The DOs and DON'Ts of Writing (Fanfiction)

I'm sure there are a ton of posts out there about writing, and all the different skills and specialties and things you need to become a peerless writer. They may also be better suited to telling you all these sorts of things than a humble fanfiction and blog author such as myself. However, in light of seeing numerous stories that simply fly in the face of reason with how poorly they can be done, I felt the need to discuss some dos and don'ts.

I hope you'll bear with me here, along with some of my various thoughts, and become a better writer in the end.


DON'T Write in Script Format

I really cannot stress enough how much this is a don't. Script writing has numerous disadvantages to it when it comes to writing. For one thing, you lose a lot of the description that regular prose provides. How is a character saying something? What are they looking like? Their actions in detail? More than that, by writing in a script form, even if you're describing things like action scenes, the problem that happens is this sudden jarring feeling when you read dialogue.

I mean, what reads better:

"You're not getting away!" Ash screamed, pelting down the path after his quarry.

OR

Ash: You're not getting away!

Ash pelted down the path after his quarry.

It should be obvious that the former reads better and allows you to picture the scene clearly. This is a huge part of why script writing, outside of actual scripts, is not accepted. It is seriously not your fault if your readers cannot handle real prose and want you to write in script. That speaks of laziness on their part. Not to mention, scripts just look messy and lose a lot of the emotion inherent in writing.

Don't do it.

DO Edit Your Work

The editing portion is the most important part of the writing process. Writing, planning, etc. All of those are important, but nothing is more vital than editing. During this process you can catch and fix mistakes, add in details that may be relevant, or take out that which might not be. It allows you to give your work a polished charm. I spend about one to two hours editing a single chapter on average, and that's after it goes through numerous changes.

Without the edit process, what could be a gem will stay a turd, really. And if you're not sure you can do it yourself, get a beta reader.

DON'T Listen to Your Readers

"Epicocity, this makes no sense! Your readers are the ones reading the story! Of course you should listen to them!"

This is the common kind of thing that I hear when I tell people not to listen to their readers, and it's utter bull. Your readers are reading the story, but they're reading it because you're writing it. The second you start listening to your readers and make it what they want it to be, you are no longer being the writer but a mere bystander in the process.

Whenever this comes up, I always point to the manga series Bakuman, wherein there is a moment that Mashiro and Takagi take all of their fan suggestions to write their newest chapter. Guess how it turns out? Crap. Utter crap. By listening to your readers and taking their ideas, the story you were writing no longer resembles what it should have been. I've written numerous things where readers have said "I hope you do this!" and I know full well I won't. If I lose them as a reader, that's their problem...because those who read on came because I was writing in the first place.

To that end, keep the existence of the author and don't change your story to fit the fans.

DO Plan Your Story

On the flip side of the above point is this. A huge way to deter your fans coming in and writing the story for you is to have everything planned out. From beginning to ending and everything in between. Obviously, details won't come right away, and nor should they. But by planning you give yourself complete control over your story.

From here on out, knowing every major thing, you can build a cohesive plot. For this, I want to shamelessly promote Love in the Time of Turbulence, my own fic. Within this fic, there is a specific moment that changes the entire story, as it were. Had I not planned this out, I couldn't have woven important details into the story. That would have made it so when the moment happened, instead of getting a genuine shock I would have gotten a WTF?!

Trust me, planning is the very best thing you can do. Without it, your readers will begin to tell, and those with brains will turn away from it, knowing you have no idea where you're going.

Show, DON'T Tell

This is pretty much the definitive advice I see everywhere, and it's so true.

Sure, sometimes telling is needed, but more often than not, you want to show things. Particularly when it comes to characters. If you come to me with a laundry list of everything a character does or dreams of or their personality, I'm going to be bored. There's nothing left to discover, and I didn't get to discover the character on my own. I feel less invested in the character and the journey they're about to have or what they'll contribute to the story.

This becomes invariably important in all aspects of your story. I find the best way to make it happen is gradual. If your characters are walking through a town, don't describe the town all at once, but as they experience it (after all, they shouldn't know anything about a new town). If you bring in a new character, show us how they're like with the way they react to things to paint the picture of them. Trust me, it works much better in the end.

Likewise, avoid too much focus on clothes unless it's important to the plot (like if clothes are what gives them power or something). Most people don't care as long as they can visualize. Give them enough of that and send them on their way. Only include important details.

