Lauren: Hey everyone. Welcome back to another episode of Publish & Prosper, where I have once again succeeded in bullying Matt into talking about fanfiction.

Matt: I'm so excited.

Lauren: I know. I know you're really excited for this one.

[0:34] – Episode Topic and Intro

Lauren: But I do think that it's a topic that you're actually going to be interested in at some point. No I do, I do, because this is actually very much in line with a lot of the episodes that we've done recently that have been about kind of trends moving forward in the publishing industry and how we're seeing kind of a big shift in the publishing industry at large, in general. We've talked about this in our non-predictions prediction episode. We talked about this in our indie, our indie authors are securing more book deals than ever and have more negotiating rights, in that episode. Like this is, this is kind of part of that overall, like, shift in trends that we're seeing. And that is something that's interesting to you, even if fanfiction isn't.

Matt: I’d also say a lot of that's arguable.

Lauren: Okay.

Matt: At least from my vantage point. But let's get into.

Lauren: Well, I look forward to you arguing with me about it.

Matt: I mean, I don't want to argue about it. I just – I don't, I don't know how much I'm ready to embrace what you just said as, as gospel yet.

Lauren: Okay.

Matt: But maybe that's just me not wanting to embrace it.

Lauren: I mean, just because you don't want to embrace it doesn't mean it's not happening.

Matt: That’s fair. I mean, you could say that about a lot of stuff going on right now.

Lauren: That's true. That's, that's so true.

Matt: Yeah.

Lauren: Oh, that reminds me of something that we probably should have talked about before we started recording.

Matt: Is it Disney related?

Lauren: No.

Matt: Tattoo related?

Lauren: No.

Matt: I don't care then.

Lauren: Okay.

Matt: Yeah.

Lauren: Great.

Matt: I've decided going forward, the rest of this year. If it's not Disney or tattoo related, I don't really care.

Lauren: Okay.

Matt: I mean, yeah.

Lauren: Great.

Matt: No space in my brain for it.

Lauren: So I can circle back to you when I'm looking for, shopping around for people that are going to do my Disney tattoos?

Matt: Yes.

Lauren: Locally.

Matt: Yes.

Lauren: I'm not flying to California.

Matt: Well, shame on you. I will be soon again, but. Okay.

Lauren: Not surprising. But until then.

Matt: Yeah?

Lauren: We’ll talk about one of my other favorite and most beloved things of all time. And that is fanfiction.

Matt: Yeah, okay.

[2:46] – Disclaimers and Reminders

Lauren: That's actually probably a disclaimer that's important up top here. If anyone's listening to this, I promise this is coming from a place of – at least 50% on this half of the recording and this half of the screen – love and adoration for the content at large.

Matt: Man, you're just coming in hard and fast, aren't you?

Lauren: I feel like fanfiction, much like self-publishing, often gets painted with this like stigma of it's lesser than it's it's lower quality. It's something that should be kind of sneered at and looked down upon. If you are outside of that community and don't really know. And so I don't want anyone listening to this to automatically start on the defensive of like, oh, look at these two like snobs that are pretending to talk –

Matt: Whoa.

Lauren: – about something they don't know anything about.

Matt: Not two.

Lauren: Well, okay, first of all, you're not a snob in general about stuff like this. Even if you don't like fanfiction, it's not because –

Matt: No, you know what?

Lauren: – you think you’re better than it.

Matt: Here's my stance on that. Okay, so you're that 50% on that side that's coming with love and adoration and obviously reads a lot of it.

Lauren: Yes. And writes a lot – well, used to. But yes.

Matt: Where I come from is I didn't know anything about fanfiction until working here.

Lauren: Yeah.

Matt: You know? And so for the last ten plus years, fanfiction for me – at least where I operate within the organization – always brings with it this nervous feeling of legality. Right? Like, cause, you know. You're skirting the edge of, you know, copyright and some other stuff. So it's not that I think it's lesser than, and I know a lot of good stuff has been born from fanfiction. However, my, my sole stance on fanfiction and why I groan every time I hear the word or the topic is going to be – is almost purely from, from a legal standpoint. Like. It's not that I, I think this stuff's garbage at all. It's, it's purely from, like, you know, again, from where I sit, like, I have to, I have to think about those things.

Lauren: I, I think that's totally reasonable. Right now, in particular, there is a lot of mainstream media talk about fandom in general and fanfiction. And a lot of that is coming from people that are like, not familiar with everything that goes, like, along with it, and the history of all that. And I feel like a lot of people are kind of on the defensive a little bit about, like... Like, you know, leave the normies out of this space. Like, don't you, don't try to, don't try to write some like, op ed piece about something that you don't know anything about. So I just want to be clear to anybody who's listening that I have been in the trenches since like 2002. So I am not talking about this from an outsider perspective.

Matt: I can confirm that off camera, she gets very excited by fanfiction. So.

