Reading the "comments" on one of the stories I was reminded how careful we publishers and editors had to handle writer's egos and emotions. Stories are writer's children. Unless one delicately massages the writer's ego while trying to tell them that baby has pooped in his-her diapers, expect blow back.
Big Closet provides the best training ground in the world for experienced and wannabe writers. The writer gets to put his or her story out there for free. Then a thousand editors have the opportunity to critic the style and content of the story. And that too is free.
Of course all this "free stuff" runs into emotionally charged territory. We always go back to the "story" is the writer's child. The writer is going to protect that kid no matter if it is the ugliest kid in the neighborhood or not. Some will take the critic of their baby as knowledge how to make their story better. Or maybe their style of writing is spot on.
On the other side of the coin are the critics. They are only that, critics. Most all with a preference to a certain kind of story and a preferred way the story script be written. These are the kind whom would be most comfortable with series stories such as Nancy Drew Mysteries written with a TG Twist. I mean come on, they aren't on Big Closet because they are looking for Zane Grey westerns.
The bottom line is, authors, some of those comments are for your good. You are receiving thousands of dollars worth of critical advice for free. You ever step out into the harsh cold world of "book in print" what you learn here is priceless. Grow a backbone. The wolves and sharks are out there. Those here are kittens and minnows.
Have fun with life
It's too short to take it seriously
always,
Barb
Comments
A coment
I agree with you 100% and the writers need that and not get made at us just get better.
Richard
I like kittens
There is a world of difference between writing a story for fun and enjoyment and providing it for free and writing something for commercial sale. If you sell something, then expect the consumer to complain in negative reviews if they don't like it. Works the same for a book or a steam iron. If you post a story for free here... well, that to me is very different. The joy of this website for me is that it is full of 'kittens and minnows'. If people don't like what you write, they vote with their feet and don't comment or kudos. If they like it, they kudos and comment. Seems a very sensible and civillised arrangement.
"Life moves pretty fast. If you don't stop and look around once in a while, you could miss it."
Absolutely right!
Nice comments are... nice, but I'm a person who takes criticism to heart - one bad criticism overrides nice remarks from 20 readers.
Do comments provide useful criticism: I've been writing here and on FM for about 12 years, and in that time I can probably count the useful comments on the fingers of one hand - and they have usually been delivered by PM. Things such as "You've misspelt a word or used it incorrectly." After all, our writing style comes from within us, and is not easily changed.
That's why I prefer comments by PM rather than publicly putting them against my story. If someone wants to call a story rubbish, let them do it to my face, rather than making it graffiti on the wall. I'd advise anyone else like me to do the same and publish their stories without public comments enabled. You'll find you get lots of PMs and have meaningful correspondence with your readers.
Heart of the Matter
And that for me is the heart of the matter. One bad critique - and the problem with this medium is that there is no subtext to a posting meaning we all read the comments through the prism of our own emotional states - can have a disproportionate impact that the commentator didn't originally intend.
For many of us, life has in its own way given us a fairly robust critique anyway. I don't need to 'grow a backbone' as I have to use one every time I leave the house. That's why the 'kittens and minnows' aspect is what I love about this site. It's a chance to express our creativity in a friendly(ish) environment. If people don't kudos or comment and I'm trying to write a popular story then I know I'm doing something wrong. I don't need a string of critical comments to point that out.
"Life moves pretty fast. If you don't stop and look around once in a while, you could miss it."
Hey, Zane Grey wrote a TG western!
Well, ok, it was a CD story but that counts, doesn't it? (I believe it was "West of the Pecos". - AND - it was FtM CD, and would come under the category of 'in hiding'. - If I have the correct story name.)(My dad - LOVED - Zane Grey stories.)
"Some will take the critic of their baby as knowledge how to make their story better." - Um sorry to be critical here, but... (Awww, come on... You knew there would be a "but" here didn't you?) Did you mean 'critique'?
with love,
HER
Once in a while I bare my soul, more often my soles bear me.
You critiqued me???
Hope, I want you to know I spent all day crying in my pillow because of you. Part of the day? Okay, you made me laugh at my grammar error.
"The critics never liked Zane Grey Books – too full of larger-than-life characters, too violent and too unrealistic"
You can read most of Zane Grey's novels for free at Project Gutenberg. West of the Pecos isn't listed although it was one of his novels. Project Gutenberg offers 46,105 free ebooks to download.
This is the Zane Grey listings
http://www.gutenberg.org/ebooks/author/212
There are also other sites that offer free downloads of the Zane Grey novels.
"The Trail Driver [ S., cattle trails from Texas to Dodge City; T., 1871]. Grey confused the names of the Texas-Kansas cattle trails (as did many of the men who drove them), but was true to their spirit. Outlaws, First Americans, weather, and swollen rivers plagued the drovers. One of Grey’s two books where the heroine disguised herself as a boy; the other is West of the Pecos."
A synopsis of Zane Grey's novels
http://www.zgws.org/romances.php
Have fun with life
It's too short to take it seriously
always,
Barb
PS: My great grandfather drove cattle north with Jessie Chisholm. Have a short story told by family and friends about horse thieves and granddad on that trail drive.
