So, you’ve watched Avatar, maybe several (maybe hundreds!) of times, but still you want more. For some of us, we are inspired to write stories about our favourite characters

in order to reconnect with the feelings inspired by this film. You’ve probably read some fan-fiction already and liked it; but you’re new, or maybe you’re not but you want to know why your readers aren’t as enthusiastic (or as many) as you expected. Why do some writers get more readers? It is really that their story is better? Maybe not. Read this to find out some handy tricks and clues!

Contents

1. Is it legal?
2. Are there rules?
3. Where and how do I get my fan-fiction to readers?
4. Help! Nobody seems to be reading my story!
5. Help! People are insulting my story!
6. What is this mystical “Beta” and where do I get one?
7. I am inventing a new creature/character/location – what should I be doing?
8. Setting out: Chapters, Stories, Titles, Summaries – say what?
9. Tell us about disclaimers already!
10. Author’s Notes
11. Smut, Smut, Smut, Wonderful Smut! (aka, “The internet is for Porn! – Now a musical!”) – This section is not for under-17s
12. Writing in Na’vi (Or: When in Rome...)
13. Some Fan-Fiction Terms You May Want To Remember (Glossary)

Disclaimer: These are not rules. However, they are suggestions for posting your fan-fiction that may very well make your writing improve, hence giving you more readers. This is made with Navi-bluers in mind, however much of this can be used when posting on websites such as Live Journal and Fanfiction.net. It is not a guide to writing in general. For advice on grammar, plot, style, either find a book, or contact me, and I would be happy to help.

1. Is it legal?

I think this is something very important we should all know. The short answer is NO. But it’s not that simple. Technically we shouldn't be writing, but everyone turns a blind eye - a court would probably refuse to hold the case, so no worries - really it might as well be legal. This is because fan-fiction often acts like free advertising, so most directors and writers don’t mind because we’re doing them a favour! Unless they make an official statement like Anne Rice or Terry Pratchett have, specifically asking for fans for refrain from writing fan-fiction, directors (such as James Cameron) will honestly not mind or care. But it is illegal for you to profit from it. So if people pay you for anything, such as writing a story for them, you're in trouble. As long as you get no profit (except the joy of writing and reviews that is!) you're good - on the safe side, put in a disclaimer that says "I don't own this it belongs to James Cameron and I get no profit" (etc) - however, websites such as naviblue and ff.net often already do this so no worries! I will show you how to write a disclaimer in a little while.

Secondly, despite the fact that you do not legally own Avatar, it is still copyright infringement for anyone to steal you story! If you don’t already, make sure you have the documents of your chapters saved on your computer, dated. Secondly, post your story on Fanfiction.net. First of all, this website is most likely where people will write their “copies” of your work. Secondly, ff.net easily allows you and others to report stories which they believe to be stealing another’s ideas - but it's easier if you have the proof on their website. Thirdly, the record of your chapters and stories on ff.net can be used as evidence if you find your story on LJ or other websites. Trust me, the admins of these sites (unless they are the naughty authors) will be happy to try and help you. Also, try to stay in contact with your readers (make friends, or, even better, get a beta!) so they can act as references if you ever run into trouble.

If anyone were to publish it, as in on paper, where you’re unlikely to find it, they would be liable to be sued (for making a profit!) – or, if it was popular enough that you did learn of it, I’m sure the evidence of you works saved to disk and on the web would be proof to claim the story (guessing JC didn’t get all angry and you were hoping to get paid off by him, lol!)

By the way, you’re more likely to fly to Pandora tomorrow than to have JC even know you write fan fiction, much less want to buy it off you for the sequel or whatever. Don’t get your hopes up. Be happy that you have readers who love your stories anyway.

2. Are there rules?

Technically, no. You can write whatever you like. It can be any genre, it can have any characters and anything can happen. You can write it in any style you like, and your story can be long or short. It’s not school – there is no teacher telling you what to do. While this is often liberating, it also means you need to control yourself. Remember, your writing can reveal a lot about yourself.

Also, I imagine you want to be appreciated for your hard work. Spell check, spell check. Don’t be lazy and hit the “spell-check” in MS Word – physically read your work. Learn to become a close reader. You’ve probably heard of this quote (below)... But trust me, it irks readers when you can’t spell. So know your homophones. Nothing is more painful than reading “I herd them coming”.

