Snowflake Challenge Day 13

[kingstoken]

Challenge 13.

In your own space, share a favorite memory about fandom: the first time you got into fandom, the last time a fanwork touched your heart, wild times with fellow fans (whether on-line or off-line), a lovely comment you’ve received or have left for someone.

One thing that I think got me into transformative fandom, that wasn't fandom related at all, was in late 2014 I took a free writing course at my local library, the focus of the course was short original fiction and some memoir writing, but it got my juices flowing and got me back into writing, which I had stopped doing a few years prior.  At the time I was big into Game of Thrones, and I used some of the skills I learned to write my first fanfiction.  I posted it to tumblr, and got some nice feedback, which encouraged me to write more (I remember I got like 28 notes and I was over the moon!).  And, because it was tumblr I soon discovered gif sets and graphics and decided to try my hand at that as well.  Some of my early edits and moodboards are not good, but people in the GoT fandom liked and reblogged them anyways, which inspired me to keep trying.  I know that the GoT fandom, especially in the later seasons, was considered to be quite wanky and unpleasant, but the GoT fandom was quite generous to me as a newbie, and I'll always be grateful for that.

Comments

[enemytosleep]

I love the crossover between an in person class/experience and how that led you to tumblr and to the fandom experience. I still remember how nervous I was to start sharing and creating years ago, and how grateful I was that other folks were excited to share with me and squee and wait for more official content together. I'm so glad you have fond memories of your early days!

[kingstoken]

I think that is why the in person class helped me, like we had to share some of our work in class and get critiqued by our follow classmates, so if I could that sharing on the internet didn't seem as scary.

[brokenhighways]

I love that you were able to use the writing skills you learnt IRL in fandom and that you had a good overall experience! :D

[kingstoken]

Thank you!

[peaked]

28 notes is amazing for a response! What pairings did/do you write for GoT? (I used to devour all the Jaime/Brienne, Gendry/Arya and Hound/Sansa fic lol. I wish I had the guts to write for it, but it's so intimidating as a universe.)

I think that even if a fandom is known for being notoriously wanky, it doesn't mean that everyone in it is. You had a great experience and I'm glad to see you're not writing it off because the fandom became a little toxic later.

[kingstoken]

That first fic was a Jaime/Brienne fic, and the Braime shippers were very welcoming at the time of any new writers. I mostly wrote Jaime/Brienne and Jorah/Dany in my early days, but I spread out and tried writing some other pairings over time.

[peaked]

OMG yes! Braime!!! I was always so interested in Dany/Jorah but never seemed to wade into those fics. I'm unsurprised to hear the Braime fandom was nice. Hopefully, you're still writing from GOT!

[kingstoken]

I rarely write GOT now, but I will still occasionally write it for exchanges or if I come across a really good prompt. I just wrote a Jon/Tyrion ficlet in December for a person's holiday wishlist.