Lauren: This is true.

Matt: Alright, let's move on.

Lauren: Alright.

Matt: Cause I’m already...

Lauren: Just a quick refresher on fanfiction copyright and legality and stuff like that. We've done this episode already, both about fanfiction and about copyright, so we won't get too much into it.

Matt: Yes.

Lauren: But this is something that comes up regularly in conversation, and it's kind of essential to establish for the topic of this episode. Fanfiction is something that technically is legal because it falls under the fair use doctrine. In copyright law, it is considered transformative work. You are allowed to use or remix or repurpose another creator's work under certain conditions. And in this case, those conditions are it must be completely non-profit.

Matt: Well nobody can profit off of it.

Lauren: Right.

Matt: That’s – So saying something's non-profit is slightly different. Different implications.

Lauren: You're right.

Matt: Nobody can profit off of the, the fanfiction itself.

Lauren: Right.

Matt: The easiest way to remember it, and the way that we look at it, like, is: if anybody can, can profit off of it, including us as printers then you're in trouble.

Lauren: Yes. And that's why this question comes up all the time, where people will say, okay, we understand that we can't publish fanfiction on a print-on-demand self-publishing website or something like that, and people can buy printed copies. But why can't I just print my – like, can't I just order a print copy for myself? No one's making any money off of it –

Matt: We are.

Lauren: – whatever. We are making money – Lulu is making money off of that, and therefore it is copyright infringement. So whether you are the author, whether you have permission from the fanfiction author, you cannot use Lulu to print a copy –

Matt: Or anybody.

Lauren: – of fanfiction.

Matt: Yeah.

Lauren: Nobody can.

Matt: Or any POD provider.

Lauren: Yes, that. Absolutely. You cannot use any POD provider to print even just a personal use copy, because somebody is making a profit off of it that is in no way, shape, or form legally allowed to do so. Because of who owns the copyright, or is licensing the rights to that book.

Matt: Yeah.

Lauren: Or that content, or whatever. So next time you see a TikTok telling you here's how to go on Lulu and order a copy of your favorite fanfiction from Lulu, don't listen to them because it's not true.

[8:12] – Establishing the Previous Standard for Published Fanfiction

Lauren: The weird plot twist to all of that is that this whole episode is about the rise of fanfiction being traditionally published. Which is a really confusing thing to talk about. So we're going to talk about it.

Matt: Yeah.

Lauren: Yes. Fanfiction being published – or, or fanfiction being turned into books that can be published – is, is obviously not new. We've talked about this, we've seen this. 50 Shades of Grey, probably the most famous example, but certainly not the only one. There have been plenty of examples.

Matt: Also got its start on Lulu.

Lauren: Yes it did. It’s my favorite thing that that's your one fun fact about fanfiction.

Matt: You know, listen, I know what I know. Like I said, I didn't know anything about fanfiction until I came to work here at Lulu. And, you know, right when I started here ten, ten plus years ago... Like, that was one of the first fun facts I learned.

Lauren: Yeah.

Matt: I don’t know how fun it was. But.

Lauren: Well.

Matt: It was one of the first things I learned.

Lauren: But there have been plenty of other examples too. Some famously, like... the whole series After by Anna Todd was originally One Direction fanfiction.

Matt: Like the boy band?

Lauren: Yes.

Matt: How does that even. Nevermind. Keep going.

Lauren: It's actually – it's worse than – it's worse than you want to know. So we're just not gonna –

Matt: Yep.

Lauren: We’re just gonna – yep, okay.

Matt: I should probably not ask any questions.

Lauren: Yes. That's fine. Ali Hazelwood, who is a very well known romance author, her, her first book was very, very kind of obviously Reylo fanfiction, which is Kylo Ren and Rey from Star Wars.

Matt: That’s right.

Lauren: You did learn about this.

Matt: You did teach about this one.

Lauren: Yep. There have also been some examples over the years that are like... you know, fandom lore is that the Mortal Instruments series by Cassandra Clare had a lot of roots in Harry Potter fanfiction. But, you know, never confirmed really – well, it depends on who you ask. There have also been books that have paid homage to fandom and fanfiction, inspired by –

Matt: Why are you looking at me like I should know, I don’t –

Lauren: No I know, I know, I'm, I'm trying to rein myself in.

Matt: So...

Lauren: That's why I'm looking at you.

Matt: How do you write something and pay homage to fanfiction?

Lauren: So that's actually a really interesting example. And I think out of all of these, it's the one that's kind of the most, like, leading to where we are now. So Fangirl was the first – not the first book that Rainbow Rowell wrote, but in, in this trajectory. She published this book Fangirl that is about a teenage girl who is... I think a freshman in college, and she's writing fanfiction for what is very clearly supposed to be Harry Potter. It's a fictionalized version of Harry Potter. But it's, it's very much a love letter to the idea of fandom and it's – And it's a book about a girl who is, she's so kind of engrossed in her fanfiction and her, like, her fan world, that she kind of forgets to pay attention to what's happening to the outside world as a freshman in college. And kind of the push and pull between that. And the, the fanfiction that she's writing, because it's such an integral part of the book, it's like actually, you read snippets of it throughout the book. So instead of it being Harry Potter fanfiction, it's a fictionalized version of it. It's the Simon Snow series.

