So Dokuga,

r0o has a question.

I've noticed, not on our lovely site but on FF that stories where authors do 1k updates often get fantastic reviews. Some of these stories are cliche and need a beta more then a drunk sleepy r0o, but they still get awesome review numbers.

i dunno what to think about this. It makes me wonder if people really care about what their reading.

I'm not going to lie I'm reading the same crazy story but i hafta tell you i don't review it hardly ever. I mean seriously if i'm saying i notice the mistakes then there are some crazy ones in there.

:l

I guess i'm confused about it really, because there are some really great serious stories out there that have been really worked on with such small numbers.

And then i see something thats 20 chapters long and 21k and i cant help but look at the over 700 count review and wonder wth. *sigh* i think i'm ranting...

sorry.

-r0o

I totally agree. I come across stories that get great reviews, but when I read them, they either make absolutely no sense whatsoever, stray from the main plot, are way too cliche, and have so many grammatical errors that they make me cock my head to the side like a confused dog. I don't get it either.

A lot of them are so bad that I don't even review them because I just might end up flaming them. And I don't have it in me to flame very bad stories. It's to the point where I lose interest in them.

I don't know. I guess people read these type of stories out of sheer boredom. Who knows?

Rant away r0o, many agree with you.

I don't read on ff.net, that site is so messed up navigating i don't bother. But i have noticed that over on AFF. I've seen some of the most horrid work that looks like a 2 year old wrote it with the misspellings and such yet, if you look at the reviews, they are all glowing and full of praise.

Though, as an author, you love reviews that praise you to the highest nirvana the truth is all of us make mistakes and most don't realize it until someone points it out. Constructive criticism is needed, really it is, for all of us. If we don't get that point out, then how do we hope to improve or fix what we have done?

I think, honestly, part of it comes from the fact that the bane of existence in fan fiction is most stories that are multi-chapter never gets finished. By praising the author to the highest level, they hope like hell that it will help ensure that it gets done. But, the reality is, that all it does is enable the bad writing and cliche work to continue and not to improve the author's skills. But, from the readers point of view, you can understand it. They just want something they like to get done and that's the only way they know to help to ensure that.

But, that being said, don't expect any change any time soon. Unless something huge happens, nothing is going to change. This is a problem on ALL sites, not just ff.net and it continues on. But nothing anyone knows of is going to stop it until people realize that you are going to get a better quality of fiction when you actually give a honest review and not just one full of praise.

Also, take notice who leaves the reviews. Usually people who write and have poor skill don't have notable reviewers, like authors who do take pride in their work or readers with discriminating tastes.

That aside, you have to accept that not all people write for the same reasons as others as well as there are people who don't read for the same reasons. There are people out there who don't care about grammar or super-short chapters and actually enjoy reading the same cliche over and over.

I overlook spelling errors if the story is interesting to me. Frankly, I want to encourage a writer to keep going, so they don't give up on the story for lack of support. If a story is interesting, and seems to be written by a young person, I try especially hard to review. Usually, there is some aspect of the story that stands out, plot, humor, depth of feeling, that a reader can say something good about. It is very discouraging to write your heart out and not get reviews, and I must say, sometimes it is one kind reviewer that keeps me plugging along on my story. As for the rambling plotline (of which I have been accused, and am probably guilty), there are many different kinds of story. The short story requires a tight plot. Other stories are more along the lines of a soap opera. Nobody nowadays has read "The Magnificent Ambersons", but at one time, such stories were very popular. I am rambling, because it's four in the morning.

4am rambles are sometimes g0od ^_^

You all make really valid points, i guess when i saw everything i was just kinda staring owlishly at it. Honestly it still puzzles me. Though i do understand that positive reinforcement might add to an author completing their work. I also get that sometimes that same cliche stuff does draw people in.

Its a conundrum.

bleh either way. It still makes me feel bad for completed work that is awesome but rarely seen, or reviewed. So much greatness out there and so little support for it.

I agree with r0o, 100 percent. So much greatness, so little support...

Still, one way to combat the fangirlishness on ff.net is to use the Recommendation Category and PROMOTE the heck out of those gems that you feel deserve more recognition. Every little bit helps, right??

