At 12:16 PM 8/24/98 -0500, Ranma Al'Thor wrote:
But how many of them will actually provide you any useful comments? There
may be 900 people on this list, but I rarely get more than 2 replies to
anything I post here. And how many people post stories and get no replies
at all? The biggest advantage of having your own pre-reader list is that
you know someone WILL comment on your work, because they volunteered
specificially to read your stories.
to r.a.a.c. Well hey, there's a well read story all right! But you are
denying yourself the kind of C&C that this list was made for. The kind that
But which it rarely provides. Unless there's a LOT of privately sent C&C
going on, a lot of stories seem to get no comments at all, or maybe one
lone comment. Part of this is simply the sheer volume of stories that
comes through, but a vast majority of the people on this list never
comment on anything, as far as I can tell.
<snip>
A potential one. But in practice, the average author will be lucky to get
comments from 1% of the lists membership.
Have you ever considered the possibility that reader's are maybe a little
intimidated by either the length of a fic or even the author's name when
they consider offering C&C?
On the size of fics: I did detailed, word for word, C&C on TOS2 for Rob
Barba a few months back. I spent about 2 to 2 1/2 hours on each chapter and
managed to make it through about 12.5 chapters before burning out. That's a
lot of editing for me! (And Rob, if you're still interested in hearing from
me, I have chapter 13 still sitting on my hard drive, about half gone
through.) Taking your fics as an example, Mr. Biles, (er, how do you wish
to be politely addressed by a stranger over email? I never have figured out
the proper netiquite for that.) looking in my mailbox I see Dance of Shiva
chapter 9, Furinkan Summer 6 and 7, and FS 8 and 9 which clock in at 42,
97, and 110 kb respectively. I think it would be a little unreasonable to
expect detailed, line for line analysis of fics of this size (though
receiving 900+ such replies would be... interesting). So instead we're left
with a shorter, simpler reply, which brings up a crucial question:
How do I summarize an 110 kb fanfic into a handful of paragraphs and make
it meaningful C&C?
Or, at least, that's always been my problem. I would very much like to hear
suggestions on solving this problem and how other people deal with it. For
now, here's my attempt with regard to the three mentioned stories.
=====
DoS ch 9
I liked it, for starters. Specific comments though... Priss in a Sailor
uniform is always funny, provided you're out of firing range. Mihoshi as
Leon's partner was also good. One little comment though, and this may be
more from memory of reading the first drafts off your web page than this
chapter in particular, but have you thought of dropping the little tag
lines at the close of scenes? While a number of times I remember them being
funny, in some cases they're extraneous, in others they're simply annoying,
and a few times they pretty much give away parts of the plot.
FS 6&7
Hmm... These probably weren't two of the better chapters of FS in my
opinion. Mostly because, like another poster mentioned, they were a little
*too* silly. While I usually enjoy silliness, there's an undercurrent of
darkness here that I dislike. Maybe it's just me, but the whole 'locking
Ranma into cursed form' isn't something I consider silly. You've taken away
his face, his body, and his martial arts. And what's worse, or simply
wierder at least, no one in the story even seems to notice this or really
care. They simply are rather 'ho hum' about it, 'on to the next joke' and
all. This attitude lends an air of surreality to the fic that undermines
the comedy. Now then, changing Happosai into a barrel of monkeys was funny,
but then you made pains to keep Happosai himself even when changed.
FS 8&9
These two chapters were better than the last two. By toning down the
silliness a notch, you made the chapter more palatable. I am curious as to
why you've chosen to make FS a spoofish fic more in the tone of "The
Nameless Sequel" by Mike Loader than the silly, yet serious tone of
"Putting Your Heart in the Right Place". I think that's why I had trouble
swallowing the last two chapters as well.
Anyway, the dream sequence with Ukyo and the scene between her and
Shinnosuke while alone at the campsite put some much needed seriousness
back into the fic. I don't want to put down the silliness in the rest of
the fic anymore than I already have, but without scenes like this, FS would
be rather shallow.
Oh well, there's my feeble attempt at C&C on two great stories. Hope this
helps.
=====
Now for the other problem I mentioned earlier, that of being intimidated by
an author's name. Maybe I simply lack chutzpah, but I find it hard to be
critical of a well-written author when I myself have produced so little.
How am I, Scott Pollert, author of no more than a half-dozen spamfics, none
of which were over 10k, suppose to criticize someone like *John Biles*,
who's written such well-known, liked, and *long* fics as Dance of Shiva,
Sailormoon Z, and PYHinRP/Furinkan Summer? (And don't let them fool you,
size *does* count! ;) I can't be the only one who is hesitant to criticize
an author for this reason, can I?
Finally, I sincerely hope no one takes any offense at this. The above
paragraph should assure you that I am very much in awe of and jealous of
the writing ability many of the author's here possess.
...
(This is the part where I say some pithy statement about good luck and
can't we all just give peace a chance or something or other. Er... Pity I
can't think of anything.)
Um. Bye!
John Walter Biles : MA-History, Ph.D Wannabe at U. Kansas
ranma@falcon.cc.ukans.edu
rhea@tass.org http://www.tass.org/~rhea/falcon.html
rhea@maison-otaku.net http://www.maison-otaku.net/~rhea/
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Scott Pollert [pollerts@hsonline.net]