Matt: I see.

Lauren: And –

Matt: Never have I wanted to jump out of this seat so badly.

Lauren: I know. But then –

Matt: In two years that we've done this.

Lauren: But here's the interesting part, is that Fangirl was so popular –

Matt: Yes, please get to the interesting part.

Lauren: Fangirl was so popular the book – and, lovely book, I absolutely adored it – that Rainbow Rowell wound up publishing a trilogy that is the, the fictionalized version of Harry Potter from Fangirl. Which that, that, that was where I was like... Okay, how do we... this, this, this is some gray area. This is, this is some gray – But, but this is kind of leading to where we are –

Matt: Yeah, okay.

Lauren: – today.

Matt: I'm giving runway and grace that you're gonna –

Lauren: I am going to get to a point, at some point. Hopefully before the 50 minute mark.

Matt: I hope nobody's wrecked their car at this point –

Lauren: It’s fine.

Matt: – listening to this.

Lauren: They knew – they, they saw the title.

Matt: Stood up on the bus or the subway and started screaming.

Lauren: They knew what they were signing up for when they saw the title on this episode.

Matt: That’s probably true.

Lauren: It's okay. But the point is that kind of in the past, up until the last year or two, this has really been a trend that is mostly an if you know, you know kind of thing. It's something that, you know, maybe the cover art is a little you're like, I'm pretty sure those people are supposed to be Adam Driver and Daisy Ridley. And it's like really obvious that they are. So this was probably originally Reylo fanfiction. Or there's rumors throughout the whole fandom that like I’m pretty sure this used to be –

Matt: But all that’s done on purpose right?

Lauren: Yes.

Matt: Yeah.

Lauren: But it's not –

Matt: It’s all intentional.

Lauren: It's not like – it's, it's absolutely intentional. But it's not nearly as overt as it has become in the last year or two. And that's kind of the shift that I want to talk about now. Oh, this is one of my examples of how it’s very obviously...

Matt: I wouldn't say obvious. At all.

Lauren: Well, that's you.

Matt: I mean. If I didn't know anything about what we were talking about right now, and you put these two pictures up. If I didn't have any context or backstory, I wouldn't even think twice that these were, these were based on the same people.

Lauren: Fascinating. We're looking at a side by side comparison of the cover –

Matt: Well you’re gonna put it on there.

Lauren: For the – for the video. But for the audio-only listeners, we are currently looking at a side by side comparison of the cover of The Love Hypothesis by Ali Hazelwood and a picture of Kylo Ren and Rey from Star Wars... Matt doesn't see the comparison, and that's, that's fine. That's okay.

Matt: I mean, if I go by knowing what I know now, sure.

Lauren: So, but that's actually, that's great. Because that's actually kind of making my point. Where it is if you know, you know.

Matt: I'm not trying to make.

Lauren: But you are, because that is – that's where I'm saying that in the past it used to pretty much just be if you know, you know, and if you don't, you're not losing anything by not being in the know on this.

Matt: Fair enough.

[14:42] – Tracking the New Shift Through Recent Titles

Lauren: In the last year there have been four books that have been published and or announced that... it's the first time in, in my memory, that I can think of, that I've literally walked into Barnes & Noble and seen, like on the the display table where these books are: the Draco Hermione fanfiction published. Like this is – like, they're calling it quite literally, like, this is published fanfiction. Openly. Like they are advertising it that way, the, the digital ads that I've seen, for like emails and stuff, like –

Matt: So based on our definition earlier, how are they getting away with that? Because I would walk in there and be like, whoa, what the hell?

Lauren: You're right. So what's happening now and what's happening in, in the last two years, basically, is publishers are taking fanfiction that is very popular, or – Whether it's within the fandom specifically, or has broken containment and is just popular in general, and they are publishing that. And the way that they're doing that, the way they're getting away with that, is by after the fact, modifying the details. So they will basically offer a traditional publishing deal to the author of the fanfiction, and they're publishing what, what has already been written, not having them write something new. But the, the production of that involves going through and editing the entire original work to remove any copyrighted content within it. So.

Matt: So – But okay.

Lauren: Yeah.

Matt: The way that these books are able to be traditionally published is what you're saying is the publisher takes the fanfiction, right? And they alter enough of the details so that when it goes to market, they're not really in any hot water.

Lauren: Yes.