Oklahoma born and raised cowgirl
Critics
Good morning Barb:
Critics on free sites can/are a twitchy subject. Most will post reviews/comments that support the author, offer ways of making the story better, and point out technical flaws (spelling, poor word choice, run on sentences, etc). Then there are the ones that just hate everything. They use the comment box/review to bash the author for reasons that have nothing to do with the story. As Alfred in the second Christian Bale Batman movie pointed out, sometimes all they want is to see the world burn.
And yes, stories are the author's babies. Hemingway said writing was easy, just sit down at the typewriter... and bleed. Authors don't want their babies abused. Authors don't want to be abused either. I've read backstories of authors who had overly harsh, even sadistic, critiques/reviews of their early works from beta reader/review groups that had their desire to write ever again nearly extinguished.
Critics can be critical of an author's work, paid or free, without being sadistic. There's no need to use a barbed scourge when all that's needed is a bit of review and a decent spell / grammer checking.
Editors ...
... are people too. Having spent the best part of a year editing/proofing a story and sometimes with almost daily updates it pains us when our combined efforts get little appreciation. Even negative reviews means that someone cares enough to say something. I know 'The Siderous Prophecy' is long but its a genuine attempt to write a realistic magical change story. Give it a try, even if it's merely to spot the typos I missed :). Darren does eventually get round to accepting his drastic change in circumstances but it's hard road before things work out and a story I enjoyed working on.
I suppose I'm a sucker for enjoying the somewhat masochistic pleasure of working on very long stories, so I guess its my own fault.
Robi
Comments can be a bitch
I know as I've had my share of ones I don't like. To be perfectly honest, I don't comment on a story unless it's exceptional. There have been times I wanted to say exactly how I felt about a story but won't because I would hate to keep an aspiring author from developing into someone like a James Patterson. I tried to rewrite the first story I ever wrote, which wasn't published here but over at the other site. I gave up, it was so bad, but it was my first endevor. I had complimentry reviews from readers saying nice job, and because I didn't know any better, I thought they were right on and wrote more stories. If I had reviewed myself honestly, I would have been in tears. As an aside, I almost didn't finish writing Assassin because of a blowup with a reviewer. We authors can have a pretty thin skin sometimes and the person reviewing the story wan't being cruel, but I just took what was happening the wrong way. Anyway, please keep reviewing and try not to be hurtful, and if you have to show how inteligent you are please do it with a personal note to the author, Arecee
I have to agree
Barb, I too have advocated that writers adopt a thicker skin. (Maybe Revlon sells something that would help. :D) But it's easy for me to say so, when I already have that thick, wrinkled, elephant-like skin. I've been writing for the Crystal Hall (the Whateley Universe) and Twisting the Hellmouth (fanfic with an emphasis on Buffy crossovers) for years, and I have gotten those 'you suck' reviews. None of them have been as brutal as some of the reviews I received from my doctoral committee, and those guys weren't trying to be mean.
Sometimes, people cannot see how the recipient is going to read that review. Sometimes the author is overly sensitive. And yes, sometimes the reader is an inconsiderate troll who is angry because his view of the character has just been revealed to be different from the author's, and so vengeance must be dished out! :D
None of these cases should be treated as grounds for giving up on writing. If you're an author and you get hate mail (which is unavoidable - I imagine even Bek D. Corbin and Morpheus have received some, given that people like Hemingway and Twain received TONS), either ignore it or treat it like a writing assignment: pretend you are not bothered, and take the high road in a short reply. (Afterward, put a picture of the commenter on your dartboard and have at it. :D) Then think about it later, after you have a chance to be reflective. Is there any meat in the midst of that gristle? Does the commenter have a point? Maybe you did make a factual error. (Despite the amounts of research and physics I go through, I still screw up.) Maybe your version of the character really is a little Out Of Character. Maybe you shouldn't have lifted your plot from Stephenie Meyer. :D So can you learn something from that comment? Even if it is just learning to cope better with nasty comments, it can help you as a writer.
Diane
Love,
Diane
Everyone keeps talking about Chrystal Hall
Okay, it's back to Google and dig time. I was able to pull up Maggie Finson and her Fey stories, bit by bit, piece by piece through google. The girl has amazing talent as an author. Each of her stories is entrapment catching the reader and not letting go until the end. She writes so softly it makes one want to hug the cat. Maybe several cats.
Google, reveal Diane Castle Crystal Hall if you please.
Up, up, and away...? Wait a minute, that's Superman's line. What's the one for Supergirl?
Oklahoma born and raised cowgirl
Crystal Hall
http://crystalhall.org/
This will take you to the main page, you can find canon stories listed there in any order you wish, including by author name.
I went outside once. The graphics weren' that great.
