You know, one of the things I regret going into fandom/fanfic spaces was that I didn't realize how important responding to people's fan works was. I only knew that AO3 was a place people put writing that included fictional characters and saw many remarks that it "wasn't social media" and engaging with each other or commenting "inflated numbers" amongst other things, so I thought that meant the etiquette was that I wasn't supposed to interact with people. I had a lot to learn, but when I unlearned the anxieties and complexities of all that discouragement [or rather, continue to work on] it opened the door to some really awesome things.
I remember a writer replying saying my comment was the first they had ever received. I even found this amazing fic in an extremely small fandom kept alive by the mighty @orionali (if I have any friends out there who know of Desperados, is this a real treat for you!). Incidentally, if you like Rolan, Lia, and Cal like I do, you might consider checking out The Shadow Cursed Day Dreams!
I started doing it with traditionally/self published authors too, and I even had a lovely conversation via email and got some writing and publishing advice from a relatively famous author just by sharing some compliments. So you never know what can happen if you have some appreciation to share!
When I started this journey, I used to set aside an evening every week to read all the new works under certain tags to try and encourage new writers. I wish I'd also been leaving comments at that time. Excitingly but unfortunately, the space grew exponentially and those free evenings vanished and I'm only *checks notepad of fics to read / re-read* about two years behind. But better late than never!
I think what I'm trying to say is sharing gratitude as we are able is good for the soul, and can lead to amazing opportunities but more importantly connections and supporting each other in community. And so I'm very thankful for everyone who uses their words to lift each other up and for all the kindness people have shared to lift me too <3
Aw, thank you kindly for the promo, Gray! "Kept alive" is such an appropriate term here, lmao, because it seems we'll never get any more Desperados source material. Not that it's going to stop me, though.
