Dictionary of Fiction

The world of fandom has many exclusive words in its vocabulary. This list will try its best to define those words for both referential and educational reasons. So this list won't be incredibly short, we will also include any terms that pertain to fiction such as "crossover" and "prequel".

C
Crackfic - An otherworldly fanfic that got its name from crack cocaine.

Crossover - An installation to one franchise in which at least one other franchise is involved in a collaborative project between the two franchises' creators.

E
Exposition - The act of explaining to the audience what is going on, what happened before, or what will happen through the characters.

F
Fan - A person who enjoys a franchise and is a part of its regular audience.


 * ...base - A section of a fandom made of like-minded individuals. This is often confused for "fandom" and is what leads to people to use the two terms interchangeably.
 * ...boy - A male fan.
 * ...dom - The entirety of a franchise's regular audience.
 * ...fic - A non-canonical story written by a fan that takes place in an established franchise. Although not all are, fanfics are best known for having characters be in sexual situations.
 * ...girl - "Fangirl" has more than one sense:
 * As a noun, a female fan.
 * As a verb, to mindlessly gush about a franchise or character, often annoying others who disagree or are outside of the fandom.

Friendfic - A fanfic in which two characters who aren't canonically friends are such.

P
Prequel - The continuation of a story that happens earlier in the universe's time. This can happen to reveal characters' backstories or add depth to those backstories without blandly having those characters go on about what their life was like in the past to the audience.

S
Sequel - The continuation of a story that happens later in the universe's time.

Ship - "Ship" has more than one sense:


 * As a noun, the non-canonical and/or man-made, fan-made relationship between two characters, typically a romantic or sexual one.
 * As a verb, to pair two characters in a relationship as a fan.