We will accept any piece of fanfiction based on the series SWAT Kats: The Radical Squadron with a rating no higher than M (see below for ratings guidelines), written in English or Spanish. We can receive stories in most text formats (*.wpd, *.doc, *.txt, *.rtf) and in html. But, please, if you use *.doc or html format, do not send them with embedded or otherwise attached images. We cannot host images or sounds for your stories. You may, however, program your html to link to them on a site of your own.
Submitting:
To submit, e-mail us at submissions@fyresight.com Please attach the story in format form to the letter.
We have a template listing the information we need from you at the top of each story. Please read it and use it so that we don't have to mail you repeatedly to retrieve all the information we need.
If you want, one of us can review and critique any fan fiction before it is posted if you're worried on how it might be received. Some of the best authors on this archive wouldn't post until DJ Clawson pushed them into it, and their work is some of the best up there.
Ratings System:
Please note that our ratings system, whatever it may favor, does not necessarily
conform to any particular official system in use.
Any sexual content should be implied only. SWAT Kats was a children's cartoon and some readers may be more than a little surprised or offended to find two cuddly cartoon characters engaged in detailed sexual activities.
Things that are not accepted:
For those of you who disagree with the rating policy on homosexuality, please understand that this is a safeguard for the people who are bothered by it and don't want to read your story because they will be offended (and feel compelled to write you or us an angry letter about how offended they are).
We do not do rate stories based on their quality. It's not our place to tell you how good the story is or not -- you have to read every piece for yourself and make your own decision.What is SWAT Kats and What isn't:
We define SWAT Kats fan fiction to mean the story concerns characters and/or situations drawn from the TV show. This includes:
Note that we must be able to tell that your new character lives in Megakat City and not just a place that resembles it in name only. Look at those stories cited above. We expect to see SWAT Kat locales like Megakat Biochemical Labs, Enforcer Headquarters, and Puma-Dyne. We expect your character, if arrested, to be arrested by an Enforcer. In short, if you're not going to use canon/show characters, we had better be able to identify your piece with the show in some way other than their being a kat in a world populated by felines.
The one exception to this is RPG-related fanfiction. We do accept it, but it will be placed in the RPG section of the archive, and you need to tell us that it is RPG-related. Just as a warning for non-RPGers who choose to enter that section, we are not responsible for how much the stories involve the SWAT Kats themselves (if they do at all). They may involve a number of RPG characters you've never seen on the show. If you are a RPG writer and you wish to have your stories also posted on the main archive, they must contain the SWAT Kats or other main characters from the show in some way, shape, or form and require no background knowledge of the RPG characters introduced in the stories.
Other Genre We Accept:
If there's any question in your mind as to how on-topic your story may be, don't hesitate to submit! We will inform you if we have any problems with it.
General Guidelines for Writing SWAT Kat Fan Fiction
A few unwritten laws of fanfiction that will help to make your story a bit clearer.
1. Usage of names and secret identities.
Jake and Chance - usage of these names indicates the two are not in flight suits, but something else, or have lost their masks
Razor and T-Bone - usage of these names indicates the two are in flight suits
You cannot switch between names randomly in the narrative text of a scene because you're sick of calling T-Bone by his name fifty times in the same paragraph and you're looking for another name to refer to him as. The usage of names tells the reader exactly how they are dressed and which side of their alter-ego they are playing, because that is no longer obvious due to the fact that we're not all watching a TV screen.
If a switching of names occurs in dialogue, that means Razor has simply decided to call T-Bone "Chance" for no apparent reason, or vice versa. While there's nothing technically wrong with this, unless they're in the hangar, it's kind of awkward if he does that and no one listening over the radio band or hanging around notices. Just picture the scene in your head on a TV screen : Razor, standing next to T-Bone and Callie, decides to call T-Bone by his real name. Now, Callie has to notice that, and the story has to indicate it. (note : there is a mistake in the show where Razor does this outside of a MASA station in "Ci-ka-ta" -- that's a voice-over mistake and nothing more).
2. Conflicts with the show.
If you deliberately change the show status quo, please inform your readers.
Remember, just because you've been planning this story and perhaps even a whole series out in your head for months, your readers know nothing. If your fanfic changes the concept, names, jobs, etc of the show or its characters or if you are going to bring in a non-kat character, please note this at the start of your story or explain your changes clearly in the narration. Note when your story is a deliberate effort at an Alternate/Parallel Universe (often called an "AU") or when you have deliberately changed a single detail, like someone's name, because of some personal preference.
