Fanfiction gets paid zillions!

Yes! It was in the news! You can make serious money with fanfiction!

You can take an iconic 20th-century multi-million pound/dollar/pesos franchise, take the canon's hero and story-world, copy the canon's style, throw in a little fanon for good measure, never worry about 'cease and desist' notices, and rake in the money, helicopters and semi-nekkid ladies!

Sebastian Faulks did it, with his new James Bond book!

Fascinating interview this morning on the BBC's Today programme. Go to the menu at top right (labelled 'Listen Again' and 'Top Stories'), scroll down to 0821, and listen!

off to paris, onto fantasy

I'm off to Eurodisney. Back on Friday. Am paying stupendous amounts of money for the Eurostar due to lateness of booking (am constitutionally unable to buy tickets in advance). Am going with t'younger son.

Have bought for the journey Lois Bujold's The Hallowed Hunt. Thank you, all you fantasy reccers! Thanks, ithiliana! I wanted to get some of the others, too, but none of the shops HAD THEM. You people clearly know the good, hidden-away stuff... *g*.

I ran to the library before it closed and borrowed another Bujold (something paladin), a Wynne Jones (something gryphon), a Feist (something fox) and Susanna Clark, Mr Norris and something something Strange.

*phew* But will only take Bujold on train as fantasy tends to be unportable!! Fat! Heavy! Tiny, tiny font!!!

Some initial observations on this genre (compared to chick lit):

Chick lit has pink covers with embossed silver stars. It shows drawings of girls with long legs and quirky expressions and 1950s arabesques.
Fantasy has dun or greyish covers with enrobed figures, billowing gowns, strange-coloured skies, weird landscapes, women with serious expressions and flowing hair, or it has covers with symbols (wheels, gems and emblems are popular).

Chick lit tends to be c. 300 pages long, relatively handleable, with big fonts. Message conveyed: Read me quickly and don't strain your eyes doing it; I'm a page-turner and will last you a few hours.
Fantasy tends to be at least 500 pages long, with tiny, tiny font to fit it all in. The flyleaf tends to sport a map. The books come in trilogies or series, much like buses. Message conveyed: Immerse yourself in my world for the next weeks, months, years.

Chick lit starts in medias res and tends to have a first-person involved narrator. Something happens in the first sentence, dialogue generally happens by the end of the first page, setting is minimal.
Fantasy tends to start with a description of setting and to favour, at least on the first page, the third-person non-involved ('omniscient') narrator. There needn't be any dialogue for many pages, or only terse dialogue. There is frequently a dead body.

Chick lit characters are called Kelly, Paige or Becks.
Fantasy characters are called the Lady Ijeda, Carawaith or Talwas Hun.

And never the twain shall meet! Genre boundaries are firmer than the Berlin Wall. I have so far not come across a single cross-over author, who's written both fantasy and chick lit.

I wonder which genres are porous with fantasy? Crime? Thriller? Mills & Boon/Harlequin romance? Horror seems to be close. And maybe historical novel? But literary fiction? Realist fiction? Kitchen sink drama?? Sci fi is very close. Very few authors appear to be non-Anglo-saxon.

I find this whole delving into a new genre fascinating. And rather exciting.

My pile of books-to-be-read would currently strain the LJ-post character limit...

See you all on Friday! *waves*