Lack of reviews.

[puffykaoru]

I absolutely hate it. I went for over 1000 views, just to get one review and that was only because I was threatening to drop the story. I've notice a little trend in the stories I like in the same area, and it's pretty much the same for them. A lot of hits and little reviews. I haven't even gotten a true constructive crit yet either. I was happy that I did get a couple of reviews, and even now a few rates, but for it to happen after I got over the 2000 hit mark is a bit discouraging for me. Especially since I want them to review me to see how I'm doing. I wouldn't mind if someone told me something was wrong, I'm new so I would like to improve, and all I'm getting is hits. I'm in originals and in romance so there has to be a story there. I know it's only one story, but it is a bit disheartening.

[Guest Monsterking]

"I absolutely hate it. I went for over 1000 views, just to get one review and that was only because I was threatening to drop the story. I've notice a little trend in the stories I like in the same area, and it's pretty much the same for them. A lot of hits and little reviews. I haven't even gotten a true constructive crit yet either. I was happy that I did get a couple of reviews, and even now a few rates, but for it to happen after I got over the 2000 hit mark is a bit discouraging for me. Especially since I want them to review me to see how I'm doing. I wouldn't mind if someone told me something was wrong, I'm new so I would like to improve, and all I'm getting is hits. I'm in originals and in romance so there has to be a story there. I know it's only one story, but it is a bit disheartening."

I Feel Your Pain puffykaoru i feel your pain.....

[animefreakandgeek]

Think this is a common problem- in the fan fic, fan art, and writing in general areas'

Its hard for an author to not get feedback- but at the same time, I think I would rather have only 10 reviews for 10,000 views when they are good solid ones.

I think the one line "this is good" or "wow write more" comments are just as annoying.

So its kinda odd- you either get no reviews or a lot of ones that dont mean didly squat.

Thats what I have noticed from personal experience

[Ezriee]

Honestly, I love the reviews that I do get because I love to write, but I wish I could get more. I try to review each story that I read and if its something that just didn't sit well with me, then THAT'S when I don't review. You know, the whole 'If you don't have anything nice to say, don't say anything at all' thing.

There are stories where I've found them complete and even so, I'll go through and comment on each chapter that I read every other chapter or so.

I think that reviews are important because it encourages the writer to keep going, to be more imaginative with that they are doing, and just love the process of producing something for their own pleasure and to entertain the masses. I WANT people to know that I've read their work because I think you have to give praise where praise is due.

I admit, I'll see people with hundreds of reviews and I get a bit envious. But then I can honestly look at the reviews both on aff and various other sites that I post on, see those helpful and encouraging words, and use that to help with the motivation.

A lot of people are just lazy. Sometimes its the fandom you're writing in. An example being Cowboy bebop. The highest number of reviews throughout all the stories posted in that section is 144 reviews, second is about 83 or so reviews but on average, it ranges between 12-30.

Things that might help boost your reviews/views is to promote your stories. Theres an area in this forum for that, sometimes if you join a livejournal group related to your fandom and start posting teasers (like the first chapter) there then direct them back to aff or whatever site you'll be posting the full version on, that can boost it as well.

Eh, thats all I can think of at the moment...wait! There is a site, called fanworks finder that may boost your readers too. I haven't used it much, but it wouldn't hurt to check it out and possibly see about listing your stuff there.

http://www.fanworksfinder.com/

[Xenobia]

I don't get myself worked up about it, but feedback is part of the growing process for me and it helps me figure out what needs improving and what I'm doing right. Fanfiction is primarily a tool for me to exercise my imagination and writing skills so that I can create better original fiction. The pre-existing world and characters cut some time and effort and allow me to focus on my plot creation and overall writing abilities, and when someone reviews and tells me what they like about it or what they don't like it's always helpful to me.

