Bad Author

[BronxWench]

As a writer, I embrace concrit. That's not to say that the criticisms don't sometimes sting, but if I'm honest about wanting to grow as a writer, I need to hear what doesn't work. It doesn't help me to only hear praise. I won't know where I need to focus, and I'm one of those odd people who doesn't want my email address out there for the world to offload their musings onto.

I've gotten concrit, and I hope to get more. I'll give it where I think it's needed unless an author asks that they not receive it, in which case, I probably won't review at all.

[ladytsunadesama]

Well it's been my experience that some writers, and I can probably name four of them right off who are actually friends of mine, that will take even the smallest constructive criticism as a personal attack or flame if posted as a review. For example, they will take something as innocent as "you should probably run this through spellchecker before posting" as "OMG you're an illiterate idiot and you should stop writing!". Yet if you private message them the same exact thing, they will take it completely differently. Almost as if they think you're an old friend trying to point out something, you're not making a big public show of it.

In short, there are those who can't take criticism of any kind of criticism and become embarrassed/frustrated when people post it as a review because they feel it takes away from the story. Personally, I'm not good with punctuation, I am slightly dyslexic, and until I got my Dragon speech recognition typing was often painful on my wrists so I know that affected the quality of the stories which I was working on. But, I know that so I'm not really offended when people tell me: "hey, your missing a few commas. You ran a couple words together or repeated the same line twice." I actually welcome the kind person pointing out something that could potentially be an embarrassing mistake, so I can fix it before it becomes one.

Just my opinion

[RogueMudblood]

In the interests of openness, I can't understand why someone who is of the opinion that any comment on their work that isn't glowing praise is a "personal attack" would post on a public archive.

If you just want person-to-person commentary, hand your manuscript off to a few friends. By posting it in a public, open archive, you're welcoming feedback - including that which may be "negative".

I take it from your response that you're only considering concrit to be those statements which say "this needs to be done to make this better" - but that's only a part of it. For example, one night I needed a pick me up, and I read one of Melrick's stories. This was practically my whole review:

Thank you for that - it was most thoroughly amusing. And the last line... priceless.

I still consider that constructive criticism. Why? Because I told him what I liked about it. I didn't dissect it line for line, no, but that was hardly necessary. I also consider this and this constructive criticism. Telling an author of a fan work that they did a good job with the character is about the best constructive criticism I think I can provide.

Even reviews like what I left here, by what you're saying, would be offensive to your friends? Even though I'm saying I like the story, there's just one little point that could be cleared up a little with re-wording? That review, other than a small suggestion, was entirely positive constructive criticism. Even the suggestion was not negative, but simply a statement that something could be explained more clearly.

[Danyealle]

I'm going to state what i did early on in this thread once more...

Now, I’m going to say something that you might not think is supportive or what you’re looking for but it’s factual… If you can’t handle the concrit reviews or someone telling you that you’re doing something wrong, writing isn’t for you. You are going to get them. Though you might not like what they say, the realism is that you probably need to listen. Especially if it’s been said by several people.

I stick by that statement. If someone is so thin skinned they can't handle concrit, this isn't for them. Period. Because, honestly, if they think concrit is bad, try an editing process with a pro or reviews you get after published. Those are ego smashers.

[Kimmimaru]

Concrit is good, what is bad is when people stalk you across TWO seperate websites simply to spam your stories saying they're shit. A human being can only take so much abuse before cracks begin to show. I have confidence ups and downs, some days the abuse doesn't bother me, other days it really gets to me and somedays I crack and go a little insane. It's just a perfectly natural human reaction, nothing to be ashamed of. As i've said before, concrit is something an author can use to improve, calling someone's work 'shit' and telling them to go die is as far from concrit as you can go. Recently I was also called a Homophobe on FF . Net (It's a friggin' trolls nest there! Lol) for doing a Kinky Slash one-shot that involved one of the characters dressing in womens underwear...I laughed at that, however, if I'm on a downer it would probably affect me a lot more than it should. I do accept that publishing on a public forum involves risks, it's inevitable, but I do it for the few people who do give concrit and those who genuinely enjoy reading my stories...i mean, they have to be out there somewhere, lol. Even the most well known Authors probably suffer from moments where they doubt themselves, again, it's only human to do so. No one goes through life without having some doubts, and sometimes other people's nastiness can really affect one's confidence. It's just one of those sad things.