~~Wiccan~~

FF has a recommendation area?

No, I meant ours... sorry, a little lacking in clarity lately!!

~~me~~

I don't read ff.net anymore. I'm only following 1 story over there, but other than that story I've given up on ff.net really. But I have seen what you've seen r0o on AFF. I don't have a lot of spare time so I sneak in reading and writing whenever I can. Sometimes I see something on AFF that has hundreds of reviews so I read it only to be incredibly disappointed.

I realize that what I'm looking for in a story isn't what everybody else is looking for, but the sheer amount of reviews some of those stories get is still an oddity. I chalked it up to people just having a lot of friends online that read their work and review it. *shrug*

I also find that people are incredibly impatient. I think the fanfiction genre spoils people to expect an update every week (if not every day). For writers like me, who don't have the spare time to write that quickly (and are intent on making sure that what is written isn't crappy), I see the steady decline of interest in my stories because of that fact.

I'm not really complaining, I just find it to be another oddity. For published authors that I read you'll wait a year or more for a new book to come out. That's accepted, but in fanfiction if you're not cranking out chapters like a machine it seems to be frowned upon.

I completely understand what your saying! while i have time, some of my plotlines are horribly complicated, and i wont lie, i know i have a few open at once i honestly cant force myself to sit and write on just one of my stories for such a long time. I really cant. Anyway i feel your pain on some of it. I know i havent updated some of my bigger fics in a while and i cant help but think to myself that many people wont even remember them by the time i get back to them. its my fault really but i dunno...

now i feel like finishing out some of my fics! i may be shopping for a beta soon, i know i have 2 or 3 that are going to need it soon. :3

SQUEEEEEEE!!!!

Much fangirlish squealing coming from this area... believe me! R0o even MENTIONS the "update" word and I go all squishy!!

Although, srsly, I will wait years for updates from my favorite authors. If they update on several sites, I will put them on story or author alert on ff.net, then go read where I prefer reading, like here. Is it bad that I "use" the features on ff.net, but read everything here???

Eh, whatever. My point is that those who follow your stories will still read them and give feedback, regardless of when you update. And, even if it goes a while, you can pick up new readers too. You may not be getting the girly 'SQUEE' reviews when it takes longer, but you SHOULD be getting reviews that offer you something more meaningful than sheer numbers. At least, that's the way *I* think it OUGHT to be. Then again, I'm not an author.

Never mind... I'll slink back into my hole now...

~~me~~

What you have a realize is that most of the reader base of fan-fiction are young people I know this from some of my own reviews, I have one story that I finished years ago at the time I thought it was good, but I've just read and I believe it's childish yet I'm still getting reviews.

All these epic stories we all enjoy could be above the level of reading these younger fans are at. I sometimes wonder if they review the stories that are at their level just to make sure that others will write at that level.

At least this is what I'm telling myself after all I only have one story that has 452 reviews. Okay so I'll admit that I didn't think it would get that many reviews since I thought it was crap to begin with, but I'll take what I can get.

(and no I didn't have friends review it)

I agree with you Roo ^_^


What I noticed on FF.net, a major of the rated T stories get more reviews than the rated M. But there's a broader variation for rated M stories.

I found grammatical stories, much like my own get reviews because it appeals to the younger readers. Younger as in Fourteen to seventeen year olds. Don't get me wrong, I'm not too much older than them! I'm only nineteen.

But I find that writing from your personal experience, elaborating it, blowing it up really attracts that age group.

Many of the rated T settings are High Schools, spunky Kagome who kicks everyone's ass, or a hot Senior Sesshoumaru gets the attention of geeky Kagome. I guess that's what attracts that age group, because they can relate to it.

You and many others write incredible stories which sometimes, takes a while to catch up because it's so elaborate and detailed. (From my teenage point of view that is) Sometimes we just look for a quick, mood lifting read. (I shouldn't have a say in this, I haven't read a single fanfiction in several months!)


But from my author point of view, yes... I find it disasterly that some 700 words a chapter stories get more reviews than my 4k words of hard work.

