How to Write a Good Fanfiction

How to Write a Good, Proper Fanfiction
By: Jennifer Gay

A) Introduction
        1) About Myself
        2) About this Article
B) Getting Started
        1) Picking the Subject(s)
        2) Having an Idea
        3) Planning Out What You Want
C) Proper Spelling and Grammar Rules
        1) Spelling
        2) Grammar
D) Layout of the Story
1) Paragraphing and Formats
        2) When to End the Chapter/Start another Chapter
E) Copyrighting Laws and You
        1) Plagiarizing
F) Notes Section
G) Thank You Section

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A) Introduction

        1) About Myself

Hello, my name is Jennifer Gay (AKA: YukiMizuno here on dA and Sage of Dorks on FF.Net).  I’ve been writing fanfictions since I was in the Seventh Grade at the age of twelve.  I’ve improved a lot since then and I still want to continue writing not only fanfictions, but my own original stuff later on.  I think fanfictions are just little baby steps into writing your own original, creative stuff.

        2) About this Article

This article that you are about to read will discuss on how to write and plot out a decent piece of Fanfiction…  And that’s basically it.

B) Getting Started

        1) Picking the Subject(s)

Okay, the first thing you would have to do is ask yourself, “Which subject do I want to write about?”.  It can be about anything, from books/mangas/comic books to movies, to TV shows and cartoon/anime.  For me, that would be the cartoon show Ed, Edd, ‘n’ Eddy; it’s almost like a “comfort zone” for me.  And always choose something that you would feel comfortable writing about.  There is also another option that you can come up with; crossovers.  A crossover in Fanfiction is when you put two or more things together and put them all in one situation.  For example, the cartoon show Invader Zim and the animated movie The Nightmare Before Christmas would be a very good crossover to do.

        2) Having an Idea

Okay, now that you have a subject to write about, the next thing you would do is to gain an idea on what you want your story to be about.  You must also determine what kind of story you want to do.  For example, will your story be Romantic?  Adventurous?  Or maybe a Horror/Mystery?  You must determine this before actually thinking about how you want it to be romantic, adventurous, or mysterious.  Then, you have to think of a situation that you want the characters of your chosen subject/story to be in or something that you want to happen to them in your story.  For example, in my story, Rhapsody in Blue, the beginning of the story happened right after the last episode of the 5th season of Ed, Edd, ‘n’ Eddy and a few weeks after the ending of the Sailor Star season of Sailor Moon.

         3) Planning Out What You Want

Okay, now that you have your idea, how will the story go in your mind and on your paper?  Well, the first thing that I would do is write a little summary on how your story will go for the first few chapters.  For example, if your story were about Ed, Edd, ‘n’ Eddy and Final Fantasy VII, write down how the Ed’s (or the FFVII Crew, your choice) would get to the Final Fantasy VII world (or the Cul-De-Sac, depending on if you did the FFVII Crew).  After that, you must plan out what they will do next.  But all of this is up to your imagination, not mine!  It would also help you to do charts on characters that will be in your story and such things like that that you can think of.

C) Proper Spelling and Grammar Rules

         1) Spelling

Please, I’m not an English teacher by any means, but you must learn the basic rules of spelling, when you either writing or typing.  If you are writing a hard-to-spell word on a piece of notebook paper, try to spell it to the best of your spelling ability.  Or, if you have a dictionary nearby, use the dictionary to look it up.  And, when you finally have the access to your typing computer, use some sort of spell check to check and see if it’s right or not.

        2) Grammar

Another very important thing about writing and typing is grammar.  It is sort of harder to understand grammar than it is to spell. So, I’ll give you some of my tips that I use when writing in a grammar sort of sense.  First off, if there is a character talking, always put quotation marks around the saying, and it must always be “double quote” quotation mark.  Plus, on the same note, it the character is thinking, always put a ‘single quote’ quotation mark around the thought, and it must always be italicized when typing, or underlined when writing it down on notebook paper.  This is the only major problem I see sometimes when reading other fanfics…  Besides capitalization, which is a shame sometimes…

D) Layout of the Story

        1) Paragraphing and Formats

Paragraphing is really simple.  All you have to do here is make sure that you have about four or five, medium length sentences in every paragraph that you do.  If it is any shorter, that’s still okay, just make them longer sentences.  The reason for this is so that your story doesn’t look so scattered or bunched up throughout the current chapter you are working on. But, this rule does not directly reply to people talking and such.

        2) When to End the Chapter/Start another Chapter

When to end the chapter and start another one all depends on you and how you want your story to go.  But, if you’re indecisive on how to end your chapter, here are a couple of tips.  You can always leave you audience with a suspenseful cliffhanger, which is ending the chapter at a climax of your chapter.  Or… you can end it any way you want to end it.  It’s your decision!

E) Copyrighting Laws and You

        1) Plagiarizing

You must never</i> plagiarize someone else’s work (unless if it’s a Novelization of a book… but that’s something slightly different)!  It is their own idea and, if you wish to use it, ask them before doing so.  And if you do use something that you did not think of, please credit them for the thing or idea that you referenced.  I would usually put a disclaimer in the first chapters of my stories to indicate what I do and do not own.

F) Notes Section

The main reason that I made this article/tutorial is because I see plenty of writers that do not do some things listed here and do some of the mistakes that I’ve pointed out.  Plus, I’ve felt like writing something different than a Fanfic for a while.  Also note that some things here can possibly help you write something original.

G) Thank You Section

Since I had no help in writing this, I thank no one!

“…”

Okay, maybe I can thank the people that review my stories, since they do help me out a lot in writing a few things in my stories, both on DeviantART and Fanfiction.net.  I also want to thank my friends in real life for supporting me in what I do.  Ronnie, Mary, Jessica, Brittney and company… you guys rock!

This article/tutorial was made by Jennifer Gay (AKA: YukiMizuno and Sage of Dorks).  Do not use this on another website without my permission.  Thank you!