FanStory

I'm so glad I found Fanstory. When I discovered this site, I was looking for contests where I could enter my writing. This site offers all kinds of interesting contests every month. So I became a member, entered a few and won some too! But that's not all I found here. The writers that participate on this site are fantastic. I have received good feedback and support from so many reviewers that have given me confidence. Most importantly, I've met lots of wonderful people from all around the world and read some great stories and poems that I may never have heard if I hadn't joined this awesome site.

I am addicted. Not only I am I receiving good input for my writing, but I really enjoy the ability to review and pass on constructive criticism to others. For any writing putting your work out for the public to see or hear is like standing naked in front of a crowd but the members here are very supportive and helpful. They go to great lengths to offer feedback that helps - does not tear down - and is meaningful.

I have written many poems but have rarely let anyone read them. But after placing three poems and getting good feedback I have confidence in my abilities.

I have learned so much from being a part of this website. If you enjoy writing this is a "must have". The reason is you get feedback for the stories and poems that you write. Or if you are writing a book you will get feedback for every chapter you write. This feedback, for me, is invaluable. Knowing what more experienced authors think of my work has helped me greatly. I'm a much better writer since I joined.

FanStory has helped many authors (including friends I have met through the site) go on to be published. The feedback is always helpful and friendly. I have learned more from FanStory then I have from any other source (including college!). The site also has writing contests and other features that really are beneficial to anyone looking to improve their writing skills.

When I first joined Fanstory, I was a writer of poetry, but I had little confidence in the poems I was writing. The feedback I received from fanstory reviewers was invaluable in helping me improve and also providing confidence in my writing. Other authors took up their valuable time to comment on my work and offer suggestions. The feedback has helped me in ways I can not explain. My friends and family have commented on how my writing has improved. I have to give credit to the reviewers at Fanstory for offering me the crucial feedback. I have also learned new forms of writing through the writing contests that are constantly challenging me to try new types of poetry.

I am now a published author. I finished my first book of poetry and my second one is nearly complete. I will give the Fanstory reviewers full credit in the dedication page of each novel.

Highly recommended! What I like about this site is that if you write a poem or a story it won't go unnoticed. You get feedback from other writers about everything you write. For me, fanstory.com is a crucial writing tool. Heck, for me it is as important as my word processor!

It's important for writers looking to get published to know that you also keep your copyright. That was something I checked into. You keep full rights to your writing. So you can go on to be published as I have. Not all sites have this but fanstory was specifically made for writers and ensures that you keep full rights to anything you post. It also time and date stamps your work when you post it. So if someone gets a copy of your manuscript you can go to fanstory and they will provide you the date and time you posted your work along with the original (unedited) post. That's available free of charge. The site is an important resource if you are looking to improve your writing. I have published two books since I joined.

Two years ago I took my first steps to write and I came to this website. Every writer who read my work on this web site offered me useful advice. They explained what I was doing wrong but also what I was doing right. I didn't expect such detailed feedback.

Mostly I learned of acceptance and yes some humility. The writing contests offer challenges I normally would never have attempted. I'm writing poetry that I didn't even know that existed. Haiku? What's that? Acrostic? Huh? That's part of where I get my enjoyment. The site is constantly challenging writers to try something different.

Very interesting and enjoyable site. If you write poetry or stories or are thinking of doing so I recommend it. You don't have to have a lot of experience (or any like me) you can learn from the site.

I recommend this site. I know I have a lot to improve and I found here many wonderful people looking to help me. I was surprised by this. On other sites people would write a couple of words. The feedback was normally "This is good" if anything at all. Here reviewers generally seem to go out of their way to help. For the most part, the reviews are detailed and seem to be well thought out. I can ask questions that they generally answer very quickly. I was very surprised.

The reviews you receive determine your rank. The ranking system shows you how your writing compares to other writers. It's so nice to see how well my writing is doing in every category. The review system is good because I get feedback for my writing. But there was an unexpected benefit. Writing reviews helps me to understand better others writing and, eventually - how mine needs improvement.

The interface is excellent. I can see from one glimpse everything I need. There is always so much to do. I have never been bored being here.

FanStory.com gets, and deserves, five stars. Is there a six star I can give?

