The discovery of the website 'fanfiction'
Has become an engaging affliction.
For Harry and friends,
The fun never ends
Oh dear, I'm predicting a full blown addiction.
I've never kept it a secret that I'm a huge Harry Potter fan - I've been known to pick up one of the seven books, open any random page and just start reading, or start from the very beginning (a very good place to start) and emerge, vaguely depressed, at the end of the seventh some time later. I'm normally a very fast reader, but I dragged out that seventh book because I didn't want to say goodbye to Harry, Ron and Hermione. Well, now I've discovered fanfiction.net and I don't have to say goodbye any more.
For those who haven't heard of fan fiction (that was me until last week), in a nutshell it is when fans of a work (movie, book, whatever) continue, expand or rewrite the original story. Stories always start with a disclaimer acknowledging the original author and stating that they do not own the characters etc, and the stories are published purely on the website for other fans to enjoy.
Before you write me off which adjectives such as "geek", "addict", "nerd", "weirdo", let me point out that fan fiction is believed to have started in the 17th century with an anonymously published expansion of Don Quixote, and over time fan fiction authors have included C.S. Lewis and Francis Hodgson Burnett. Obviously the internet allowed for an explosion of fan fiction, and now fan-authored works are estimated to make up a third of all content about books online.
Debate continues over questions of copyright - some authors embrace it, some vigorously oppose it - but in the US it's considered a derivative work which means as long as the fiction contains a level of originality in it's own right, there are no legal issues.
Currently, I'm reading the story of how Lily and James Potter (Harry's parents, for those non-Harry nuts) got together. If you're interested, click here for the link.
Ok, I realise I'm opening myself up to a certain level of abuse here, but does anyone have any good recommendations?
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