#the bookbinding

[the-inkwell-bookstore]

i can hear you

Oh- I- ...you can? Thank everything, I've been calling for ages- blast this damned device-

Damn it, I don't have- someone's coming, I-

Who are you?

...you can see me?

What do you mean? Of course I can see you, that's-- never mind. This is a restricted area. Who are you?

I, er- terribly sorry, I appear to have gotten a tad- i-if you could-- bollocks, I'm not doing this right. You're... you're not supposed to be able to see me.

What is... that? ...Why are you...

A-ah. This is, er... my book! Lovely little... abode. please don't tell him I got out

...You're a ghost, aren't you?

...nooo...?

I've never been able to talk to a regret before.

I'm not a-

Whose are you?

No one's! I'm- damn it. ...Fine. I'm James. Real alive sentient person, o-or I... I suppose I used to be. A-and you must be...?

Riiiight. ...I'm... I'm Mallory.

[click]

[thingsidrawgohere]

Alright. I'm calling it done before it kills me. This is Second Head. It's an Art Book containing instances of the phrase "second head" in fanfics found on AO3. I'll explain much, MUCH more in the cut.

So when I say 'art book', I mean this is an intrinsic piece. I have no motivations aside from personal amusement and interest in outcome. A lot of money was lost/transmuted into free frustration in this project and I have no claims, obviously. I will prolly be the only person alive to read this.

THAT SAID. I have noticed in my years reading fanfic, there's a few linguistic shibboleths that arise in authors who also have experience in the mines. I think there's not a soul alive who hadn't wandered across a 'ministrations' when reading Narutos oral sexing. There's- Hold on. Here's some pix.

There's an impulse, I think, to in-group even when performing a creative act. A feeling that there are certain ways one Should go about the act, by virtue of seeing it performed that way. Especially so when 'training' at the act is often just Doing. Double Dog Especially when the act is exclusively for oneself with very little oversight. Which is to say, we make what we see and we make what we think we should make. At least, at first.

Now, I've been noticing 'grew a second head' (to insinuate surprise) in fanfic for some time. I've never seen it used Outside of fanfic. (Edit to add: I am not making the argument the phrase is from fanfic. Nor do I Believe it is from fanfic. Jesus Hopping Christ, people. That's not what this project is about.) That may speak to my own bad habits but it got me curious. So a friend and myself downloaded a mirror of AO3 from July of 2024. He did some code- Stuff to scan the mirror for "second head" and of the ~13 million works, ~70k (English) results were returned. That's a rounding error, honestly, but Far FAR more than I expected.

This book is 401 such examples that I personally selected for a variety of reasons. The number itself was arbitrarily chosen. Each page is separate fic, the roughly 300 words around our key phrase.

I don't think repetition or mirroring is a negative thing. I think it's quite charming. Nor do I think it's a sign of a 'bad' artist or 'bad' art. I think it's a signifier of personhood, of belonging, of enthusiasm. Of culture shared and wishing to share. I think it's real sweet. I always smile when I catch a 'grown a second head' in a work.

And it's really fucking funny when it's John Sherlock getting a sloppy toppy. Bless.

Edit: Fixed a very VERY funny error.

Edit: I am not making the argument that the phrase is exclusive to fanfic or, fucking forbid, FROM fanfic. I'm stating this Again because we skim here. Also- If you would like slamdunk my ass by stating the phrase predates the Internet or your GenX parents use it, please use 'sailboat' in your comment so I know you're specifically trying to kill me.

Edit Edit: You know what? Fine. I DO think this phrase came from fandom. I think ENGLISH came from fandom. I think YOU came from fandom. I think EVERYTHING came from fandom. The Sun, the Moon, the Seas- Fandom. Specifically Sonic Mpreg. The second head was Shadow the Hedgehog crowning. Congrats!

[puppiesareperfect]

people on TikTok don’t realize fic binding didn’t begin with idiots selling mass printed fanfiction on TikTok-Shop. They think it started as a negative thing ON TIKTOK😭it started on tumblr years ago as a way to appreciate authors!! It was never about selling fics, we’re AGAINST THAT HERE and always have been. I am so tired of the way TikTok rewrites fandom culture.

[wrenthetitmouse]

Major shout-out to men that craft. Dudes that knit. Fellows that felt. Bros that bind books. Cobbers that cross-stitch. Y'all are wonderful and I appreciate you.

[worme4ter]

yo dudes so i'm currently making a tma book for my friend!

it's basically the tma wiki but in book form :)

(highly inspired by what pricklypearviking on reddit did just much less cool)

current status: i run out of printer toner and im in pain so decided to share this to pass the time

[desolationfires]

Maya Bookbinder

[lucrezianoin]

How to bookbind your fanfic!

Part 1: From AO3 to printing

The necessary first step is turning your AO3 fanfic into booklets. Your whole book will be a bunch of booklets piled on top of each others and stitched together.

Booklet examples:

Btw, this is the official Word tutorial on how to make a booklet.

You can see there are different options. I usually do 8 pages, which is what you will see in the video. This means that a booklet of 8 pages is two sheets of paper, printed front and back, folded and one put inside the other. To have your word pages in the correct order you will need to format your word document.