Reviews I find most helpful are the ones that center on character portrayal (am I doing a good job at making these characters realistic and true to themselves?), plot development (Is the story itself interesting?) and writing style (is it easy enough to follow and have I avoided making too many grammar/spelling errors?). All of these things help me do a better job making my original worlds and characters come to life. Criticism about word usage I generally take with a grain of salt, because when you write erotica of any sort there is ALWAYS going to be some adjective for a body part you use that somebody doesn't like. I've learned there's just no getting around that and I've stopped making myself go cross-eyed trying to find ways to describe sex scenes without using a word that will make someone flip out.

I share my fanfiction on four different sites, mainly because of different audiences but also because some sites just don't seem to have readers that like to leave reviews and AFF.net seems to be one of them. When I want to check in and see what people think about something I'm working on, I swing by one of the other sites I post on because the reader base tends to be more willing to speak up and give feedback. I'm honestly not that fond of FF.net but I do get some helpful responses to my work there, so I still post there.

I'd say if you're getting high scores and high views but no comments, it just means the people enjoying your work either don't have the time to post a comment, aren't adept at reviewing (I personally suck at reviewing but I try anyhow) or simply don't feel like taking a moment to leave a comment. If you have a full page of negative reviews, that's when its time to question the quality of your work.

Sorry for the mini novel. I got caught up in the subject and babbled before I even realized I was doing it.

[temp_anon]

As someone who has never gotten a second review on anything, I appreciate any little bit of review I get. However, the Rate system isn't all that helpful in my case. My profile's a collection of 5 star and 2 star reviews. Most of the 2 star ratings have gone to the violent and gory fics, but with no reviews, I can't tell if I'm just bad at writing gore, I'm offending a couple of people's delicate sensibilities, or I'm not giving fair enough warning beforehand in the summary.

[Guest jj19]

As someone who has never gotten a second review on anything, I appreciate any little bit of review I get. However, the Rate system isn't all that helpful in my case. My profile's a collection of 5 star and 2 star reviews. Most of the 2 star ratings have gone to the violent and gory fics, but with no reviews, I can't tell if I'm just bad at writing gore, I'm offending a couple of people's delicate sensibilities, or I'm not giving fair enough warning beforehand in the summary.

Try putting a buffer with all possible tags and an extra warning before the first chapter if you are worried about offending someone.

I have gotten three reviews so far (and 8 five star ratings)and my stuff is pretty hardcore, so I don't think that is really a problem (but I do have a warning page and the tags again for the actual story begins.

I also haven't bugged anyone to review. I do note that I like Ratings/Reviews in my Author Page, but have never held anything hostage. Holding a story hostage may produce some reviews, but it will also annoy people.

Of course it depends it also depends on the story, but that varies from person to person.

[marley_station]

You're not going to get lots of reviews on this web site.

I know what you're thinking--with the 130,000+ who troll here, there should be many, and you are right. But therein, ma'am, lies the proverbial rub.

There is a lot of fanfiction on this site, provided free by the writers. People log on, sift through the melee, read a few fics, one or two they might really get a kick out of, and then promptly move on to Facebook, or another site. No reviews, and why not? Because tomorrow night when they repeat the process there will be *gasp* even more fics to sift through.

Writers are taken for granted here, regardless of how good a writer they are. And to be fair, the really good writers are at a dearth. Their stuff is hiding amongst the stuff written by the minors who have lied about their age in their profile and are writing crap to get attention.

Writers seem to consider a review the holy grail here. I am a writer and I do not concur with this. I get precious few reviews for what I write and I consider my writing to be both well-written and entertaining. But I don't write what I think someone will review. I write what I would want to read if I were here trolling at 11PM (like I was when I first found this site). And no, the two are most certainly not the same.

As writers posting our work on AFF, I think it's important that we do two things: one that we don't take the readers too seriously. You know the lion's share of them are minors with too much time on their hands. Your concept of a good fic and theirs are probably light years away from each other. Two, we don't take ourselves too seriously. This is a web site touting adult fan fiction, for crying out loud. If you are looking for genuine honest feedback on your writing skills, you're in the wrong place. If you're here to win a popularity contest, then you need to figure out what minors with too much time on their hands are willing to review and write lots and lots of it.

