Text Fic

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Tropes and genres
Synonym(s)texting fic, texting AU, chat style, chat-style, chat room, chat fic
Related tropes/genresPhones in Fanworks, Get together fic
See alsoAlternate Universe
Related articles on Fanlore.

A text fic resembles a log of two or more characters texting each other. It may be written entirely in the form of text messages, or it may contain narrated passages.

The term often implies that the characters started texting by coincidence and are getting to know each other, meeting in real life at some point, and in the end find themselves in a relationship.

A popular subtrope is "texting the wrong number", other examples for coincidentally acquired numbers include a number written in a library book, matchmaking scenarios gone wrong, and finding a sketchbook, calendar or other item with the owner's contact information.

Often, the different characters' messages are represented by bold and italic font at first, and each new character that joins the conversation gets a new combination of bold, italic, underlined writing.

Many text fics are AUs, because the characters meet in different ways than they do in canon. In some cases, the mere existence of mobile phones leads to a modern AU, muggle AU or needs a different creative explanation.

Variations

Faked screenshots of text conversations between characters (or screenshots of in-character texting) are popular in many fandoms and usually the main difference is that these are much shorter, and often lead up to a punchline (e.g. lexa buys (a) fish.). Sometimes, these conversations are part of a social media-edit, including things like a character's instagram page or tumblr header. Sometimes they are closer to the Texts From Last Night Meme. Some, however, tell a complete (often multi-part) story and can only be distinguished from traditional text fics by medium.

Chat style refers to fanfiction that takes place in a chat room and looks like a chat log, including dialogue as well as automated messages like "xy left the room". With traditional chats becoming less popular and traditional texting being partially replaced by chat apps like Whatsapp, Telegram and Signal, the boundaries between text fics and chat fics are blurring.

Examples

Assassin's Creed:

Fire Emblem: Three Houses

Glee

Haikyuu!!

Harry Potter:

Sherlock

The 100

The Walking Dead

The X-Files

Resources