Everything is in the video but here is the text for easy reading (btw the fanfic I used is Exit by schwutthing, an amazing Valjean/Javert fic)

Do not download the fanfic on AO3. Click on "Entire work" and copy paste it on word.

Format your word document. Click on File-> Margins. Select "Multiple pages: Book fold" and "Sheets per booklet: 8". Put "Gutter" to 1cm.

Double click on the empty area just above your text, on a random page of the document. This will make the "Do not download the fanfic on AO3. Click on "Entire work" and copy paste it on word.

Format your word document. Click on File-> Margins. Select "Multiple pages: Book fold" and "Sheets per booklet: 8". Put "Gutter" to 1cm.

Double click on the empty area just above your text, on a random page of the document. This will make the "Header and Footer" option appear. You can click on "Footer" and select the format for the pages' number. Always add the pages number, it will make your life easier.

Now you can justify your book. I usually justify (select all text with CTRL+A and click on Justify), but keep in mind that some documents might not enjoy passing through "justify" so double check your final document. For example, if there are lines of poetry and the author wrote into the next line without starting a new paragraph the justify option will make it weird.

Make your book pretty! I added some illustrations and blank pages. I also made the title of the fanfic bigger.

Fix the chapters' titles and notes. I clicked on Home-> Find and searched for "Chapter", so I could select on each chapter title and make it bold, and also delete the "Chapter text" added just after. You can do the same with "notes" in case you want to delete notes.

Now it is time to print! I prefer to save in pdf before, so I will do that.

IF YOU HAVE A PRINTER THAT DOES NOT PRINT BOTH SIDES

Click on print

Select "Microsoft print to pdf"

Select "Manually print on both sides"

This will create two different files pdf, one for the front pages, and one for the back pages.

Click on the file for the front pages and print them all. Do not panic if you see the pages number all over it.

Now take your printed (only on one side) block of pages and load it into your printer again, making sure that you will now print on the blank back. Open your back pages pdf file and print.

(you can do a trial with a few pages to see if everything is lining up correctly).

IF YOU HAVE A PRINTER THAT PRINT BOTH SIDES

"Click on print

Select "Microsoft print to pdf"

Select "Print on one side"

This will create a single pdf that you can print on your both-sides printer. You will see that the page are not in the order you had on the word document, but the whole file will start with page 8 (see video).

Now print!

What you want is this:

You can see that on the front you have page 8 first, page 1 after, because when folded it will end up with page 1 at the start of your booklet! And on the back of this first sheet you have 7 and 2, that will end up in the correct position.

Now you will have a lot of pages... time to fold and create your booklet! Every two sheets... you will fold as you see above.

Next post will be specifically about folding the booklet, making the holes and sewing them together.

[kitsunetsuki]

Lester Bookbinder - Jeweled Egg by Stuart Devlin (Vogue UK 1973)

[bamsara]

If you're stressing out about a part of the writing process for fanfic to the point where it's not fun anymore, just don't do that part

Post that fanfic with 1000 grammar and spelling errors. Make your characters OOC and give it a Mary Sue. It is a hobby you're sharing not a literature assignment you have to turn in by midnight

[mellific]

last book post for the year! this is Urban Adaptations, Vol 1 (Moths), it's seven full page spreads each with a moth popup, saddle stitched. i made four copies for a book fair in nov & sold them all so i will do a flipthrough video when i've printed and assembled the next batch!!

[stlartsupply]

I made this zine last year to teach Japanese stab binding. It's a technique that every artist should know—with just a few tools, it's so easy to bind your own sketchbook or to make a physical version of your art/writing/etc. Download the PDF version (with bonus photos & tips!)

[eloquence682]

There’s something cosmically beautiful about bookbinding fanfiction. Not the bookbinding of fanfiction for monetary gain (which is undoubtedly morally wrong) but rather bookbinding as a gift for someone you love. Or simply bookbinding for the sake of having the story in a tangible form. After all, doesn’t it deserve a place on your bookshelf, too?

But that isn’t the beautiful part. It is this: the melding of something new with something as old as language itself. Fanfiction (at least compared with bookbinding) is a strikingly new phenomenon. Modern fanfiction has only been around for a few generations. Bookbinding, on the other hand? It can be traced back to 2nd century India. It’s a dying art — one that’s been reborn in order to immortalize freely written words.

Even better: the scribes in India who first invented the process of bookbinding used it to create religious texts. In a way, aren’t we doing the same? Fanfiction isn’t a religion, of course, but if you love a story enough to bind it, isn’t that a form of reverence in itself? Isn’t it holy?

Yes. You make it so. The needle and the thread, the newly creased paper, the hardly dried ink … your fingers consecrate it. And as you slip the book onto the shelf, you make it a temple.

And isn’t that just lovely?

[starblightbindery]

"Gritty Kills Tony Stark" by Copulation Matrix.

Bound in April 2023

❤️‍🔥A very short fic about restorative justice. ❤️‍🔥 Cased in orange faux fur with guillotine pendant decoration ❤️‍🔥 The signs held up by the people on the endpapers are the original tags on Ao3, and they are waving banners with the Flyers logo and Ao3 logo on them. ❤️‍🔥 Modified artwork of "La mort de Maximilien de Robespierre" by Giacamo Alprandi c.1799)

[gord-sky]

Handmade embroidered hardback copy of Red Valley S1 transcript