One of my favorite Mentalist fic writers has tired of all of us bemoaning the dearth of comments and reviews on our stories, and has started "Operation: Reviews". The idea is, to take a pledge to leave a comment on every fic one reads, even if it is a very short, simple "good work!"

I intend to apply my pledge only to stories I read all the way through. If something is so bad I Giveup on it, I won't bother. It's not like "your grammar, punctuation, and ability to write in character all suck" would actually help.

ETA: I guess that also undoes my resentful, envy-laden refusal to leave comments on stories that get tons more reviews than my own. Piffle. Now I have to act all grown up.

Now I have to act all grown up.

Doesn't that suck, having to do that? I hate it.

The idea is, to take a pledge to leave a comment on every fic one reads, even if it is a very short, simple "good work!"

I once read a post from a fic writer going ballistic on people who leave short comments. She said either write a helpful in-depth review or don't bother. I wonder how many other writers feel that way. Me, I love any feedback.

I know comments are wonderful, especially good ones, but I think it's a lot to expect everyone to leave one. Everyone who buys a book doesn't write the author a letter. Views is maybe a better way to judge how many people have read your work, and then supportive comments are gravy. For me, anyway.

As a part of the SPN anon meme I did make a pledge for a month? Two weeks? Anyway, an amount of time that felt way longer than one week, to comment on any piece of art I actually clicked through on and *looked* at, and any fic I finished. I didn't finish as many as I usually do--but for me that's really not a bad thing. I will literally try and read every fic in my pairing that hits AO3 or the main LJ community that doesn't contain a squick pairing or warning/component. It's not the pairing, but it is the other pairing. Traffic is decent. That was my habit at the time, anyway. I have since started putting LJ notes on authors and only retrying them every 3-6 months to see if they've upped their game.

For me "good job" feels like a pat on the head from a teacher--not quite as rewarding as might be imagined. Something with a bit of personality is preferred "That was nice" or "They made me laugh!" or something. A "good job" is better than nothing, but not really much better.

Comments are great! People can say whatever they want to. As long as it isn't rude. I agree that page views are probably a better way to judge the number of people reading, but I couldn't be arsed to look it up, myself.

There really isn't any perfect way to weigh response. Comments are great, but fewer than 5% of readers leave them (on average). Hit counts are helpful, but they don't show you if someone hit the back button ten sentences in. Links on Delicious or Pinboard or AO3 can be nice, except they often don't include any commentary. Recs are great, although I admit to being mildly peeved if I get recced by someone who never left me a comment.

Frankly, we're never going to be satisfied. I know someone with a story that has been bookmarked 400 times on Delicious, and she still thinks she doesn't get enough feedback.

Frankly, we're never going to be satisfied. I know someone with a story that has been bookmarked 400 times on Delicious, and she still thinks she doesn't get enough feedback.

I guess that's the disconnect for me. Some genres aren't even going to get more than one review somewhere, and very few direct communications from readers. And, you know, when someone buys your book, you still don't know if they actually read it, or read part of it and threw it against the wall, or what.

I guess I'm saying that writing with the idea of feedback, especially good feedback, in mind is probably emotionally dangerous.

I'm saying that writing with the idea of feedback, especially good feedback, in mind is probably emotionally dangerous

Indeed. I hate to see writers write to the readership, because the readership is notoriously fickle. It leads you off into answering the feedback instead of following the story's own logic.

Me, I had one story I was writing that was almost entirely for me, because it was narrated by and was primarily about an OC, a family member of the canon characters (who it turned out later never actually existed, although I didn't know that at the time). I had hated the way the canon ignored the possibility of family, and wanted to examine that. So I wrote the story for myself, and figured hardly anyone would read it because hey, no Winchesters.

Turned out to be by far my most popular story in the fandom. Possibly my most popular story ever. Somehow, in writing for myself, I hit the fannish sweetspot.

Of course, it's never really happened again, but it was nice.

Is it time to put up the link to Penknife's essay about The Claw? [link]