How did you get into reading/writing fic? What were your earliest fandoms, and what’s the newest one you’ve fallen for?

I first found online fandom when I was teaching Buffy as a TA for seven discussion sections and I got desperate (that is a lot of discussions). I got into reading Buffy fic a couple of years later, only after several failed attempts at looking for fic and really not enjoying it, by which I mean feeling scarred for life. I didn’t like it when the characters didn’t sound like the show and I honestly had no idea what I was looking at. One night I was bored to tears in the ER, and I finally found one I liked, and, Dear Reader, the rest was history.

So with fic, first it was Buffy and then out into the Whedonverse. I very selectively (remembering the scarring) ventured into certain beloved fandoms of my youth (though back then I wouldn’t have called it fandom), like Star Wars, some comic books, X-Files, Sherlock Holmes, and The Breakfast Club. Soon enough, I had read every single Veronica Mars fic. I have a distinct memory of researching in the French national library, getting an update on a Bones fic I was following, and looking it up in the reading room.

Recently, I am very carefully reading both new and old Veronica Mars fic. FOR REASONS. Mostly these days, I find secret old dead fandoms and read in them and tell no one. I don’t really like to weigh in as me in fandom arguments or conflicts (because of the professor thing), and I don’t really like having a hidden identity for that kind of thing, either, as it seems a bit disingenuous (for a pen-name, it seems different). But also, it has been a while since a current fic fandom really grabbed me. Probably the last one was Hannibal.

How has fic (reading or writing it!) influenced your professional work?

I began incorporating fanfic into my teaching in various ways from around 2007, a couple of years after I had started reading and writing it. I was very interested in the different ways fic could present narrative structure, genre, character, and frankly presented these very different forms that many people were writing and reading but people like me were considering. And of course I began considering issues of authorship, originality, and even literary history from a very different perspective.

Writing Fic changed my career pretty dramatically because I became a visible expert at a time when a lot of people in the media suddenly wanted an expert. So now fan studies is a big part of my career—but my most recent critical book was on Kafka and Czech culture, and that was a lot closer to my training.

When I started out, writing fanfic was more of a pure pleasure—I loved to try to have a completely different voice, to sound like someone else and adopt their concerns, to push back a little on elements I hadn’t liked. And in a profession where “publish or perish” is such a big deal and everything is tallied through a lens of accomplishment and prestige, I was thrilled to write completely outside that economy. To “waste time” felt like a kind of chocolate. I had studied fiction (and poetry) writing in New York and at Princeton and I kind of lost the joy of it, didn’t like the publishing industry (interned in publishing), and wrote poems destined only for my sock drawer. Fanfic was a very different mode, and I valued that about it.

But then I wrote 200K words of Breakfast Club fanfic, and then I wrote a novel, In Between Days, that is in many ways a Breakfast Club AU or Breakfast Club-critical fix-it fic. So that blended fic and professional, in a way. And I think writing fic made me more willing to publish it myself rather than take it out of the 80s, which is what my agent thought it needed in order to sell it. I don’t blame him at all! I am sure he was right. But I think based on my experiences with fic, I had more faith that someone would hear “John Hughes Noir” or “The Breakfast Club, but with more coke dealers” and think it sounded cool. And I definitely had become less invested in commercial publishing and the kinds of legitimacy it affords. I don’t think it is as much fun.

However, I also have tenure so other material concerns are not as pressing and I probably have cultural legitimacy to spare in some respects.

Are there things that you find fic generally does better than pro writing?

Fanfic can do sex better than pro writing, especially around consent—whether making it sexy or exploring the various ways consent can be dubious through power relations, etc. Of course, fanfic can fail massively at all of that! But when it does it well, I think it does it better. I think it can do a kind of granular emotional level better because readers will tolerate a slower pace. It can represent sexual and gender minorities and neurodiversity and disability better (and fail to represent them! And do a terrible job representing them! Fanfic is very, very big).

But really, fanfic can do so many different things that published fiction cannot, because fanfic can be as long or as short as the writer wants, can start or stop in the middle or at the end. It is much more free, and often more original, for all its various derivativeness.

You literally wrote the book on fanfiction! Did studying fic in a professional context impact how you read it?

I read fic differently for work than I do for pleasure. For example, I think the Omegaverse is one of the most fascinating things fanfic has ever done, and that some of the stories do weird but important political work. But it’s never what I’ll read when I read for myself, because it makes me vaguely nauseous (so many fluids). When reading for work, I’m more analytical, and I’m not just following my bliss or whatever. I’m looking for interesting, and I don’t care as much if I’m invested in the characters or world, because it’s not about me. I’ll be fascinated by something going on in BTS fic when I couldn’t recognize one of their songs.

