Curious Minds

[wickedwords]

Wow, it has been awhile since I've been on. I need to swap out the chemo icons with the winter hats on them to the regular ones. I should also probably change my layouts, as I think I'm still using ones from around Christmas.

Since I got the Kindle, I have read a lot more standard fiction than normal. I worked my way through the Anne Bishop Black Jewels stories so I'm all caught up there, and finished the Hunger Games as well. Speaking of the Black Jewels stories, it's clear that my love of the character with the inferiority complex is high. I loved Marion's story (she's the hedge witch who marries Sadi's brother) in the short story collection, and the most recent book, Shalimar's Lady, was pretty good too. I think she was on drugs when she wrote the haunted house story, though, as that one was clearly a fan fiction novel that somehow ended up being written by the series creator: focused on Minor Characters, set in something more akin to our world than her established one, with occasional cameos by the main series characters. I just...don't know how to describe why it felt more like fan fiction than a pro stories, but it really, *really* did.

Has there been any profic you've read lately that felt more like fan fiction than you expected it to?

Comments

[blueraccoon]

I find that Tanya Huff feels like fanfiction to me. She's one of my favorite writers, but some of her books--especially the Smoke trilogy and the Enchantment Emporium--feel an awful lot like excellent quality fanfiction.

On another note, want to do lunch or dinner next week sometime?

[wickedwords]

Dinner would be great! I'm working in Bellevue, so it would have to be after 6pm.

I've only read a couple of Tanya Huff's stories. Sounds like I should look at a couple more.

[auburn]

Ah, a chance to get this off my chest. Lee Killough's Wilding Nights (werewolf/police procedural) read like fanfiction to me. Except that is unfair to fanfiction, in that much of it is far superior to this particular book. Wilding Nights read like that first drawer fic novel that someone persuaded the author to resurrect because she didn't have anything else and had stopped writing (but wasn't adverse to making a little extra money since someone was willing to buy it). It didn't read like I'd expect profic to, in any case. It needed either a fierce beta or a superior editor and even then... I was terribly disappointed because I'd loved Blood Hunt and Blood Links and some of her science fiction.

I've never quite been able to decide about Anne Bishop's Black Jewels books. There's an element there that hits one of my buttons, at the same time I can objectively say they're kind of ridiculous and don't make sense if you deconstruct them at all. But I still own my copies and I just read The Shadow Queen and will no doubt pick up the next one. She's doing something right.

Maybe what's she's doing is the same thing I get out of fanfiction, but if so? Fine with me. At least I don't want to demand my money back for her books.

[wickedwords]

I've never read any of the Blood Hunt series you mentioned, and it sounds like maybe I should skip them. And I feel the same way about the Black Jewels stories--there's something in them, even the awkward ones, that gives me the payoff that I read fan fiction for. I'm really happy with her stuff; they're page turners, even when the story isn't quite working out.

profic/fanfic

[talking_sock]

That Karen Marie Moning fever series feels like fanfic. Or rather, like a show like Buffy set in Dublin, with a similar character. Swallowed as fast as fanfic, too.

Re: profic/fanfic

[wickedwords]

I haven't tried those. Are they kindle-ready?

Re: profic/fanfic

[talking_sock]

yes, i pretty much only read via kindle now, sadly (because it's so much easier). Just be sure to start with the first one, maybe darkfever? can't recall.

[bientot]

I read "Outlander" by Diana Gabaldon and it felt like a bad hurt/hurt/HURT/comfort Mary Sue to me. Trying to describe those concepts to the non-fannish friend who gave me the book was a challenge! But it was worth suffering through the doorstop of a novel when the recent kerfluffle came up about the author damning fanfic (people actually like her stuff enough to write fanfic about it - I don't understand that at all!), and then it was revealed that her focal male character was based on a Dr. Who companion.... Truth IS stranger than fanfiction.

[wickedwords]

I completely missed that kerfluffle, but I always thought it was Mary Sue Highlander fiction. Sounds like I only got the highlander part wrong. *g*

[van]

Oh god, chemo. {hugs}

Maybe tangential to what you're looking for but after the Diana Gabaldon 'fanfic makes me want to barf' kerfuffle, bookshop posted this (in case you hadn't seen it):

http://bookshop.livejournal.com/1044495.html

[wickedwords]

Oh, that was excellent! Thank you so much for passing it along, as I missed the whole kerfluffle.

[trobadora]

Heh. I'm reading so little profic lately, it's not even funny any more. But I love the idea of fanfic written by the series creator. :D

[wickedwords.livejournal.com]

Sometimes it seems like that's what going on. I think it happened to Anne Rice.

[trobadora]

It gets silly when the author doesn't realise what she's doing, but it might be pretty cool if they did it deliberately. *g*

[carbonel]

The Liaden novels by Steve Miller and Sharon Lee have always felt more like fanfic. I think it's the high angst levels and extreme focus on a couple of characters that gives it that aspect, but I'm not sure.

[wickedwords.livejournal.com]

Interesting! That may be a part of it, that's for sure.