Without finding this site, I don't think my dream of having my book published in print would have been realized.

FanStory is a great place to get honest opinions on what you write. The writing contests are challenging and offer a fun dimension to writing. It's helpful to write a book chapter or poem and have a place where you can get feedback from other writers. With the help from others on this site I learned how to write poems and book chapters that hold the interest of the reader This site is simply wonderful and helped me immensely become a much better writer.

This is the real deal and one of the most professional writing sites I have been involved with since I started writing. I highly recommend it.

I just want to say how happy I am to have found this site. I've always wanted to write, but have always struggled with confidence and actually getting things finished. I've been on here most days since I joined last month, and in that time I've written 5 stories, actually finished them and received good feedback. This has boosted my confidence. Now that I have started writing, I am finding it really hard to stop!

I heartily nominate FanStory as the most helpful website I have ever come across that truly delivers what it promises. Not only is it a forum in which your poetry and stories are reviewed by other aspiring writers (I had 110 reviews of my latest story!), but I've been able to develop my critical skills by reviewing other members' works, as well. There are contests galore to enter, daily, with generous payouts... and... well, I see no reason to go anywhere else!

The FanStory website is attractive and easy to navigate. The help info is user friendly. And it is fast. The writing you post is there - immediately. And more amazingly the feedback is almost as fast. I love that I get feedback for everything I post. Congrats to the writers that developed FanStory.com.

The quality of the feedback is outstanding. Members take the time to read the work and write thoughtful comments both plus and minus. Comments from other writers are worth their weight in gold. One hears from folks that are grappling with the same 'problems'. As a learning tool - unsurpassed.

The website has depth and discovering all the possibilities available is quite an adventure. It has a game like quality about it. :) It's fun.

Here's the dark side, the REAL story about Scamstory:

As an extensively published, well-known writer and magazine editor for decades, and a one-time ''Top Ranked Number One Author" on the Fanstory site, I can tell you with authority that Fanstory is NOT a legitimate writing site. It's a narcissistic little online reality show run by spiteful, cowardly, no-talent schoolyard bullies. With a few notable exceptions, most of the writing there is pure unpublishable garbage.

Fanstory's owner and Supreme Ruler For Life, is a despotic, draconian internet scam-artist who rules his little fantasy kingdom through fear, intimidation, repression of intelligent thoughts and ideas, and the deliberate encouragement of competitive discord between members.

A big part of his well-developed strategy is to divide and rule, just like a dictatorship, keeping members in line under the constant threat of Big Brother watching. This maniac has gone so far as to imply that he monitors the private email accounts of members, in order to revoke their membership for violating his ''site terms'' and speaking out about his atrocities, even in private.

Fanstory is an Orwellian nightmare. It's owner works his malevolent internet con-game through obvious favoritism to a few no-talent cronies and the iron-fisted enforcement of all sorts of arbitrary little rules, regulations and ''site terms'' which are exclusively and entirely subject to his own personal interpretation and whims.

Like the Wizard of Oz, this creep has raked in a fortune by feeding the egos of lonely pensioners and the like, bleeding their Paypal accounts dry by charging them a fortune to ''promote'' their work on the site. The more money they spend, the higher they rise in ''rank'', despite the overall poor quality of their work.

It's nothing but a scam, feeding on peoples' vanity. It's a classic case of The Emperor's New Clothes, where the few intelligent members who know what a corrupt little farce it all is are bullied into silence under the constant threat of expulsion if they so much as make a peep.

He's gotten away with terrorizing his shivering minions like this from behind a curtain of anonymity for years. Most of the members don't even know that the draconian who threatens them with expulsion for the most petty of infractions on a daily basis is a real person. In his narcissistic little fantasy bubble of illusory omnipotence, this money-hungry weirdo and his unfortunate subjects seem to have lost touch with the reality that there are real consequences in the real world outside of Fanstory, where unprincipled scam-artists like this can and will be held accountable for their crimes.

I, for one, am in the process of initiating a lawsuit against this abomination of a ''writer's site'' and its owner, for the many absurd outrages committed against me and my work during my time as a ''Top Ranked'' member there.