When I’m reading for myself, I tend to want a particular combination of good writing, intellectual interest, and emotional engagement that’s not so different from what I’ve often read for pleasure. Sometimes I want more of a good thing, and sometimes I want solace or absolute denial of terrible things dumb show writers have done—like any other fic reader. I will read in a fandom where I don’t have emotional investment if the fic is good enough—because then I get the emotional investment. But that is rare for me. It happened with Twilight fanfic, where I never cared even one bit about the books, but some of the fic kept me up all night.

What makes you ship a set of characters together? Or what elements in canon make you want to read or write fic?

Angst plus humor is my OTP. I want a certain kind of friction, banter, tension, angst or conflict, but usually affection underlying those elements. The fiction can be about corpses or curtains—don’t care. Operatic or domestic, all good. A lot are variations on the Holmes/Watson or Kirk/Spock dynamic (or are, you know, those exact ships), and the others are basically variations of Elizabeth/Darcy. Han/Leia, Mulder/Scully, House/Wilson, Logan/Veronica, Spike/Buffy, Will/Hannibal, Merlin/Arthur… I find there is less femslash with these elements, and often it entails a genderswap, but I love it when I find it. Then sometimes there’s a show like Battlestar Galactica where I will read all the ships because they’re all weird and interesting. That’s the rare example where the world is compelling enough to drive fics I’ll want to read. Fantasy can do that, but I’m not a big fantasy reader.

Sometimes a fic fandom will start doing a particular thing very well. For instance, some of the historical fic around Steve Rogers is amazing, so even though I don’t get into any MCU ships, I’ll read that from time to time. MCU can also sometimes produce really entertaining gen or bromance, and I like that. I’m a sucker for bantery gen fic. My Little Pony had some incredibly funny stuff, and I didn’t respond to the canon world at all. I can’t really stomach The Walking Dead but some of the Michonne fic is awesome, so I read that just for the characterization.

When I think, oh look! Here’s something only fic can do!, I do a happy dance. And when someone does something weirdly literary, I squee, like Hannibal-Schopenhauer or Veronica Mars-Lovecraft, Sherlock Holmes-Nightmare Before Christmas, Brontë Juvenilia AU, etc, weird Victorian crisis of faith Sherlock AU. That kind of thing makes my English professor heart sing.

Do you have fanfics or fanfic authors that most influenced you, or that you often return to? (Or are there fics that changed how you thought about what fanfic/storytelling in general are capable of?)

TheBlackArrow from the Twilight fandom really changed my understanding of what fic could do—it was a Twilight/Wuthering Heights crossover that I read because the author was one of my first commenters on a fic, and I was intrigued she said it was Twilight, but it didn’t matter if I hadn’t read the books. That was the first time I’d really read a standalone fic and the first time I’d ever read fic that was (although I didn’t know it at the time) so much better than canon. Obviously there are many others! I did write a book…

What are your favorite things about fic as a medium? Are there things about the fic world that you’d like to see changed or improved?

I like the collaborative elements, the fictive worlds, the strange collective relationships among stories and tropes, not just authors.

I wish fanfiction could be better about race. I think you can learn a lot about race from looking at fanfiction, but mostly what we learn is not encouraging. Of course, it would be odd if fanfiction were somehow immune to structural racism. But taken as a whole—and I am not talking about individual writers or stories—fanfiction exposes how entrenched whiteness is in patterns of storytelling, characterization, norms of attractiveness (and, of course, casting, although it doesn’t all come down to that).

Tell me your favorite tropes! What tropes are your catnip, and what tropes do you tend to steer clear of?

Catnip: Enemies to lovers, there is only one bed!, hurt/comfort, huddling for warmth, mutual pining, office/professional tensions, friends to lovers, social media/texting/digital relationships, set in fandom, casefic

Nope: soul mark/soulmate; very underage; omegaverse (unless for science!); daddy kink; feeding; reader insert

Authors in Fandom is an interview series where I talk to professional authors about their backgrounds in fandom and fanfiction. If you have suggestions for traditionally published writers I should talk to, let me know in the comments or hit me up on Twitter!

The post Authors in Fandom: An Interview with Anne Jamison appeared first on Reading the End.

How to Catch a Wicked Viscount, Amy Rose Bennett

After an indiscretion at school that leaves Sophie and her three best friends with a reputation for scandal, she never expects to be accepted back into polite society. But when Charlotte discovers Sophie in a compromising situation with her rakehell brother, Nate, she offers Nate a deal: If he helps Sophie to catch a rake with a heart of gold for a husband, Charlotte won’t tell their father that he’s compromised Sophie. But Sophie finds that all she wants is Nate — a man who’s sworn he’ll have nothing to do with love and marriage.

