Don’t Worry Folks… Harry Potter Still Rocks

Part I: According to Fanfiction.net,
Harry Potter Still Rocks

Guilty secret: I read fan fiction.

Perhaps you’ve never heard of it. Fan fictions, affectionately known as fan fics, are basically self-explanatory. It’s “new” works of fiction written by fans of certain literature. Hence, fan fiction. The stories are based on the characters and environments in the original work. I liken it to music, where musicians regularly cover each others’ work to create something new and different, but made from the same base. For example, a Harry Potter fan fiction may contain a plot where Lily leaves a letter for Harry to read in the future, confessing that Severus Snape is actually his father, not James Potter. Or a Lord of the Rings fan fiction may revolve around a complicated romance between Legolas and Aragorn. Anything can happen. In fact, some fan fics can get pretty smutty, spelling out the romantic and lusty scenes we all envision between our favourite pairings that never actually get published. Or even acknowledged by the author, depending.

Fan fiction can be found most specifically on the website fanfiction.net, but is available via search engine on all sorts of websites, collective or private. Fanfiction.net stories have been divided into many categories, including books (further divided by book or author), film, television, manga, cartoons, plays and musicals, and video games to name a few. Say you really enjoy watching House MD. Well, in case just watching it once a week doesn’t get you enough House action, you can read one of the over 18,000 stories on fanfiction.net alone.

I am more of a book fan fic reader, considering the original work is text itself. I find it difficult to read about something I regularly watch, play or sing along to. But it never ceases to amaze me how many stories can be spawned from a single work or series. Keep in mind that some fan fics are longer than the original work itself.

The top twenty fan fiction sections in books on fanfiction.net are as follows, as of July 29, 2010*:

20. Vampire Academy - 2,480
19. Silmarillion – 2,635
18. Vampires – 2,879
17. Bible – 2,920
16. Clique – 3,056
15. Inheritance Cycle – 3,856
14. Artemis Fowl - 4,071
13. Fairy Tales - 4,081
12. Animorphs - 4,577
11. The Outsiders – 5,273
10. Chronicles of Narnia – 6,695
9. Gossip Girl - 6,961
8. Percy Jackson and the Olympians – 7,678
7. Song of the Lioness – 8,073
6. Warriors – 8,221
5. Phantom of the Opera – 9,384
4. Maximum Ride – 10,787
3.Lord of the Rings – 43,558
2.Twilight – 156,842
1.Harry Potter – 467,071

So Harry Potter still dominates, as it has for years. But Twilight, thanks to hundreds of thousands of sexually frustrated teenage girls worldwide, is quickly catching up. I had no idea The Outsiders or The Phantom of the Opera were so popular as to garner one of the top twenty spots in books. I mean, they’re great books, but seriously? The one that completely stymies me, of course, is the Bible. Seriously? Who writes a fan fic about the Bible? That’s like writing fan fiction about your history text book.

Part II: Bible Fan Fics – Spiritual Glory or Just Fucked Up?

I checked the Bible fan fics and disappointingly, most of them are poems about God and Jesus and pretty normal stuff like that. But with a bit of searching, I found some synopses that sound rather epic:

The Way of the Lord, by StarXEnoch

“A modern day reimagining of the teenage years of Jesus. Through the eyes of John the Baptist, we will watch the young Messiah as he attends high school, learns about who he is, and begins his ministry.”*

Jesus went to high school?

Lilith by Min Daae

“Lilith/Eve. Temptation is sweet. Like fruit. Sort of dark and weird.”*

Nothing like some Biblical girl-on-girl action.

Jesus and Hitler: A Romance by Angkras

“Adolph Hitler travels back in time and meets a man who will change his life forever.”*

I…don’t even know what to say to that.

Judas: On the betrayal by Zak’s-blood13

“Judas’ take on Jesus’ death and his own actions. Remember, there are other gospels and writings from Jesus’ time that weren’t included in the Bible – this takes after one of those – Judas’ gospel. I don’t own Jesus/Judas/Peter or the ideas behind this.”*

I love the disclaimer. I know a lot of people put “I don’t own Harry Potter!” or whatever in their fan fics, but “I don’t own Jesus”? The Bible officially gets top ranks for most awesome fan fics ever.

*Denotes quotes or statistics taken directly from fanfiction.net.