. More
than that, there is nothing worse than staring at a blank computer screen
while having a great idea for the climax of a story in your head but no
idea how to get to that climax. My solution? Write the climax first! Chances
are it's the first thing you invented for your story, anyway. So don't worry
about what comes before or after it. Just write the big emotional and/or
action-packed climax that you have stuck in your noggin. While you're writing
that, you'll no doubt say to yourself something along the lines of, "Hey!
To get to this point, Character X had to do this beforehand." So
then write that part next. Continue to work backwards in that manner to
the beginning of the story or forward to the end and then worry about
the beginning. Or start at the very end of your story and work backwards
to the beginning. Hey, it may not work for you...but it works for me! Sometimes,
it's the only way I can get past the horror that is a blank computer screen...
The point is
that sometimes people, especially beginning authors, have trouble writing
the opening of a story. They want to jump right into the action. If that's
what you want to do, then do it, for pity's sake. Don't torture yourself
wondering about the events that led up to the climax of the story. If you
don't worry about how to start a story until you've already written most
of it, it sometimes makes life easier.
But when you
do write that opening, remember that the opening is probably the
most important part of the story. It's the "maker-or-breaker" of a story.
If people get through the first two or three pages of your twenty-page story,
for instance, it's a good bet they'll stay through to the end...The trick
is to make the beginning interesting and slightly mysterious but not too
mysterious. You want your reader to wonder what you will be accomplishing
with your story, so that they'll continue to read it in order to find out.
Some
important stuff to think about as you write...
I think it's
safe to say that the most important element in writing a successful
fanfic is characterization. You can have the world's coolest, most original,
most well-paced and well-written plot, but if the established characters
are all wrong in it, it spoils the whole effect. Why? Because everyone
who reads your fanfic will already know something about the established
characters whom you will be using in your story. Everyone who reads
your fanfic will know how those characters speak and generally behave. And
if you write something in which an established character acts and/or
speaks completely differently than he or she normally does in the canon
material without a very good reason for doing so, then everyone
who reads your fanfic will be able to spot it ... and many readers will
completely ignore your story because of it. You don't want that, do you?
So, in short,
the biggest blessing when it comes to writing fanfic is that the characters
are predefined. The biggest curse when it comes to writing fanfic is...well,
that the characters are predefined! It's a blessing because it saves you
a lot of work. You're writing a story in which at least half of your
work as a writer is done, characterization-wise, simply because there is
already a wealth of information that your reader knows about the established
characters you are using in your fanfic. This is A Good Thing™. It
saves you the work of having to develop characters from scratch, which is
no small thing, I assure you, and which is a process far beyond the scope
of this discussion.
It is also,
however, A Bad Thing™, for a couple of reasons. The biggest one is
that it limits your options, both in terms of what the characters say and
in terms of what you can do with them. For example, it is not all
right to have...say, Grimlock suddenly recite long, poetic speeches, particularly
if your story takes place in the G1 cartoon continuity. It is not
all right for Starscream, for instance, to wake up one morning and decide
to be a happy camper under Megatron's command. Not unless you previously
postulated the idea that he got whacked in the head with something the day
before, that is. It is not all right for Megatron to decide suddenly
that humans are creatures worthy of consideration or for Optimus Prime to
decide suddenly that humans are unworthy of consideration. They would
not do that. In short, you have to stick with what the readers know
about the established characters or else you'll have to do some serious
explanation in order to justify a given character's out-of-characterness.
And, in general, such expository explanation is boring for the reader to
read. You do not want to bore your reader.
Overall, though,
the established characters must, must, must behave the way
they do in the canon material. Otherwise your reader will not "recognize"
the established characters as themselves, which is crucial for an effective
fanfic. It is perfectly fine ... It's encouraged, in fact! ... to
add depth to an established character's personality, to add details to their
lives and psyches that were never mentioned or shown in the canon, so
long as those details seem to be a logical extension of or companion to
the characteristics that are in the canon. But unless you're
writing a fic in which there are no established characters (Something I
do not recommend at first!), you must realize that the established
characters are the foundation and the "anchor" of your fanfic. If you write
the established characters wrong or grossly and inexplicably out-of-character,
you lose that anchor. Your story will subsequently drift off into the ether...and
it will lose a good percentage of its readership as it drifts away. You
don't want that!