It's a long road to master this particular thing, but once you have, it'll read so much better because of it.

DO the Characters Right

This is something that applies more towards fanfiction, but I think it's still something worth discussing it.

I find a lot of fanfics and their authors have more trouble with the concept of keeping characters in-character than they should. The sad part is that it's really not that hard. So many fanfics that I read make Ash into some sex-crazed dude who loves attention from women, and don't get me started on the cliché Smart!Ash and Aura!Ash fics. These bastardize the character and change him from what he is.

While some individuals who clearly don't know a good story if it would bite them in the ass might think this is okay or good and eat it all up, it's no longer the character that you're writing about, but your own creation. That's right. He's no longer Ash Ketchum.

See, when we write a fanfiction, we are given these characters and entrusted them, to keep them the characters we know and love. To that end, we need to endeavor to keep them in character no matter what. A lot of writers forget this. You want to change the fundamentals of the character? Go write original fiction and build your own world. To help with this, just watch/read/play the source material. That alone should give you enough to move on with.

This can even apply to original fiction, though there it's more a question of creating your characters and making sure they act the way they would act in any given situation.

DON'T Add Pointless Things.

Everyone loves filler, don't they? Of course not! Hell, filler is one of the things most complained about in anime, be it Pokemon or any other series. Guess what? Filler isn't needed in writing either. Are nice moments of interaction between characters a good thing? Hell yes! Include them! But don't make them take something over without a point.

You don't want to add a character whose sole purpose is "hey, go here". Especially giving them a name or profession...that's boring and a waste of my time when I could have looked at a map. You really don't want pointless clutter to fill the page and leave your readers walking away going "that was pointless". To remedy this, I endeavor to have something important, even if it may not seem it at first, happen every single chapter.

"Please, Epicocity, you did the same thing with that Haku fellow in Love in the Time of Tropics!" Ah, but I didn't! Why? Because Haku brought them to a specific location they weren't asking about, leading to the introduction of Miss Akela, an important character for the future. And that's what I mean about not adding useless things: have the small lead to the big.

Essentially, it plays into a lesson on subtlety. The subtler you are, the more details can seem innocuous that aren't, but never for a second make it so your reader feels like nothing of any note happened in a chapter. For examples of stories that, sadly, do this, just ask. I don't feel like dragging any through the mud here.

DO Make Dialogue Natural

When people talk in real life, we don't talk like a perfect grammar machine. And usually conversations have a flow, with one speaking and the other responding. This is how dialogue should read in a story as well. When you write dialogue, never write it like you would write the rest of your story. Focus on making it as natural as possible.

I find the best way to accomplish this is acting out your scenes. Not only does it give you a feel for how the characters are feeling, but it also gives you the flow of the words, sentences and who is taking part in the conversation. On top of this, it also allows you to trim the fat from a conversation so that you don't include overly useless kinds of dialogue. Maybe you'll seem silly acting it out, but trust me, it works. Heck, for a major scene I was screaming my lungs out to act the dialogue. It turned out to be called "one of the most emotional scenes".

So, make sure your dialogue actually feels like people talking. Your readers will thank you later.

DON'T Assume Anything

This is less about writing and more about the individual. Don't think you're the best. Don't think you're unique. Don't think you're the special. Don't think you're entitled to reviews or views, or even that those 100,000 views you see actually mean anything (they could just as easily mean someone who clicked on your story and backed out in seconds).

Most importantly, though, don't assume you'll get better. Rather, don't assume your readers will wait long enough. The first chapter, the first lines, is the first and last time you'll have to convince your readers to read this. They don't care if you've suddenly become Tolkien in Chapter 10, because they won't make it that far if Chapter 1 sucks. So put everything into it right away to write well, not thinking it'll be better later. And if it's not good...well, then hope for positivity, but don't assume you'll get it. Instead, hope for the negative review that will make you grow.

Conclusion
In general, this is pretty much all I have for this particular segment. There are a lot more things to discuss that I could bring up, but I'll share that another day. For now, though, I hope these tips help you to become a better writer. Oh, and for fanfiction writers, DO post on fanfiction.net. It's a far better site for feedback than Archive of Our Own and *shudders* Wattpad. That said, thanks for reading, and leave a comment below or on my Twitter!

Dare to Be Silly,
Epicocity