1001 things you don't do in a fanfic

I write pretty lengthy Author's Notes myself. But usually they include important information, like resources I used in research, or repsonses to a pretty popular question. They also include a pretty good update on how things are going for me writing the story and when the readers should be able to expect my next installment.

One of my A/N's might look like this:

Thanks for all the reviews everyone, I really appreciate it. This is the next chapter, but you knew that already, in this chapter you can expect a little bit of smut, but it's been sensored. If you're interested in the full version ask me and I'll link you to my page.

A lot of poeple have been asking me if Danny and Lindsey are going to have a baby in this story, no they are not. Sorry if I did anything to make you think that they were.

Lindsey's brother, my OC Joshaua, was revealed to be Autistic in the last chapter. There will be a lot of information about that in this chapter and I took most of that from research on the sites www.wherekathyresearches.net and www.researchstation.com as well as from interviewing a local doctor in my area, via telephone. If you would like any more information or have any questions please feel free to PM me.

Since it took me about two weeks to write this chapter (it's about 18 pages long) we'll say you can expect the next one in the same amount of tim. I will, however, try my hardest to get it out sooner.

Thanks for reading and all of your reviews.

-LLK

That, of course, was a completely fabricated A/N. I am not writing any CSI NY pieces at the moment. However, that's a good example of what I'd be putting before my chapters if I was. I know it's lengthy but it makes me feel like I'm establishing a bit of a bond with my readers.
 
My pet peeve is when people don't punctuate dialogue properly. For example,

"Hey, Delko" said Ryan.
and
"Hey, Delko." Said Ryan.

ARE BOTH WRONG. It's such a tiny thing that makes the story infinitely easier on the eyes. If someone doesn't punctuate their dialogue properly, I can't finish reading, because I'm so focused on the errors that I don't take in any of the plot.

Nobody can predict how certain characters will act under certain pressures, but I'm pretty sure Calleigh doesn't crawl into a fetal position, sucking her thumb, after she's been hit. And have you ever seen her being overly affectionate on the show? No, she's not going to say, "I've loved you for eleventy billion years omg!!!" to anyone.

Incest is a big no-no. "Twincest" is even worse, especially since none of the characters (on Miami, at least; not a huge fan of the others) actually have twins. Follow this basic rule and we'll be friends: don't make shit up.

I'm going to be completely honest. I don't read A/Ns longer than 3 lines, sorry. Nothing personal, I'm just not interested. If people have questions pertaining to or are confused about a major part of your story, you can probably make it clear in the update, instead of explaining it explicitly. And I know ^^that's a fabricated A/N, but it's Lindsay, not Lindsey. Not trying to be rude or anything, but we were just talking about it above so I thought I'd point it out.
 
I opted for NY because it's not something people can expect any stories from me in, at least not for a long time.

I knew that... Lindsay. Lindsey Willows (Catherine's daughter from Vegas is Lindsey so...) I own that mistake, sorry. I'm just used to writing it Lindsey. Not that it makes it any better. I shouldn't have made the slipup.

Yeah... my A/N's are too long but I really just can't help it. It's my way of doing things, and I disagree there are some things that I feel are pertinent to be put into them that can't go into the story.

As for punctuating dialogue... that really urks me. And the worst part is that I have a coauthor who is terrible at it and insists on changing all of my properly gramatized(is that a word?) dialoge to an incorrect form. I've explained the rules several times and it just doesn't get through. Oh well.

Oh well.
 
No worries. I'm pretty sure I've made the same mistake with Yelina (for the longest time, I really did think it was Yelena, but I don't really write her into my fics).

I'm sure there are people who read A/Ns to the letter. I'm just not one of them.

I don't think readers should be asking questions like, "Are Danny and Lindsay gonna have a baby?" in the first place. Does it really make a difference? Are you going to stop reading the story if the answer is no? Asking that question just sounds a little stupid to me, and pretty much forces the author to answer the stupid question with a boring answer. I'm just taking your question as an example, of course. This applies to all questions in the form, "Are they gonna/Is there gonna be/Will they _______." Maybe you should read the story and find out!
 
somethingsdont said:

"Hey, Delko" said Ryan.
and
"Hey, Delko." Said Ryan.

ARE BOTH WRONG. It's such a tiny thing that makes the story infinitely easier on the eyes. If someone doesn't punctuate their dialogue properly, I can't finish reading, because I'm so focused on the errors that I don't take in any of the plot.
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What's the correct grammar? Is it supposed to be "Hey,Delko",said Ryan? I know there's a comma there somewhere but I can never remember if the word after is supposed to be capitalized or not. It's wierd though, I opened a Word document but the grammar thingy didn't say there was anything wrong (but I know the period isn't right in the quote).