And here's
something subtle that many fanfic writers, experienced or not, miss concerning
the established characters. They must speak in a fanfic in exactly
the same way that they do in the canon material or they will not "sound"
right in the reader's mind, which is every bit as bad as having them not
acting right. A few Transformers characters have noticeable verbal quirks,
some obvious, some not-so-obvious. Such as: The list goes
on and on. These examples are but a few. And you have to know this
stuff and you have to use it in your fanfic or your established characters,
again, will not ring true and, again, the anchor of your fic will be gone
and your story will drift into unrecognizability. Again, it all goes back
to knowing your canon. It's vital. I cannot emphasize that enough.
While you're
writing, keep in mind that Transformers fans are used to highly visual stories.
They're used to cartoons and/or comic books. In both of these media, mood,
tone, and setting are easily established without having to say a word. It's
all there in front of the viewer. With written fiction, it's an entirely
different story. You have to paint for your reader a picture made of words
which tells the reader what they need to know about the setting and the
overall mood of the setting. Is it light, dark, cold, hot, damp, creepy,
sunny, happy, dreary, etc, etc, etc? The words you choose to use, not a
picture on a TV screen or in a comic book, must convey all of this
to your reader. At the same time, you don't want to get bogged down in description
at the expense of plot and character. You do not need to wax rhapsodic about
details of the setting that have no bearing on the plot, but if a detail
of setting is important to the plot, make sure that you describe
it such that your reader has a clear mental image of it!
One of the
easiest ways to do this is to use image-driven narrative, "visual" story-telling
language that paints clear pictures in the reader's mind. For instance,
you could write, "The sun set over the ocean." It would be a perfectly legitimate,
though not particularly interesting, sentence. But it's easily spiced up
and "dramatized" with a bit of narrative imagery, thusly: "The sun was a
blazing ball of orange fire squatting on the horizon, casting tendrils of
flame across the calm ocean surface beneath it." The latter paints a much
more vivid picture in your reader's mind than the former. And oftentimes,
the setting or mood of a story contributes to the story as much as the plot
does. Setting and mood are important, and they're often overlooked, especially
by fanfic writers.
Developing
descriptive, image-driven narrative is not as tremendously difficult as
you might think. For one thing, it helps enormously to have a full arsenal
of descriptive words at your disposal. (Again, the thesaurus is your friend!
Make use of it!) But the true key is to think visually and be mindful
of setting while you are writing. Before you write a scene, sit for
a moment and visualize it in your mind. Close your eyes if that helps. Who's
there in that scene? Where are they in relation to each other? What are
they doing? What is the mood like in that room or place? Happy? Tense? Relaxed?
Bored? What's the environment like? Dark? Stormy? Sunny? Hot? Cold? Have
a clear image in your head of the scene that you're writing, and
decide what elements of that picture in your mind are important for the
reader to know. Use interesting, descriptive, visually-based language
that clearly conveys to your reader the image that you are seeing
in your head as you're writing the scene, whether it's a detail of setting
or a subtle nuance of a character's facial expression. Don't leave such
things vague or open to the reader's interpretation if they are important
to the plot, as readers will invariably interpret it differently than you
want them to interpret it. You don't want that! Tell your reader
what you're seeing so that the plot you create within that
setting will also be easier to understand on the reader's part.
Another easy
way to inject some interesting imagery into your writing is the use of simile
and metaphor. Both of these are comparative devices, the former including
the words "like" or "as," the latter containing neither of those words.
