There's a big difference between holding someone and threatening them, and arresting someone nearby who's covered in blood and could just as easily be another victim.

 

Behead those that update stories with nothing but an apology/excuse/announcement that no update is forthcoming, insh'allah.

 

So, a shit fic I favourited back when I was new to fanfic updated. A 45k word update.

Like, why? How many people actually have the time to slog through a 45k word update? If the author had broken the fic up into more manageable pieces, not only would I might actually consider reading it to see if it's still any good or not, but the author would have had 10 or more times where the story near the top of the recently updated list. Ten more times for more exposure.

 

My pet peeve is where Dumbledore is a evil manipulative old coot who binds Harrys magic, casts loyalty and obliviate charms on him, steals money from Harry's vault and sets up marriage contracts for him. I hate it. And most of the time, it is accompanied by Molly Harpie Weasley, Ginny Gold digger love potion Weasley and Ron Greedy Idiot Weasley along with saint Slytherins and snape. I agree that Dumbledore is a bit manipulative but he certainly isn't that.

 

That's a Pet Peeve straight from 2011. Or 2008. Or 2018. Or IDGAF, it's old as shit, and still nice. It still appears, it's still mega mondo peg my ass shit, and so fuck all that shit you listed

 

I wasn't even reading fanfiction in 2011. Even the Canon HP I read in only 2013

 

In original fiction:

When the protagonist's day job is as a successful writer - or worse yet, in a YA novel when the character wants to be a writer when they grow up. Ugh.

 

Self inserts transcend through all dimensions.

 

May I ask why this irks you so? I mean, it's obvious that this trope mostly exists for reasons of writers taking "write what you know" to its logical extreme, but that's not necessarily a bad thing. "Write what you know" is a time-honored adage for a reason — and as long as the beauty of artistic creation is in itself something of interest to you (and it certainly is to me) then surely no one can write about it better than a great writer himself.

 

YA novels aren't typically fonts of great writing. "Write what you know" is perfectly well put for matters of research. Resorting to "successful writer" or "aspiring writer" isn't writing what you know; it's wish-fulfillment and self-insertion. Whereas good writing draws upon the intimate perception, it wants also some distance between the author and his subjects; evidently not the case in Otter's peeve.

One cannot make a day job of writing, especially not these days. All the "successful" writers seem to do it on the night-schedule, hustling all the way. I should like to see that insertion, instead of some one-dimensional "beauty of artistic creation."

Unless we're talking the artistic beauty of trust funds.

In which case, you'd better know your trust fund kids well. (Edward St. Aubyn has made a career of it.)

 

Personally, it isn't Dumbledore being a manipulative bastard that bothers me in such Fics. It's how incompetent he is at it. Dumbledore never acts subtle about what he's doing, he never seems to have any real motivation or long-term plans more complicated than making Harry miserable, and he's ultimately defeated by a teenager who maybe read some books over the summer. And while some stories attempt to explain Dumbledore's stupidity away with senility, they also don't explain why it only took a teenager who maybe read some books over the summer before anyone noticed such a dominate figure was suffering from serious dementia.

As far as I can tell, there is only one Fic in the entire history of HP FanFics to seriously consider how a genuinely intelligent Dumbledore would actually fare when confronted with a teenager who maybe read some books over the summer, called What Was Your Plan? It singlehandedly put the entire Manipulative!Dumbledore trope to shame by giving the intelligent mastermind some actual intelligence.

 

For reasons of the hilarious irony, I should like to point out that the fanfiction community to which this forum belongs was sparked by the works of a woman whose writing has famously made her a millionaire.

I mean, I do see what you mean, regardless… but then, who said the fiction we're talking about has to be set "these days"? I read historical fiction and fantasy much more often than I do novels set in 21st-century Earth, and in both these settings ‘successful writer’ is a perfectly possible situation for the character to be in. Go on, hop in your time machine, knock on Victor Hugo and Charles Dickens's doors, and tell them he can't make a living of writing. Fall into the Veil or however you're supposed to self-insert in the Wizarding World, and tell Lockhart writing will do you no good finance- and success-wise.

Also, while I can see how "successful writer" smacks of wish-fulfillment, coming from writers who are not, as a matter of fact, successful… how is writing your protagonist/author avatar as an "aspiring writer" arrogant? If anything, it's a step down considering that by definition the person doing the writer is no longer "aspiring".

 

And you thought I'd not considered that exception? For she is an exception. Who signed up for welfare benefits as she wrote. There was tremendous suffering preceding her fame and fortune, quite of the sort I'd like to see in those vaunted self-inserts.

FYI, Dickens was first a solicitor, and then a freelance reporter of law cases, who wrote in his off-time. Similarly Hugo suffered through years of penury, refusing his family's charity, until his historical drama Hernani made him rich. You seem not very informed about these figures you idly flaunt in my face.

Hilarity.

Portraits of "aspiring writers" with no notion of the realities are hardly portraits worth viewing.

Edit: It'd be something else for a writer like G. R. R. M. to self-insert into a novel post-success.

Why, he could regale us with all the hours of "literary inspiration" spent gm'ing his friends' games as part of his daily writing process. And the hours in his garden office putting words to paper, averaging about... once every three months? Ahhh, the artistic life of a successful writer.

 

I get where you're coming from but your argument kind of feel like a tautology. Before these people were successful, they were unsuccessful. Yes. Obviously, to quote movie-Snape, Victor Hugo wasn't born a famous author. But there was a point in his life where he ended up an acclaimed, renowned and successful writer, and that's what matters for this discussion.

There also remains the opportunity of science-fiction or fantasy worlds. Re: Gilderoy merlindamn Lockhart.

 

Not particularly. Merely that we're focusing on different aspects of the journey. But here's the rub. "Aspiring writers" are uninteresting unless you deliberately work in the elements that make a writing career such a pain to start with. "Successful writers" are boring unless you fill in with the kind of mental tortures intrinsic to any human psyche, but particularly of the background said writer is to come from.

So either way, from the standpoint of the average pop writer, you lose. Obviously once a writer is successful --- but how many make it to the level of a Terry Pratchett in any case --- they can roll success into success, varying on their audience --- but such a person is entirely unimaginative to read about. At that point "successful writer" is a lazy plot device.

That anyone can self-publish a book (as they can these days) is neither to make them a sustainable career or a successful writer. Your grandma can hand-knit a "sweater," doesn't put it on the level of a Cucinelli or Hawick.

All of this is to Otter's point, which is to say the vast majority of writers self-insert poorly, if they self-insert at all. Hence the peeve.

 

Here's one that's probably been here before: if you can't be bothered to figure out how to spell a character's name right - any character, don't bother writing a story in that universe.

 

Godric's Hollow, Wales, England

 

Inaccurate. We all know that 100% of Britain is in London.

 

City of London certainly thinks so, but the existence of the City of London is not a peeve I can fairly attribute to Harry Potter fanfiction authors, unfortunately.