Saint Dionysus Has Officially Retired from Fan Fiction

To all my loyal readers and listeners, some of you may have already heard, but I have some very bittersweet news for you all, but I have decided to officially retire from writing fanfiction. I know. I just posted a huge 20k final installment of my work in progress. And a few of you have already messaged me that you’re sad or disappointed that I’m retiring but this felt like the perfect time to walk away, and Addicted (to you) is a story I never knew I had in me and is unlike anything else I’ve seen in fanfic. It’s my HP fanfic opus that I’m leaving with you.

For those who have known me, followed my work, or listened to me on podcasts, I’ve been drifting from fanfiction for a while, really trying to stay motivated in the fandom while working on my original work. While there are other writers who brilliantly manage to keep one leg in fanfic and the other in original work, that’s just not how my brain works. I have to give all or nothing, and right now, my heart is 100% focused on my original works.

But one of the biggest reasons I have chosen this moment to leave fanfiction isn’t just because I finished Addicted, but because our current social climate made me realize a lot of things. I’ve had a lot of time to think about what it is to be a first-generation American, POC, woman creator, and I have felt a lot of guilt and complicity amplifying the voice of a now-controversial white author, white characters, and not even speaking as an American in my own voice.

My talent and creativity haven’t been used to do anything to enhance the representation of people who look like me or my husband or my children, and for that, I am ashamed. I became so wrapped up in my love for a fandom, that I didn’t realize how much of myself I was neglecting in my work. While the Harry Potter series meant so much to me, and I support so many members of the fandom’s effort to diversify fan casts by making Hermione black or mixed-race, Harry Desi, Pansy Eurasian, Draco trans, etc, but it doesn’t change the fact there aren’t any Southeast Asian or Pacific Islander characters in canon or any truly open LGBTQ characters. In my original works, I will be telling POC stories, people who struggle with their racial identity, embrace, are proud of it, share it, and the same with their sexual and gender identity. And while I know how powerful the fanfiction platform is, it really comes down to authenticity, and I cannot live my own truth if I’m always speaking through JK Rowling’s voice.

Am I leaving the fandom? No! I love you guys too much. I still have commitments to authors who I love to be their alpha and beta readers, and will see those commitments through. I will continue to run my podcasts and be a casual reader. I just will no longer be an active writer.

So what does this mean for my fanfiction? Well, I’m leaving the majority of it up—Confessions, A Girl Worth Fighting For, Trope Soup, Drama Club, Addicted (to you), and the random one-shots and drabbles. Hot Mess has undergone some minor revisions and is now only available on Archive of Our Own. I made some racial fetish jokes that I no longer feel comfortable with, and they have been omitted. Isle of Morsmordre has come down, but only had one published chapter. Peter Pan will be going fully into the public domain by 2023 so I have decided to write it completely as a dark Peter Pan AU. Lessons Learned in Laurel has also already been pulled and will also be coming down to be reworked as an original. Confessions: I Dare You/Get You are fan favorites, but I have been playing with the idea of turning Al and Pol into an original graphic novel series. Please keep your subscriptions on those stories for alerts in the event I do pull from the archive.

I want to thank you all so much for going on this journey for me and hope you join me in the future. I would not be here without you. I’m really excited to write stories with diverse characters and write in my own voice. You can all follow me on Instagram @cat.dionisio, Twitter @catdionisio, and Facebook @catdionisioofficial to find out more about upcoming projects, cheer me on, and even just say hi. I love you all and thank you.