Personally I do think it should appear as though some effort went into catching mistakes but I see no point in getting too upset if there are just a couple minor ones. Sometimes I find a friendly way to point them out, especially spelling stuff.

Re replies: I often have trouble putting my thoughts into words or knowing what to say so I'm often only able to leave a short review. I do try to tell the author that I don't get my thoughts about stories into words all that well all the time though, and I *do* try to mention some things I liked, so it's not a total waste.
 
It should be "Hey, Delko," said Ryan. with the comma inside the quotation marks.

MS Word 2007 will give an error for the second sentence (since Said Ryan. is not a complete sentence), but not for the first one, even though grammatically, it's incorrect. Word grammar check is not flawless, as it's impossible to program every aspect of every possible combination of words.

I do get picky about the little things, because so many people call themselves "writers" even though they really can't write. You don't see random people walking around claiming to be painters or musicians if they can't paint or play an instrument.

I know that someone's going to want to refute with, "fan fiction is srs biznis!!" I don't care if it's meant to be for shits and giggles, I think people who want to venture into fan fiction should brush up on their grammar. Poor grammar on a writer is like a photographer without his or her camera: he/she can see the beautiful images in his/her head but cannot transcribe it into something tangible. Same thing with writing. You can have the best ideas in the world, but with sloppy grammar, your story isn't going to take off.
 
^ I agree with Mel (can i call you that?)

Another thing- (Trying not to get in trouble here)Is making the characters so horny all the time. I can't say how many fics i have read with characters making out in the lab/ the showers/ broom cupboard wherever. In my opinion it's just ooc.

I agree with the characteristics post: If i had no idea what Mac looked like I would think he had green, grey, blue and hazel eyes. WTF? I always thought his eyes were blue.

Angst- If your not sure about it. Don't do it. Bad angst is not as bad as bad smut but is still annoying. And don't turn characters emo and having them cut themselves. It's just ooc

Another thing is ENOUGH ACCIDENTAL PREGNANCIES! For god sakes, these are responsible adults we are writing about. By now they should have learned about safe sex.

And please lay off the completely cliched stuff e.g. Danny proposed to Lindsay and just as the clock chimed New Years there lips met *vomits* Nauseating.

And another thing stop fricking make them talk openly about the fact they are going away to Make Love. OOC!!!!!!

Try to keep in character. PLEASE!!!!
 
Drat, I was right with my first guess but I thought again and posted the incorrect one.

*nod* I do think stories should look like some effort was put into it...no one likes poorly written stuff. Obviously if the beta also misses something it's not the writer's fault but a writer should make every effort to ensure everything is correct or as correct as possible.

Another 'thing' of mine...anyone else occasionally find themselves scratching their heads at odd pairings? I won't go much into it cause it's not the ship thread but I can't help being like "wow" at some of them. I do say if a writer can somehow make the pairing convincing while staying in character, more power to them lol.
 
The number one piece of advice I can think of to give fic writers: RESEARCH your subject!

Basically, just know what the hell you're writing about. Because if you don't know what you're writing about and screw up on an important fact/detail, especially in a case file fic, at least one of your readers will catch you. I pretty much promise you that. And then, for the rest of the story, they'll be scratching their head saying, "What the...?" or just give up altogether. I've done it, I'm sure just about everyone else has, too. So, yeah, that's my biggest pet peeve in reading fics.

Also, don't jump back and forth between narratives in stories. It's really hard to keep up with a fic if it's constantly skipping from first person, to third person and back again. Not to mention, it totally messes with the flow of the story.

And for the love of God and all that is good, DO NOT include personal Author's Notes in the story's text! A little A/N at the beginning or end is okay, but seeing this kind of crap: Greg sat down on the couch and handed the box of cookies to Nick [A/N: OMG! I loooove Oreos!!]. Then he flipped on the TV and noticed it was already set to his favorite show. [A/N: Dontcha think Greg wuld bee a total Grey's Anatomy fan?! McDreamy is sooo hawt!]

Yeah, stuff like that makes me want to strangle kittens.
 
I have a suggestion: since this thread is called "1001 things you don't do in a fanfic", why don't you add numbers before writing your ideas? This way we'll have , in the end, the 1001 things.
It's just a thought of course not an order :lol:
 
I was curious as to where the numbers went, I noticed that they started but didn't go on.
I agree that grammer, spelling and general writing style are important, and as I'm bad at spelling and have the occasional grammer issue, I highly recommend finding a beta or at least a peer editor. Hand it off to a friend and say 'is this readable? Is my grammer okay? Is my spelling alright?' if you can't find a friend to do that, I think there's a beta volunteer thread on this board.
Please people! Format your stories! when a person speaks there should be a new paragraph, when a thought or idea changes there should be a new paragraph. Letting the story run on and on as one long paragraph is just annoying as hell!
 
