Fanfic: I Can Fix Him (No Really I Can)
Kate (she/her) is on romance BookTok as @katelovesbooks_, where she posts ‘fanfic lol’ meme-dumps, as well as book recs and nonsense for upwards of 50 thousand followers. A late-bloomer, Kate discovered fanfic in 2022 and primarily lives in the Harry Potter fandom. Her favourite book is Dark Heir by CS Pacat, and favourite FF is The Heir to the House of Prince by elph13 on AO3. Girl loves an heir. And Regulus Black.
Every now and then I forget to lie when people ask me what I’m reading. A rookie mistake when your answer is Harry Potter fanfiction.
Ask me how I know.
Usually, this response is met with stunned silence, mild horror, and/or vague musings of, ‘Wasn’t Fifty Shades originally Twilight fanfic?’ (It was. Master of the Universe by Snowqueen Icedragon on Fanfiction.net).
Unless of course you’re speaking with someone who knows the secret code of A/B/O, in which case, you’ve probably just made a friend for life.
But first. What is fanfic?
Fanfiction (fanfic, fic, FF) is fictional work based on existing characters and settings. It’s written by fans in an amateur capacity and is posted episodically like a modern-day Dickens serial—or as a one-shot—to sites like Fanfiction.net, Wattpad, or Archive of Our Own.
Inspiration could be a popular book series or tv show, anime, video game – the possibilities are as endless and unhinged as the human imagination. Which is to say: very.
They can be full series rewrites or retellings from alternate points-of-view (A Court of Mist and Fury: Rhysand’s POV by illyriantremors on AO3), romances with fan ships (Drarry is Draco Malfoy x Harry Potter), side-characters who are given full backstories (All the Young Dudes by MsKingBean89 on AO3 tells the story of the Marauders’ time at Hogwarts), crossovers between fandoms (Crimson Rivers by Bizarrestars on AO3 is a Harry Potter x Hunger Games epic), or alternate universes (AU) with the same characters in different settings (Fifty Shades is Bella and Edward in a spicy, dark-ish workplace romance), and more.
Isn’t that just an ‘adaption’?
The line between fanfic and a ‘modern adaption’ is precariously thin. The only real difference is fifty years—the timeframe for intellectual property protection after the passing of the copyright owner.
What is Warm Bodies (2013) if not a zombie AU Romeo and Juliet? And for that matter, what is Shakespeare’s Romeo and Juliet (1597) if not fanfic of The Tragical History of Romeus and Juliet (1562) by Arthur Brooke?
Fanfiction is like a collage. Different artistic inspirations layered together to create something new and beautiful … or badly written and batshit. With FF, it really could go either way.
Why do people do it?
In my observation, writing fanfic:
1. Is a way to ‘fix’ canon (for example: “I’m not sure if you’re aware, but those characters are actually gay,” and “Oh-my-god-I-can’t-believe-you-killed-them-you-maniac!” *ctrl + alt + delete*). These are actually called “fix-it” fics.
2. Allows a fandom to continue to experience the worlds and characters that hold a piece of their soul, and to answer the question: “what if …?” (Hot take: The Disney+ series What If …? is literally official Marvel fanfic).
3. Means you can add smut. No further questions on this point at this time.
It’s also a way for burgeoning writers to practice their craft while contributing to a community they love. Cassandra Clare, Olivie Blake, Rainbow Rowell, Neil Gaiman, Christina Lauren and Ali Hazelwood all began in fanfic.
As did, Alice Winn (aka GallaPlacidia on AO3), who’s debut novel In Memoriam has been all over my For You Page; and The Idea of You, starring Anna Hathaway and Nicholas Galitzine, and based on the book by Robinne Lee, is basically Harry Styles fanfic.
It’s like a secret club. Once you’re in the know, you can see ripples of fanfiction’s influence all across the entertainment industry.
‘Pulled to publish’
I joined BookTok around the same time Ali Hazelwood’s The Love Hypothesis (aka Head Over Feet by Ever_So_Reylo on AO3) was breaking the internet.
Hazelwood’s fake dating romantic comedy was an instant New York Times bestseller and TikTok sensation, selling over 750,000 copies worldwide.
The success of The Love Hypothesis also seemed to spur a flurry of traditionally published Reylo (Kylo Ren x Rey Skywalker) fanfic, including Forget Me Not by Julie Soto (2023), The Hurricane Wars by Thea Guanzon (2023), You, Again by Kate Goldbeck (2023) and Not Another Love Song by Julie Soto (2024), among others.
And I think Dramione (Draco Malfoy x Hermione Granger) might be next.
Why? Because in 2025, the Booktok cult classic, Manacled by SenLinYu on AO3, is being reimagined and traditionally published as Alchemised.
This fic was my favourite read of 2022 and is a dark, dystopian longfic with a Handmaid’s Tale crossover. For obvious legal reasons, SenLinYu has reworked their debut novel to avoid any copyright issues. It’s described as “a standalone dark fantasy set in a war-torn world of necromancy and alchemy, in which a healer with amnesia is taken as a prisoner of war and must fight to protect her lost memories and the secrets hidden among them”
Your homework for this article is to look it up on Goodreads, and also to search your favourite show or book on TikTok or Google along with “best fanfic” and see what comes up. You never know, you might trip and fall into a whole new era of reading.
