~~ wank.

[reenka]

I have a very strange confession to make. I just need to get it off my chest so I never have to writhe in silent nameless discomfort ever again. Yeah, right.

Squeeing, 100%-positive and yet not really -descriptive- rave recs/reviews of fics make me cringe. No, I lie. I hate them. I REALLY HATE THEM A LOT. RAAAAGE. (Ok, no.)
    EDIT - to clarify: by "review" I don't mean feedback, I mean it in the "movie review" sense.

Not only that, they make me violently dislike both the reviewer and the fic, even if I -adore- the fic in question. I have to really bite my lip and repeat to myself "I love this fic, I -love- this fic, remember I -love- this fic!" so that I don't just write an anti-rec right back detailing all the flaws I can possibly think of (there are always some! Jeez!). I realize this is easily seen as hypocritical, considering how excited I get over fics. Still, I could -swear- I've never given what I'd consider pat compliments: Oh, this is great, genius, wonderful, beautiful, amazing. I've never called anyone "extremely talented" or even talented. I've never raved about how worthy someone/something is of their popularity or thought any fic -should- be popular as a sign of its greatness. Of course, I'm sort of elitist and snobbish like that :>

I've never guarranteed anyone would have to like a fic. That just -really- pisses me off. How could anyone assume -any- piece of writing is soooo great, -everyone- has to love it? My god, what arrogance! Not only that, it just feels like advertising to me. I hate advertising, in case that isn't clear. I hate it with all the passion of a thousand burning hells. Nothing rubs me the wrong way like a rave review that could easily apply to -any- fic out of hundreds. Saying only nondescript, gushy things about a truly good, visceral piece of writing just... deadens it.

I actually can't stand reading most positive reviews, though I'm almost always highly entertained by negative ones (they're usually funny, at least). The words one uses in response should contain some tiny spark of inspiration, something that is reminiscent of the fic, otherwise the review is pointless because it doesn't actually -say- anything and all I get is "propaganda-propaganda-propaganda-propaganda". And as should be painfully obvious, I reallyreallyreallyreallyreally despise propaganda quite, quite a lot.

So I'm in this weird place where I'm semi-known for recs and reviews and yet I have very little respect for the practice of reccing & reviewing itself as is commonly practiced. In fact, 98% of all blurbs & mini-reviews and such annoy the living daylights out of me, especially if they're of fics I adore. First of all, if you act as if a fic is -perfect-, it takes away from its actual humanity, from its real worth. It's like, you're not using your brain, so why should I believe a word you say in response, and does that mean -I'm- not using my brain in loving it, too?

If I had time, I'd post a mini-list of all my favorite fics and say only critical things of them to show how much I love them. If one doesn't -think- or express one's feelings in any sort of creative manner, one is just a parrot, someone who likes the shiny thing without really being capable of seeing its true beauty. I think to an extent, the readers help define the fic-- that is to say, if brainless zombies like a fic, you wonder how good can it possibly be. On the other hand, if eloquent, thoughtful people like the fic, one feels the worth of the fic itself is thus elevated.

Because of this, I realized I have a creed-- a set of ethics as a reviewer:

    - Never use hyperbole-- say how it affects you in the most direct yet descriptive way possible; pretend you're talking to a skeptic if it helps. Said skeptic will laugh every time you use more than one adjective per sentence.
    - Never project your own response onto others-- confine yourself to detailing your own thoughts, leave others to form their own opinions; separate your kinks from those of others and keep it in mind when describing the merits of a fic.
    - Never push a fic onto others as if it's a drug-- separate your own excitement and your actual full response to the work.
    - Objectivity isn't just for dinner anymore: try it, it works! Don't do the writer or the work the disservice of pretending they've attained perfection: there is no need to be negative, but please refrain from overindulging in the "bestseller syndrome", where mass hysteria passes for literary worth. Treat the writer as "a writer", and the work as "a work", as best you can.

*wankwankwankwank*

Comments

Re: idea!

[bookshop.livejournal.com]

Well, and also, how hypocritical am I for sitting here going "WAHIDONTWANNALEAVECRITICALREVIEWSDONTMAKEMEDOITWAAAAH" while also going, 'hurrah, reena is online, soon she will read my fic and leave me a long glorious beautiful review that will make me insanely happy like always, hurray!!!!"

:D

i suppose that i could and shall try these headings of which you speak in the future. i shall NOT be doing 'star' ratings. i detest stars. also, if you're going to give a fic less than 3 stars you might as well not rec it at all, hahaha. :D *is not helping*

Re: idea!

[yourpoison.livejournal.com]

*meebles*
erk. i meant to say "not" instead of "now", but... er... sigh, it's already past 1am, so i probably don't have enough concentration for the beta. *smacks self again*
so like.. there are several fics i meant to read (well, you & thess & layha & rhoddlet as far as i remember) ...but then, i'll just read yours now instead, though shhhhh don't tell :D :D

Re: idea!