I have had four different people do a lot of fan art for my fan fiction. To me, that is the holy grail. I think fan art created by someone who read my work and was inspired by it is the kindest compliment--and the best review--that I could receive.

[Faymore]

I have 3 stories with 25,000+ hits but less then 60 reviews. Personally if they are reading it and coming back the hits are going up that's good enough for me lol.

[Satai Delenn]

I guess I should be ashamed of myself. I always appreciate the reviews I get and I always ask for them, but I hardly ever review myself (which partly has to do with the fact that I don't read many stories and that only finish about one out of five). But I'm not.

Sure, I love my reviews and it's great that someone took the trouble to write something for me, but, as several others already pointed out, one-liners with capital-lettered words and typos are nice and all, but other than telling you that someone is out there reading the story, they aren't really helpful.

But that's most likely what my reviews would be like and I don't feel the need to add something like that when there already were people before me who wrote more or less the same thing. I would review if a story didn't have any feedback yet and I also review when someone asks me to or if I have a question or something like that, but then I will make a point to write more than "good chatper update SOON", because you can only hear something so often before it gets boring.

I'm also a bit cautious about writing negative reviews. Firstly, because English is not my mother tongue and even though I sometimes notice spelling or grammar mistakes, they don't really bother me and I know that I make a lot of mistakes myself (which my beta is kind enough to correct). And secondly, because I don't think that I'm in any way a tactful person and I know from experience that such criticm often sounds harsher than was intended and I really don't want to be the cause for anyone to take down their story.

I can understand that it must be hard if you don't get any reviews, but I doubt that you would really appreciate it if someone said that your story sucks or something like that. That's something that would compel me to think about taking down my story... It's okay if someone really knows how to give constructive criticm, but no one likes flames. (Well, okay, I mostly find them amusing, but that's another story...)

Like I said, it's not quite fair on my part, but I think it's better that way- for both me and the stories I don't review...

Dinkel

OK, I'm sorry, but I really must disagree with you. Maybe it's because practically no one EVER reviews my story(ies) that has me at this point going, "Geeze, even a review saying, "You suck!" would be AWESOME for me at this point," because right now I'm wondering what I'm doing wrong that no one has bothered to leave even ONE review on my story posted here. It's got hits, sure, but I am honestly wondering if I'm doing something wrong that no one is reviewing my story, yet I look around at other peoples' stories and they've got at least two or more reviews. AM I doing something wrong that I have no reviews but a decent amount of hits? I mean, I thought for sure that with my second chapter, SOMEONE would have something to say, but so far, NOTHING. And no, before someone jumps on me, that wasn't an attempt at begging to have someone here rush off to read my story and comment. I am just seriously wondering whether my story sucks or not. I have a lot more of it to update with, but the fact that not one person that has viewed it, has given a review has me wondering if they even like the story and whether or not I should bother updating anymore because honestly, why should I update a story if no one likes it? *sigh*

So yeah, OK, fine, call me a review whore, and severely insecure with my writing, but seriously, how am I supposed to know otherwise if what I'm writing is something people are enjoying? Or not enjoying? For all I know, people are reading the first chapter, and then not even bothering going on to the next chapter.

So, in answer to your comment(s), Dinkel, yes, it is extremely frustrating (for me, as an aspiring author, who yes, is trying to write a couple of original stories for hopeful publication one day) to write fanfiction, see hits on it, and have ZERO reviews of ANY KIND!

You're not going to get lots of reviews on this web site.

I know what you're thinking--with the 130,000+ who troll here, there should be many, and you are right. But therein, ma'am, lies the proverbial rub.

