Basically Fanfiction

CDPL’s May display “Basically Fanfiction” may just be my favorite display that I’ve put together. It allowed me to collect a wide variety of books, many of which were unexpected.

You may be asking yourself, “What is Fanfiction?” For those not familiar with this term, it refers to fictional writing by fans of an already existing work of fiction. Some of the most popular fanfictions out there are about books like Harry Potter or Twilight, but fan fiction can be written about almost anything. Many people write stories based on movies, comic books, or even video games. Some of these new stories continue where the original media left off. Others take a background character and give them their own story. Many of them change the love interest or introduce and new one. There are endless possibilities when writing fanfiction.

Since many of these stories are written about characters and settings that are under copyright by other authors, fan fiction stories are often posted online rather than traditionally published. However, sometimes a writer will be so inspired by the story they are telling that they take it in a new direction and publish something that is its own stand-alone novel. For this display, we featured some of these stories.

A few of the books on the display are famous (or infamous) for being fanfiction. For example, a lot of people are aware that Fifty Shades of Grey by E.L. James (FIC Jam) started out as a Twilight (YA FIC Mey) fanfiction. Other books are much less well known or would not traditionally be thought of as “fanfiction”. For example, The Aeneid by Virgil (873 Vir). Despite being over 2,000 years old, Virgil’s Aeneid fits the description of modern fanfiction surprisingly well, in fact, one could probably argue that it is the first recorded example of fanfiction. In The Iliad by Homer (883 Hom) Aeneas is a background character. He is mentioned only once or twice. Virgil takes this side character and writes a whole book about his adventures.

Another famous book you may not associate with fan fiction is The Adventures of Sherlock Holmes (FIC Doy), but fanfiction actually saved the famous detective. Sir Arthur Conan Doyle famously killed Sherlock in 1893 by throwing him off the Reichenbach Falls. This death was meant to be permanent because Doyle hated writing the Holmes stories. Fans were devastated. They wore black mourning armbands and began to write their own Sherlock stories, lots and lots of stories. So many stories that Doyle was inspired (or maybe forced) to bring the sleuth back to life. This is considered by many to be the birth of modern fanfiction. And the tradition of fans writing Sherlock fanfiction has not diminished in the past 100 years. Our display features many books (not written by Doyle) that tell tales of Sherlock Holmes, and there are dozens more in our collection.

While I love that I got to include ancient Greek, Roman, and Victorian books on this display, I understand that that is not everyone’s cup of tea. There are plenty of other great (and more modern) books featured on this display. I highly recommend Carry On by Rainbow Rowell (YA FIC Row). It is a fanfiction of a fictional book series called “The Simon Snow Series”. The Simon Snow Series is definitely supposed to be the Harry Potter books (j FIC Row). Fans of the wizarding world will notice many similarities between the adventures, villains, and characters in Carry On and Harry Potter. If you are in the mood for a romance, check out The Love

Hypothesis by Ali Hazelwood (FIC Haz). The two main characters in this enemies to lovers romance are clearly modeled after Rey and Kylo Ren from the latest Star Wars movies (DVD FIC Sta). After by Anna Todd (FIC Tod) is also featured. It started as fanfiction about the band One Direction. Plus, there are many more!

I hope that everyone can find something to read on this display, and who knows, maybe it will inspire someone out there to write their own fanfiction.

Have questions? Stop by the Reference desk on the second floor at CDPL. You may also call us at (765) 362-2242, ext. 117 or email us at [email protected]. Have a great read!

– Emma Lashley is a Library Assistant i the Reference and Local History Department at CDPL.