In general, How to Catch a Wicked Viscount was a lot of fun, particularly if the “I am supposed to be helping you find someone else but in the meantime we are falling in love” trope appeals to you. (As forced proximity tropes go, it’s low on my list; but I love forced proximity across the board, so even an un-preferred version of it is enjoyable to me.) I love that Sophie’s part of a network of lady friends who all support and love each other, no matter what — they’re all treasures and gems, and I would like them all to find love. While some of the sex prose gets a little purple (is there a special term for that? sex prose that’s overdone?), it’s brilliant to see an unexperienced heroine who’s still able to identify what she wants and go after it. I loved her for being the initiator of most of the couple’s sexual encounters.

However, for a generally sex-positive book, How to Catch a Wicked Viscount has a weird little interlude to introduce Nate. He and his rakish friends are breaking into the Astley house to steal the underwear of the famously, I guess, slutty?? Countess of Astley — which I already don’t love — and then she catches them and propositions them. Nate thinks “he wasn’t going anywhere near her unless he was wearing a sheath” and then when his friend does decide to stay for sex, they remind the friend to wear a condom too. I couldn’t tell if this was meant to be a pregnancy thing or a disease thing, but it made me uncomfortable, and it was hard to come around on Nate as a character after that. Because: Ew.

Dalliances and Devotion, Felicia Grossman

Admittedly Twitter is a hellscape, but it can’t be all bad, can it? when it led me to this book. Dalliances and Devotion is the second in a series, though it can be read as a standalone (which is what I did). It’s the story of Jewish heiress Amalia Truitt and her former flame, Pinkerton Daniel Zisskind, who are thrown together on a train trip across America after Amalia receives a string of death threats. She’s determined to make it home and gain access to her fortune so that she can go on funding her charity, which helps women get divorces when they can’t afford them. (Amalia is twice divorced.)

Though “road trip” was the pitch that got me to read this book, I dare to say that I would have loved it just the same if it hadn’t been a road trip at all. It was lovely to see a romance between two Jewish protagonists, and even lovelier that their beliefs and religious practices were central to the story (Amalia’s going to Delaware for her nephew’s bris, among other things!). Since the story takes place in the aftermath of the Civil War, there were also many timely discussions of what it means to be American and Jewish, what the best of America is and how to pursue that ideal of a nation. It added emotional resonance to a book that already gave such heft to the interior lives of its central characters, inside and outside of the central pairing.

I also want to give special mention to the sex scenes. Like many romance novelists working today, Grossman is careful and deliberate about consent, which rules, but she also manages to strike a (to me) perfect balance of consent, sexiness, and joy. Amalia and David are having FUN with each other, which made their eventual HEA all the more satisfying. I loved this book to pieces and can’t wait to read more by this author.

Open House, Ruby Lang

Let’s pause a moment to celebrate the fact that Ruby Lang is writing again, after a pause that in real life was very short but experientially was like TEN THOUSAND YEARS OF DEPRIVATION. Any romance writer who can write a line like “He didn’t want to be her weakness; he wanted to be part of her strength” is already to be treasured. Add to that Lang’s gift for vivid settings, complex family relationships, and reliably funny, affectionate, crackly banter between the leads, and you’ve got one of the best contemporary romance authors currently working.

Open House is the second novella in Lang’s Uptown series (first one is reviewed here!), and it follows realtor Magda Ferrar as she tries to unload her recalcitrant uncle’s brownstone on Strivers’ Row and a vacant lot on 136th St. Unfortunately (for her), the lot has been turned into a community garden, and the community — including sexy accountant (yes) Ty Yang — isn’t any too thrilled at the idea of losing it.

The love story in a romance novella can feel rushed and incomplete, but Open House never does. Nor does it depend on uncontrollable mutual attraction to justify the leads’ interest in each other (no shots btw to uncontrollable mutual attraction, which can be very fun sometimes!). Ty and Magda like each other because they like each other: because they’re each kind and funny and engaged, because they challenge and encourage each other out of easy false narratives, and also YES I ADMIT because they find each other really hot. But principally, their relationship is founded — despite this being an antagonists-to-lovers story — on trying really hard to be in each other’s corner. I loved it.