Matt: Okay, I get that. So my, my second question to you is, and this might be later in your outline, I don't know. But when you talk about traditional publishers now, you know, what are the signals that are telling them, like, hey, this fanfiction is poppin’, we should, we should scoop this up? Like, are they monitoring Reddit forums and like – or do they got a couple people on their team who are as nerdy as you that are constantly like – Like, what are the signals that are telling some of these publishers like, this piece of fanfiction, we need to, we need to scoop this up? Like, it's not like an agent comes to them with – you know what I mean?

Lauren: So.

Matt: Like the normal process.

Lauren: That's, that's a good question. So the, the first – So the four examples that I was going to talk through, the first two we were just going to skim. And they're the ones that answer this question. First, the first one being The Irresistible Urge to Fall for Your Enemy by Brigitte Knightley. Which was –

Matt: Is that Brigitte or Bridget?

Lauren: I honestly just assumed – it could be Bridget.

Matt: And is she related to Keira?

Lauren: That's a great question.

Matt: That’d be cool.

Lauren: I mean, if she was, it probably would be Brigitte. But...

Matt: That's fair.

Lauren: Sorry to anybody whose name I mispronounce throughout this. But what is interesting, is that actually –

Matt: How do you pronounce that? Dramione? What is –

Lauren: Dramione.

Matt: Dramione?

Lauren: Yes, cause it’s Draco and Hermione. So it's Dramione. It's the portmanteau of Draco and Hermione.

Matt: Okay.

Lauren: Yeah.

Matt: Ugh.

Lauren: You're welcome. I know.

Matt: I should have brought coffee or something.

Lauren: You absolutely should have brought coffee.

Matt: This is not a bottle of water episode.

Lauren: I know it’s not.

Matt: But go ahead, sorry.

Lauren: I'm just glad you ate lunch before we, before we recorded.

Matt: Yeah. Me too.

Lauren: But no. So for this example specifically, this was actually – the, the least – This is the most removed from original fanfiction. But the way that, that she was discovered was a literary agent was a fan of her Dramione fanfiction called Draco Malfoy and the Mortifying Ordeal of Being in Love. And a literary agent reached out to Brigitte or Bridget. Again, I really should have looked up how to say everyone's names, I'm sorry. And reached out and was like, hey, let's – do you have any interest in pursuing a traditional publishing deal? And ultimately wound up doing that. So this one of the four examples is more – I think this is the one that was reworked the most. It's definitely still very heavily implied where its origins are, including in the cover design and the, the presentation of the book and everything.

Matt: Well, just the title alone. Like –

Lauren: Yes. Then the, you know, the second one is Rose in Chains by Julie Soto. Which –

Matt: Is that a play on like Alice in Chains from the 90s?

Lauren: Probably not.

Matt: Lame.

Lauren: Probably not. But I thought that was an interesting example too, because it's so kind of obvious with the shift in how these books are marketed.

Matt: Oh, these are the ones that are Kylo Ren and Rey?

Lauren: So. Well, Julie Soto's first two books were Kylo, Kylo Ren and Rey. And so this was her third. Rose in Chains was her third one. And that one is Dramione. But they were a lot more obvious with the marketing. That's the first one that I walked into a bookstore and saw a, like, an endcap display that specifically used the words Draco and Hermione fanfiction when promoting that book. And you know, that's the bookstore's marketing decision to do so. But I had literally never seen that before in any other bookstore. Somewhere in the last two years, we went from if you know that this is fanfiction originally... You know, you might giggle, you might see some references in the book that are like, oh, I'm a fangirl of this particular original content, so I'm –

Matt: Or fanboy.

Lauren: Or a fanboy.

Matt: Fanperson.

Lauren: So like, I'm seeing – a fanperson. A fan, perhaps.

Matt: A fan. Yes.

Lauren: You know, I'm seeing some inside jokes in here, basically. And, and suddenly in the last year we have gone to overtly like, hey, we're calling this exactly what it is. Like, we are specifically using the words that used to be implied. We are now openly using them. And that's the shift that I think is interesting, and that I think that we're trying to understand why. And also that's why I think this is an episode that's worth listening to. It's because why is that important to indie authors? Why is that shift something that they should be paying attention to?

Matt: It's not my cup of tea, but if it gets more books in the hands of people who are reading, then I'm not necessarily – like, great. Okay, cool.

Lauren: Fair. But, the really big – the really, really, really big deal ones that are happening now, one most recently and one that was literally announced today, the day of recording this, is Alchemised by another name that I am going to mispronounce, but SenLinYu. Which was originally published as the fanfiction Manacled, which is a Draco Hermione Harry Potter fanfiction that has been heavily inspired by The Handmaid's Tale too. So it's, it's a real double whammy of...

Matt: Yeah.

