The Joy of Reviews
Jul. 26th, 2005 08:53 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
icarusI love reviews, oh yes I do.
I've been hearing that there are some complaints about reviews these days. That there's a sense of reader entitlement, a demand for response. Perhaps overwhelm in replying to reviews (I can understand the latter -- I am so far behind it isn't funny).
I'd like to add my ten cents to the debate:
Reviews are wonderful.
Nothing makes my day like a lush, detailed review that points out aspects of a fic that I may have missed, or tells me what works for the reader. Even a one-liner (regardless of spelling!) is enough to bring a smile to my face.
Reviews to me are the equivalent of an audience giggle for the comedian, applause for an actor, or the light in a child's eyes for a storyteller. I'm well aware that my stories are on stage and each one is a performance.
I like to know how it went.
I use reviews (plus the hit counts and the depth, content, and length of said reviews) as a temperature gauge as to what works and what doesn't.
When I started writing Lord of the Rings fanfiction (see dreadful story here), I received very few reviews. Another writer told me "Oh yes, people have such poor taste. I don't get many reviews either -- and you should see the trash people like! Tsk."
I took it differently. Clearly I was doing something wrong.
I re-evaluated my writing, and decided I was putting pretty prose before the story. I gutted my pacing -- which was exceedingly slow (I describe what I did here: How To Write For The Internet) -- and completely changed my style. I cut and cut and cut.
I wrote An Irresistible Photo and then Primer to the Dark Arts.
The reader response turned around 180 degrees.
Reviews poured in. People stopped saying what a good writer I was and started responding to the story. Especially with Primer they treated the characters as if they were real. They were annoyed with Ron, wondered what was going on with Snape, had advice for Harry. Hallelujah.
I changed sections of Primer in response to readers. One ff.net reviewer said "Nine chapters and still no sign of a plot...," which prompted me to tighten my outline. Intensely negative responses to Ron caused me to add a chapter. A compaint "where're the dark arts?" nudged me to flesh a chapter with more magic.
And to this day I still listen. Stories that receive no feedback I may discontinue; clearly I was barking up the wrong tree. Others where someone replies "that was well-written" (eek!) I re-evaluate. Stories people hate, I keep. (Heh-heh, praise isn't the point.)
If several people mention the same sentence or section, I'll bear that in mind.
Reviews are never what I expect. One woman told me, "I was thinking about A '57 Vincent And A Red-Headed Boy while was gardening and I think the Weasleys are...." Another said "We read Guy Talk like a play on vacation." Someone else replied "Sonic Boom takes me back to when I flew airplanes for the Navy...." I received the most wonderful review about The Albatross, where the reader actually apologised for taking the story so personally and talking about themselves (oh no, honey, that's the best reaction, honest).
When I turn a story loose, it becomes an interactive project, firing the imagination of the reader (if it works). Fan art is living proof of how vastly different the story becomes once it reaches the reader's mind.
It's not mine any more.
But I don't know what's happened until I hear. Like throwing a rock into a canyon, I listen for the echo.
I've been hearing that there are some complaints about reviews these days. That there's a sense of reader entitlement, a demand for response. Perhaps overwhelm in replying to reviews (I can understand the latter -- I am so far behind it isn't funny).
I'd like to add my ten cents to the debate:
Reviews are wonderful.
Nothing makes my day like a lush, detailed review that points out aspects of a fic that I may have missed, or tells me what works for the reader. Even a one-liner (regardless of spelling!) is enough to bring a smile to my face.
Reviews to me are the equivalent of an audience giggle for the comedian, applause for an actor, or the light in a child's eyes for a storyteller. I'm well aware that my stories are on stage and each one is a performance.
I like to know how it went.
I use reviews (plus the hit counts and the depth, content, and length of said reviews) as a temperature gauge as to what works and what doesn't.
When I started writing Lord of the Rings fanfiction (see dreadful story here), I received very few reviews. Another writer told me "Oh yes, people have such poor taste. I don't get many reviews either -- and you should see the trash people like! Tsk."
I took it differently. Clearly I was doing something wrong.
I re-evaluated my writing, and decided I was putting pretty prose before the story. I gutted my pacing -- which was exceedingly slow (I describe what I did here: How To Write For The Internet) -- and completely changed my style. I cut and cut and cut.
I wrote An Irresistible Photo and then Primer to the Dark Arts.
The reader response turned around 180 degrees.
Reviews poured in. People stopped saying what a good writer I was and started responding to the story. Especially with Primer they treated the characters as if they were real. They were annoyed with Ron, wondered what was going on with Snape, had advice for Harry. Hallelujah.
I changed sections of Primer in response to readers. One ff.net reviewer said "Nine chapters and still no sign of a plot...," which prompted me to tighten my outline. Intensely negative responses to Ron caused me to add a chapter. A compaint "where're the dark arts?" nudged me to flesh a chapter with more magic.
And to this day I still listen. Stories that receive no feedback I may discontinue; clearly I was barking up the wrong tree. Others where someone replies "that was well-written" (eek!) I re-evaluate. Stories people hate, I keep. (Heh-heh, praise isn't the point.)
If several people mention the same sentence or section, I'll bear that in mind.
Reviews are never what I expect. One woman told me, "I was thinking about A '57 Vincent And A Red-Headed Boy while was gardening and I think the Weasleys are...." Another said "We read Guy Talk like a play on vacation." Someone else replied "Sonic Boom takes me back to when I flew airplanes for the Navy...." I received the most wonderful review about The Albatross, where the reader actually apologised for taking the story so personally and talking about themselves (oh no, honey, that's the best reaction, honest).
When I turn a story loose, it becomes an interactive project, firing the imagination of the reader (if it works). Fan art is living proof of how vastly different the story becomes once it reaches the reader's mind.
It's not mine any more.
But I don't know what's happened until I hear. Like throwing a rock into a canyon, I listen for the echo.
no subject
Date: 2005-07-27 06:15 pm (UTC)So, yeah. I guess I view fic-writing as more like conversation than performance. (Or economics, which is how some people have analyzed it.) But clearly both outlooks work, or we both couldn't be writing fic...