RE: "Awardsmanship"

Jenn is taking issue with the "Really Big Hanson Fan Fiction Awards." And while some of her criticisms are quite valid, I think that she may be taking this whole thing just a little too seriously.

Yes, there is a lot of crap that made it onto the final slate of nominees. And yes, much of that crap was put there by teenies who acted like the whole awards thing was a middle school student council election. But you have to remember the audience you're dealing with. They are teenagers ... most of my readers are well under 18; I'd say the majority are somewhere between 13 and 16. Which is why we have to
encourage them to weed out the good Hanfics and shun the trash. Telling them that they shouldn't read the smut is just going to make them stampede right for it.

You're right when you say that these awards are popularity contests. But when you ask the general Hanfic public for nominees, that's what happens. What I think we need to do, Jenn, is get together and have our own LITERARY HANFIC AWARDS. E-mail me. We can do this. The only way to make sure that garbage like INAP doesn't end up a nominee in practically every category is to give the voters a choice of stories that are well-written, well-developed, and heck, why not ... use "your" and "you're" correctly. I guess what I'm saying is that in any kind of awards that rely on the readers at large to submit their nods, those with the most readers are going to end up as nominees ... whether they
deserve to be there or not.

I agree that there are many authors and stories that deserved much more than they got. My for instance is April's "One Night" receiving a nomination for "Best Dirty Story." What a slap in the face. Yes, April's stories are racy, but there is a difference between well-written erotica and "dirty" stories. The thing is, the people who were nominating stories couldn't see past the fact that there were sex scenes in the story. For them, that automatically made the story "dirty." I guess my point is that these are awards based on opinion.

Even though I've either not heard of many of the nominated stories or get a feeling akin to when I hear nails being dragged down a blackboard when I read others, apparently someone like them enough to get them nominated.

I am an adult, and as such when I write Hanfic I try to be responsible about it. I hate to bring up the obvious example of INAP again, but that's an incredibly irresponsible story, what with Taylor running about screwing everything that moves and not ever thinking about things like pregnancies and sexually transmitted diseases (at least in the first chapters). However, you must realize that this story's author is all of 15 years old. When I write sex scenes, there is always some discussion of birth control, emotional states, etc. That's because I'm 29 years old, I was pregnant at 19 and have had to sit on pins and needles through my share of AIDS tests. You write what you know. I'm trying to be responsible, and hopefully if a 16-year-old girl stumbles
across my stories she'll be able to realize that they're more
legitimate than things like INAP. I realized when I got into this that I'd be writing for horny teenage girls ... they make up a large portion of the Hanson fan demographic.

I admit that I'm flattered to have been nominated for these awards. And some may be surprised to know that many of us who were nominated ... myself, Julie, Amanda, Stephanie, April, Pamella and Sharon ... are all adults in our 20s and 30s, some of us even beyond. We are trying to raise the bar, and these awards you call a travesty were really a victory for us.

Special guest editorial by Jamie.