Lauren: But it was... this, out of, out of every piece of fanfiction that I have ever read, or come across and not read, this is hands down the most recommended, advertised – I would be watching TikToks for years that would be people doing book recs, and they would go and it'd be a list of like, the ten books I read this year that changed my life. And nine of them would be books, and the tenth one would be this fic. That was not a published book, was Harry Potter fanfiction. And then in – finally in February of 2024, they announced that they were, they had signed a book deal with... I want to say Del Rey, Del Rey Books, but I might be wrong about that. And then that was published last year in September 2025 as Alchemised.

Matt: I was going to ask you, is it one particular imprint in, in particular that is –

Lauren: Oh.

Matt: – scooping these up, or is everybody kind of having a –

Lauren: – I actually I can, I can say –

Matt: What are you pointing at?

Lauren: Sorry, the – So, what I noticed when I was going through this was both of these were acquired by not only the same publisher, but the same editor at this publishing house. So it is Del Rey that is publishing, or that has published Alchemised. Because as of – officially announced in Publishers Weekly today, it's April 13th – Del Rey has also acquired the rights to a book called Wolfboy, which has formerly been known as All the Young Dudes.

Matt: Which I do know of.

Lauren: Which you do know of. You've heard of that one.

Matt: For all the wrong reasons. All the young dudes for all the wrong reasons.

Lauren: Yep. That's, that's fair. It's, it's an anomaly for a lot of, a lot of reasons, though. But that is the most recent, and that was kind of the announcement – The North American rights deal was announced today. The UK rights deal was announced when we were at London Book Fair. So we kind of knew this was coming, a little bit. It's a coincidence that we're recording the episode the day that the announcement was made here, but –

Matt: It’s a pretty strong coincidence.

Lauren: We did – we did know about it.

Matt: You knew about it.

Lauren: Well. Because it was – at London Book Fair, it was, it was kind of buzzed about. So.

[24:55] – Understanding the Signals That Lead to Publishing Deals

Lauren: The announcement about All the Young Dudes and then, you know, for it to be six months, slightly more than six months after Manacled was published, it's – I think it's really signifying a pretty massive shift in like, this is something that people are really actively seeking out now. Like these were two, these were the two biggest pieces of fanfiction... probably in the last decade. And there's a lot of fanfiction out there.

Matt: But that’s why I was asking earlier, and that's what I would love to know. Like you know, again, nothing against them. They're, they're businesses. But traditional publishing houses... they don't buy content unless it's gonna sell books, so.

Lauren: Yes.

Matt: There has to be signals somewhere in the market that are telling them that this will sell. Above and beyond what it's already circulated amongst tens of thousands of readers.

Lauren: Sure.

Matt: Which we know these things hit tens of thousands, if not hundreds of thousands of readers. So how – what signals are telling them like, if we buy this and then actually publish it as a book. That, you know, there's going to be more people out there that will buy it that haven't already read it off of, you know, a downloaded PDF somewhere or something. Like, what are those signals? I don't understand.

Lauren: So, statistics on Archive of – Archive of our Own is a deeper dive than, than you want to go. But we’re gonna – you asked the question

Matt: I don’t even know what you just said.

Lauren: I know.

Matt: Like, that just sounded like a whole ‘nother language.

Lauren: So.

Matt: What is the Archive of our Own?

Lauren: Archive of our own is the main site – not the, it's, it's one of the most popular websites these days that is where people actually post and host fanfiction. So that's where this all lives. That's where both Manacled and All the Young Dudes were originally published, on Archive of Our Own when they were in fanfiction form. But you can easily – Anybody, we could go literally right now on Archive of our Own and just sort the complete archive –

Matt: I don't want that in my history.

Lauren: I know you don't. That's okay. And just look at, you know, sort by the different stats that different fics on there have. And two of those stats that are probably – there probably are people at publishing companies that are actively paying attention to this – are hits, which is just the page visits. Page views, basically, the number of times that a visitor has opened this piece of work. And then kudos, which is just a like. So you can, you can like, you can kudos a fic, and you can only do that once per registered user. So, All the Young Dudes had over 300,000 kudos. So like –

Matt: So the assumption is those, those kudos or those likes, were from people who read, you know, all if not most of that particular story or series.

Lauren: Yes. And it was a –

Matt: So this is what I was asking, yeah.

Lauren: Yes.

Matt: So if I'm a traditional publisher –

Lauren: Yeah.

Matt: – or if I'm on a team at a traditional publishing house, and I see something like this, that's worth looking into.

Lauren: Yes.

Matt: And 19 million hits. So 19 million opens, basically.

Lauren: Yes.

Matt: Yeah. But you know, then part of me would also go, like, do I take a chance on this? Like of the four that you've noted earlier on that are going to be traditionally published, or have been. Do we have any, you know, stats on sales cycle, sales life? Like, how are they doing?

