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marobbins's review against another edition
4.0
Some parts of this book intrigued me more than others, but overall, I found it interesting, fun to read, and helpful. I initially read it more so for fun and to help me get ideas for my own fanfic work, but some of it will also be helpful for my dissertation writing. I learned a lot about the history of fan fiction and fandom in general. Fan fiction writing used to be in the form of Zines, which I very much want to look at. Since I now write Buffy fan fiction myself, I particularly enjoyed that part of the book. I do think fan fiction will continue to influence the literary and popular culture worlds, so this book is an important one.
colorwriter's review against another edition
informative
reflective
slow-paced
2.75
I had high hopes for this book but had different expectations from what the content ended up being. I personally did not enjoy the huge focus on sexual content within fanfiction. As someone who rarely writes or reads fanfic smut I felt unrepresented by most of the book. The last part was what I was most interested in reading about.
crtsjffrsn's review against another edition
3.0
I've been doing a bit of reading in the area of fan studies lately, so as someone involved in fandom and fanfiction communities, this was certainly a book I needed to pick up. I was really interested to see an approach focused on fanfiction from an academic perspective. And for the first third of the book, I feel like that's what I got. But past that, the in-depth and objective feeling seemed to fade. A number of major controversies in fanfiction are highlighted, often without a full perspective, and the weighting of examples is heavy in two specific fandoms (which, with fanfiction being a very large panfandom activity, it would have been good to bring in a wider array of examples or case studies, I think).
Overall, the book does provide a good overview of fanfiction for someone who may not know much about its history, but I'd be hard-pressed to call this 'the definitive text' on the subject.
Overall, the book does provide a good overview of fanfiction for someone who may not know much about its history, but I'd be hard-pressed to call this 'the definitive text' on the subject.
amcloughlin's review against another edition
4.0
A wonderful history of fanfiction, especially early zine distribution and recent works in the Internet age. Much fandom scholarship focuses on the early days of ficcing, and while that is useful for historical and educational purposes, those of us who got our fix through dial-up rather than mail-order zines can't relate personally to that era. Jamison's Fic is the first wide survey of fandom to the present day that I have come across, and I loved the chance to relive my own first years in fandom in the early 2000s. A recommended read!
jcd1013's review against another edition
4.0
I started reading this back in 2014 and then stopped about 1/3 of the way through it as I really didn't have time or interest in books back then. But I hated seeing it on my "currently reading" list, so I decided to finish it off this autumn.
I've been part of various fandoms for nearly 25 years now. I've written fanfiction and read gobs and gobs (part of the reason I didn't have interest in regular books, I suppose). But while this involved interviews with fans, I'm pretty sure that I'm not the target audience, and that's okay too.
The book less than 10 years old and it's aged. Livejournal has gone to the Russians. Fanfiction.net is only ads at this point. The big fandoms that she described have mostly faded away (all except Supernatural, which like the show never seem to die off). The later part of the book dragged, which is probably why I stopped reading it. But it was also great to see how things have progressed. The cease and desist letters have gone away. Fanfic writers becoming published writers is much more common now.
I would love to have taken this class in college. My transformative works back then were not appreciated.
I've been part of various fandoms for nearly 25 years now. I've written fanfiction and read gobs and gobs (part of the reason I didn't have interest in regular books, I suppose). But while this involved interviews with fans, I'm pretty sure that I'm not the target audience, and that's okay too.
The book less than 10 years old and it's aged. Livejournal has gone to the Russians. Fanfiction.net is only ads at this point. The big fandoms that she described have mostly faded away (all except Supernatural, which like the show never seem to die off). The later part of the book dragged, which is probably why I stopped reading it. But it was also great to see how things have progressed. The cease and desist letters have gone away. Fanfic writers becoming published writers is much more common now.
I would love to have taken this class in college. My transformative works back then were not appreciated.
lberestecki's review against another edition
3.0
This was an interesting book, and I enjoyed reading it. I've never been a real participator in any fandom, but I'm definitely a big lurker, and I have a lot of opinions on fanfic. However, despite generally enjoying this book, I had some pretty big problems with it. The biggest of which was that I wish the book had been more balanced. If you're going to write a book about fanfic, I think it's important to not just discuss what it adds to fandom/media, but to also look at it critically.
There was one essay about the lack of racial diversity in a lot of fanfic, but in a lot of ways the essay focused more on the lack of diversity in the media that fanfic is based on. There was no discussion about the sexism/internalized misogyny that can be a huge issue in fandom - I think it would have been good to have a section on why slash fic and mpreg are the most popular genres when they often completely females from the picture, as well as looking at how female characters that get into the way of ships are treated. Especially considering most of these works are written by women.
I also wish there had been a rebuttal to the RPF essay. Full disclosure, RPF makes me super uncomfortable. I understand that a lot of people who write it say that they're writing fictional versions of these real people, but given the content of most of the works I'm not sure that makes much difference. Certainly it is important to have a defense of RPF in the book since it is generally derided, but I think that the other side of the debate should have been given a voice as well.
Overall, I found the book to be more of a defense of fanfic and a discussion of why it is awesome, and I really would have preferred a book that looked critically at both sides of the issue.
There was one essay about the lack of racial diversity in a lot of fanfic, but in a lot of ways the essay focused more on the lack of diversity in the media that fanfic is based on. There was no discussion about the sexism/internalized misogyny that can be a huge issue in fandom - I think it would have been good to have a section on why slash fic and mpreg are the most popular genres when they often completely females from the picture, as well as looking at how female characters that get into the way of ships are treated. Especially considering most of these works are written by women.
I also wish there had been a rebuttal to the RPF essay. Full disclosure, RPF makes me super uncomfortable. I understand that a lot of people who write it say that they're writing fictional versions of these real people, but given the content of most of the works I'm not sure that makes much difference. Certainly it is important to have a defense of RPF in the book since it is generally derided, but I think that the other side of the debate should have been given a voice as well.
Overall, I found the book to be more of a defense of fanfic and a discussion of why it is awesome, and I really would have preferred a book that looked critically at both sides of the issue.
whitneyborup's review against another edition
5.0
It was absolutely fascinating to learn so much about this community I knew almost nothing about (with the exception of some completely clueless X-Philes fic I wrote as a kid, I haven't ever belonged to a fandom). And some of the reviews here are equally fascinating. Jamison warns about the anger and vitriol in fan communities (the reason I feel a lot of nerds are scared to get involved), and these goodreads comments are a great illustration of that kind of passion. It actually reminds me a lot of the early reactions to academic work on superheroes and comic books - people afraid of academic appropriation, of elitist attitudes towards their beloved medium, or the creation of some kind of artistic hierarchy within comics culture. Since I read this on a kindle and the pictures were too small to really see, it was nice to see these examples play out in the goodreads comments section! :)
mariama_soares's review against another edition
funny
informative
reflective
relaxing
medium-paced
4.0