They work as description by comparing an object or person or setting to
something else, something either concrete or evocative that the reader will
interpret precisely as you wish them to interpret it. For instance, you
could write, "Cheetor sulked in his quarters." Or you could write, "Cheetor
sulked in his quarters like a sore loser in the game of life." This is a
simile. It uses the word "like." By comparing Cheetor to a sore loser, the
sentence evokes an image of Cheetor being petulant, since sore losers are
generally petulant, without having to say that Cheetor is being petulant.
By the same token, my "the sun was a blazing ball of fire" example from
above is a metaphor. It compares the sun to a blazing ball of fire without
using the word "like" or "as," creating a clear visual image in the reader's
mind's eye of what that setting sun looks like.
Developing
and using visual story-telling and clear, evocative description through
the use of imagery, simile, and metaphor is particularly vital to any kind
of fiction writing, fanfic or otherwise. It is often, however, something
that is overlooked by fanfic writers, in particular. I'm not exactly sure
why this is, but I do know that it is to the detriment of those writers
that they neglect it. It can add a whole new layer of interest to your writing.
More importantly, it can do it easily, without major effort on the
writer's part, aside from taking a moment to visualize a scene and finding
the right words to convey the scene to the reader. And, of course, the more
interesting layers you have in your writing, the better your fic!
There are two
types of narrative voice with which you should be concerned at this beginning
point in writing a fanfic. One is third-person narrative, the other first-person
narrative.
Third-person
narrative is told through the viewpoint of an omniscient narrator who knows
the entire plot of the story and can see into all of the characters' heads,
so to speak. Because of this, you as the narrator can, among other things,
offer bits of foreshadowing (Clues about upcoming events in the story) or
you can relay to your reader all of the characters' thoughts. As such, it's
perhaps the easiest and most common narrative voice used by writers of both
fanfic and mainstream fiction. A brief example:
The night
was like a smothering blanket, absorbing all light, all sound, all warmth.
Joe walked down the street, bathed in the anemic light of the streetlights
spaced at regular intervals, like little soldiers standing rigidly on the
battlements of a fortress, ever vigilant, ever watchful. He sighed and wondered
again how his life had become so hopelessly complicated.
Notice that
nowhere in this bit of narrative does the word "I" or "you" appear. Indeed,
they should not appear in third-person narrative writing. (Dialogue is different,
of course.) Third-person narrative is detached, impersonal, non-judgemental,
and omniscient; it does not have the immediacy and the personal focus that
using the word "I" imparts on your writing. Likewise, when using this voice,
the writer should never address the reader by using in the narrative any
form of the word "you." (Again, dialogue is a different story.) Also notice
that all of the verbs in the above passage are in some form of past
tense. Present tense in any form should never be used in fiction
writing except in some odd cases of stream-of-conciousness writing, where
a character is telling the reader what's going on in his or her head at
that very moment as the events happen. This device should probably not be
used for an entire fic, however. Past tense should be used for the majority
of a fic's narrative, if not all of it. To illustrate these common
mistakes in third-person narrative writing, here is same passage, still
in third person, but done incorrectly in places:
The night
is something you can almost feel, a smothering blanket absorbing all light,
all sound, all warmth. Joe walks down the street, bathed in the anemic light
of the streetlights spaced at regular intervals. They might seem to you
like little soldiers standing rigidly on the battlements of a fortress,
ever vigilant, ever watchful. Joe sighs as he wonders again how his life
has become so hopelessly complicated.
This may sound
good. It does use good imagery. It is, however, a technical minefield. The
"you" in the first and third sentence is addressing the reader, something
which should never be done. As a writer, you are telling a story; you should
not be telling the reader what to think or feel about a setting or a character.
That's for the reader to do. Further, the verbs "is," "walks," "seem," "sighs,"
and "wonders" are all in present tense. Again, the narrative of a story
should never be written in present tense. Present tense does not
fit the "feel" of narrative, particularly third-person narrative. Unless
you are writing in stream-of-consciousness, you are telling a story pertaining
to things that happened in the past, even if it was just moments
ago. Therefore, past tense is the only verb tense to use in narrative writing.