Lastly, be sensitive. Some readers will not appreciate lots of gore, or sex scenes, or your particular brand of humour that involves copious use of the f-word. If something like this is going to happen, put a little warning at the beginning so they know. Even better, put a rating too. Fan fiction ratings are much like movie ones- G (everyone), Pg-13 (some scary scenes, little violence, small sexual references), M (sexual references, violence, coarse language), MA-15 (Adult themes, coarse language, sexual references, strong violence) and NC-17 (strong sexual references/graphic sex scenes, graphic violence, adult themes). If you don’t put a rating on n your story is clearly MA or NC-17, in some countries this carries the same penalties as providing pornographic material to minors, so be warned, and warn your readers! Obviously, you shouldn’t be writing a story with a rating greater than your own age.

3. Where and how do I get my fan-fiction to readers?

There are many venues. On Navi Blue you can request to have permission to post Articles from the admins (such as the ever-cuddly Swotu), which has a growing number of fan-fictions and have the added benefit of being shown on the homepage of Navi-blue (make sure you tick the box that makes this happen). Alternatively, you can start a thread in the “fan-made” forum and include your chapters there, or links to your live-journal. If you want a site dedicated to fan-fiction that allows readers to put you onto “alerts” (so they know immediately of new stories and chapters, thus boosting your reader numbers) and lets your easily organise your story into chapters, sign up for free at Fanfiction.net.

4. Help! Nobody seems to be reading my story!

This mayn’t be your fault. Unlike books and movies, you have no posters up on buildings, no trailers. You must be your own publicist. Post your stories on more than one web-site. Read other people’s stories, give them feedback. Ask fan-fiction authors whom you admire to read your work. But don’t be a pest. Begging for readers and reviews will annoy your readers and ruin your confidence. Don’t post on every forum and chat saying “Read read read”! You will only find that nobody wants to. Remember, your first audience must be yourself – if you don’t like the story, it will become apparent in your work.

When you do get readers, don’t become their slave. Stick to your own schedule, not theirs, no matter how much they beg. If they like your story, they will wait.

5. Help! People insult my work!

First things first, wipe your eyes and be strong. Many seem to think writing is easy with quick rewards. It’s not. It’s frustrating, and there are so many loopholes and after hours trying to figure out if “abdominal” or “terrible” is better, your readers seem to be dissatisfied with the whole thing. They pick at your spelling, your characters, the pace of the plot. They seem to not care that this is your baby.

But the fact is, it’s your baby, not theirs. And your first response will be “What do they know? I am so awesome!” But if a reader is giving their time to tell you that your spelling is crap and Jake sounds like a girl... then they’ve probably got a point. Read your work as if you’ve never seen it before. Fix the problems. If you can’t, seek a beta reader (I’ll explain these later). Remember what they did to sulking children? Yes, they put them in the naughty corner – if you sulk, your readers will give up on your story.

But don’t forget that there are also some people who are wrong. Not always, but everyone has different opinions. Keep heart. They’re often hypocrites.

Occassionally, you will get what is known as a “flamer”. These are people who constantly criticise everything – they may make personal attacks on you, or seem to not know what your story is about. Report them to the website’s admins and ignore the flames. A good writer has skin thicker than a sturmbeest.

6. What is this mystical “Beta” and where do I get one?

Beta-readers are what you might think of as editors. They are people who work on a voluntary basis (you do not pay them) and can help you on a range of issues: spelling, grammar, characterisation and plot being the most common. How much help you want is up to you and your beta’s capabilities. Betas are very honestly the best thing you could do – they give you a fresh pair of eyes that will remove all your embarrassing mistakes – never think that you can be perfect all on your own. You can also have more than one. I personally have two – but I’ve known people with up to six. One to three is a good limit to have.

The best place to get one is after the first few chapters of your story, ask at the end of your chapter for volunteers. Make sure you scope out the people – it’s amazing who offers (twelve-year olds, people who don’t speak the language, etc) and you really want someone who is the same or better than yourself when it comes to writing. Once you have chosen your beta, you can email chapters to them. Work out your own way of editing, but I’ve found using MS Word with “Track Changes” turned on and “Final showing mark-up” - both found in the “Review” tab - to be very comfortable.

7. I am inventing a new creature/character/location – what should I be doing?

Fan fiction has no rules. But if there was one, it would be this:

“Beware me-hearties of she that be the Mary-Sue!”

What is this, you ask? She is a vile creature, that’s what she is. She’s the original character, usually with a name with weather patterns/flowers in her name. She’s beautiful, but smart, and talented, but shy, but oh she’s so unusual yet strangely attractive! She’s you the author, but better, she’s the perfect character, but she has flaws, oh yes, she’s been hurt – but if true love comes, she will open her arms and cradle it to her well-endowed – yet strangely flat – bosom.

In short, she’s the kind of character that will make your readers suddenly develop bulimia and run to the bathroom to puke.

Do not write her. And please, for the love of Eywa, don’t let Neytiri turn into her.

