Exploring Strange Old Fics 2026

We’re back, back, back, back again!  Yes, it’s the 4th installment of “Exploring Strange Old Fics” at Dragon Con.

• Exploring – I try to bring you things not as easily found online (though some obviously will be), and provide some additional information or context.
• Strange – Chosen because it’s we’re talking Star Trek and fits the cadence. Not intended to be derogatory in any way. In reality, I always look for things that were popular, impactful, interesting, relevant, or even the best example of a kind.
• Old – At least 20 years old. (Sorry, that means nothing more recent than Enterprise.)
• Fics – Short for fan fiction. But really, it’s all kinds of fanworks.

Below is a list of written works featured this year, with links to the full texts when possible.  Keep in mind, this is a “Mature” panel, meaning it’s for ages 18 and up only.  That doesn’t mean that every fanwork is also rated as such, but several are.

• • “Why a Star Trek Fanzine?” by Danielle Dabbs, Introduction to Star Trek Fanzines, 1975
  • “Tower of Terror” by Jennifer Guttridge
  • “A Time Out of Fragment”, “Oedipus Sex”, and “Eat it Raw” by Paula Smith, Warped Space #20, 1976
  • “About the Size of It” by Leslie Fish, R&R #3, 1977
  • “Requiem” by Ingrid Cross, Odyssey #1, 1977
  • “A Bitter God to Follow, A Beautiful God to Behold” by Susan Crites, Masiform D #13, 1983
  • “The Hive” by Roberta Debono, 1987 (not available online, but here’s the Fanlore entry)
  • “Here’s Looking at You, Kid” by Emily Gallagher, The Bawdy Electric, 1993
  • “Closure” by Altariel (Una McCormack), c. 1998-2002
  • “Close Encounter” by Reverend Jim, 1997
  • “Indiscretion” by Mareel, 2004

“Indiscretion” turned into a series – I was able to find 4 follow-ups:  “Interlude”, “Insomnia”, “Introspection”, and “Intonation”.

If you’d like to do your own explorations of strange, old fics, I highly recommend Joan Marie Verba’s book Boldly Writing, and also spending a lot of time poking around Fanlore.org.  If you’re looking for the stories themselves, The FANAC Fan History Project has a large archive of scanned fanzines, as does Archive.org; and Trekiverse has a large archive of the stories posted on ASC and ASCEM in the early internet days.

And if you happen to be in or near Toronto, I highly recommend visiting the Merril Collection of Science Fiction, Speculation & Fantasy at the Toronto Public Library (Lillian H. Smith Branch), which boasts a collection of over 14,000 fanzines.