How A 'Lord of the Rings' And 'Harry Potter Fanfiction Writer Started A Highly Successful Fantasy Series'
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You’ve probably heard of The Mortal Instruments. The first book in the series was published in 2007 and was on the New York Best Seller list for 102 consecutive weeks. It has spawned a Hollywood movie, a Netflix series, and a massive fandom. But if that was the first time you heard of Cassandra Clare, then you clearly were not on Tumblr/Fanfiction.net in the early 2000s. Cassie Clare went viral in two huge fandoms, and that was before people knew what the term meant. She wrote two fanfictions that are so ingrained into the fandoms, most have no idea that’s where the jokes come from. Bear in mind the effort it took to pass things around back then without mobile phones. Most of these were shared via e-mail, Yahoo Chat, AOL, or printed out and handed to friends on paper. Yes, that happened.
The Draco Trilogy
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In 2000, Cassie Clare broke the Harry Potter fandom when she wrote a three-part fanfiction told from the point of view of the franchise’s villain called The Draco Trilogy, complete with a cute hand-drawn cover for each entry. This work is HARD to find online. Her publishers did a good job of scrubbing it. Fortunately, a few loyal fans saved it as a pdf, and it can be found on Harry Potter Wiki. The infamous Potter gag about Draco in leather pants comes from this work.
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Cassie Clare pairs up some interesting Potter couples (Draco and Ginny?), and there is even a body swap between Draco and Harry. Draco is very much the dark antihero, and many elements from The Mortal Instruments are recognizable in this work. She also included Easter eggs from other Young Adults books and romance films and cited them at the end of the work. However, these nods were taken as plagiarism, despite the fact they were referenced, and it sparked an online feud. Imitation is the very point of fanfiction, so her accusers did not have much of a leg to stand on legally. Unfortunately, it did damage Cassie Clare’s reputation.
The Very Secret Diaries
Image Source: TV Tropes
This is a series of fanfictions that encapsulates the millennial sense of humor. Pretty much every single The Lord of the Rings in-joke starts with Cassie Clare. It was not conservative, and she did not hold back. Her concept was simple. Each character wrote a diary. However, this was written at the time of Salad Fingers, Charlie the Unicorn, and Weebl and Bob when comedy did not necessarily have to make sense. It just had to be funny. Most of the Fellowship had a crush on Frodo (Sam will kill them if they try anything), and all of the Elves had an obsession with their appearance.
If you’re a die-hard The Lord of the Rings fan, and you’ve been confused by terms on Reddit like “pervy elf/hobbit fancier,” “pointy hat trick,” “still the prettiest,” “still not king,” and references to strawberry bubble bath/soap. All of these terms came from The Very Secret Diaries. The Théoden entry is widely considered to be the best, but like Hogwarts houses, everyone has their own favorite. Elrond’s diary is also extremely popular, and Aragorn’s passages have a following as well. Cassie Clare wrote the original on LiveJournal in 2003 and was getting between 100 to 200 comments per post in the days when only half the households had a computer in their home. Influencers today would be over the moon with those views.
A True Fantasy Fan
Image Source: B&N Reads
Clare’s cult status and talent brought her to the attention of literary agents, and she was signed by Simon and Schuster. The first book in The Mortal Instruments series, City of Bones was released in 2007. By this time, Cassie Clare was already a household name in the Harry Potter and The Lord of the Rings fandoms. Most importantly, she never lost her love for them. Even while she was doing edits for one of her recent works, Chain of Gold, she wrote a Tumblr post about movie marathons with her friends, and how she still obsessed over the characters. A slightly messy, angsty fanfiction writer who spent her youth up watching fantasy films, Cassandra Clare is definitely one of us. She should know she is an integral part of the fandom, even if she is “still not king.”
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Source(s): Tumblr, Harry Potter Wiki, Wikipedia, statista,
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