Fanfiction: when you take someone else’s characters (fictional or otherwise) and craft your own stories around them. The practice has deep roots—we’ve been reworking the same stories and characters for millennia. But in the modern, copyright-restricted era, fanfiction is written and shared in specific contexts, thousands of fans writing millions of stories about characters they love, mostly in communities online, written and distributed for free. It’s a practice that attracts writers of all skill levels and backgrounds, including published authors. Fanfiction can give you unique tools to tackle characterization, voice, perspective, structure, tone, and more. This workshop is designed for writers and editors of all backgrounds, from those who know nothing about fanfiction to people who read and write fic every day. Expect to dig into the craft of fic, and how it can improve your skills as a storyteller overall.  

Elizabeth Minkel is a journalist, literary critic, and editor who has written about fan culture for the Guardian, the New Statesman, the New Yorker, the Verge, the Millions, and more. She co-hosts a podcast on fan culture, “Fansplaining,” and co-curates a weekly fandom newsletter, “The Rec Center.”