BronxWench

I can't imagine going through a real professional editor. Christ on a cracker, Bronx, that must've been hard.
Every single time I post a story - hell, even when I post to a thread or in the shoutbox - I'm a bundle of nerves. Even when it's something I'm proud of, that I've gone over a dozen times with a fine toothed comb and came out the other end loving the finished product. As soon as I click that submit/post button, the anxiety hits me. "Did it sound too stilted? Too clinical? Was that sentence too long? Did I start too many sentences with the same word? OMG is that what I call a transition?!"

I usually end up doing a bazillion post-finished-product-edits. In case anyone's wondering: yes, it is entirely possible to over edit.

I sympathise, KoKoa.

I'm sorry but I'm laughing over here. Not because it's funny but because I've held off on asking anyone to beta my stories for me for the same reasons as you're freaking out about. I'm afraid that they'll tell me to stick to writing excuse notes for the kiddies and leave the real writing to the professionals.
Though my grammar isn't usually that bad, I used to have a problem with run on sentences but I've gotten much better with that, I have a wandering mind. I'm not sure sometimes if my stories bounce around like my thoughts do or if they are more coherent. Oh look a butterfly...
I'm sure that you're harder on yourself than you should be. Hearing someone pick apart your work will probably not be easy but maybe you'll end up with an amazing finished product for your readers to enjoy.

I just needed somewhere to rant/freak out about this! If you want to give me feedback on how big of a chicken wuss I am, go right ahead!
I guess I've finally cried enough on another website about not getting any reads (although to be honest, I've stopped it a long time ago. Found out that writing was much more enjoyable if I didn't worry myself over who didn't read); someone is right at this moment, taking a look at one of my stories!
And I have to say that I am scared shitless!
I know, I know; concrit is helpful and yada, yada, yada! And I do appreciate feedback; I'm not one of those who only wants the positive and the "aejfnielbwivwslbv THIS STORY IS A-MAZZING" comments. They don't help. At all. I can only tell you thank you very awkwardly and go back to my crocheting!
But, oh my God, I'm about to cry! She's critiquing the author's note, for crying out loud! *cries* I mean, she has a solid point and I'm going to make changes! But, still... is the author's note not even safe anymore?!?!
So, now, tomorrow is going to be a very long day for me, filled with mini panic attacks. Because I know she's going to critique a couple of more chapters. And tell me not to quit my day job. Which sucks because I have no job to begin with! Yeah, KoKoa: good job impressing folks with the crapload of an info dump in the very first paragraph! Yep... that helped a ton!
I should tell her. I should tell her that I know that I suck and that I need a lot of work and that my MC who I love with all my heart and would marry if she was real and I swung that way, is nothing but a Mary Sue. And that my plots are non existent. And my grammar... fuck, my grammar; that's ghost as well! Let's not start on my dialogue, which I found out that I write it like a five year old Hulk! Because if I tell her then she'll already know what to expect. Maybe she'll be a bit lenient on me and just go with a "you're right" critique.
Just... ugh... here... *gives out hard drive* burn it; burn it all!!
I've definitely got to be the only one who freaks out when it comes to this... but writing it all out has been slightly helpful

Found on Twitter, and (I thought) worthy of reproducing here:
How to be a Writer – Terry Pratchett
I get asked all the time, in letters and emails and questions from the floor:
“Can you give me a few tips about being a writer?” And you sense that gleam in the eye, the hope that somehow, this time, you'll drop your guard and hand over the map to the Holy Grail or, preferably, its URL. I detect, now, a slightly worrying edge to all this, a hint of indignation that grammar, spelling and punctuation have a part to play (“Don't publishers have people to do all that?” was one response) and that the universe is remiss in not making allowance for the fact that you don't have the time.
So, instead, I give tips on how to be a professional boxer. A good diet is essential, of course, as is a daily regime of exercise. Pay attention to your footwork, it will often get you out of trouble. Go down to the gym every day – every day of your life that finds you waking up capable of standing. Take every opportunity to watch a good professional fight. In fact watch as many bouts as you can, because you can even learn something from the fighters who get it wrong. Don't listen to what they say, watch what they do. And don't forget the diet and the exercise and the roadwork.
Got it? Well, becoming a writer is basically exactly the same thing, except that it isn't about boxing.
It's as simple as that.

Great...so my idea, that means you guys handle logistics and execution and I'll take all the credit! see I am management materiel!

works for me!

ahhh i believe they are called fan poodles here...love that term by the way.
so note the shock collar, i say we track the fan poodles down and attach one to each of them...
zaps em every time they type, or say, something stupid

I've started ignoring votes one way or the other. People, especially Naruto people, are far to competitive and obsessed with this fandom. I don't even know what to say about it. You should try going to conventions with these nut jobs. They are the ones that bully cosplayers, start crap for no reason.
I admit I am serious about cosplaying Tsunade and she and I share a lot of similarities. Physically and mentally. So I own that shit. My husband and I are cosplay celebrities around here. But we have never bullied, shunned, talked down, insulted anyone about their cosplay. In fact, we go out of the way to be friendly and we have even helped people improve their cosplay. Maybe they were amateur, maybe they didn't have time/money. Same with fan fiction. Instead of tearing people down build them up, offer to beta ,or writing tips... Eh I'm ranting.
Bottom line, I'm going to write Sasuke/Karin and if LaLa don't like it she can (and I quote the Rock) shine that bitch up, turn it sideways, and stick it straight up her candy ass. I'm going to write Naruto slightly ADD and when he's not with Karin, I will write Sasuke as gay. It is FICTION.
I'm off to bed now. Night yall

Done! "Yup" is Japanese for "yes" isn't it? I'm sure the rest will sort itself out. You can rest easy!
I look forward to reading new stuff in the future!

I used to have a female German friend whose English was also immaculate. She used to get me to beta her stories, for some mystifying reason, even though I had nothing to do. Her spoken English was also virtually immaculate. It's kind of depressing that foreigners speak and write better English than most native English speakers. But that does mean that people like yourself are very good at writing stories, so I command you to write more!

LOL, I will… you want to do my Japanese schoolwork for me while I do?
I hope that as soon as my health improves, I'll start to write more. And hopefully, if Bronxie ever gets time to peek at my chapters (sorry, Bronxie ), I can start working on my novel again too. But for now, sadly, there's only the RP.
And the rest of my stories
Thank you, Melrick, for the support, and I really hope I'll be able to write more in the near future.

To be very honest, I tend to text in full words, and with proper punctuation. I have no patience with trying to puzzle out a series of abbreviations and acronyms, and I'll just ignore the message if it's that incomprehensible.

*giggles* because I learned it from books…. I started making the connection between the spoken English on TV and the subtitles at somewhere around 8 years old, my favorite book around age 10 was an English-Icelandic dictionary, and at age 12, when I finally started to study English at school, I already knew the basics… And I've been reading stories in English pretty much exclusively since I was around 16. The trick is, to learn it from a book

lol I'm glad you liked my review. It's good getting an unexpected review from an old story. I did enjoy it. Now imagine how good you'd be if you wrote non-slash stories with characters like this one! lol

Oh, but I am… have been for more than half my life. These are characters from my "big novel", honestly. It's just that life, school, and health problems keep getting in the way of it. And the characters run off to do whatever the fuck they like, when they get bored.
But thank you again, Melrick. Maybe I won't give up on this writing thing just yet

You shouldn't give up on it. I like your smut involving 'innocents' becoming less innocent. Oh, and the rest of it, too.

Oh, and how is English not your first language when it's better than 90% of the 'gems' that are posted in the archive?

WOW, that was a bit of a blast from the past I had gotten a few reviews for this story when it first got put up, but then suddenly today, I got another one, which totally made my day. And made me want to reply.
* * * * *
So… *squee* Thank you, Melrick, for the wonderful review, and I'm still blushing
I'd like to clarify that the reason for those periods after their names are because for some reason I felt shy (or overprotective) about putting their full names in the story at that point. But this is sort of the first draft of my story, Polinues Marines, the would be mage. (and yes, the name should be Mariness, since that's how it's pronounced.) Ley. stands for Leyjen, and Pol. stands for Polinues. If you want to check that story out, there's ton more detail, ton more smexy goodness, and a shitload more characters but, still, all slash, sorry.
Thank you again for the ego boost, Melrick. I'll be all squeeing for a week now, and I really needed that.

Whoever told you that is an idiot, look at the greats, Mark Twain, Salinger, Lee; they all wrote in a nerritive that was fairly close to how they spoke, regional idioms intact. What you know best is you and your world, use it. A good rule says write what you know.

I think a swat or two over clothing is acceptable, and necessary in dangerous situations, but anything above that which involves planning, preparation, bare skin, implements etc is abuse in my book.
It never happened to me, although my mother had this way of grabbing your arm, pushing your sleeve up, and slapping you hard on the forearm ten or twelve times in rapid succession. To this day I still remember how much that hurt.
Mostly, when they wanted to punish me for something or other, they kept me away from my books.

Never spanked my girls, but I have to say I don't think if done right its abuse. The one swat principle I think is appropriate as long as it's doesn't become the go to for every offense. I know I got whipped with belts and switched and shoes and spoons and just whatever was handy at the time, literally made me worse. I would take it as a challenge, sort of I can take whatever you can dish out and once my spanking was done, I would repeat whatever got me the whipping in the first place, just to prove my parents couldn't break me I guess.
I tend to take away privledges when they're bad, take away a 16 y/o's car away and see how fast they straighten up. If I need a quick intervention, I just pick them up and hold them till they get the message - drives the 15 y/o nuts
So, not abuse if done with restraint...oh and the making the kid drop their pants...so wrong and sorta creepy!

Oh that hurts DG, my kids think I'm perfect! That's my story and I'm sticking to it! Plus I'll ground the little buggers until they're thirty if they disagree

We're glad we could help.

Believe it or not, its best to be vague, it actually helps readers connect more with the story on an emotional level. There has been a bunch of scholarship done over it lately, I wrote a paper over it in Psych and lit a few years ago. It has to do with being able to impress your vision of beauty/yourself on the characters or some such, essentially its the same reason why in a lot of hentai the male's faces are darkened out or shadowed. *insert more you know rainbow here*

This one is kind of embarrassing: Years ago, I wrote a trilogy of short fanfics about Wilykit and Wilykat from ThunderCats. And somehow, in switching from one computer to another, I lost the MIDDLE story. I've never found it again; I think the only place I posted it was on a ThunderCats-themed Yahoo group that is now defunct.

Oh my! I have a ton of lost stories that were all handwritten; my last fiance got a storage unit before we decided to move and he never paid on it. I lost not only every story that I had written/typed between the ages of twelve to twenty but all of my school memorabilia from kindergarten to senior year!
Anyway; the one that I actually hate that I lost was one that had no title and no end in sight. It was typed (and man, I remember how I had to go to the only store in town that carried that specific ink every month for that typewriter) and I placed it in a purple binder. I've always been a sportsaholic and so this story was surrounding my favorite college team. Every now and then, I would think about that story and giggle about the little parts that I could remember! I hate that I lost it because it would be 99.99999% hilarious and awful right now but it would be proof of how old I was when I started to really get into writing... and how weird my little mind was back then!
I also remember this one that I started writing when I was about nineteen about a figure skater who fell in love with her bodyguard. Someone told me that it reminded them too much of The Bodyguard (Whitney Houston/Kevin Costner flick... just in case you didn't know) which I had never seen, even to this day. I didn't want for people to think that I copied the movie and stopped writing it!
Once I became a member on here, I had long since invested in the power of the flash drive and so whatever story I decide to delete from here, I will always have a copy of somewhere!