Now, now…fanfic (slash or not) does have one very good purpose. It provides endless fodder for internet MiSTings. Some of this stuff is simply priceless as raw material for Mike/Joel and the Bots.
I detect a certain disdain for fanfiction from some posters, and while I certainly agree that much of it fully deserves ridicule, not all of it does. Here’s an interesting article that examines the role of fanfiction in popular culture, which might be of interest to the people reading this thread.
As for fanfiction based on so-called “children’s characters” - while some media creations are obviously designed to appeal to children, many have a surprising number of adult fans, too. Is it wrong for an adult fan to write a piece intended for the other ADULT fans of that creation? Not in my opinion, but I DO feel that those authors should be providing enough information about the contents of their story so that parents will realize that the subject matter of that fic may not be suitible for their children, regardless of the fact that it features a so-called “children’s character”.
Eh…I dunno, I write a lot of Star Wars smut. Not slash-although I’m part of a mailing list and we some slash writers there. And some of it’s pretty decent.
But then, it’s Star Wars, so who cares? It’s not like it’s Barney or whatever.
Although I did see a really bad one-Leia/Jaina. For those of you who don’t read the novels, Jaina is Princess Leia’s and Han Solo’s daughter. ICK ICK ICK!!!
Incest slash is BAD BAD BAD.
And then there was the Jar Jar slash…shudder
Actually, that’s a good example of the problem, Guin. Some people undoubtably WOULD argue that STAR WARS is “kid’s stuff,” and that the material you’re writing is inappropriate because there are plenty of 7-year olds who are rabid STAR WARS fans. Heaven forbid you should write something they shouldn’t be reading!
Who gets to decide what counts as “kiddie fare”? Barney - sure, most people would agree on that one. But what about comic book characters? Many people seem to believe that all comic books are "kiddie stuff’ - nevermind the existence of series like “The Dark Knight Returns,” “Watchman,” and “Maus”. Is Batman a “kiddie character”? What about animation - are ALL cartoons a priori “kiddie fare”? Many people seem to think so - never mind “Princess Mononoke” or (gulp) “Fritz the Cat”.
Ditto the objections to slash - one person’s “horrible smut that’s a complete distortion of the original characters” may be another person’s “masterpiece, with wonderful characterization, even BETTER than the original!”. Different people have different tastes.
That’s why I take the approach that honest labeling and rating of stories is better than saying that some types of fanfiction shouldn’t be written. Let each reader (or for minors, each reader’s parents) decide for himself what is or is not good reading. Anything else is treading on dangerous ground.
(It’s also why I’m grateful I write Silmarillion fanfiction - J. R. R. Tolkien’s magnum opus doesn’t hold much appeal to the pre-teen crowd!)
Sorry about the wierd coding - not sure what happened there!
Oh, and I never want to see Jar-Jar slash… Some things are just too traumatic to contemplate!
Well… feel free to recommend any fanfics. Usually, back when I was interested, I’d go looking for a few stories online, and I’d find so much crap and so few good stories that I’d become very discouraged. It stopped being fun and became quite the chore.
Well, SPOOFE, the only fandom I know well enough to recommend fics in is J. R. R. Tolkien fandom. If you’re interested in that, I’d first recommend checking outThe Henneth Annun Story Archive . It’s an archive created by a Tolkien fanfiction writer’s group, and stories have to be recommended and voted on by the members - no self-posting is allowed. So the real garbage that shows up at fanficion.net never makes it onto the site. Almost all the stories there are very good, and they’re quite diverse. I have several stories of my own posted at that site (under the pen name Ithilwen), as well as at fanfiction.net - but as I am only writing stories based on the Silmarillion, my stuff is only worth checking out if you enjoy the Sil.
Perhaps people who write for other fandoms can recommend good stories/sites for their own fandom? Come on, good fanfic writers! Stand up and be counted!
[sub]I think my fanfic is pretty good. :
:[/sub]
I have a pretty narrow focus… Buffy fanfic, mostly Willow stories. Here’s a smattering of website/authors that people seem to feel are top in their class:
If the idea of Willow and Giles doesn’t totally freak you out, read any of Q/Monique’s stories on her site… I STRONGLY recommend “Out of Time.” For a good laugh, read “Sometimes the Bear Gets You.”
On
this site (look mostly in the “Love Bites” section) look for Tisienne Blue, Mystra, Medea, Paula (her “Stone Circle” series is really, really good), Ruby, and T.C.
Inell does a fabulous job of writing Willow, esp. Willow/Angel; her site is here…
The Wicked Sluts, singularly and together, write some very interesting stuff.
Saber Shadowkitten is also really good. Read her Abracadabra series and Elaisias (both under W/A).
And finally, for Angel slashiness, almost all the stories here are good.
That help? 
For one thing, most SW fan fic is rated. If it’s smutty, it’s marked as such.
Also, any parent who lets their seven year old surf the net on their own…
That is the problem - too many parents DO let their children surf the web by themselves, confident that it’s up to the rest of the world to make the Internet “family-friendly”. And these folks get into a huff when they discover it isn’t. To them, the fact that STAR WARS fanfiction (and for that matter, most other fandoms’ fanfictions as well) carry ratings is of no importance whatsoever, since there’s nothing to stop their child from clicking on an NC-17 Jar Jar/ Anakin Skywalker slash piece (except parental involvement - but that would take EFFORT).
So, Guin, care to recommend any good STAR WARS fanfics? SPOOFE is looking for some good reading…
You can do a search at the latter-it’s a mult-genre fan fiction site.
I know of NC17 sites, but I don’t know if I should post them here.
Looks like someone hasnt heard of furry sex fanfiction!
Well, I’d have to recommend many of the works by the featured authors at http://www.outpost-daria.com/fan_fiction.html. I especially like the work of Yui Daoren. Although I personally don’t care so much for some of the extended “series’” of fanfic of the other authors. But that’s just me.
Also, I’m reading a multipart Rescue Rangers/Secret of NIMH crossover fanfic called “Out of Range,” although I won’t post a link to it because it DOES include some VERY mature subject matter. (And because I don’t want to risk luring Disney lawyers anywhere NEAR it) Although it’s only “incidentally” mature, to paraphrase George Peppard. And it IS essential to the plot. I certainly recommend it, even if it does deviate quite a bit from the show and film it’s derived from…perhaps that’s one of the reasons I like it so much, as a matter of fact.
Ranchoth