I guess it's just another slice of Jealousy, but hey. If we spend less time being jealous and more time improving our writing, we can kick those stories in the booty!



(sigh) My post... makes no sense?
This lowly Misera apologizes for any made up words or grammar mistakes in this post =D
(Can't go anywhere without a beta!)

I have to agree with you rOo. I take my own stories as an example. I started writing when I was young and I am ashamed of almost everything I posted on ff.net in 2005-2006. But I got some glowing praise. No one pointed out my lack of plot or development or the cliche-ness of my work. They just said: "love it, update soon!" Which, when you think about it, makes up about 60% of all reviews. There is no constructive criticism, just "UPDATE UPDATE UPDATE!" So maybe that's why not so good stories get such rave reviews.

MiserablySweet wrote:
You and many others write incredible stories which sometimes, takes a while to catch up because it's so elaborate and detailed. (From my teenage point of view that is) Sometimes we just look for a quick, mood lifting read. (I shouldn't have a say in this, I haven't read a single fanfiction in several months!)Yanno i never thought about that. I would venture to think thats very correct, b/c i find myself reading these fics too when i'm wanting something like that.

Sometimes i think to myself that i would try to do something similar, keep chapter total word counts down below 2k. and my brain just completely freezes up. I find now i cannot express myself in such short confines. I'm not going to lie its possible, but it does take something more for me to edit it down to a "quickie" story. these i usually do as my oneshots but then again i'm kn0own to make incredibly long oneshots too. now at least.

And i also feel that my first works need help. One of my fics, that will eventually make it to Dokuga that's not here, is very cliche, and needs some serious editing etc, is still not here for that very reason. It was my first story and while i love it, its like OMG wtc! @_@ i started writing it before i ever knew what a beta was. Lemme tell you its enlightening to see where you were writing wise to look back. its almost scary!

And Wicci! I'm working on the last chapter of "Kagome's Forced Hand" and "A Woman!" [*which is the mulan based demon everyone cept Yasha fic, not the Kagome's a demon and gunna gut Sess fic =x] >_> r0o likes making kagome a demon in AU worlds :3 well... actually r0o likes making her a demon period.

It might be so, that regular updates does the trick to most of the readers. They just need to get their 'fix', whether it is less than 1k or 7k chapter.

Then again, I myself for example got a huge case of a writer's block, and one of my stories was on hold for one year. I still got reviews, although fewer, when I finally got it updated. There still were familiar names though. There are readers who won't leave you behind, even if you didn't update for a whiiiile. And there are some readers who've been sticking along since the very first fic I wrote. That's sort of endearing, don't you think?

(And I have to say that nowadays I find my own work childish as well, not to even mention the style. Guhh.)

The way I like to look at it is that a higher-quality story will receive higher-quality reviews. I think someone may have said this earlier (if so, apologies! 13 is too lazy to scroll back to the top of the page. ) but you can usually tell the calibre of a story by looking at the people who review it, and review it consistently

But the lack of constructive criticism in the reviews given to these stories we're talking about pretty much astounds me. For anyone to develop as a better writer, they inevitably need someone to point out areas for improvement and grammatical problems, etc. Empty praise will get you nowhere in the long run; it's only a short ego-boost which will lead to future disappointment.

Lol, we need a squad of people to go out and give these people some concrit, stat!

I've noticed this trend on FFN as well. More than that, it seems that my newest story (which I feel is a lot better than any of my older stories) gets so much less hit counts it makes my head spin!! It almost seems like when I worked to improve in my writing, my audience decreased!

I find mind boggling! I wanted to improve my writing because, looking at my old stories, I though I could do so much better. I would have thought it would have attracted more readers instead of running many of them away. Oh well, the readers that I do have, (mostly on FFN) are pretty loyal reviewers and typically offer a lot of encouragement. That being the case, I guess it worked out for the better because I'd rather have a few really encouraging reviews than a bunch that just say "update soon!"

Younger readers may not be bogged down with poor grammar and spelling if they, themselves, do not have strong skills in this area. Instead, they can look beyond that and enjoy the plot of the story, and I have read a number of stories where, if you can look beyond the mistakes, they actually were pretty good in concept.