Lauren: I don't. The three that have been published already – So the, it’s all of them except for All the Young Dudes, Wolfboy, have already been published. And all three of those did hit the New York Times list. So they have, they have done well. I don't know how they've continued to do over time, but they have done well. I did also see, I was actually literally on Barnes & Noble's website this morning and saw them advertising a special edition of Alchemised. So it's clearly doing well enough that they're... within less than a year of it being published. They're also, all four of these – actually, I'm not 100% positive about Alchemised – but at least three of the four of these have been multi book deals. So there has been that too, where there is... Rose in Chains, right now or recently, there was buzz about the sequel announcement and the sequel, like the title, cover art, pub date announcement for the sequel. So there is definitely still buzz happening for these, for sure. But actual sales statistics? No, I don't have those. To go back to your question about why are publishers willing to take a risk on this? It comes back to what we've been talking about recently, where publishers are less interested in content that has no proven value in the market. And authors that have no, like, preexisting built-in audience. These are things that maybe they won’t – you're right. You know, maybe Wolfboy will not sell 300,000 copies.

Matt: Oh hell no.

Lauren: One for every single person that read and liked or left kudos on the original fanfiction. But even if they sell 100,000 copies. That's...

Matt: That's a lot. It's still a lot.

Lauren: It’s still a lot.

Matt: A hundred percent. Yeah, I think –

Lauren: It's still going to be probably a best seller for the year.

Matt: – people in general are under a very big misconception about how many, how many copies most traditional books actually sell.

Lauren: Yes.

Matt: So even if it sells 100,000 copies, that's a lot.

Lauren: Yes.

Matt: Yeah.

Lauren: And it's still – I think they still are willing to roll the dice on that.

Matt: Sure.

Lauren: Because even if they sell a fraction of that, it's still more than they could guarantee that they would sell on a no-name debut author –

Matt: A hundred percent.

Lauren: – that has no existing audience.

Matt: Yeah.

Lauren: So I think that's... this is that, in line with the episode that we just did on indie, indie authors getting traditional publishing deals, or hybrid deals where they're doing retaining some rights but not, but giving some of their rights to traditional publishers. I think this is part of that. Where it's, you know, people are – traditional publishers are seeing that gap where they're saying, oh, people really want printed copies of this work. We're seeing people constantly trying to get around the loophole of making printed copies. Or there are – you can go on, on any of the video social platforms right now and find videos that have hundreds of thousands of views and likes on them that are people doing bookbinding with fanfiction. Like specifically learning how to bind their own books. And that is technically legal if you're not selling it. If you are doing it for yourself –

Matt: Well I mean, that’s no different than scrapbooking.

Lauren: Well, right. Right. But if –

Matt: It’s – yeah.

Lauren: – if you are making for yourself a bound copy that you are the one doing all the work...

Matt: Yeah.

Lauren: Like that's, you, that – that is, you know, close enough to the you did this, you're good. You can have that. And there are thousands of videos out there of people doing it. So there's clearly a demand for people wanting print copies of these books.

Matt: Yeah.

Lauren: I mean, I want them. Not for these, not for these particular books, but there are plenty of fics that I can think of that if, if tomorrow the law changed and we were allowed to print copies using Lulu. I'd be, I'd be in – I'd be paying for Microsoft Word just so that I could format these as fast as humanly possible.

Matt: You could just use Atticus.

Lauren: That's true.

Matt: That's a lot easier.

Lauren: That's true. And actually, I really don't want to pay for Word. Word sucks. It's fine. But I do think that it's, it's primarily about, you know, why are publishers willing to take a risk on this stuff right now? Is the bottom line. It’s –

Matt: Yeah.

Lauren: It's money –

Matt: It's still a bit foreign to me.

Lauren: Yeah?

Matt: You know, but seeing that there are some forms of market signals and data available, it makes a little more sense –

Lauren: Yeah.

Matt: – to me why they would risk it, or even bother with it. Because you're right. Like these days, most traditional publishing houses and their, their, you know, other imprints, they can't afford to take risks anymore, really.

Lauren: Yes.

Matt: I mean, they take some, but they usually take some risks when they've also got a couple, you know, sure bets in the bag. It's that whole venture capital model. So if they know they've got a couple titles already rolling that year that they know for a fact are just going to crush it in the market, then maybe they'll take a few risks. But, you know, stuff like this where there's, there's an obvious, you know, set of data out there that shows that, you know, 300,000 people basically either read this and liked it or read some portion of it and liked it. Right?

Lauren: Yeah.

Matt: Like, that's, that's a huge signal. That's a big marker. So, yeah, I mean, that makes a little more sense to me because at the end of the day, it's a business.

Lauren: Yes.

Matt: So.

Lauren: Yeah. And that's – I think that's really what it comes down to. And, and also kind of building that... not necessarily building a brand around it. But one of the things that I think is, is the most interesting in its own way about specifically Alchemised and now Wolfboy, is that they are – the, not only are they the most overtly, like, the deal announcements and the, the media about these have like, openly acknowledged that they're fanfic, or that they're inspired by fanfiction, or that they were – Like, no one's trying to hide it. This is, this is like, openly in there. Specifically Manacled, the author’s name is the same. Like, Manacled and Alchemised, the author uses the same pen name. They use SenLinYu you as the pen name or author name on both. And I did not dig into whether or not that is their real name or whether that is the pen name, but it is very unusual. Most people that are publishing fanfiction, it's a username. Like, you're, you're –

Matt: Sure.