Why do this? Well, most importantly to you, it confuses your readers when they start a fanfic and it refers to Jake's best friend and SWAT Kat partner as Butch. Who on earth is Butch? Chance is the other SWAT Kat, right? At best, your readers are confused. At worst, they think you have absolutely no idea what you're talking about.
Look at the opening notes of Greg Williams' Down, But Not Out. It's a good example of backstory and other explanations to explain the authors' additions and adjustments to the SWAT Kat world.
3. Character names.
If you are uncertain as to the spellings of the names of the SWAT Kat characters, here's a basic list: Chance Furlong, Jake Clawson, Callie Briggs, Mayor Manx, Commander and Felina Feral. Villains: Dark Kat, Dr. Viper, the Pastmaster, Mac and Molly Mange/the Metallikats. (All spellings taken from episode titles and the second season credits.)
For further information on spellings and general show trivia, try:
4. The MARY SUE.
They are rampant in almost all fandoms, and cutting them down a few notches allows us to run the SWAT KATS Fanfiction Archive, not the "I'm in love with the SWAT Kats" Fan-personal-fantasy Archive. For the curious, a so-called "Mary Sue" (also sometimes called "Gary Stu" or "Marty Stu" for the male version) is an original character created by the author who tends to reflect the author's personal tastes and interests and takes over any storyline they are placed into. They become the center of the universe. They tend to be better than their canon counterparts in every way. If they are a good guy, they are a better fighter, a better pilot, smarter, and any sad past they might have is intended to make them more sympathetic to both the audience and the canon cast as well. If they are a bad guy, again, they are better than the canon villains - stronger, smarter, more skilled... even more evil!
We cannot point out specific examples of Mary Sue fanfiction on this site as no author is likely to appreciate that. However, Cherry Koivula has created a wonderful Mary Sue parody called Jake's Angel that you might want to read. And, for further explanations, here are a few other resources you should visit:
Plagiarism:
Do not plagiarise. If you take a fanfic and replace the author's name with your own, it will be rejected and we will give you a warning. If you repeat this action, you will be banned from the Archive.
Stories that merely favor one another due to a common theme will not be considered plagiarism. It's easy to see where several authors might choose to write a "Return of Turmoil" fanfic. The episode featuring Turmoil screams for a sequel. It's equally easy to see why several authors might choose to write a "How Chance and Jake met" fanfic given how the canon offered no explanation. No one can hold a monopoly on either concept and, so long as each author writes their own variation on the idea, there is no plagiarism.
However, please be sure that your idea is indeed unique, and do not present us with a story obviously cobbled together from only slightly modified scenes borrowed from works by your fellow authors. If you are ever uncertain as to how closely your idea favors another's, just e-mail us. We understand that people can have similar ideas, and we understand that an author can subconsciously copy a favorite story without realizing it. We would be happy to offer feedback and suggestions.
In a similar vein, your story is likely to be rejected if we realize that it almost exactly copies a movie, novel, anime, comic book, television series or game. You may be inspired by other stories, you may borrow their villains and heroes for crossovers, you may borrow technology, you may quote lines and song lyrics, you may deposit the SWAT Kat cast in the universe/setting of another series, but please always give credit where credit is due and do not copy someone else's story. This includes re-writing individual scenes or selections of dialogue from other series, movies, etc and presenting them as fanfiction. Quoting individual lines and having characters try, "something I saw in a movie once," is fine, but do not directly copy an entire scene from a movie, dialogue and all.
We cannot police other webpages. We are not going to settle disputes of whether an Archive author's fanfic copies that of an unrelated webpage we have never seen prior to the complaint. As we would have no idea which party was telling the truth, we cannot make a decision on such matters. We can only ask that it be settled between the authors. The only exception to this is if you have posted your work at an automated archive like Fanfiction.net that dates fanfiction as it is submitted. In this case, you may show us your posting as proof of your story pre-dating a copycat.
If we discover that another website is borrowing or stealing fanfics from the Archive without the authors' permission, we will do whatever we can to inform the fandom of the theft and support the affected authors.
--The Management (Contains portions from DJ Clawson's original Guidelines)