What is your favorite story?

[subterfuge]

Believe it or not there are a few of us who do believe in helping, or hindering in some cases, authors who post on the site. ... Feedback is one thing that most authors strive mightly to obtain, be it good or bad.

Actually what prompted me to respond to this thread is the baffling nature of reviews. My second concern is the appalling dearth of them, given an author's efforts in writing a piece. I have spoken of this before, as one of fav stories got only 7 reviews in four years!!! This was 7 reviews out of 49K reads! And it was a huge 38 chapter effort. It was, maybe not too surprisingly, the only story that writer ever submitted.

I read a story last night that got 17 reviews in 4 days! ... all 9's or 10's. And it was only one chapter to set the scene (to be continued)! And more baffling still, the plot had been done a thousand times (uh, let's see if we can blackmail a housewife into being a slut one more time - although I will freely admit that I LOVE a good slut-wife story!). I could see nothing so exceptional as to receive that number of enthusiastic reviews in so short a time. I will not reveal the story out of courtesy to the writer. This is NOT a criticism of his writing.

I should perhaps put this in perspective by saying that I'm a big fan of many writer's here - I am NOT a harsh critic, as these things go - if I like something, I like it, regardless of style or spelling/punctuation idiosyncrasies. My reviews tend to be enthusiastic and with admittedly quite a bit of rating inflation.

Back to the 17 reviews. To me at least this more or less confirms my long held theory that reviewers mimic the ratings of the reviews before them. Basically I think that high marks attract readers, who then leave high marks. I'm guilty myself of not even opening a story that gets less than 8. I mean, christ, ya gotta find some way to filter all the new stories. Lex, you were one of the lone dissenting reviews out of the 17, which in part is why I'm responding to your comments on the subjects of reviews. I couldn't have agreed more with your assessment.

Now to my own "need" for feedback as a fledgling author. I probably spent a year on and off writing my first two stories. My first got 3 reviews out of 8133 reads, and I got a few nice, although extremely short emails with some positive remarks, but not much that helped me answer some writing questions I had, or help determine the direction or approach of my new episodes using the same characters. I did appreciate those emails tremendously though. By the way, after the stories fell off the "front page" of new stories, the hits went down to nil, but that particular problem has been identified already. So, I have struggled with my motivation to finish and submit my current stories. Damn, I've got next to nothing to go on (except of course, my own erotic fantasies, which can be considerable at times).

I will finish this semi-rant with a huge thanks to you Lex. You were one of those few reviewers I had, and I was very impressed that you took the review process so seriously. I really appreciate your feedback. You are doing a public service to us writers by taking the time to give detailed reviews. Given your prolific writing, I am flat out amazed at the number of thoughtful reviews you submit.

regards,
sunburststrat