Fandom Fluff: Will the Real Twilight Fan (Fiction Fan) Please Stand Up?!?

Twilight Fanning Fictions...

By:

Hoosier Mama

Between Remember Me and reading the fics Coming to Terms and Trust, Loyalty, Commitment, I didn’t get anything written this week. Instead I’m releasing an article from my hard drive (like a movie released from the “Disney vault” except less syrupy sweet) written August 2009 but never posted. Enjoy! - HM

Ok, so we’re Eccentric & Obsessed, but still…

I was reading the Guardian newspaper online a few weeks ago. (I love the U.K. Somehow this has evolved into me getting all my online news from Britain. I can’t explain why; I also can’t explain my mad 30-year long crush on Michael Palin.)

Anyway, the article I was reading was about the “vampire genre” and how everyone’s been jumping on the bandwagon and how sick to death the world is of it, and blah, blah, blah. Twilight was of course mentioned and bashed a bit, but nothing too horrible was written as I recall. At least there was nothing that a fan that’s been around awhile hasn’t already heard and dealt with. I take no offense because I don’t think of the series as part of the “vampire genre” even though the media insists on pigeonholing it there. To me, it’s primarily a romance novel, not vampire/horror. Anne Rice writes vampire books, Stephen King writes horror; Stephenie Meyer writes romance, and when her books get described as “horror” or “vampire,” the real horror/vampire fans tend to jump off the deep end so they can come after us deer-in-the-headlights Twilight-fans with torches and pitchforks.

But I digress.

What I do recall from the Guardian story, word for word, was one of the many hateful emails that appeared below the article. The entire message stated, and I quote:

If you think Twilight fans are bad, try fans of Twilight fan fiction.

Ok, now that pissed me off.

WTF? Somewhere across the pond, there’s some British dude that believes we’re worse than ordinary Twilight fans and he’s spending all his time writing disparaging remarks about the fandom on public forums. (Ok, so he spent about five minutes on one forum, but still…) Does he even know any of us?? Has he even read any fan fiction??

I happen to believe fans of Twilight fan fiction are a cut above your typical Twilight fan. (Ok, so maybe I believe that because I am one, but still…) We didn’t just buy a calendar and a keychain from Hot Topic; we expanded our love to include a myriad amount of stories that wouldn’t even exist in this world except for us.

We’re imaginative, helpful, creative, opinionated, and very passionate. We’ve delved much deeper than a typical Twilight fan into Edward’s tortured psyche. We know the meaning of the word “angst” and we completely embrace it. And unresolved sexual tension (UST) in a relationship? Please. We’ve totally got that covered. I’ll bet we could name at least five fanfics with UST way more heart-wrenching than Stephenie’s books. (Ok, so there wouldn’t be Twilight fan fiction without Stephenie’s books, but still…)

There’s nothing I can do about some anonymous Brit and his asinine opinion of us. But why should we fanfic fans carry such a stigma? Why should we hide in the shadows? Fans of fanfiction are way cooler than ordinary Twilight fans. We need to stand up and proudly acknowledge who we are to the world.

Hmmm, now let’s see how that would play out in a job interview situation…

Mr. Head Honcho: So, tell me about yourself. What was the last book you read?

Me: (defiantly) I don’t read books anymore; I only read stories online.

HH: Ok, what was the last story you read online?

Me: Oh, that would be “The Dominant”.

HH: “The Dominant”?

Me: Yes. Well, it’s the sequel to “The Submissive”.

HH: (eyebrows raised suggestively) “The Submissive”?

Me: Yes, but I’m not personally into…you know…kinky stuff. I just like to read stories about Edward and Bella.

HH: And they are the kinky ones?

Me: No, not always…but sometimes. They’re the main characters in Stephenie Meyer’s Twilight series.

HH: (light bulb goes off above head) Oh, Ok, so Stephenie Meyer wrote “The Dominant”?

Me: (chuckling) No, no, Stephenie doesn’t write kinky; that was someone known as tara sue me. There are lots of different stories and writers. I’ve written some myself, but they’re all canon. I think I prefer to read AU, AH, OOC stuff from Edward’s POV.

(Cue the crickets.)

HH: (after a minute of staring) Translation please?

Me: Oh, sorry. Umm, alternate universe, all human, out of character, and POV stands for…

HH: (interrupting) I know what POV stands for! I’m not illiterate!

Me: (sheepishly) Sorry, Sir.

HH: (deep breath, exhaled sharply) So, let me see if I’ve got this straight. You can’t be bothered to read a book because you spend all your free time reading kinky stories online written by various amateur writers but all concerning the same two characters from a young adult book about vampires?

Me: (defensively) Hey, not all the stories are kinky. Some have more lemons than others.

HH: (looking up while rubbing both palms against forehead) Lemons?

Me: Yeah, you know…smut.

HH: Smut? (Forcefully said, emphasizing each and every consonant)

Me: (trying to be helpful) You know the face you make when you suck a lemon? That’s supposedly the face a woman makes when she…initially…you know…gets off.

HH: (angrily) Gets Off?

Me: (trying to be soothing) Maybe you’ve never seen a woman make that fa…

(More crickets)

Me: I’m not getting this job, am I?

Ok… so maybe proudly acknowledging who we are to the world is not such a good idea, but still…I’ll always believe we’re way cooler than ordinary Twifans.