Patience is a virtue...

A few weeks ago, I was surfing some Lord of the Rings fan fiction. Here's the link if anyone's interested. http://www.fanfiction.net/s/3764208/1/Ill_Fortune. I was reading through the story, on the edge of my seat, when I came across something that kind of threw me for a loop. It wasn't even in the story itself, it was in the author's note. For those of you not-fan fiction savvy people, an author's note is just what it sounds like; a note written by the author about the story.

At the time that the author posted this chapter, she hadn't posted for a bit because she had been busy with other stuff in her life. Understandable, right? But she follows up this with a sentence saying "I am not trying to be mean or lazy, but I appreciate it if I stopped getting private messages telling me to update my story soon. I’m glad that you all like the story that much, but please understand that my schoolwork comes first." And that's what blew me away. Now, I love fan fiction, obviously. It's been a huge part of my life for ten years, but as much as I love fan fiction, it's never going to be more than a hobby for me. That's the way it is for most fan fiction writers. It's a fun, creative thing to do and it gives those brain cells a nice work-out, but what it comes down to is we've all got lives outside of fan fiction. We post for fun, so to be bombarded with messages urging you to update is a bit rude.

I've been on both ends of this. I've frequently been on the end of the reader, just getting into a story when all of a sudden, you're left on a cliffhanger, but I could never try to harass the author to update because I've also been on the other end; the end of the author leaving people on cliffhangers. My longest running fan fiction is a 30ish chapter story about the TV show M*A*S*H. It took me 3 years to finish it because, like this author, I was a high-school, then a college student, frequently too busy with schoolwork and other stuff to update as frequently as I would have liked.

Reviews are probably one of the most rewarding aspects of posting fan fiction, but not when they're like the messages that this author was getting. That's the sort of stuff that makes you almost resent writing the story in the first place. Like I told this author in my review of her story, it's more important for you to be happy with your work, then giving your audience a quick chapter that you're not proud of just to shut them up. Sure, the reviews are part of why you write and if you don't update frequently enough, people stop checking your stuff, but the impatient people of today need to realize that, just like they do, sometimes you've got other stuff to do. As important as reviews and the audience are, the main reason you're posting is because you have this story that you want to share with the world, right? It's your story. You need to be the one happy with it at the end of the day.

So to anyone who has ever sent a message bugging a writer to update their story, please remember that we authors aren't here solely for your pleasure. If you love our stories, great! We're so pleased to hear that, but we still have other things to take care of in our lives and sometimes, that might interfere with your next fix of our story, but that's no reason to get pushy. We'll be back, don't worry! But until then, your consideration, respect, and most of all, patience, is greatly appreciated.