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Fanlore:Featured Article Archives/2019: Week 53
Qfer ("The Q-fer"), short for "The Helper's Network Quarterly Fanzine Review" is an index of Beauty and the Beast (TV) zines compiled by Nan Dibble. It set out to survey the many fan-produced publications inspired by Beauty and the Beast and help fans tell "the best from the rest", which it accomplished via ratings of one to five stars based on how high-quality the zine was considered to be. This practice was somewhat controversial among fans, and the star ratings were dropped in 1995.
The initial compilation, which included nearly 400 zines, was based on Beth Druhan's The Beauty & the Beast Fictionzine Database from Dragonback Publications.
It appears the zine was published four times a year, and then once a year as a combined issue. The cover of some issues says "quality" and on the others it says "quarterly." This oddly, however, does not seem to correspond to the zine's publication dates (see Gallery).
There are many differences between the print version of the Qfer and the Qfer that was put online in 2001, also known as Helpers' Network Quality Fanzine Review Online. For more on these changes, see: Differences Between the Print Qfer (1995 and after) and the Online Qfer.