Re: Everyone keeps talking about Crystal Hall
Maggie Finson is not the only author there worth reading. Bek D. Corbin is one of the creators of that Whateley Universe and the author of the Chaka stories... and the She-Beast stories... and the Nacht story. Babs Yerunkle is another creator, and wrote the Jade and Jinn stories. Then there's Dr. Bender, poet Heather, Starwolf, E.E. Nalley, and a dozen others. That is now going to include Morpheus and Elrod W, two of the classics in the field. It is a shared universe that has spent a massive effort to make that universe consistent from story to story and author to author (there is an original 'bible' the creators wrote that is well over 300 pages of material), and the subject is often TG, always in the superhero genre, and Lovecraft Lite.
Oh, and I've written more words for Whateley than anyone else. It is no wonder my author avatar is a student with OCD. :D
Diane
Love,
Diane
writing and comments
One of the things that I think a lot of amateur writers miss is that writing isn't really about what the author thinks or wants.
Writing (and storytelling in general) is about what the reader feels. The process of telling a story, is about taking the reader on an emotional journey. Now, that doesn't mean that the writer's thoughts, wishes, etc are unimportant by any means (the Hemingway comment about sitting at a typewriter and bleeding is quite apt), but it does often mean a shift of perspective for many amateurs.
Does an amateur piece put up on a free site deserve to be treated more gently? I don't know ... I guess. Some of the authors who post here aren't every going to be professionals, they're clearly writing as a form of personal therapy (even if they themselves don't realize it). I generally avoid commenting on stories I think fit into that category. On the other hand ... if I see a piece where the author is clearly trying to construct a solid, viable narrative and looks to have ambitions beyond amateur writing (and if that particular story strikes an emotional chord with me (which is a very important element to me, because there are plenty of well written stories on the site that just don't happen to strike that chord for me, and which I don't comment on as a result)), then I'm much more likely to comment.
Commenting is an attempt at communicating an idea (much like writing a story is), sometimes it goes well and is understood on both sides.
Sometimes not so much.
Even here though, if you post a story regardless of the free nature of the site, you're still publishing. And if you publish, you're going to get comments, some of which won't jib well with your vision of how the story should go.
I think it's a exemplary goal of Erin's to try to have a site that's welcoming, but at the same time, I also think that anyone who intends to make their writing available to the general public does need to have a thick skin. I am in my 50's though, the understanding of the need for that "thick skin" may well be something that comes more naturally to me than someone younger.
Writing for the writer
For an amateur writer, writing has to be totally about what they think or want, if I am concentrating on what someone else wants then I am not being true to myself and I am wasting my own time. It's about the creative process, I'm not saying my work counts as art, far from it, but I doubt Salvador Dali chose his subjects based on what his audience might feel.
Also which reader do I write for, the one that wants to see my protagonist face the Trial of Job or the one that wants nothing more than mild peril? My job is to get my story out there and hope that people like it and that is as much as I can plan for.
-
You can't choose your relatives but you can choose your family.
Well,
I won't disagree that many amateur writers believe that writing has to be totally about them. But I do disagree that it is about them.
What are you writing for? To have your work sit, quietly on your own hard drive, never to be seen by another person? Or did you want to send it out in the world, in the hope that others would see it, read it, experience a resonance with it?
I haven't personally studied the process of Salvador Dali. I don't know what his thoughts on his own works were, but in absence of a specific citation indicating that he completely ignored how he thought his viewers would react to his work, I would have to disagree with you, quite strongly. I have spent quite a bit of time studying visual artists in general. The most serious of them, the ones we think of as masters, generally held the belief that a piece of work does not even truly become art until it is viewed, experienced, by another person. Art is communication, the greatest artists are (or were) keenly aware of that.
Which reader do you write for? That's up to you. Which story are you telling?
I'm not telling you to try to please everyone, nor am I saying you shouldn't also try to please yourself in the process.
I'm not saying that the personal blood/sweat/tears of the individual writer aren't important. I'm not saying they're not critical to the creative process. What I am saying is that one of the key differences between professionals and amateurs is that understanding of how their works are likely to be received. The understanding of how crucial that perceptive element is to the original process of creation.
Yes, it's your job to get the story out there. Yes, it's your own worry to hope people like it.
But no, that's not all you can plan for. Writing, storytelling, is a craft. In the fields of human endeavors, writing is not a nebulous, poorly understood undertaking. When the likes of Jim Butcher, Stephen King, Elizabeth Moon (or any other "big" names who can churn out books) sits down to write a book, you can bet they have a plan.
You NEED to write for yourself!
On of the BIGGEST and MOST COMMON pieces of advice to ANY writer on this site, from OTHER writers, is...
Now that's not a direct quote, because it's been posted by SO MANY DIFFERENT people over the years, but the sentiment is all the same.
YOU need to be your number one fan, and ignore everyone else. Because it's YOUR story, not theirs.
-Piper
not really what I'm talking about.
Crafting an emotional journey for the reader isn't necessarily synonymous with pleasing them.
I'm saying that the pros are keenly aware of what emotional chords they're striking, what tempo they're setting.
Critiques...
I've often asked for them; begged for them in fact. Please do, any error in grammar, spelling, or story continuity only helps me get better. In honor of Erin though, private messages should be used, as it might start an argument of sorts. Not from me, but from al those rabid fans I dream I have.
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