Size Queen

[sua_lay]

There are lots of different story types in fic. Notice that here I use the word 'story' loosely.

Drabbles with exactly 100, 200 or 500 words. Ficlets. Snippets. Stories. Long stories. Novella length stories. Huge mega stories. Incredibly long mega series of stories that never end.

But does size matter?

Have been fighting discussing about this with tvillingar for quite some time now. Apparently my comments on story length have given the impression that I'm a total snob and hate short fics just because they're short.

At first, I went to the 'of course not! that's absurd' - thing where I'm all nice to all and want everyone to think I'm an overall good person.

Fuck that.

The truth is, I read fanfic to read stories. Yes, stories about characters I'm all yay about. I usually never read Established Relationship stories, so I like to read about the guys now, the guys getting together, the guys after they get together. In terms of literature, I would like to read a tale with a beginning, a middle and an ending with the characters developing while the plot thickens.

You write five hundred words that give me all that and you're a genious.

Short fics are usually just scenes, due to the fact that you can't write a real story if you write something that's barely one page long. Sometimes an author manages to catch something great into that scene, but unfortunately that is really rare.

Pick a fandom. Any fandom. There are usually dozens of 'fics' with 'character a stares at character b and thinks something' and nothing more. It can be Harry staring at Snape's hands or Jim staring at Blair's hair or Krycek staring at Mulder's gun. But whoever the guys are, they keep staring and fantasizing and that's it.

A story? Nope. A piece of fanfic. Yep. Am I all yay about reading that? No way in hell.

I'm just not interested in these brief moments of time. I want to know more! It's not my thing to write or read fic just to see the guys go all mushy at each other or see them have a quick shag against the wall. I want to know what happens next. And then see them have a long shag against the wall if possible.

Size Queen? You bet I am, in a way. I want to read a story, not some whatever. Just like I want to read a book instead of a half page long short story. Do I automatically assume a short story is bad just because it's not long? No! But I do assume it's not my thing and move on.

Get it?

I'm not saying all long fics are good. Come on. Remember I'm the one always bitching about the quality (or actually the lack of it) of fic?

Go and read lots of elf slash. There's at least one author there who writes incredibly long crap with everyone all mushy and lovey. Then go to Sentinel or Xfiles and read through some of the so called Big Name Fans fic and see how you like the loving relationships of the former enemies who now buy houses and raise dogs or witness the big guy bathe his sweetheart.

And yeah, notice I'm being nice and am not naming anyone. I leave that to the times when I bother to friends lock and really vent out. :D

Length doesn't mean quality, but I'm more likely to be intrigued by a long fic than a short one. And I don't have to be ashamed of it.

Reading long fic isn't a bad thing and neither is writing it. I guess one reason for some annoyance in people around me is the fact that I do have the tendency to babble about a certain long fic I'm writing myself. You try to write a plot -based fanfic for two and a half years and then be all hush about it.

glares

It's not the fic to crown all fandoms, it's probably not even something most of the people would want to read. But it's what I'm into right now, so I'm the one going all yay. Sorry if that bugs you. Feel free to stop listening any time now!

Okay, I'm not trying to be a pompous asshole here; just take a look at the crap I've posted on my site. It's not all novella sized. It shouldn't all be novella sized. If you have nothing to tell, don't force the scene! But there are lots of people telling a real story instead of capturing a moment of two of some characters' lives and I really like that.

I like reading long stories. Heh. Long good stories anyway. I'm not forcing everyone to like them. Go ahead and read the drabbles! Whenever I'm in the mood or there's nothing but shorties about the guys I love, I read (or write) them too.

Just stop telling me it's cool to only write short crap because long crap fics are hard to write. Of course they're hard to write! And of course most of it is crap. And of course we're all entitled to our opinions.

My opinion is to laugh in the face of 4k 'stories' (yes, not fics but stories). What's yours?

*goes to read long Xfiles fic*