There is a lot of fanfiction on this site, provided free by the writers. People log on, sift through the melee, read a few fics, one or two they might really get a kick out of, and then promptly move on to Facebook, or another site. No reviews, and why not? Because tomorrow night when they repeat the process there will be *gasp* even more fics to sift through.

Writers are taken for granted here, regardless of how good a writer they are. And to be fair, the really good writers are at a dearth. Their stuff is hiding amongst the stuff written by the minors who have lied about their age in their profile and are writing crap to get attention.

Writers seem to consider a review the holy grail here. I am a writer and I do not concur with this. I get precious few reviews for what I write and I consider my writing to be both well-written and entertaining. But I don't write what I think someone will review. I write what I would want to read if I were here trolling at 11PM (like I was when I first found this site). And no, the two are most certainly not the same.

As writers posting our work on AFF, I think it's important that we do two things: one that we don't take the readers too seriously. You know the lion's share of them are minors with too much time on their hands. Your concept of a good fic and theirs are probably light years away from each other. Two, we don't take ourselves too seriously. This is a web site touting adult fan fiction, for crying out loud. If you are looking for genuine honest feedback on your writing skills, you're in the wrong place. If you're here to win a popularity contest, then you need to figure out what minors with too much time on their hands are willing to review and write lots and lots of it.

I have had four different people do a lot of fan art for my fan fiction. To me, that is the holy grail. I think fan art created by someone who read my work and was inspired by it is the kindest compliment--and the best review--that I could receive.

I DESPERATELY envy you your self-confidence, Marley_Station, because I considered myself to be writing things that are well-written and I hope entertaining, or at least, engaging. Hell, I've even been published in my school's literary journal two years in a row. But for someone like me, who, even after several years of therapy where my self-confidence has increased, I'm still extremely vulnerable to the outside world, and maybe I shouldn't, but I do gauge my writing skills upon whether or not someone is reviewing my work. As I said above, at this point, I'd even take a, "You suck!" for a review because that would at least mean that not only have they read the story, but they are FEELING SOMETHING about it, and LETTING ME KNOW!

Edited May 10, 2011 by Satai Delenn

[Jaded_Star]

I wish I had more reviews, but I'm glad I don't have troll reviews. I write for fun, and I haven't posted most of my stories. Just having one reader who genuinely enjoys my stories is enough for me. It would be nice if I had at least one review for every hundred hits.

I like feed back to, which I never seem to get. I would like if people said do more of this less of that. I write for the love of writing though, which I remind myself when I get down on not enough reviews. And AFF is a better community than others I've been in, where you felt like you were intruding on someones private party. At least here feels like an open and inviting forum for everyone. At least in my section it's about the quality of what you write and not a popularity contest.

[Mistressofthewest]

I do love reviews but I can’t help but wonder at times, why I have so many hits and very little reviews. I don’t care if it’s just one that says ‘great chapter or Keep up the good work’ anything to let me know that they like it.

I have my story posted in quite a few places and the hits and reviews vary. AFF, I have 3467 hits and 13 reviews but on Dokuga, I have 15,588 hits and 26 reviews. It’s the same on FF, where I have 15,269 hits and 69 reviews – I start to worry when I see a whole lot of hits and small reviews. I can’t help it and I end up wondering if I am doing something wrong or if my story is so bad that nobody has the heart to tell me. I put a lot of work into my pieces and if there is something wrong, I would rather want to know then to be left in the dark.

[PyroYoshi]

I too am irked by a lack of reviews- although, to be fair, I only have three stories uploaded so far. Two of them have a review, the third does not. What irritates me more than lack of reviews is lack of views. One of my stories doesn't have many views because it's buried in a section that doesn't seem to get much traffic, so that's to be expected.