If you read fan-fiction, you’ve probably seen her in the form of “Random Earth Girl Gets to Go to Pandora”. Wish fulfilment of the author tends to be very boring to readers, unless they are so desperate as to imagine they are the main character.

Write some truly unlikable characters. Write some truly cute ones. Label your character “Token cute-kid”, “Token-hot bitch”, “Token stutterer”, “Token warrior” to yourself (don’t tell your readers, that’s just weird). People say to avoid stereotypes, but actually you do want them. Then, after a few chapters, BAM, you give them an unexpected quality (The warrior likes to weave?! The kid’s hitting on Jake’s daughter – who’s half his age?!) and your readers will be like “Wow, such an in-depth unusual character!” Stereotypes are like bricks – make your house out of them, and then put the furniture inside.

There is a male equivalent of a Mary-Sue (The only difference being is that his bosom is moved down between his legs and his feminine sensitivity gives way to prowess on the battle-field) called a Gary-Stu and he is just a sickening.

When it comes to creatures, try to make them not corny. Atokirinia’s floating in every scene? Get the leaf-blower, people! Plants and animals are not there just to decorate the place or bite off limbs. Give them significance, but don’t use the word “Omen”.

Locations, locations. Guess what: everyone else has already written Hell’s Gate and Hometree the Second. Yawn. Get a pencil, draw these two places on either side of the paper, then look at all the white space. What’s there, hmm? Mines? Forest? A river full of Pandoran piranhas? What about beyond the Omaticaya’s territory? Sea, desserts, grass plains? Jake’s got an ikran: use it.

Most of all, be creative! Pandora is not Earth and your characters, creatures and locations should reflect that.

8. Setting out: Chapters, Stories, Titles, Summaries – say what?

This will be more simple for those who are writing one shots, but most will be writing “novel-length” stories – or, novellas at least. You’ve probably already got a title (Try to be more original than “Avatar II” – there are many of those already) for the whole story. When it comes to chapters, you don’t have to title them, but I find it helps pique the reader’s interest. Keep titles short and sweet, so people can remember them. If your story is meant to be a “Sequel”, put “Post-Avatar” into the summary instead of the title. We already know it’s an Avatar fan fiction, so there is no need to tell us.

When it comes to chapters, there is no set length. Mostly, it will have to do with how much you write and how often you post. I average 10 000 words in 7-28 days (I’ve also been writing fan fiction for 4 years). You might do 1000, but post every 3 days. Generally though, long chapters are better. 3000- 5000 words is a good length, because it is the length of a normal short story (chapters are, in essence, short stories which form a whole, much longer one) – for shorter, Novella fics, 700-1000 words may be appropriate, but I personally view that as reserved for prologues and epilogues, which tend to be shorter than the rest of the chapters. Remember than a page usually= 500 words (more for those who use lots of short words and no dialogue, less if you have good dialogue or lots of big words), so 10 K is 20-25 pages, 17K is 40 pages. If you’re reaching 40 pages, I suggest starting a new chapter. Try to keep your chapters the same length, perhaps gradually getting longer or shorter near the climaxes. Also, there is no rule for how many chapters you should have. Most books have 20-50 chapters, as a rough guide, and are 100 000- 500 000 words long (if you find yourself nearing the 400 K mark, I suggest thinking about doing a series or trilogy). When you first start to write, these numbers seem daunting, but if you keep at it, it gets easier – much like exercise.

At the very start of your story, it may be an idea to write a short summary or “blurb” to entice readers. Keep some mystery, but tell people what your story is about. Keep it to 200 words maximum. It can also contain important information such as the rating of your story, genre, pairings, when/where it is set, whose POV (if any) it is, and if it contains material such as lemon, PWP, OCs, ect.

For posting chapters in the articles of Navi-blue, I suggest you use the format I’ve come to use in the “Article Title” box. Story Title – Chapter Number – Chapter Title (For example, for my most recent and tenth chapter of my story Hybrid, I called it “Hybrid – 10 – All the Strange Creatures”). It eases confusion and lets your readers easily find both your story and the chapter they want.

9. Tell us about disclaimers already!

Disclaimers are kind of like a “please don’t hurt me” at the beginning of your story/chapter. Usually they are used for two reasons – to state that you do not mean to infringe on copyright, and secondly because the content may offend readers (character death, sexual kinks, etc). Here are some samples:

Disclaimer: I do not own the rights to Avatar, nor am I affiliated with Avatar, James Cameron, etc. Avatar is Copright to James Cameron, etc. I make no profit by writing this fan fiction and mean no copyright infringement.

Disclaimer: This story contains graphic sexual scenes including BDSM, slash and smut. If you are underage, or do not like these, then this story may not be appropriate for you.