[bookshop.livejournal.com]

no no no read thess' first it is brilliant and short!!!!

Re: idea!

[layha.livejournal.com]

I'll pretend I didn't see that, and only give you the following helpful, cryptic advice: skip the first 3 and/or 4 chapters. They reek like shit from a mule that's been ruminating on asparagus for three days. I kid you not. Cringeworthy.

*smirks goodnaturedly*

<3333

Re: idea!

[layha.livejournal.com]

when, of course, you find the time.

heheeheheeeee

Re: idea!

[yourpoison.livejournal.com]

for a sec i thought you meant `transfigurations', eheheh. which would've been reather funny :D :D

but no, i meant your ficlet~:)
damn, i don't check my friends page in 3-4 days and look what happens ^^;

*giggles*

Re: idea!

[layha.livejournal.com]

oh that?
rahahah... oh, it's lame.

I was under the (distintly erroneous) impression that you meant The Readiness is All.

Your rants make me happy, did I mention that? Maybe it's warped, but it's true.

Re: idea!

[lieblich.livejournal.com]

GOD NO. WE LOVE THE READINESS IS ALL.

*hugs it to chest*
*hugs layha to chest too* :D

Also, Reena, Resonant is good about constrictive crit. I think she's a good writer, and a gracious one. And I definitely think you should make up your own mind about Transfiguration, though I have definite leanings as to what your opinion of it will be.

Re: idea!

[layha.livejournal.com]

meep. thanks much.
*toes ground, very very pleased and trying not to show it too much*

Re: idea!

[yourpoison.livejournal.com]

my snark likes your snark back, in all their mutually warped-yet-happy-making glory :D :D

*beams*
dude. you made that vid with the groovin'!draco. naturally, we're on the same frequency ;))

Re: idea!

[spare-change.livejournal.com]

Don't do stars ... just do categories like how Reena suggested. That's how I did it, way back in the day, and it seemed to work. Just so that your readers have some idea of what they're in for ... otherwise, there really isn't any point in doing recs at all.

And I do think that there is a place for concrit in the fandom. And for saying, "Hey, folks, this fic is worth checking out, although I think elements X and Y are weak." I do this all the time, and although lots of people may bitch about me, I don't think that this, specifically, is why they do. ;)

As for why people hate squee recs so much ... here's one reason why, from a few days back: http://www.livejournal.com/users/gmth/66301.html

Re: idea!

[bookshop.livejournal.com]

*laughs and laughs at the reference to That One Fic We Both Hate*

Hahahaha. Irony of ironies. Ever since I basically flamed the fic "Empty Chairs at Empty Tables" to a crisp the other day after somebody on my friends list praised it to the skies, I have been wanting to do one of those "so, don't you really wish you could say what you *really* think about so many of the fics that get all the love?" posts. I would have, in fact, polled everybody about it today had I not gotten distracted with writing other things. It *is* incredibly cathartic to just be able to vent about the authors and fics we all can't stand--and yes, it is SO INCREDIBLY FRUSTRATING to see everybody reccing fics that I can't stand.

Maybe I will make a post about this on lieblich or something tomorrow, and fully vent my spleen. :)) *rubs hands and plots*

Re: idea!

[spare-change.livejournal.com]

Yes, Aja, VENTING BEHIND LOCKED POSTS WORKED SO WELL LAST TIME!

;)

Go ahead and vent, but given how [deleted] snarked at me when I tried to talk about Transfigurations in lieblich, I'll have to pass. :/

Re: idea!

[bookshop.livejournal.com]

*snorts up the very pink beverage she has been drinking, with interesting results*

Hahahahahahaha.

I can guarantee you, with 100% certainty, that [deleted] has better things to do than snark at you at the moment. If she even notices the post she'll be too busy/distracted/preoccupied to snark. :D Pleeeeease join me in snarking? Since [deleted #2] will not be participating I will have to snark alone and that will not be any fun. You and Reena and I can all vent together. Pleeeeeease? *bats eyes*

Re: idea!

[yourpoison.livejournal.com]

*cries, unvented & alone*

unvented's not even a word, is it :>

also, i'm getting this feeling like i shouldn't read `transfigurations', though i probably will just to make up my own mind. though. *snorts* i think resonant actually is really good about con-crit, though i could be wrong :-?

Re: idea!

[spare-change.livejournal.com]

Well, see, the problem is that with the exception of the fics you recced -- whose names I no longer remember -- I haven't been really feelin' the rageahol about fics lately. Or maybe it's just that I don't really keep up with the H/D bit of the fandom any more (with the exception of you and Sara and Reena and a couple of others), so I am missing all these horrible-yet-widely-recced fics.

Or maybe my standards are just low.