If you're looking for a real, legitimate writer's workshop online, avoid Fanstory like the Black Hole of Calcutta. Its advertising policy borders on criminally misleading, and the whole thing just stinks to high heaven. Through massive amounts of false advertising, they manage to make it look all pretty and innocent on the surface, but the reality is as dark and corrupt as it gets. An ugly, unwholesome little nightmare!

If your are serious about your writing, don't drink the Fanstory Kool Aid. This site is the absolute pits!

*[personal information redacted by admin]

Here's the good and the bad about FanStory. FS is a great place to post your poetry, short stories, novels, and scripts, and receive feedback from other members on the site. It also has numerous contests, both site-sponsored and member-sponsored, and these can be fun to enter. The cost to be a member allowed to post your writing is not prohibitive.

So what's the downside?

In order to have your writing reviewed, it needs to be "promoted". All your postings will have a free initial certificate which expires after two reviews. To give your work visibility, you must buy a certificate which will cost you between six and ten dollars. But wait! That will only get you a place far down on the list, where you might only get one or two more reviews. To move your work higher, you need to buy "pump" certificates that pump your work up the list. This costs another $3, but you may need several to move you piece up where it will get a lot of visibility.

You can either whip out your credit card to purchase certificates and pumps, or earn member dollars by reviewing the work of other writers. In order to avoid spending "real" money to promote their work, other writers review, review, review. Of course, the volume of reviews they need to do results in some reviews being virtually worthless "fluff".

Ratings are based on the volume of work you post, and the review ratings given them. The top-rated poets on FS are not by any means the best poets on the site, but they are the most prolific, some with literally hundreds of (sometimes remarkably) mundane works that get numerous "fluff" reviews, and therefore move them up the ranks. Some of the highest rated poets do have talent, but even again, the driver is volume, which of course requires - you guessed it - that people buy certificates to promote their volumes of work.

But here's the real danger to serious writers, and a well-kept secret that the owner doesn't want potential (or current) members to know. Many publications consider a work posted on FanStory as having been published online, which disqualifies it from being considered for publication elsewhere. FanStory will tell you that by making your profile "private" and setting "content sharing" to off, your work is only visible to members, and therefore that rule does not apply. This is not true in all cases, and reputable submission services may refuse to consider any work that has been posted on FanStory because it is considered "previously published".
If you are looking for a supportive writing community, recognition within that community, and fun contests that will inspire you to write, FanStory is a fine place to go.

If you are a serious writer looking to be published, DO NOT put your work in risk by posting it on FS and opening up the possibility that your opportunity to be published will be lost.

There are many testimonials about writers cuttting their teeth on FS and their experience there helping them to get published. But the opportunities to get published are, as we all know, hard to come by. If your goal is to publish, don't risk having your work disqualified from being accepted because it has appeared on FS.

It has been two years now since I joined. After retiring I thought it would be a good time to start working on my book. I found this site and thought it might be a good way to get feedback from other writers. I was very pleased with the feedback I received. Writers, like me, were happy to share their thoughts on my book. This is a wonderful place for poets and authors to get feedback and learn. I have finished my book and couldn't be more excited about what the future holds. I owe this all to the wonderful reviewers on this site.

I've been a member of fanstory since 2003 and love it. I've learned an incredible amount, I've won contests, made great friends and have not seen another site that comes close to Fanstory!

Whether you're a polished writer, a a budding poet or one who writes scripts, there's a place for you at Fanstory.

Likewise, an offshoot, Fanart, is the place for artists, graphics and comics and photographers.

An all around great site. Can't beat what it offeres for $50 per year.

Gayle Farmer aka Showtimebook

FanStory.com is a writing site. On FanStory.com you submit your writing for feedback. So if you write a poem and share it on FanStory.com you will get feedback from other writers. There are also writing contests with cash prizes.

When I retired, I began exploring the idea of writing poetry. It's something I never had time for with my career and family taking up much of my time. I sought writing sites and discovered FanStory. Since then, I have never stopped writing!

I have met friends, reviewers, editors and have received wonderful advice on FanStory. I have learned to trust my writing enough to my thoughts through my words.

I love poetry since finding FanStory. I love to write it. I love to read it. I also share my stories on the website. I also enjoy the writing contests.

I am also now published... something that was beyond my imagination.

I recommended the site to anyone that enjoys writing.