In part one of this mini-series, we looked at Fear of the Unknown. Here, we’ll delve into the second common writing fear.

Addressing: Fear of the Wrong Step (Writer’s Block)

This fear can take several forms, but the most common seems to be “Writer’s Block.” In my previous post, I defined Writer’s Block this way: allowing fear and other negative thoughts and emotions to influence writing habits. So, that’s the definition we’re going to use for the entirety of this conversation and all other future conversations covering “Writer’s Block.”

Writing fanfiction eased my fears of taking the wrong step in two big ways:

1. It’s been done before—successfully.

   Think of a book, TV show, video game, or graphic novel you love. Chances are the writer(s) had a sense of unease about one or more elements of that IP. There’s always some amount of uncertainty involved in creating. It’s just the way things are. We want people to like what we’ve made, and if they don’t, we’re sad. It’s like holding out a piece of your heart and having it thrown in the dirt and stomped on—at least, that’s how we feel.

   Writing fanfiction let me choose from elements people already loved. There’s a built-in audience of people who go in expecting to like your work. Now, I have read fanfic pieces set in my favorite fandom that I didn’t care for, but I started into them with optimism and gave them a chance based on what I knew of the source material.

   Starting where I did let me stand on a pre-existing platform of success instead of having to build it myself and wonder if it would hold. I got to see what already worked (and some elements that didn’t) and learn from it in a way that writing original fiction didn’t.

2. It doesn’t matter where you choose to go.

   If there’s anything I’ve learned from writing fanfiction, it’s that the next step is entirely up to you. Writers agonize over where to take characters next. The truth is, as long as it’s well-executed, it doesn’t matter.

   Consider a few examples:

   In Gavriel Savit’s The Way Back, two young protagonists literally walk into the Land of the Dead. They move seamlessly from the physical world into the spiritual, but it’s done so well readers simply accept the shift.

   Chris Colfer’s An Author’s Odyssey features a young man literally bringing his own stories to life, but the way Colfer sets up the event leads readers to this point without breaking believability.

   Guerilla Games’ Horizon: Zero Dawn takes the player through a post-apocalyptic world inhabited by tribal groups that live alongside machines resembling animals, but because of how well-integrated the story is, seemingly in-congruent elements co-exist without losing that wow factor.

We might dread taking a wrong turn on the way to an important appointment, or getting lost on the way to a place we’ve never been before (Let’s be honest, not all of us are great with directions, even when our phones tell us where to go), but sitting down to write and wondering if we’re going the right direction is a different kind of dread.

Fanfiction helps us feel like we have been here before, and we do know how to get to our objective, even if we can’t pin down the exact route we want to take yet.

When it comes to writing, the only wrong step is the one you never take.