Now, if you like the inappropriate immediate and more "personal" feeling
of the above passage, however, you might enjoy writing in first-person instead...
First-person
narrative is more "personal" in that it uses the word "I" and is told from
the viewpoint of one single, non-omniscient character at a time. It still,
however, never uses present tense and never addresses the reader. Here is
the same dreary passage once again, modified a bit and converted into first-person
form:
The night
was a smothering blanket, absorbing all light, all sound, all warmth. I
walked along, bathed in the anemic light of the streetlights that were spaced
at regular intervals along Elm Street. They seemed to me like unfeeling,
impassive soldiers, those lights, standing rigidly on the battlements of
a fortress, crowding around me, staring down at me, summarily judging me.
I stared indifferently back at one of them and sighed, wondering how my
life had become so hopelessly complicated.
Limiting the
narrative of a story to the viewpoint of one character, as the above passage
does, can be good because it can allow you to get deeply into the head of
the character from whose viewpoint you are telling the story, allowing you
to reveal their thoughts without interpretation from a narrator. But it
can also be bad because you lose the freedom of omniscience that third-person
narration gives you. You can tell your reader to the finest detail what's
going in the viewpoint character's head...but you can't say anything
about the goings-on in another character's head. So, in general, it's easier
to use third-person. It can be difficult to sustain the first person viewpoint
for longer than a twenty-page story or in a story with a "cast" of more
than about five characters or in a story that has multiple plots because,
obviously, your viewpoint character has to be involved in every facet of
the story. That's difficult ... though not impossible ... to do with
larger-scale stories.
All in all,
my advice to you is to decide before you write your story what voice/viewpoint
you want to use in it. The most important thing is to keep the voice consistent.
Don't flip back and forth between third-person and first-person. Never address
the reader directly. Never tell your reader what to think. That's their
job. And whatever you do, be obsessively vigilant about your verb tenses.
In general, never use present tense in any form. If you're confused
about verb tenses...Again, I suggest you read up on basic grammar.
Now, I
will say that there are some clichés on Rob's list that are more
awful than others. But still, on this particular topic, I'll simply
say, "What Rob said!" (Thanks, Rob! :) )
I will
also say, as Rob also mentions, that it is possible to write
a good story that still contains one or more of the standard clichés
in Rob's list. Don't let anyone tell you otherwise. But still, it's
best to be aware of them, at least. And if you can invent a creative
way around them without significantly altering your story idea,
all the better!
And, of
course, there are some things on Rob's list upon which I feel a need
to expound, too...and there's one or two things that Rob didn't include,
as well. So, moving on...
Yes, I
know that just about every Transformers fan on the planet has created
their own Transformers character(s). And I know that many of
those people want to write fanfics about them. But you know what? For
a first fanfic, I really don't recommend it. Really! Write something
first that deals only with established characters. Since you don't have
to worry about fully developing an established character, you can concentrate
on the other aspects of writing a good fanfic. After you've written
a fic or two about established characters and you feel comfortable with
developing plots for them and with furthering their characterization,
then you can move on to your fan-created character(s).
After all,
in addition to worrying about all of the technical stuff when it comes
to fanfic writing, when you use a fan-created character you also
have to worry about developing that character from scratch and relating
him or her to the established characters in a believable, non-stereotypical,
and non-clichéd manner. Believe me, this is no small task. It
might be too big of a task for a very first fanfic. That is, of course,
your call to make. But in my experience, it's best to get a few other
fics under your belt before you tackle creating and developing a fan-made
character and inserting him/her into the established Transformers universe.
Without knowing what you're doing, you'll more often than not make your
character either a blatant self-insertion character or a very clichéd
character. (Again, refer to Rob's list of cliches for the types of overused
fan-made character types that pertain to the Transformers universe.)
