You might be psyching yourself up too much with the need to read “high quality” published fiction, and gravitating toward fanfiction as a result.

Look: I read a lot of litfic. I am literally an English teacher. And litfic is not always fun to read. There are published novels that offer all the raw pleasures of fanfiction, but have the polish that fanfiction doesn’t have. This is very common in the fantasy, romance, and thriller genres. I read a huge mix of “smart” and “fun” books, and I won’t tell you that the smart books have never been enjoyable, but they have also almost always been work.