10. Author’s Notes

Author’s notes allow you to communicate with your reader. Never put them in during your fan-fiction – even if you want to explain or excuse or disclaim something. If it’s that bad then maybe you should revise the writing so it doesn’t need explaining. Leave all comments to the end. Author’s notes can be at the beginning or the end, but to avoid spoiling the story for your readers, it’s often best at the end. You can tell your readers when you will next post a chapter, what inspired you, thank a particularly kind reviewer (don’t put a whole list of names attempting to thank everyone – this annoys readers) or your betas. You can even provide the title of the next chapter as a tease. Try to keep your ANs short. Never post a chapter that is only an Author’s Note, or has more AN than actual story. 100 words max is a good limit.

11. Smut, Smut, Smut Wonderful Smut! (aka, “The internet is for Porn! – Now a musical!”)

I personally do not write what I deem as “smut” or “porn”. I’ve tried it. I found it a sad excuse for not going out on a Saturday night and actually – well, that’s another story (I figure spending time writing about blue-cat people may actually turn you into a “Cat-lady”). The point is, if you’re of age in your country/state (if you’re not, skip this section) you have the ability – no, the right to write scenes of a sexual nature (your ability may be questionable). Maybe it’s the end of a chapter, Jake and Neytiri are going to bed... and you figure, well, the bed’s already there... In some cases, love scenes can be beautiful, touching pieces of literature. They are actually incredibly hard to write well, and can be embarrassing when done wrong. Out of Character behaviour tends to breed like a pubic bacteria. Don’t post unless you’re absolutely sure, if you’re hoping to be a high-quality writer. And putting a glowing tree in won’t hide your awkward stumbles around foreplay and pillow talk. I’m sure you’re all very experienced, but that doesn’t always translate into writing.

However, this doesn’t cover PWPs, Smut and Lemons. PWP stands for “Plot? What Plot?” or “Porn without plot”. It’s a story that is mainly about the sexual adventures of the characters. These often reward you with very enthusiastic readers (what kind of person doesn’t like sex?) but demands a different array of writing skills than general fiction. Pay attention to all the senses: touch, sight, scent, sound and taste. Be mysterious – despite what they tell you, your readers don’t want it all placed in their lap at once (both figuratively and literally) – remember, you are seducing your readers to fall in love with your story – you’ve got to have foreplay, build up their excitement, then BOOM! An orgasm of similes, metaphors and then the pure truth like that last scream of delight.

Basically, if you’re going to write adult scenes, write like an adult. I’ve seen the works of teenage girls and boys forcing their characters into all sorts of situations (Hopefully you’ll remember that Pandora doesn’t even have cucumbers) that make the reader feel raped, and it’s not a good mix!

On a side note: Slash. Some people like it. Some people don’t. Make sure you make it pretty clear in a disclaimer that your story will include it, if that’s what you’re writing. Also, rape scenes – slash or heterosexual tends to squick your readers unless it makes a lot of logical sense (using it as a “shock” at the beginning of the story is not logical).

12. Writing in Na’vi (Or: When in Rome...)

Avatar fan fiction is unique in that we have a language that is hard to avoid and beautiful to behold. Na’vi is an integral part of the Na’vi culture, and you may even be learning it, or wish to. But you must remember that, especially since Na’vi is so “young” there aren’t many fluent in it. Writing huge swathes of possibly incorrect language will frustrate readers. Putting translations in, either directly after wards or at the end of the chapter will have readers chucking their computer in the bin. But still, writing completely in English just doesn’t have that ‘flow’ that Avatar had (Oh, if only subtitles fit so neatly into the written story!).

What I suggest, and seems to please both camps – Na’vi speakers and non-speakers alike, is to have a limited vocab. Common phrases or names - ikran, irayo, olo’eyktan, Kelutrel, Eywa, Oel ngati kameie, tsahaylu, Tsahik, tsamsiyu, Sa’nu, ‘evi, Tawtute/Sawtute, pa’li/fa’li, palu’lukan, Toruk Makto – all of these are so well known to us fans, or self-explanatory during the course of the conversation that it is very unlikely people will get confused. Dot these throughout whenever the speakers are speaking Na’vi, instead of using “Thanator” or “Cheif” or “I See you” and it will give the sense that the whole conversation is being held in Na’vi, and that you, the author are simply translating.

I hope some, or all of this has helped you. Fan fiction is great fun and a really nurturing environment for your talents and creativity. Always write because you love it. I know I do. If there is anything I’ve missed, don’t hesitate to say, and I will try my best to enlighten you.

Some Fan-Fiction Terms You May Want To Remember: