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My latest story just fell into the abyss (off the front page).
It was an average story for me, in that it took about two months to write with considerable research. It received what has become my normal reception, with 111 kudos, 6 comments and 2,966 hits.
I assume about half my hits are unique readers since the story ran over 15k words and isn't easily read in one casual sitting.
That would seemingly mean that about 1,400 readers of http://bigclosetr.us/topshelf/fiction/56557/have-heart were so overwhelmed by its "awesomeness" that they were rendered speechless.
I can assume that attitude, or I can feel remorse for my efforts as Lincoln did when he reflected on the crowd's reaction to his Gettysburg Address and remarked to a companion: "It is a flat failure and the people are disappointed."
Seriously . . . in RL I've written several novels that have not been published. I know many, many people, as that is my stock-in-trade. Yet, I've only been able to find less than one hundred readers for my efforts. Big Closet provides an amazing opportunity for an appreciative audience, which is why I do everything I can to support it.
Comments
Re-read
As I stated in my comment about this story after re-reading it a second time, thanks! I know that you must feel that people don't appreciate your talent in writing but in truth, sometimes the ability to produce an intelligent reply is lost in the jumble of the day or the given moment of emotions stirred up by a good story. It is not for lack of a well written story but sometimes we as readers are unable to express as freely or easily as you writers. Thereby why there are 'writers' and then there are 'readers'.
Bravo for an awesome story!!
Dahlia
I just finished it,
and left a comment. It was very good.
BC Can Be Strange Too
While it is much kinder, in my opinion, to an author than other sites, the reaction to stories is just unpredictable. Angela (Jill M I) is one of the best authors of TG fiction anywhere and yet some of her best stories get very mediocre receptions. Why? I have no idea.
They just don't seem to grab the vibe of this site for some reason. She deserves better, because she posts to Hatbox on behalf of us and the proceeds from her writing help to support BC.
Wasn't a Whine
Honestly this wasn't a whine. I do feel appreciated. Overly appreciated at times. I actually posted this because the more people who write for BC the better. I enjoy reading as much as I enjoy writing. Several times in the last few months I've seen it mentioned that a 10% ratio of kudos to hits is a standard.
That is utter nonsense. There is no "standard". As mentioned above, some people write in genres that aren't terribly popular at the moment. Some write in genres that don't attract comments. Some of my most popular and enduring stories have contained an element of forced fem. People seemingly consider forced fem a guilty pleasure and even though forced fem stories will get a huge number of hits, few want to admit they read them.
Over the many years I've been here I've witnessed too many writers give up because they didn't get "enough" recognition. Kudos and comments are great, but they really, really aren't a measure of much other than how many readers want to read that kind of story with that kind of story outcome and those kind of characters and scenes at that particular moment. They're like box office receipts and academy awards. They only mean . . . what they mean.
Please my fellow authors . . . cherish your hits and comments, but don't read too much into them. Write first for your own pleasure, while totally respecting your readers' needs.
I honestly try to read every standalone story. I try to read most of the serials that have been completed. I comment on a large share and leave kudos, unless the story isn't readable. A readable effort is worth a kudos. That is my standard . . . and that isn't utter nonsense.
Angela Rasch (Jill M I)
Two points to keep in mind....
First, Lincoln's Gettysburg Address was poorly panned in the press when he gave it primarily because the people of the day had come to expect long, flowery, empty speeches, which was what the average politician was giving them. Hmmmmmm.....sounds kind of familiar huh?
Lincoln was a simple, straight forward man - a man of few words; but when he spoke he put great meaning into his every word. If you get the opportunity to read any of his speeches or papers you should do so. Remember, unlike many politicians, Lincoln was a simple frontier lawyer. He did not come from wealth, did not have a priveleged upbringing or education, and had not been raised in the so-called high society of the day.
Second! You should always remember that although Lincoln's address at Gettysburg was poorly received at the time, it has come to be known as one of the most profound and meaningful speeches of the past several centuries. While the vast majority of his peers have turned to obscurity and the drivel which came from their mouths turned to dust, his short address given on the hallowed ground of Gettysburg - a field which was watered with the blood of the honored youth of both Union and Confederate soldiers - has become so important to us that school children are still memorizing it to this day.
My family fought on both sides of the Civil War, both for the Union and the Confederacy, a situation which although not common, was also not unknown. I have two family members buried at Gettysburg, and another at the nearby Confederate cemetary in Hagerstown, MD. I try to visit them whenever I am near - and when I do, I remember the words which Lincoln spoke on that field.
Whether your words will be thus remembered only time will tell - but always remember that success and accolades are not always immediately forthcoming.
I have not yet had the opportunity to read the story, but rest assured I will - and when I find it to be as good as I expect, I will shout it from the rooftops. OK, maybe not that - but I will definitely leave a comment.
You may not have been successful publishing as of yet, but you have done something many (including myself) can not. You have created the written word. You have made something from nothing more than the wisps of thought within your mind. My talents lie in other areas, and I am forever in awe of those who are capable of doing what you do. When you get down or depressed at the seeming lack of enthusiasm over your work, keep that in mind.
Dallas
D. Eden
Dum Vivimus, Vivamus
The Gettysburg address ...
... is something I've heard of but without some research I would have no idea what it's about. In fact if it hadn't been mentioned in your post I wouldn't even have known it was given by Lincoln. So to see that it is the most profound and meaningful speeches of the past several centuries is misleading, though it may apply to the USA.
In my lifetime Enoch Powel's infamous 'rivers of blood' speech or Harold MacMillan's 'wind of change' speech would resonate more here in the UK, although Churchill's passionate plea that we would 'fight them on the beaches' after Dunkirk in 1940 is perhaps more widely known. I'm afraid we're all a bit parochial perhaps because life's too short to be anything else in many ways.
I apologise to Angela/Jill for not leaving either a kudos or a comment for her story. My excuse is that we've just returned from an extgended break in France, mostly without internet access and so I missed it. I will remedy my error ASAP :)
Robi
It is true that it is more important to us here.....
But at the time of Lincoln's death, the Gettysburg Address was being recognized around the civilized world as one of the most important statements of the day. It was reported in the press, even in the UK, and I believe that the statement was that the speech would be remembered long after the actual battle was forgotten.
In a few short paragraphs, Lincoln reiterated the basic tenets that were behind the creation of the United States, as laid out in The Declaration of Independence. I have inserted it below for those not familiar with it:
Four score and seven years ago our fathers brought forth on this continent, a new nation, conceived in Liberty, and dedicated to the proposition that all men are created equal.
Now we are engaged in a great civil war, testing whether that nation, or any nation so conceived and so dedicated, can long endure. We are met on a great battle-field of that war. We have come to dedicate a portion of that field, as a final resting place for those who here gave their lives that that nation might live. It is altogether fitting and proper that we should do this.
But, in a larger sense, we can not dedicate -- we can not consecrate -- we can not hallow -- this ground. The brave men, living and dead, who struggled here, have consecrated it, far above our poor power to add or detract. The world will little note, nor long remember what we say here, but it can never forget what they did here. It is for us the living, rather, to be dedicated here to the unfinished work which they who fought here have thus far so nobly advanced. It is rather for us to be here dedicated to the great task remaining before us -- that from these honored dead we take increased devotion to that cause for which they gave the last full measure of devotion -- that we here highly resolve that these dead shall not have died in vain -- that this nation, under God, shall have a new birth of freedom -- and that government of the people, by the people, for the people, shall not perish from the earth.
Abraham Lincoln
November 19, 1863
D. Eden
Dum Vivimus, Vivamus
It's strange, isn't it
I too share this frustration at people's inability to tick a box simply to say thank you to the author for sweating for many weeks/months or years over a piece of work which they present free of charge to the reader.
Of course, hits are highly unrepresentative of the number of people who read a story to the end. I click on every standalone, probably only read more than a few paragraphs for 5% of them, and get to the end of the story for 1%. So, if everyone was like me (which they thankfully are not) then you could only expect 29 people out of your 2900 to get to the end of the story. To receive 111 kudos is phenomenal!
But as I said, everyone is not like me. Some years ago, I carried out an experiment, posting the end of the story as a separate item which could be accessed from a link at the end of the first part, but not from the main story page. From memory, about one third of hits clicked to read the last part of the story, but I still only received a few percent of hits in kudos points.
I've even taking to putting an image to encourage people to click the link
or 
. It does improve things but only slightly.
It may even be that people don't understand the term kudos. It was certainly one I'd never heard of before I came to this site. Perhaps changing the words to 'Thank You' might improve matters.
On the positive side, you have 111 people saying they enjoyed your story. That's not bad, as Kudos go.
Best wishes
Charlotte
In my experience
stand-alones tend to accumulate kudos and comments more slowly than continuing serials with which readers are familiar. It always fascinates me that I can offer a short story which will get more hits than the episode of Bike, sometimes four or five times more, yet will have fewer kudos and sometimes fewer comments. I presume, and I could be wrong, this is because Bike has its own following of loyal readers who are more generous than casual readers because they have a familiarity with the characters and even sometimes empathy or sympathy depending upon my skills on the day. My experimental stuff, where I try something different has met with mixed results and one or two short stories have done very well and others totally bombed. Or I assume they did, as the lack of feedback says something as well as lots of it.
I always give a kudos to anything I read and enjoy, often accompanied with a comment or pm, though I find it sad that so many of the stories here aren't to my taste, so I read fewer and fewer offerings.
Given the nature of the site - being listed as an adult one - it will attract a certain casual visitor who, whilst not wearing a dirty raincoat - may not wish to draw attention to themselves and see any sort of participation purely as a passive exercise, it's also advertised as free, gratis and for nowt, so some assume that means they just take without even giving the time of day in return. I'm also aware we have readers who are in invidious financial positions and couldn't afford to pay if some sort of charge were levied, so I support this site wholeheartedly as a free to use one - but giving kudos or comments doesn't take more than a few seconds, both of which like all authors, I enjoy receiving and I always reply to PMs (that's personal messages not premenstrual syndrome). The joys of posting things in public...
Angharad
I'm not good about this either.
I know what you mean about comments. I just submitted a story recently (plug! plug!), and have only gotten 2 comments (plus my reply to one of them.) I'm bad abount leaving comments for a couple of reasons.
First, I generally don't log in when reading stories. In fact, I only created an account a week or so ago, just to leave a comment. (Keeping track of on-line accounts is a pain.)
Second, as another commenter mentioned, writing a halfway coherent comment takes time and energy. When I make comments on blogs (elsewhere), it normally takes me at least an hour to put what I want to say into words. I don't generally have an hour to spend.
However, as a result of this post, I am going to mend my ways, at least enought to try to leave "kudos".