What Not to Read

I've read a lot of fanfiction since I first started posting it online way back in 2002. I actually have written it for many years longer than that. For instance, some of my fondest childhood memories involve writing X-Files fanfiction with my brother, except we just called it "writing X-Files stories" because this was so long ago that shipping was known by its original term, relationshipping, and you can see why that got shortened, can't you? Anyway, ask to read one of those stories sometime when you want to be mind-numbingly bored (but don't ask for the Christmas one for boredom, because that one turned out hilarious).

The point is, I've been around. I can save you from a lot of atrocious fics (we fanfic types don't always have time for full words) by a handy reference guide to the most common warning signs.

Many of these warning signs can be found right in the summary:

• AU: Let's establish right now...in general, I don't do Alternate Universe. There are very rare exceptions, such as the time after Star Trek: Generations came out that I wrote a story (pre-fanfiction days then, too) about how Picard, having an infinite range of choices available to him, made the wrong one by coming out of the Nexus five minutes before things blow up. Unless I can see that it's a parody or a version of what should have happened when the writers of the actual book or show just completely dropped the ball (*cough*seasonfinaleofSmallville*cough*), I won't mess with AU.
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• OC: This stands for Original Character but often means Mary Sue, a fanfic term for a character who is the author's stand-in. She is usually shockingly beautiful and/or talented, has a strange name, and is irresistible to the male character the author thinks is the biggest hottie. (The male version is called the Gary Stu, but the ratio of Mary Sues to Gary Stus is approximately 100:1, which from what I've heard may be due to the fact that most men don't fantasize in writing.) Avoid the OC, especially if the summary says something like, "My OC Izabell and Remy LeBeau have their first date. Fluff!"
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• Bizarre pairing: Even those who don't write themselves into the story as an OC might have bizarre notions about who on the show or in the book is attracted to whom. In the Harry Potter fandom, for instance, just about every possible combination has been explored, not excepting animals. One of the most squicky (that's "icky," but in a nerdy fanfic way of saying it) pairings: Snape and Hermione. *shudder* Pairings are often represented with a slash mark (Van/Hitomi) or a combination name (Clois). Knowing your combination names can save you from reading fics you don't want to read, and be careful...despite the difference of only one letter in the summary, there is a big difference between Clex and Chlex.
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• Too many exclamation marks: If I read your summary and it looks like you OD'd ("overdosed," but you already knew that one) on caffeine before starting to write it, I will skip you so fast and nimbly that if you were a flat pebble you could cross the ocean.
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• Grammar and punctuation errors galore: See above, substitute "not caring" for "caffeine."
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• "My first ever": Why would you mention this unless you're hedging yourself for failure? And speaking of failure....
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• "I suck at summaries": Really? Now you've made me afraid that you suck at writing in general. You might as well just come out and say....
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• "Not very good": Dude, or more probably little 14-year-old girl, you have just flunked Salesmanship 101. I'm moving on.

Now, there are times the summary is deceptively interesting, or you are feeling charitable and think that maybe that author sucks at summaries on the outside but is Tolstoy on the inside (did Tolstoy write the copy for his book jackets? I submit that he did not).

Here, then, are the most common interior signs of a fic you can drop before finishing:

• Bolded words (yes, I see the irony, but this is a semi-comedic essay, not a fic): Italics are okay. Bolded words are over the top. And even italics should be used sparingly. If you don't wince a little when making the italics choice, you're probably taking it too lightly.
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• Excessive attention to detail: We're not talking descriptions of mountain ranges and ocean views, we're talking what the heroine is wearing and how cute she looks in it, or (worse) what color her eyes are as compared to a food. For instance, if "Suzanne's chocolate brown eyes darkened as she wondered whatever happened to that pair of pink jellies, not the first pair that she wore out because she loved them so much but the second pair, because they went really well with her pink dress with the puffed sleeves and the white polka dots, the dress that sort of made her feel like a princess" looks sparse in the sartorial description arena, you're pretty safe in leaving the fic. (Also, I've said it before and will repeat it again and again, comparing eyes to food is gross and unromantic.)
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• Out-of-place four-letter words: If you're cruising along through a fic of The Office and Pam starts dropping F-bombs, it takes you out of the moment.
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• Cut-and-paste descriptions of kissing: Seriously, do you want to go there? Because it'll involve phrases like "tongues tangling" and words like "moaning" and it just gets creepier from that point. Ah, little 14-year-old girl, you have not yet learned of the romance of mystery and half-spoken-of things. And I really have seen so many of these descriptions that look like they've been lifted straight from some other poorly-written scene where physicality is a substitute for connection instead of a means towards it. See it in a fic, skip the rest of the fic.

