To give back to all the fantastic writers on here, and specifically, those that follow me, I'm going to be sharing writing tips that have helped me on my journey. There will be some content from my blog shared in this book (but you should check out...
Welcome back, friends, to part two of How to Write Fanfiction That Doesn't Suck; I trust you all had an enjoyable week and have some fun plans for the weekend. I'm sure you've been dying with anticipation for this post, and now, you shall wait no longer!
Let's do a quick review of what we discussed last week before diving into this weeks topics, shall we?
Fandom: Pick what you think you will stick with; there are thousands to choose from, and some things to think about when making your selection.
OC vs. EC: We touched on the pros and cons of Original Characters and Established Characters, how they fit into your story, and how you will not be able to please everyone.
Universe: There are three main ones you need to know:
1) Original
2) Alternate
3) Crossover
It's important to pick one (maybe two) and run with those for the whole of your story, as this will help you promote it correctly.
If you haven't read the first one in this series, I recommend going back and doing so you can get a holistic idea of what I'm talking about.
To Trope, or not to Trope...
Tropes. You either love them or hate them. This is mainly due to the sheer amount of crappy writing out there that use these things. Love triangles, ugly duckling syndrome, vanilla villains who are so bad they give villainy a bad name, and the hero who saves the world from certain doom. The list goes on and on.
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Please don't misunderstand, tropes aren't some evil thing that you should avoid at all costs (unless it's that thing above *shivers*), they can actually be useful at times and if done in the right way because readers will be familiar with them.
Let's take vanilla villains; I have one in my Tales of the Fourth Age series named Dalion. He's a bad guy; a villainous villain who revels in villainy. I show him with hardly any personality, and I kill him off pretty quickly (#spoilers). I have a second one named Lord Falcon who also enjoys villainy. He dies fairly quickly, too.
Are you picking up what I'm putting down?
I'm using the trope of an overly villainous villain to hide what's really going on, but they are not the stars of my story; it's a tool to throw readers off the trail. I take something that the reader is familiar with and use that against them.
Readers are so used to seeing tropes in writing that they tend to not second guess that something else is really going on. This works to your advantage as a writer, and you can leverage that to enhance your stories. Just remember, it happens to you, too.
A Little Bit of Everything
You should spend time thinking about what you want to include in your story, such as romance, thriller-like moments, horror, adventure, wonder, etc. Did you know it was possible to have all of those in the same book? The same chapter?
