How to Write a Good Fanfic

3.1 Responding to Critique

A soft breeze blew the curtains of Danni's room in as a warm breeze kept her room at a nice temperature. Her desk top was covered with a few small Anime figurines she had managed to scrounge up while a few posters of her favorite band adorned her wall. She couldn't forget what Elizabeth had told her earlier in the day. "... you should know the difference between all of those homophones. That's something we learned back in kindergarten. Your stories will never be good if you can't get the grammar right."

Her fingers began to sweat before her fingers even touched the keyboard of her computer, and her throat felt dry. Every time a red line appeared in the word document program she would feel like she wasn't getting anywhere in her writing. Despite this she decided to after typing up the story that she would go ahead and post the first chapter. She set to working on her homework as a response was not something she expected right away.

After finishing she went to check the reviews on all of her stories. The story 'Child of a Slave' had quite a few reviews despite only having been posted that day. She clicked on the button she needed to read the reviews, and felt the mixed feelings as she read them. Some of the reviews were nice and encouraging. Some even went and gave her tips. One review made her stomach lurch as she read the content of said review.

"Seriously run your OC through a Mary Sue test. Slaves didn't exist in Middle Earth because Tolkien never wrote about any of the people owning slaves. I also don't get why you use the book 'The Lord of the Rings Weapons and Warfare' as said book is not canon. You also butcher Tolkien's elvish. Why do you add words that don't exist?"

She let out a sigh and decided to keep going with the reviews. Eventually after a few weeks she received a review telling her that her story had been features on a thread of a particular site which proved she needed to improve her writing. Everyone thought it was hysterical that Eomer and Legolas "wore the same expression on their faces" when they could very well "afford their own". The site was cruel and Danni couldn't take any more and deleted the story.

…

Danni's story is based on a true story of one writer I came across. The writer wrote a story where a slave woman dies and leaves behind a baby girl. Legolas finds the child and proceeded to look into making sure the child was well cared for. The writer of the review jumped to the conclusion that the character was a Mary Sue because said character was an OC. I'm not going to discuss the Mary Sue here as that is a later topic – most Mary Sue litmus tests don't work, nor is there anything wrong with writing a Mary Sue.

That was though my introduction to the term Mary Sue as well as my introduction to spork. Not all sporking is bad – I've come across quite a few people who spork fanfiction and/or professionally published works who go out of their way to try and protect the writers, but I've also met a good deal of people who honestly get kicks out of mocking the writers rather then discussing the writing they are supposed to be sporking.

On top of this some of the comments were uncalled for. One of the jokes I see come up a lot grammar wise is the joke involving the homophone bored and board – said joke goes typically along the lines of "Mary Sue ran into a board and feel to the ground". This is done to emphasize the difference between the two words. The joke though of "affording their own expressions" though is sick as it has nothing to do with poor grammar, but instead a personal choice by the writer in order to get across a very specific meaning.

On top of this there was the book in question – I've actually read said book and saw no problem with using it as an additional source. Why? First – it didn't contradict canon. Second – it provided a good source of material for those who knew little about weaponry and warfare. Third – the creators obviously did their research and tried working in the same vein Tolkien did.