Lauren: – in the same way that you would on any other –

Matt: Because you're on some platform like Wattpad or whatever.

Lauren: Yes.

Matt: Yeah.

Lauren: Yeah. So, you know, people are using... I don't know anybody who is using their real name as their fanfiction author name. So that was really interesting to me, that they were published with the same author name. Because that's also then, like, you're willing to claim that 100%. Like you're not even trying to hide that this –

Matt: Yeah. But the flip side is that for the publishers, again, they need to make sure that they sell copies of this, so.

Lauren: Yes.

Matt: They need the public –

Lauren: But I think that –

Matt: – people in the fanfiction circles to know, like, this is the actual –

Lauren: Right. And I think that's why this shift is happening. And I think that's why. Because, because of the... We want to make sure that we're selling copies of this. We want to make sure that there's money, that there's value in these deals. Because these, these are also pretty sizable deals. These are, these are like, six figure deals for sure. But they want, you know, they want to make sure that... Wolfboy –

Matt: A six figure deal and you couldn't come up with a better title than Wolfboy?

Lauren: I – I don't – I'm trying, I'm trying to be nice about it.

Matt: Ugh.

Lauren: I'm trying to be nice about it. I laughed out loud when I saw that that was the title. I was like, you actually have got to be kidding me. So Wolfboy, probably important context. It's, it's – cause I said it was the anomaly in a couple of different ways. That's the one that is not Draco Hermione fanfiction.

Matt: Right...

Lauren: It's actually, the main characters are the Marauders, who are... So it's Harry's parents. And then – So it's, Lily and James, and then Sirius Black, Remus Lupin, and Peter Pettigrew. So it's the, it's the previous generation at Hogwarts. All the Young Dudes –

Matt: Okay.

Lauren: – is the previous generation. And the main character of All the Young Dudes, it's actually Remus Lupin. Who is a werewolf. So Wolfboy – but even that is like... wow, we really hung a lantern on that, huh?

Matt: You could hang a lantern on my blood pressure right now.

Lauren: I know. I know. Unfortunately all the young dudes is also a song lyric, or a song title, so it's also copyrighted material that could not be used directly, probably, without some kind of legal rights licensing. But. Fair Enough.

Matt: Yeah.

Lauren: But yeah, I did think that was an interesting title choice. But, you know, whatever. It is – it is what it is. But maybe, again, maybe another effort in the same way that, you know, I was just saying SenLinYu, same, same author name. MsKingBean89, who has been famously mysterious, nobody's ever been able to figure out who they are, as the author of All the Young Dudes... Wolfboy is being published by... it said –

Matt: Del Rey.

Lauren: No. The author name is B.N. King.

Matt: Oh.

Lauren: I believe. And yes, Del Rey, Del Rey Books, same, same imprint and same editor for both Alchemised and Wolfboy. Which is fascinating. I think it's fascinating. I know you don't.

Matt: Fascinating is a stretch. Interesting, maybe.

[39:10] – Considering the Larger Implications of the Shifting Trends

Lauren: I just think – I think it's continuing evidence of, like, these are intentional moves by the industry. There's a reason that Del Rey is paying attention to this type of content. Clearly, if Manacled came out in September 2025 – I'm sorry, Alchemised was published in 2025, September of 2025. The Wolfboy deal was just announced very recently, so I don't think they would have taken the gamble on Wolfboy if Alchemised hadn't done well. So clearly they have that data to back it up. But I just think it's all indicative of this bigger sign that, that publishing is moving in this direction of more and more, like. They're looking to indie creators for proven value, for proven audience, for like, we're not taking a risk on unknown, on people that don't have an audience base, people that don't have any kind of proof of concept whatsoever. And instead, like, we're really looking for for people that are established in some way. And they're not going to find that from debut authors that are just pitching their manuscript directly to traditional publishers. They're going to find that from self-published authors, hybrid published authors, and apparently fanfiction authors.

Matt: Which usually fall into one of those two categories anyways.

Lauren: Oh for sure. Absolutely. There are plenty of – there are published authors that are actively traditionally publishing right now, and also actively still publishing fanfiction. Why not? Who has that kind of time, personally? But good for them.