However, my most recent story is very easy to find. It's under games/M through R/Resident Evil. When it comes to Resident Evil 4 fan fiction, most people want to read Leon/Ashley, Leon/Ada, Leon/Luis, or Leon/Krauser. Basically, Leon has to be in the pairing for people to want to read it, because all the fan girls think he's hot. (I do not). Apparently, nobody wants to read a fic about the chainsaw wielding Dr. Salvador and one of the decapitation loving Bella Sisters getting it on. Seriously, when it comes to Resident Evil, they're my OTP.

One reason my stories don't get many views is probably my choice of fandoms. The really popular fandoms such as Harry Potter, Pokemon, Deathnote, Kingdom Hearts, Star Wars, etc are of no interest to me. I'd say that's probably part of the problem. It won't stop me from writing, though. Like some other here, I mainly write for myself, to create a story that I feel proud of and can read six months later without cringing.

[Satai Delenn]

I totally get how you all feel. I'm writing a HP fanfic right now, and have three chapters posted so far. I have fairly decent views, I think, but only one person has reviewed. I'm grateful to him/her (I have no idea if the person is male or female), but I truly wish that others would be kind enough to review. I just don't understand why people can't/won't review. So, I don't think it has anything to do with how much or how little the story is being viewed, because as I said, mine's an HP fanfic. The only thing I can figure is that it's because I chose to have an OFC as one of the main characters. I know a lot of people don't like OCs because they can be mary sue's/larry stu's, but I honestly don't think my character is a mary sue. I've tried hard to not have her be one. I'm just at the point where I'm ready to give up, and just work on my original work. I should be putting more effort into that anyway, since I want to have it published one day. Not to be rude to readers here, but maybe the general public will appreciate what readers here don't seem to. *sigh*

[Melsiebug]

This may have just been me being really stupid, but a few weeks ago I posted a new chapter and got no reviews for it (I normally get at least one), so at the bottom of my next chapter I left an A/N saying that I hadn't had any reviews for that chapter, ( in a polite non review whoring kind of way).

I got quite a few responses, and one of them pointed out that I had "don't allow anonymous reviews" on, that as a reader if they see that on they normally can't be bothered to log in just to review and assume that the writer is scared of getting reviews/flames.

I had no idea that I had that box checked, I hardly ever change my profile. I'm not sure if it's on as default or if I checked it by accident but since I unchecked it I've been getting more reviews, and from people who's screen names I haven't seen before, one of them even congratulated me on unchecking "that stupid box"!

As I say, this could be something everybody except me knows about, but if you are suffering from lack of reviews it's worth making sure you are making it as easy as possible for people to review you.

[DemonGoddess]

If you remember, for the LONGEST time, there was the issue of spambombers in the review boards. So, at that point it was always told to people to prevent that, you have to disallow anon reviews. When recaptcha was added to the archive, this became a non-issue, for the most part, because the spambombers HAVE to enter the text for each and every review left. As it changes with each review to be left, these spam scripts can't quite manage it, LOL. If I remember right, disallowing anon reviews is the default setting, so when you add the story, you have to check the box saying it will be allowed.

[Melsiebug]

Thanks for explaning, I didn't think I'd turned it on, and I think the problem with spam on the review bords predates me (yay for recapture).

Perhaps the default should now be changed, I'd imagine quite a lot of writers never realise it's on and quite a lot of readers can't be bothered to log in, or arn't members in the first place. As writers we really don't want anything that puts possible reviewers off, and I can only see you need it on if you are having a troll problem.

[Satai Delenn]

I didn't realize that either. Thank you, Demon. Now, just one question. How do I find the box and uncheck it?

[Melrick]

If you want to allow anonymous reviews, this is what you need to do.

Firstly, log into your account on AFF as you would normally. Hover your mouse over the “Member Tools” menu option along the top; select “Author Panel”.

Once there, look for the “Edit Profile” option along the left of the page; click on that. Near the top, you should see “Prevent anonymous reviews” with a check box next to it. If there’s a tick in it, click on it to remove the tick. Having no tick there will mean you can receive anonymous reviews. When you’re done, scroll down and click the “alter profile” button, and you’re done.

