To Phear Or To Phail?

Alrighty, so Ive been purging my room the past week. Of what, you may ask?

Crap.

Pure, unadulterated crap.

Well... not literally. Crap equals old college mail and sacrificial school papers not worth the time of saving. Did I mention that I totally stole the shredder from the living room and still haven't brought it back out?

Yeah. That's how serious this particular purging is.

... phear me?

Ahem. I must say, however, that this purging is not completely unredeemable! I found an assignment I did just last year in AP Lit--a parody of Hamlet's 'To be, or not to be?' monologue--and I thought I'd post it here for your viewing pleasure.

Behold! The Phear of Bad Fanfiction:

To read, or not to read: that is the question:
Whether 'tis nobler of the mind to suffer
The slings and arows of horrible fanfiction,
Or to take keyboards against a sea of errors,
And by reviewing flame them? To review: to criticize;
No more; and by criticism to say we end
The head-ache of the thousand forehead slaps
That exasperation is heir to 'tis a solution
Devoutly to be wish'd. To review, to criticize;
To criticize: perchance to be constructive: ay, there's the rub;
For in that criticism of authors what review may come
When we have ourselves written off these contemptable creations
Must give us pause: there's the repulsion
That makes a joke of such horrible prose;
For who would bear the whips and scorns of flames,
The reviewer's wrong, the proud author's arrogance,
The pang of abandoned series, the update's delay,
The absence of the well-written and the abounding hiatuses
That overtake merit of the fandom
When good authors in their quietus make
A lack of decent writing?

...I'm not entirely certain it makes sense, but it was fun to write. : D

But onward we shall go. And to help you with that and to battle the bad fanfiction, here's a good one:

It's another Danny Phantom fic, but it's amazing. It's called Checkmate, and it's got to be on my top five Most Epic Story's Read Ever. In short, it's a tale of DannyVlad mentorshipness, but...I mean, seriously, I've never seen a story this epic--and that's a reference to both it's amazingness and size, ladies and gents.

However, I have also decided to insert Checkmate's actually summary by the author, Pearl, herself!

Danny's fifteenth birthday is coming up and his friends and family plan a surprise party for him; however, his fun, ghost-free birthday comes to a halt when Jazz mysteriously collapses during his party. Now Danny has to deal with his sister's sick state and ghost hunting. But Danny is faced with an even greater problem when Vlad comes to visit. What will Danny do when his sister's life depends on one choice from him?

I retyped that for you people. Please appreciate that. Especially considering I still look at the keyboard to type. T^T

But yes, as always, this particular fic is much, much more than what it's summary says. Beyond the detailed plotline and incredibly faceted and intense characterization, Checkmate offers something else (that I appreciate, at least), too: because this story is now four years old and has yet to be abandoned, you get to see the author's writing evolve. That in and of itself is amazing to observe.

I urge anyone looking for a great story to read this one!

Whew. Finally posted this. I'll probably be posting one again tomorrow about something completely different, but I'll worry about that later.

Thanks for reading, and as a note to all the stories I'm following and potential blog comments--I hope to read you soon!