Tips for Young Fan Fiction Writers

Before we start, a quick disclaimer: This isn't meant to be hate-filled or confrontational in any way. Like I said, I was a young fan fiction writer once, and I did a lot of the things I'm about to go over. My goal isn't to shame, but rather to teach. By following these tips, I hope to help you become a better writer.

With that in mind, here are 4 of the most glaring, yet most easily fixable, mistakes I see young writers make.

1. Foreign Languages

This is something I see a lot among anime (and recently) Kpop fan fiction writers. You know a few words or phrases in that language (maybe you're studying it to get closer to your faves), so you decide to sprinkle them into your fan fiction to sound more authentic. Nothing wrong with that, right?

Except there is. You can't assume that your readers have the same grasp of the language as you do. Adding in a bunch of foreign words (or, as I saw one bold writer do, having a whole conversation in a foreign language) will only confuse your reader. Confusion leads to anger. Anger leads to hate. Hate leads to leaving your story. Adding translation won't help either, no matter where you do it. If you put it next to the foreign word, it breaks up the flow of the story. If you make a glossary at the end of the chapter, now your readers have to keep flipping back and forth.

As a general rule of thumb, only use a foreign phrase if there is no direct translation for the phrase in English. For example: honorifics, like -san or -ssi; slang, like daebak or dattebayo; food, like teppanyaki or ddubokki. If you mean yes or no, just write yes or no.

2. Surprise Pregnancy

In the event a guy learns his SO is pregnant, his immediate reaction will probably not be acceptance and joy. Unless they have been actively trying for a baby up to this point, he will freak out. He will have doubts. He will wonder if he's ready for this. Of course, depending on his personality, he might not outwardly show this panic: He might shut down, he might pretend to be happy, he might over-prepare. Even if you've been dreaming of having a baby since the day you hit puberty, when it actually happens, it's scary.

Don't shy away from this, writers. It's suspense, it's drama, it's conflict, and even the shortest and fluffiest stories need just a touch of conflict. A story needs to earn its happy ending, whether it's two characters finally having an honest talk, finding a missing shoe just before curtain call, or a man finally coming to grips with his own insecurities.

3. The Honeypot Effect

Please, please, please, stop making grown men blush and stutter at the sight of your OCs. I'm not saying that grown men don't get flustered, because they do and it's amazing. But it's in a different way from prepubescent boys, and again, it depends on his personality. For example, Sherlock Holmes is not going to dissolve into a red-faced, stammering mess at the sight of a girl in a towel.

"But love can change people, can't it?" Okay, sure. There are plenty of instances of love making someone a better person. But it doesn't make them a completely different person. The fundamental traits that make up who a character is tend to stick around. Howl from Howl's Moving Castle ended up less vain at the end, but still vain. Zuko from A:TLA started out angry and driven and ended up... slightly less angry but still pretty driven. So make sure that when you say you're writing a character, you actually write that character.

4. Specific Reader-Inserts

Like the name gives away, the point of a reader-insert is that they are a blank slate for the reader to envision themselves in. The ideal RI story should have no specifics about the RI's physical appearance, because a reader who doesn't fit these specifics will find themselves immediately pulled out of your story. I cannot tell you how many times I've lost immersion at the first mention of "pale skin" or "long, straight hair" or "small nose." That's not me, and that's not a good chunk of your potential readers.

Again, let me be clear: There are no rules to writing. No matter what anyone of any fame level may say, as long as it's coherent and readable, you're free to write whatever you want. These are just guidelines that I think might help you to become a better fan fiction writer. And most of them should also serve you well if you try creating your very own universes, too.

That being said, in honor of NaNoWriMo, happy writing!