Besides
which...Well, not to seem harsh, but here's a bit of insight into the
mind of your typical fanfic reader, Transformers or otherwise: They
don't care about your fan-created character(s)! Even if they're well-"drawn"
fan-made characters! Or at least, they don't care about him/her/them
nearly as much as you do! As a general rule, most fanfic
readers want to read stories about their favorite established
characters, not about fan-created characters that they don't know, especially
if said characters are not developed well by the author and/or not related
believably to the established characters.
So while
I would never advise you not to invent and/or write stories about your
own characters (After all, I'd be a hypocrite if I did!), I would
advise you to write stories exclusively about the established characters
first. Give your reader a chance to get to know your writing style and
your personal little spin on the Transformers universe and then
sic your fan-made character(s) on them. It generally works much better
that way, and you generally do a much more admirable service to your
fan-created characters if you perfect other facets of your writing before
you tackle the chore of properly developing a brand new character from
scratch.
You
might think it's a marvelous idea to write a crossover story between
Transformers and, say...Dragnet. But I guarantee you that not
many others will think it's a great idea. (Then again, I can just hear
Prowl saying, "Just the facts, ma'am...") Why sabotage your chances
of having a wide potential audience for your literary efforts? Why put
all of that effort into writing a story that, by its very nature, will
have more limited reader interest? If you do it, you're shooting yourself
in the foot, plain and simple.
Of course,
with the Transformers universe, there is a special case involved, given
that, for example, there are television series (Like G1 and the "Beast"
continuity, for instance) that are both Transformers and that are related
to one another but that use entirely different characters, settings,
plots, etc. Still, I wouldn't cross them. Not for a first fanfic, at
any rate. If nothing else, not all G1 Transformers fans like or know
anything about Beast Wars/Machines and not all "Beast" fans like
G1, though most at least know about G1. Again, you are limiting
your audience. Why would you want to do that? Even if you still want
to do it, I'd recommend holding off for a little while. Get a "small,"
easy, uncomplicated fanfic or two under your belt before you make yourself
worry about the complexities of reconciling two universes that, in some
cases, really don't mesh very well.
The main
reason you should stick to the canon rather than shattering it into
a zillion unidentifiable pieces is quite simple. Most Transfans
like the canon just as it is. For most Transfans the canon stories,
whether comic or cartoon, were what drew us into the fandom in the first
place. In some cases, it's what we grew up with. Sure, there may be
some things in the canon that a given fan doesn't like or some facet(s)
with which they do not agree. But for every one of those fans,
there are a host of other fans who do like that facet of the
canon.
So, for
example, if you decide you're going to write a story in which...say...G1
Megatron is brought back to life at the expense of Galvatron, or one
in which BW Dinobot survives the events in "Code of Hero," you might
please some people. But you will more than likely piss off a far greater
number of people. And if you don't piss them off, I guarantee you that
many readers will roll their eyes and think, "Great, another
jerk who thinks he/she can write TFs better than the canon writers."
And you know what? Maybe you can write better than the canon
writers. But...it's still the canon, poorly conceived or not! It's what
all of the fans know and what many of them love. Tamper with
it significantly and you will lose a good portion of your readership,
same as you would with a freaky crossover or with writing established
characters the wrong way. Why on Earth would you want to do that??
You're writing a story. You want others to read your story. So why alienate
them by flushing some aspect of the canon they all know and love down
the toilet? It's not ... repeat not! ... a wise idea.
No doubt,
if you've got it in your head that you want to write this really "kewl"
plot that tears asunder the canon, my sage advice is not going to deter
you from doing so. But...well, don't be surprised if you never hear
anything about your big, epic story if you do it! Chances are,
most readers won't get through it. If you want to put that much effort
into writing something that relatively few people will read all the
way through, that is, of course, your affair. More power to you. But
don't say I didn't warn you!
