How Lori and I Became Published Authors (written from a one-sided POV)

How legit is fan fiction?

I've seen posts that sneer at it; I've seen posts that laud it.

What I had never done was to be involved in it - never even knew it existed. That is until I got caught up in the romance of a new singing group about seven years ago. Heard them briefly on Oprah singing Unbreak My Heart or, as they called it, Regresa Mi. I bet even Toni Braxton wouldn't have recognized her own song! Absolutely beautiful.

I set out to hunt them down. I wanted their CD.

By utilizing my miniscule computer skills, I managed to locate their official site. I lurked for quite a while; I believe I've mentioned before that I'm a shy little thing and I would never enter a conversation uninvited. Took me some time to realize internet manners are vastly different than Emily Post's. Make that vastly!

Time passed and I began to feel at home there. Sort of. Just enough to begin exploring all the different sections and the plethora of threads. Lo and behold! The official site had an entertainment section and people were writing fiction - sometimes quite risque fiction - about these very real men.

Okay, this was new and different, but was it legal? Apparently it was, because it's still there and going strong and nobody got sued.

The stories ran the gamut from purely pitiful to 'actually this is quite good'. English is not the first language for some of these authors, because the men of Il Divo have an international fan base, but everyone wanted to show their lurve.

That's how I met Lori. She wrote the neatest fan fic - The Cheeky Spaniard - and I fell in love with it and with her. Pm-ing and messaging and emails led to phone calls and a writing partnership that I treasure deeply. Even if it did lead to our piece of shit, The Bodice Rippers. ;-) We hope to make an announcement soon regarding the upward progression of our partnership efforts.

For the first time since high school I got the writing bug. And for the first time, I had someone to encourage me. Once I screwed up my nerve to actually post something, I became sort of prolific. I've written some stuff I quite like.

But it was all fan fiction. Does that automatically mean it was poor writing? Is fan fiction the red headed stepchild of literature? Is it even considered literature?

I'm trying to become more mainstream, but I'm finding it hard. Every hero I imagine seems to have bits and pieces of my original heroes and I want them all to sing, lol. I could say those four singers are holding back my progression.

But I won't, because without them, I don't think I'd be writing at all and writing has come to mean so much to me.

Y'all - I don't have degree in anything except an associate's in nursing. I'm not erudite in my posts and when writing I struggle for words whereas I used to just pull them out of a hat. Aging sucks, damn it. I don't analyze a story to death and I will maintain to my grave that good writing can overcome many character and plot defects. Get me to like your characters and care what happens to them, and you've got yourself a reader. I think Lori would agree.

So, there it is, from someone who began their writing career with fan fic and who tends to write those 'feel good' characters in her professional writing. I like to blog (sometimes) and I like to write (mostly), so I guess my question is: is there an audience for writers like us? For a not-so-deep POV and a minumum of angst. ;-)

By the way - this was our early inspiration. ♥