For the stories with countless plot holes, and such . . . I have little explanation, except that maybe the story provides the readers with the events that they want, and they don't care how or why the characters got there. They get instant gratification . . . Kagome and Sesshoumaru are proclaiming their love for each other, or at least involved in a little citrus, by chapter five. Character and plot development be darned. (I know I'm not the only author who has received complaints about the slow development of Kagome and Sesshoumaru's relationship in a chapter story.)

As far as the number of reviews a story gets . . . to me, it is not so much how many reviews there are, or who gives them, it's what is written. Don't get me wrong, I love to see a lot of reviews that want me to update. And I especially find it heartening when other authors whose works I have read and loved give their opinion. But any well thought-out review that goes into detail, asks questions, or offers suggestions, is a high quality review to me that prompts me to work harder to improve my skills.

Younger readers may not be bogged down with poor grammar and spelling if they, themselves, do not have strong skills in this area.

that may be valid for some but on AFF where all are adults over 18 this is not an excuse. Nor is english as a 2nd language (there is a non-english section). Yet the most poorly written and hard to follow pieces of work get some of the most glowing reviews i've ever seen. This is not right and doesn't do anyone any good.

I dont know, people want recognition for the work that they put into their stories and for their constant updates. For some people, (even though they may not be the best writers) the support they get gives them a confidence they never had before. I used to know people who spent days and days working on their stories and received a lot of great feedback and it made them feel good. It encouraged them to do better, to write more and sharpen their skills.

But also these stories get so much attention because they are constantly around, they're always being updated. I know we should all have our patience (heck sometimes I won't update stories for months) there are just some people who like to sit down and read a whole story in one sitting or have daily or weekly updates there for them when they turned their computers on. It's true, a lot of readers out there want instant gratification but they also want to read these stories because it makes them feel good. It doesn't matter to them if there are numerous cliches because they haven't be exposed to the writings of more seasoned authors. These romances are all that they know, this is what appeals to them and what they love to write about.

I think a lot of people rag on these stories and while I may not particularly love them, I will support them. It's called fanfiction for a reason. We are all fans putting our love into our stories. We can give all the constructive criticism we want but there are times when all readers want a simple uncomplicated love story.

To those who have great work but aren't recognized for it, sorry you deserve more. There are thousands of stories on ff.net, some get lucky enough to catch the attention of many people and some dont. While you may not get all the recognition you deserve, know that the lovely reviews you do get will mean a lot.

I agree with Breezy. A lot of stories with these numbers are the ones that are constantly updating. I think for some people, because it is there they support it. For others, it is mostly likely do to a young new audience.

I myself don't update often, not that it's anything fantastic, and get few reviews. Now post the same story on FF.net and I get at least six per chapter. As a author, the reviews to give me that extra push to write more. To hear what people like and knowing people enjoy it helps. I've actually even received some somewhat constructive feedback.

As for the cliché part... sometimes it what your in the mood for. Il admit that I've been guilty of this. My guilty pleasure being the hurt Sesshoumaru that Kagome tends to. But I only stick to the ones where I like how it's been done.
Though I know there are some really bad cliché out there that even make me gag at the constant reuse. But it may just be peoples personal preference. In some cases, people just need a instant fix. Not that it makes it any better that these great fix aren't getting the attention they deserve.

As a solution to this, I read peoples favorites on FF and try to promote rare gems the same way on my favorites section.

I agree with Breezy. A lot of stories with these numbers are the ones that are constantly updating. I think for some people, because it is there they support it. For others, it is mostly likely do to a young new audience.

I can personally tell you that is wrong. I update 2-3 times a week every week and that isn't the truth. The truth is the longer the story goes and when people realize you do update on a frequent steady basis they quit reviewing, taking for granted the fact that, reviews or not, you're going to update. Unless you pull something very odd and shocking out, most stop reviewing, taking for granted that you're still going to update despite lack of reviews.

thirteenxwishes wrote:
Lol, we need a squad of people to go out and give these people some concrit, stat!Dokuga has such a group. you can join. they send out notices. The original idea and still is was for new authors and new stories with no reviews to be reviewed. so that newer authors get groomed into better authors for the future. :3