Those are most of my cues as to What Not to Read when it comes to fanfiction. Ignore them at your own risk.

Rewrite This Tragedy

Peter is with the other disciples after Jesus' resurrection, in the group that follows Him, but he must not really feel like one of them. How could he? Three times he had denied that he even knew Jesus.

Then one day, Jesus asks Peter if he loves Him. Peter responds that he does.

Jesus asks again. Peter responds in the same way, and you have to wonder if he thinks that maybe Jesus just wasn't paying attention the first time, but by the third time Peter catches on, that it's three times, and he remembers another instance he's affirmed something about Jesus three times, and he's grieved by the memory, but then there's this: Jesus has just rewritten Peter's life. Three times the denial, yes, but now three times the affirmation, three times the commission to care for God's people.

"Follow me," Jesus says, for the second time, and Peter takes up this second call with an energy that flows from the magnitude of his forgiveness.

We catch it easily because it happens so quickly, less than a month between the denial and the forgiveness, but this is God's pattern on broader scales, too.

The first woman meets the serpent. She's new to this world, so maybe it doesn't surprise her that he starts talking to her, questioning her, and she can't quite remember just what God said, can't quite convince herself it was worth following through on, and the man beside her is no help at all and the world changes. She is the first to see sin.

And you could blame the woman for this, and you could persecute her and her daughters for being more wicked than men, more prone to error, but there was a promise, a promise quick to follow the disobedience, a promise that one born of a woman would crush the power of the serpent.

Years later, when the angel of God speaks His words to a young woman, they are strange and wildly different from anything she would have expected and instead of questioning whether God really said it or meant it she says "I am the Lord's servant." She is the first to know the Messiah's long-awaited coming will be soon.

Years after that, when the tomb is sealed and the disciples are in hiding, another woman will risk her life to be identified with the man executed as an insurrectionist. She is the first to see Jesus after His resurrection.

In a breath-taking display of the sweeping arc of God's storyline, she thinks He is the gardener.

And the band plays on....

I have always been fascinated by the story of the Titanic. As a young girl I devoured books and documentaries on the subject. Now, years later, the part of the story that still stands out most starkly to me is the choice to course-correct. Had the iceberg been hit full on, the ship might have stayed floating. Instead, several of the many watertight compartments were breached at the same time, and the ship couldn't hold together.

Our brains work a bit like that. Pain will come, but maybe we're meant to face things head-on, to be breached one part at a time, to seal off one compartment so the others can keep us floating. It doesn't help to turn aside as though the iceberg you can see is all the iceberg there is.

We all of us, no matter how shiny on the top deck, hide hull breaches beneath the surface. Eventually, we need to go below decks and deal with them. But sometimes, we need to be sure we've cleared the iceberg first.

Character Growth

once Juliet

loathe to find you for fear of losing you

Penelope now

constancy second only to God's

if you're out there, I promise you this:

after you've found me, nothing you do or fail to do

will ever lose me

"Now I know I have a heart, because it's breaking."

Some things I need to hear....

The Lord himself goes before you and will be with you; he will never leave you nor forsake you. Do not be afraid; do not be discouraged.--Deuteronomy 31:8

Lord, you have been our dwelling place in all generations.--Psalm 90:1

I lift up my eyes to the hills--

From where does my help come?

My help comes from the Lord,

who made heaven and earth.

He will not let your foot be moved;

he who keeps you will not slumber.

Behold, he who keeps Israel

will neither slumber nor sleep.

The Lord is your keeper;

the Lord is your shade on your right hand.

The sun shall not strike you by day,

nor the moon by night.

The Lord will keep you from all evil;

he will keep your life.

The Lord will keep your going out and your coming in

from this time forth and forevermore.

--Psalm 121

You whom I have taken from the ends of the earth,

and called from its remotest parts

and said to you, 'You are my servant,

I have chosen you and not rejected you.

Do not fear, for I am with you;

do not anxiously look about you, for I am your God.

I will strengthen you, surely I will help you;

surely I will uphold you with my righteous right hand.'

--Isaiah 41:9-10

I have loved you with an everlasting love; therefore I have continued my faithfulness to you.--Jeremiah 31:3

And behold, I am with you always, to the end of the age.--Matthew 28:20b