I agree whole heartedly with:

1. 14 year olds writing smut...nothing grosses me out more

2. Stories that are nothing but porn, and I do mean PORN.
You are more than welcome to write it, but as soon as I
figure out that your story is just pornographic f**king
I'm hitting the X in the top right corner.

3. Stories rife with spelling errors, especially character
names. I'm okay with a minor misspelling (Yelena vs
Yelina) but major ones tick me off (Callie vs Calleigh).

4. Stories where the characters are written so far out of
character that they are unrecognizable. This just tells
me the author has no concept of who the character is.

5. I don't think anyone has mentioned this...but stories
that drag on and on and on...or parts of stories that
seem to drag on. One author that writes for a ship
does this, and not only do the stories drag on, but so do
parts of them. Its like a bad movie that won't end. And
while I'm at it, angst filled stories where the angst
never ends and all sequels are filled with angst. I
don't mind angst, but come on...how much bad s**t can
happen to one character!

6. My pet peeve...authors that post stories in chapters,
but NEVER finish them. Sucks the big one to be left
hanging. Or, authors that take MONTHS to put out the
next chapter. I certainly understand being busy, but
when it happens I often have to reaquaint myself with a
story before reading the new chapter. I really wish
authors would finish writing stories before beginning to
post them.
 
I'd like to say somethings about canon. 1st, I consider fanfiction a/u. It's a place to play, what if? 2nd, if we kept to canon only, there wouldn't be any slash, and wouldn't that be a shame? ;) And 3rd, if the darn show can't keep track of it's own canon then how the heck are we? You only need to look at the 'official' website to see my point. :rolleyes:

7. Writers who feel the need to get defensive. I've noticed this trend in slash fics over at ff.net. The author states the pairing and then says something to the effect, don't like it don't read it. Even if I did like the pairing, I wouldn't read the story. I know there are people out there who are ignorant, but still the defensive tone irks me.
 
Once a while ago a ff writer that I both admired and respected a great deal and ended up developing a fanfiction comrodary with a while later wrote a slash fic. Now that's not the point here. Shim wrote a phrase similar to "If you don't like it go get your bible and read that instead..." and some other things that I don't so much remember in the summary. Well, I PM'd the person and told them that though I don't particularly enjoy reading slash it has nothing to do with my Christian background, which I don't hide. And that I found that deeply offensive. I generally find slash fic to be of a lower quality when considering characterization, plot, and mechanics. It's not that there aren't some amazing slash fics out there, there are, just an overwheming majority aren't as well written. That's why I generally don't read slash... but if someone I know to be a good writer turns out a slahs fic, I eagerly read it. Homoseuality is not offensive to me and I do go to church on Sundays.

So yeah... that whole defensiveness thing can be taken WAY too far and can end up bening insulting to someone else.

8. I know this has been said, but I'm going to bring it forward to the list. Writers who threaten not to update again util they have a certain number of reviews. Nothing makes me want to scream more.

9. Another thing that really bugs me, but you can take it off the list if you want, because it's in regard to the readers is the following. I can not stand it when someone alerts and favorites my story but doesn't leave a review. I mean, it's not hard to press the review button a comment. A simple "I love how you characterized Nick," or "Great story so far but I think it's kinda jumping around a lot. Maybe you should try sections." How hard is that? I love that the people liked my story, but I want to know WHY!

10. Thought of somehting else too... people who leave short one or two word reviews. "Aww" or "xD" or "Awesome" aren't reviews. Yes, they make the review count of the story go up, but that's not quality. Seriously it's not hard to write three lines saying what you liked, what exactly was cute or awesome. Or three lines saying what you didn't like... seriously. Have enough respect for the writer to give them some decent feedback.
 
And another thing stop fricking make them talk openly about the fact they are going away to Make Love. OOC!!!!!!
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Did you mean they shouldn't talk about it? If yes, I disagree. I personally feel it is important for two consenting adults to talk about their relationship before making it... physical. I don't mean "Oh I love you more than I could ever say ___ I have been saving myself for the one I love most in the world... you" and such OOC drabble but the whole 'this is the first time we are making love' thing, must be apparent. It is in real life.

But if the sex isn't meaningful; a quick stumble into bed with an OC, talk isn't really necessary. 'Cept maybe a mumbled 'shut up'.


Angst stories: They should, in my eyes, not be longer that 4/5 sections unless you add some relatively happy twists into the mix. Stop the readers from turning suicidal. Maybe, in a shipper sense, an unrequited love angst... but mix in some funny moments from the other characters.

Authors that post in chapters then NEVER finish them
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:eek: *hides*

Guilty as charged. Yes it's annoying, I know. I'm working on it. But I've done it so I can't really complain.



11. People who write 'sorry if this sucks' in their A/N. Does that make me want to read your story? Err, no. So go gain some confidence then try posting. Or just write, 'this is my first fic' so people know.
 
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