Matt: Yeah, I guess. I mean, in general, I agree with you. You know. But by and large, it's just, you know, an evolution of what traditional publishing was already doing. Which you, you already alluded to. So am I surprised? A little bit. Just because of the legalities surrounding fanfiction. But, you know, when you think about it, or when you break it down like you just did with some of the numbers around, you know, the consumption of this fanfiction, then I'm not surprised. Traditional publishing has, for a long time, been moving in the direction of self-published authors. Or in general, authors and creators who have built their own audience. Because a number of things have been happening at the same time. Their budgets get tighter. The first people to get cut are usually marketing people at traditional publishing houses, which means they can't market titles as strong. Which means the sales team has to work harder to try and find manuscripts with editors and agents that are going to sell copies without as much marketing help. Which ultimately means we need to find authors and creators that have large audiences or proven work. Where, you know, sales numbers can be projected out in a way that's very confident. You know what I mean? So am I surprised? Again, not really. Other than, again, this particular genre, fanfiction – or, you know, overarching genre – carries with it some, some legal tight ropes they have to walk on. But at the end of the day, if it means 100,000 units sold on this particular title, or 300,000 units on another title, those are legal tight ropes they're willing to walk, for sure. So. I think it's just validation. It's just another signal.

Lauren: True.

Matt: So, if you're an indie author and you're listening to this, or creator and you don't really care about fanfiction, like me. This – yes, it's important, because it's another signal to what we just talked about. That, again, traditional publishing houses are more and more looking for established content and established audiences. They want to take less risks. So, you know, if you were one of those indie creators out there that would like to one day, potentially, you know, deal with a traditional publisher. A. tread lightly, or carefully, but B. it's looking more and more like those opportunities will be a lot more bountiful as we continue moving forward. So yeah.

Lauren: Yeah.

Matt: In the, in the, the instance of fanfiction, it's just another signal. Yeah, I agree. But again, when a traditional publishing house is willing to, you know, potentially pay some of their lawyers a little bit of overtime money to get this title in-house? I agree. That's, that's substantial. It's significant. And it definitely warrants a conversation or two, for sure. But again, it's just another strong signal to –

Lauren: Yeah.

Matt: – indie creators. Like, keep going, you know?

Lauren: Yeah.

Matt: But I would also say... listen, if they're willing to get their attorneys onto some overtime pay, I think it's also a good sign that for those who are interested in fanfiction, maybe you can start publishing and doing the stuff yourself.

Lauren: Carefully.

Matt: Carefully, of course. I mean, the same way that a traditional publisher is going to release All the Young Dudes under the ridiculous title of Wolfboy – I said it, I don't care.

Lauren: Yes.

Matt: Why couldn't you do it as carefully as they are?

Lauren: Yeah.

Matt: So, you know, whatever. I'm not encouraging anybody, you know, rip off somebody's IP or copyright, but. I mean, just like anything else though. Like, if you're interested in staying indie, you know, long term, making more profit, building your own audience, and not sharing that with anybody. But you're also interested in fanfiction. Again, here's a signal. Take note. Keep watch for a little while. See what happens. I mean, I don't know.

Lauren: I mean. At the very least, pay attention.

Matt: More power to them. I don't, I don't have anything against ‘em. Like, I think it’s –

Lauren: Yeah no, I know.

Matt: Again, more books in the hands of readers, I think is great.

Lauren: I totally agree. I mean, I have kind of mixed feelings about this too. And we're not going to open that can of worms, because we've talked for long enough. But I am excited to see the legitimization of some pieces of work that deserve acknowledgment. Like that is – like, I think that in the same way that self-publishing had that stigma for a really long time and were finally kind of seeing it lessen and lessen in the last few years. I think that a lot of people pretend that fanfiction is nothing but absolute trash, and some of the most beautiful writing that I've ever read in my entire life has been fanfiction. So, I – I like to see that there are people now that are, are seeing a side of that that they might not have seen five years ago.

Matt: I think that's great.

Lauren: Yeah. And kudos to anybody out there that has published any of their own fanfiction. Legally. Not the illegal way.

[46:14] – Episode Wrap Up

Matt: Speaking of the paying our lawyers overtime.

Lauren: I could have gone to law school. Alright well, I think I tortured you for long enough, so I'll let you go now.

Matt: I appreciate that.

Lauren: If anybody has any questions, comments, concerns.

Matt: Concerns especially.

Lauren: Especially. You can always leave us a comment on any of Lulu's social media channels, on YouTube, on Spotify. You can email us, podcast@lulu.com. You can watch video episodes now on YouTube and on Spotify. Apple still trying to figure that one out, but it's so new that it's, I think it's just going to take a little while.

Matt: Yeah, video is such a new thing for Apple.

Lauren: I –

Matt: Poor guys over at Apple. They'll figure it out.

Lauren: One day.

Matt: Maybe.

Lauren: One day, who knows.

Matt: Maybe.

Lauren: But in the meantime, you can always like and subscribe wherever you like to listen. And we'll be back next week with another new episode.

Matt: Not about fanfiction.

Lauren: Not about fanfiction.

Matt: Good.

Lauren: But until then, thanks for listening.

Matt: Later.