I should also mention that Lang has a true knack for writing family dynamics and exploring the way they affect people in romantic relationships. Insofar as her leads face obstacles (and these are typically quite low-conflict books), they are typically internally generated and respectfully explored over the course of the book. I loved seeing Magda in a position of trying to navigate an adult relationship with her much-older sisters!

A chef’s kiss to this book, in honor of my hope that Lang will set the next series after this one in restaurants LIKE SHE CLEARLY WANTS TO. (I see you, Ruby Lang.)

In Between Days, Anne Jamison

Eh, this one may be more YA than romance, but who’s counting? It contains a romance, so I feel fine about it.

In Between Days is the angry feminist Breakfast Club Judd Nelson / Molly Ringwald romance you definitely knew you wanted, a coming of age story that also features a lady friendship to warm the cockles of even my stony automaton heart.

If me saying this book warmed my heart has led you to believe that it is heartwarming, I assure you that it is not. It’s one of those books about high school that will gladden you that you’re not in high school anymore; and one of those books about The Past (in this case, the 80s of Gen X) that will make you feel blessed that the runaway train of linear time WHATEVER ITS FAULTS is dragging us inexorably further and further away from The Past. (I mean racist and homophobic slurs, my pals, & drugs & sexual assault — so be good to yourselves if you’re not in the mood.)

But I adored the three central characters — Pris and Jason and Samantha — and their gradual, prickly efforts to learn how to be good to each other. I started off feeling that there was no way for things to be okay between them — Jason and Samantha area real assholes, good GOD I do not miss high school — but the book lured me along to a touching and satisfying conclusion.

American Love Story, Adriana Herrera

This is the third in Adriana Herrera’s Dreamers series, which I have probably already raved about in this space. (Fact check: I have.) American Love Story follows scholar and activist Patrice Denis, who has taken a job at Cornell for reasons not wholly unrelated to the hot Ithaca ADA, Easton Archer, whom he used to bone. Their relationship is complicated not just by Easton’s job as a representative of a system Patrice loathes, but by a recent uptick in unwarranted traffic stops of black and brown men in Ithaca — which Easton’s boss is reluctant to address.

Despite this being all the way in my wheelhouse, American Love Story is my least favorite in the series so far, only because I had a hard time getting a grip on Patrice’s character. Most of what we learn about him is told, not shown, from his job to his personality. I wanted to know more about his scholarship (important, apparently?), his online presence (ditto), his history of cutting people out when they disappoint him (considerable?). Without that, his character lacked some of the wonderful specificity of Herrera’s other characters.

Even so, I got all verklempt at the end of the book when Easton and Patrice are finding their way back to each other and sorting through how not to damage each other in this same way next time. I still love this series and can’t wait for the final one! Social workers should always write the books!

As a final note, I received, I think, all of these from the publisher/author for review consideration. This has not impacted the content of my reviews.

The post Police Stops, Brises, and Other Rites of Passage: A Romance Round-Up appeared first on Reading the End.

(Progress?)

Fic is not — as I was imagining when I picked it up — an academic text. As Jamison explains in this excellent interview at Critical Margins, she wanted to reflect the complicated relationship to authordom that you find in the world of fanfic, rather than producing a more traditional monograph. Accordingly, she includes interviews and short essays from writers of fanfiction, offering their views on fanfic communities, diversity (lack of), the ethics of monetizing, etc.

This is all very good, and I appreciate the inclusion of these voices on a theoretical level (some of them had really interesting things to say, and some not so much, sorry Amber Benson), and I wouldn’t have minded if Anne Jamison’s chapters had been twice as long in each case and if there had been twice as many as them. An academic who teaches classes in fanfiction and a writer of fic herself, Jamison’s writing style is friendly and approachable and also nicely authoritative. Like where it is extremely readable, and you also feel you are in good hands.

Because Jamison’s particular area of study is Twilight fanfiction, this book leans heavily on the Twilight end of things. Her most in-depth case studies of modern fanfic area centered in the Twilight fandom, and she has a whole section about E. L. James and the fandom’s conflicted relationship to fanfic-for-profit. If that sounds like a complaint it’s only a complaint in the sense that this book was fascinating, and I wanted it to go on being fascinating for maybe infinity chapters while offering a basis for comparative studies of different fandoms and norms and community standards.

My main criticism of the book, in brief, is that there isn’t more of it. If there were infinite books dealing with the workings of all the different online communities, I would curl up in my reading nook with all of them stacked around me and never come out again. And I certainly look forward to any scholarship Anne Jamison plans to produce on this topic in the future.

Assist me please: In the comments, if you have favorite works of fanfiction, kindly recommend them to me. I never know where to start with fanfic — there’s so much of it — so would appreciate some guidance.

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