I am the
first to admit that huge, sweeping stories with a cast of thousands
and a dozen interrelated subplots are fun to write. I am also the first
to proclaim that, for a reader, they can be pure, unadulterated hell
to read if the author doesn't know what she/he is doing. Really! Most
(but not all, certainly) beginning writers don't have the technical
writing skills ... Yet! ... to write a huge story that will interest
a large percentage of the fandom. More than that, the writer will usually
realize that she/he doesn't have the necessary skills half-way through
the story and then lose interest in writing it and never finish it,
which is a shame. So my advice is to start small. Write some small-in-scale
fics to practice the technicalities of writing and then, when
you feel comfortable with all of the technicalities, move on to the
big epic story that's rattling around in your brain. Trust me, if it's
a good enough story, it's not going to go away while you work on the
more technical angle of your new craft by writing different, smaller
stories.
Now, there
are two good sources that I often use to help generate smaller story
ideas. (And, in fact, small stories are my favorite kind to write or
read! I've never felt the need to write an epic! Not for Transformers,
at least...)
One is
the cartoon episodes themselves. Watch a few of them. Ever notice how
the events in some of the stories would have to have an emotional impact,
large or small, on a given character but that that angle is never really
resolved or referenced in subsequent episodes? It happens often! How
did Optimus Primal feel about Dinobot's death? How did Rattrap
feel about Dinobot's death? What about Cheetor's reaction to the disappearance
of Tigatron and Airrazor? What in the world is the deal between Optimus
Primal and Depth Charge? How did Beachcomber feel after his little environmental
paradise was trashed in the "The Golden Lagoon?" What went through Tarantulas'
head when Blackarachnia defected to the Maximals for good? How did Gears
feel about being used in "Changing Gears?" How did Red Alert deal with
what he did in "Auto Berserk?" How the heck did Starscream get back
into Megatron's good graces after...say, "Countdown to Extinction?"
What made BW Rampage the psycho that he is? What were some of the Autobots'
emotional reactions to the fact that they nearly blew away the real
Optimus Prime in "A Prime Problem?" The list is endless.
So...Write
a story that deals with the impact of the events of a given episode
or one that sets up what will happen in an episode. This is called a
"tag fic." It's like writing the prologue or epilogue of an episode.
You deal with and detail the events just before or just after an episode.
These are among the easiest "small" story ideas to generate. (You could
perhaps do this with the comics, too. I don't know because I'm not a
comic fan.) Note that "small" does not mean ineffective, however. Small
stories are sometimes the most emotionally-wrenching ones ... or
the funniest ones! ... out there!
Another
source for smaller story ideas, for G1, is the Transformers Universe
entries. These are those nifty things that were published with the comics
which were essentially thumbnail sketches of each Transformers character.
They often detailed little personality quirks that sometimes did but
more often than not did not make it into the comic or cartoon.
(Soundwave's a blackmailer? Thundercracker is unsure of the Decepticon
cause? Huh?) Read through these sketches, and I guarantee that you'll
find angles to characters that you never considered before. Incorporate
those unexpected angles into a character by writing a fic about them.
Easy as can be! Well, sort of... :)
They are,
quite frankly, unnecessary at best, utterly confusing for your reader
at worst. Let's face it. You're writing a Transformers fanfic
here. There's a 99.9999% chance that anyone who reads your story is
going to be a fan of Transformers. Of those, at least 90% will know
that Ironhide and/or Quickstrike talks with an exaggerated Southern
drawl, that Waspinator has a fascination with the letter "z," and that
Blurr speaks very rapidly. It is necessary to get the characters'
speech patterns right, as I noted elsewhere. It is not
necessary to phonetically spell every word they say if they happen to
have a verbal quirk. Your reader will know that they have such a quirk
and, if the character's dialogue is written as it should be, they should
be able to "hear" it correctly, anyway, without any visual coaching
from the likes of you. So don't do it! Give your reader some
credit!