[DrunkenScotsman]

As EveKnight said, quality is better than quantity to me when it comes to reviews. I'd rather have a handful of well-though-out ones than a lot of "OMG I love this story it r0xx0rz!"

Omicronus: I've only had one instance where one of my stories received a review well after it was first posted - the story's only review, no less. That did make my week.

I'd never consider pulling a story just b/c it wasn't receiving enough reviews. How many is 'enough' anyway? To gauge how well a story is being received, I think it's best to use a combination of views (especially if that # goes up w/ each update), rates, and reviews.

[LockedBox]

I know that most non-reviewers are due to laziness but a pretty good proportion of them are caused by fear of the dreaded foot to mouth syndrome. I, like many other readers, like to read my fanfiction late at night, and as such I can be rather moody and ready for bed by the time I reach the end. Then, looking back on the reviews I left, all I can do is groan, smack myself in the forehead and say "why did I write that? I sound like such a bitch/winger/nitpicker/annoying brat/idiot/brainless fangirl" which is very embarrassing for me, even if what was written doesn't offend the author. It really put me off reviewing, but now that I've started on my own story (and have become annoyed by the lack of reviewing going on) I've tried to start reviewing again. But because of my habit of shoving my foot into my mouth at every given opportunity, I will often spend at least half an hour combing through the story again and rereading what ever I wrote to make sure that it is something that I'm not going to regret saying later on. I'm sure I'm not the only one with this problem, so don't be too harsh on the lack of reviews happening.

Edited November 7, 2011 by LockedBox

[Lisbet_Adair]

I do think it's a bit of a shame when people read the stories and don't review them, and I can see it bothers other people too.

I quite agree with everything said above about ratings that are low, with no explanation. How does anyone expect you to make your work better if they won't say what it is about it that they didn't like?

That said, it does annoy me to see a story which is tagged completely appropriately and giving a full description of all the acts likely to take place within the text, only to have a review that is upset by the acts they were warned about, or that they don't like this fandom. I can understand if you want to leave a review saying "This was not a pairing I thought would work, and I think you might need to do x or y in order for it to be convincing." My only review is a snub that questions why anyone would write slash for that particular fandom, and I find it terribly ironic that it's from a named user who writes the same for another fandom!

[DemonGoddess]

I'm going to state the obvious on this again (at least I think it's obvious). Often, the quantity of reviews is in no way an indication of the quality of writing. In the process of cleaning up and reordering and whatnot, I've seen a load of stories I'd never bother to open but for the task I'm working on, that get more reviews than you can shake a stick at. Yet, I'll also run across very well written stories, which have little or no reviews, often not even a rating.

I think it's because you have some people (I'm not a writer, so have no idea, truly) who have their friends and the clique they happen to belong to, review their stories, and review them as being wonderful, whether or not such a review is deserved. Often, those reviews are not deserved.

Just my two cents..

[Hairyhaggis]

I make it a point to review whatever I've read. To me it tells the writer that I red more than the first page if there are several chapters and what my thoughts on the story are. If I don't like something I'll say I don't like it but I'll back up with why and I do the same if I love it. There's no excuse not to unless you have to run out the door as the review tab is directly below the end of chapter. So, ye I like reviews but I think I would cringe more if after writing for hours or days and uploading a story no -one bothered to read it

Edited April 15, 2012 by Hairyhaggis

[Firefall_Varuna]

I try to put myself in the "write for yourself" frame of mind but I do like at least a little feedback. Anything to let me know people are reading it and that I'm headed in the right direction. I'd prefer concrit, but I'll even take the "Write moar!" or "Looking forward to ur next update!"

At the moment, I only get real feedback from my beta and best friend of almost 15 years. So at the moment I write to our tastes.

Though I guess for genuine concrit, too many people have encountered authors who don't take it well. *shrugs*