My Foray into Fan Fiction

I have to admit writing fan fiction wasn’t even on my writer’s radar, I’ve never even read a fan fiction book, but when opportunity knocks sometimes you have to open the door to see what’s on the other side. For me the opportunity came after I attended the 2014 Romance Writers of America conference in San Antonio. There I had the chance to hear about a program at Amazon Publishing called Kindle Worlds.  This is not an endorsement one way or the other for this program, this is just my experience venturing into the realm of fandom, as it’s known. I never knew the scope of this phenomenon. I popped on over to the website www.fanfiction.net and found hundreds, if not thousands of subjects where people have added to the worlds created by the original authors. And that was just under the book tab! There are authors who cut their teeth writing fiction this way. Perhaps the most famous is E.L. James the author of the Fifty Shades of Grey trilogy reportedly written as fan fiction based on the Twilight series created by Stephenie Meyer.

So fan fiction is written by writers who loved a certain story so much they couldn't let the characters go. Popular are the Sweet Valley Series, Catcher in The Rye, Star Trek and many more. Authors of the original work are never paid by the writers who write in their worlds. In Kindle Worlds all of the “Worlds” in this program are licensed works; meaning the original authors share in all the revenue of all the subsequent works created by other writers in their series. For more information you can check out Kindle Worlds at Amazon.

For me the experience so far has been writing one book, in one world. And that would be the world created by Lucy Kevin, aka the mega bestselling author Bella Andre. I decided on The Four Weddings and A Fiasco series. Lucy Kevin wrote four original stories for the series and set them at a wedding venue called The Rose Chalet. My challenge was to continue to use her setting and some of her characters infusing them into my story. The setting is one of my all-time favorite places, the San Francisco area.  So I started my story in wine country, adding my hero and heroine, Scott and Heather, to ones already created! And they get to enjoy the Rose Chalet while mixing business with pleasure. 

The fan fiction experience has been a positive one. I got to debut my first contemporary novella, The Wedding Toast. Writing short after doing full length novels for the bulk of my career was fun! Working with the Kindle Worlds team has been a pleasure. If you are an author looking to add to you writing portfolio you may want to consider exploring the world of fan fiction. If you are a reader wanting to try new authors and new stories, you should definitely look at fan fiction works.

And I would be remiss if I did not recognize one of the best holidays we get to share here in the United States, Thanksgiving. Today I am thankful for my family, particularly my husband, sons, daughter-in-laws and my trio of grandsons! I am also thankful for my friends and family who have supported me throughout my life and my career. And, as always, I’m thankful for new opportunities, those that I’ve found and those yet to come. Happy Thanksgiving!

Tracey sold her first book on 9/9/99! She is the best selling author of the Women of Surprise Historical romance series, Montlake/Avalon Books and writes the contemporary Wine Country Vixen series. You can learn more about Tracey and her books by visiting her website, www.traceylyons.com. Four Weddings and A Fiasco,  The Wedding Toast is available now at http://tinyurl.com/n3927l5.