Editing
and Rewriting
Almost as important
as actually writing your story is cleaning it up afterwards. Editing a story
before it's put into the public eye is crucially important. It's also a decidedly
tedious process. No one likes to do it (Well, except for me, for some perverse
reason...), but it really has to be done. Here are some words of wisdom about
the general process:
Obviously,
there should be no grammar or spelling mistakes in your finished piece,
and careful editing will sniff them out, assuming that you've brushed up
on your grammar and you know how to use a dictionary. But beyond that, every
word and every sentence of every story should have a reason to exist. There
should be no superfluous words or sentences or entire rhapsodic paragraphs
that sound good but have no real bearing on any element or plot point in
the story. Every sentence should advance the plot, further define a character
or characters, or serve to make the story more "visual" for the reader through
judicious use of description, mood, and imagery. Nothing else should be
in your story. Furthermore, every sentence of the story should be analyzed
for the overall effect that it has on a reader. A sentence can be grammatically
correct and contain no spelling errors, but it can still be vague, confusing,
bland, overly-wordy, poorly structured, nonsensical, or too long. You should
read the finished first draft of your story as if you have never seen it
before, as if it was one that you just found on the Internet, and you should
judge it that way, with no preconceived notions about it. And you should
judge it harshly, as well. You should be your own harshest critic. Better
you than your reader, after all!
Why? Because
you're too close to your story. It's yours. You put hours, days, maybe weeks
or months of labor into it. It's your baby. You can't be completely objective
about it. You need the opinion of someone who can be objective. Why? Because
there will probably be elements of your story which seem fine to you but
which will sometimes seem unclear or very confusing or simply unnecessary
to someone else...and perhaps they're right and you're wrong. So, just as
you would never have major surgery without a second medical opinion, neither
should you throw a fanfic into the public eye without at least a second
editorial opinion.
Such programs
are only as good as the programmers who create them, and I have never seen
one that catches every possible kind of spelling and/or grammar error. By
all means use such programs as a first line of defense, as it were, as a
first editorial run-through of your draft. But please realize that
such programs can not replace a thorough line-by-line edit done by
a human being and preferably one done by more than one human being.
Seriously.
I don't think anyone's ever read a story where they thought, "Gee, this
is too over-rewritten." But I guarantee you that most people have
read a fanfic and thought, "Gee, I can't believe they spelled that word
wrong." The more you edit/rewrite, the better the chance that you will catch
all of the errors in your writing ... and everyone makes
errors; I don't care who you are ... and the better the chance
that you have written a concise, clear, yet interesting little (or not so
little) story. Sure, you can get obsessed with revisions, but in general
you'll come to a point where you're completely comfortable with your story,
without any reservations. But if there's any part of it about which you
have any doubts, any part of it with which you just aren't thoroughly happy,
then your story can probably benefit from still more rewriting. So do it!
So now you're all
ready to put your fanfic opus on display for the world to see. Hopefully, you've
taken some of my advice to heart and what you've written is a good fanfic. I
can't guarantee that it is, but you have crossed your first hurdle. You've completed
a fanfic and, if you followed my advice, you did it the right way. And
hopefully, you'll get some feedback about it. Maybe some of it will be glowing
praise, and there's nothing in the world quite like being glowingly praised
for a creative endeavor. But maybe some of your feedback will offer you some
constructive criticism. Don't be offended by it! Take what the person says into
consideration and, if the criticism seems justified to you, by all means work
on that aspect in your next fanfic.
Because I guarantee
you that, if you're like most fanfic writers, there will be a next fanfic. Fanfic
writing is a runaway train that's difficult to stop once you start it. And you've
got plenty of company on this particular train. So welcome aboard! Just stay
out of my reserved seat, and we'll get along just dandy...
For instance,
know what a Mary Sue is before you unleash another one on a weary,
jaded, fanfic-reading universe... If
you have no clue what I'm talking about, go to Google and search for something
like "fanfic Mary Sue," and you'll discover a wealth of information
about our old friend and why she's evil...
But beyond
that, I won't go into detail here about such clichés as they pertain
to writing Transformers fanfiction. Why? Because someone ... namely
Robert Powers ... has already done it! To read all about them, go to
this page on Rob's site: http://members.tripod.com/repowers/manic/writing2.html.
But then come back here because I'm not through with you yet...