Years ago, a fellow writer recommended FanStory to me as a solution to improve my writing, so I joined. I wrote stories and poems and received good feedback and some excellent ratings. I won one or two contests and lost all the others. I also gave feedback to other authors and enjoyed it, but I didn't remain a member. Lack of ability, motivation, or writer's block were not the problems.

The problem was money. At the time, my household budget remained very tight, and I couldn't afford the membership fee. I also disliked, and still do, that FanStory charges authors to promote their work to other authors on the site. This feature reminds me of a vanity press, so I don't promote my work beyond the two reviews allowed in a contest. An author may spend large amounts of money to promote individual pieces. FanStory should allow authors to promote their entire profiles so an interested fan can read all of an author's work for one price.

At Christmas in 2017, I joined FanStory again because my daughter gave the membership fee to me as a gift. Rejoining FanStory reminded that the site provides great prompts for stories and the chance for other authors to review your work, which I think is great. I also like that FanStory allows artists to post their stories or poems with artwork. This reminds me of the Bible as Literature class that I completed in college. The instructor required that the students in the class post artwork with their projects. This practice adds color and another "wordless" dimension to the stories and poems. I join contests mainly for fun and mental exercise. If I use my entire balance of member dollars, I will replenish it. I don't mind paying the contest entry fees because they provide the prize money for the authors.

During this second enrollment, I entered a contest titled "Fun with Punctuation" on March 4, 2018. The deadline came and went. It's July and the contest hasn't opened for voting. The contest deadline just keeps getting extended repeatedly for two weeks each time. When I wrote an e-mail to FanStory that asked about all the extensions, the answer I received from them was this, (it's paraphrased), "I can't find that contest, but they are extended for several reasons." This answer and situation are unacceptable to me. The contest should be canceled and the entry fees returned to the entrants if the voting doesn't begin within a reasonable amount of time after the deadline. Extending the deadline over and over again drains the excitement and motivation from me, and maybe other authors.

Overall, I feel satisfied with FanStory. I like to look for new contests to keep my motivation to write. It also helps me with my revision process, which I hope will also help with my new assistant editor position at my alma mater's newspaper. For me, FanStory acts as a perpetual, college-level fiction workshop, which I need to keep my artistic efforts at the forefront.