*sighs*
*tries to work up snarkiness*
*fails miserably*
*wonders who the hell [deleted #2] is*

Re: idea!

[yourpoison.livejournal.com]

isn't there something almost -more- awful about hating the reccing of a fic you -love- because of how it's being presented? ><
maybe that's just me. *laughs*

although it happens to me all the time. brilliant authors deserve brilliant reviews. on the other hand, if someone's stupid enough to like a stupid fic, that just means people are stupid squared, which is nothing new~:)
that's why it's always puzzled me why people -hate- popular badfic moreso because it's popular than because it's badfic. i mean, i hate `perfect imperfection' completely on its own merits. my hate is pure and unsillied :D

it must be different when this natural love-or-hate relationship gets all mixed up with paranoia (like, if i say -this- They Will Come After Me). I mean, it's not a -crime- to have some things just... not work for you, is it. of course, when the masses of fans ally themselves one way or the other, it ceases to be about fic at -all- and starts being about hype. which just sucks sweaty donkey balls, to quote my happy d&d-playing friend.

also, i'm all jealous of your other lj now~:)

Re: idea!

[lieblich.livejournal.com]

that's why it's always puzzled me why people -hate- popular badfic moreso because it's popular

well, i can honestly say that i HATE Just This because, were it merely a bad fic, I could mock it and enjoy the mockery; but because it is a popular fic, because it's a beloved fic, even, it has basically to me becomes a mockery of all the really magnificent fics out there that *deserve* to be well-loved. (I could say the same thing about R. but I am too chicken even to spell the name out here lest I be lynched.)

of course, when the masses of fans ally themselves one way or the other, it ceases to be about fic at -all- and starts being about hype.

my beef with empty chairs at empty tables is that it's decently well-written, but it's such an utter horrible TRAVESTY of a fic, that belies everything canon is about, that when you have fans flocking to it eager for more, it makes you feel like, good god, how can these people possibly be real fans? it makes you want to not write anything else ever again because if these are the kind of people reading your writing then they can't possibly have any understanding of things like "in-character" and "canonical", can they? sigh. and that, to me, has nothing to do with the hype and everything to do with the kinds of expectations we as writers have of the kinds of audiences we want to read our fics.

which is why, when i rec fics, i rec fics to a certain kind of audience. i guess i long ago gave up hoping that the more aesthetically picky crowd would ever go for my stuff. What you people see in it is beyond me. :D

hee ^^

[yourpoison.livejournal.com]

*grins widely*
there's nothing that's enjoyable quite the same way as picking apart fic. i -think- i could do it to my fic, too, and be flattered, but i'm not sure, having never done it. still, it's tempting~:)

i really dislike most of blue's stuff.... but then, overplayed angst is worse than overplayed fluff in terms of being too sentimentalized and cheap and sad. i actually don't remember `chairs' as well as i could.... am definitely surprised you had such a strong response to it, since it seemed kinda "eh" to me-- readable but mediocre.

oh yeah. -that-. ahahaha. the-betrayer!draco. heh.
oh man, i was like, WHAT?!? when i first read it, but kept reading 'cause of some morbid fascination. couldn't get myself to read part 12 after having it somewhere bookmarked. just dull, really.

badfic is always dull, too.
then again, so -much- fic is a travesty to canon, i'd be ranting all day if i started. *smirks*
i should prolly start with mine, heh -.-

i myself have a certain bulletproof kink factor when it comes to h/d in general, though i've gotten tired after a year. i put up with a lot, but then... in the end, if it doesn't have basic psychological believability (which i think all badfic is missing), i just can't be bothered. though i could be convinced if it's got porn, you know how it is. i'm only human :D :D

am now wondering madly what "r" is, 'cause i'm running all popular h/d fics through my head and none of them start with r. *ponders*

and now it's past THREE and i STILL haven't read -anyone's- fic.
*falls over*

Re: idea! (part one)

[conversant.livejournal.com]

I'm reading through this thread and really should stop and get work done, but I wanted to weigh in here. As I recall, you object (and frankly, I do, too) to both Empty Chairs and Just This because the portrayal of Draco makes him abjectly willing to suffer things from Harry and (in the first case) from wizardom in general that no one should suffer.

If either of these stories succeeded in being (or intended to be) studies of abjection or battered partner syndrome, then there might be a pretext for the things they do to the character, but it is disturbing to be led into such a fic (by interesting scenario or even by simply competent manipulation of the standard H/D exposition) to find that one's sympathy for the characters (and for H/D readers this is also a patterned response, a sort of Pavlovian response, which produces sympathy for both H and D) is being asked to stretch to accept behaviour from Harry that is vicious and behaviour from Draco that makes him complicitous with abusive!Harry.

I do not mean to say that 'dark' treatments of Harry can't/shouldn't exist -- certainly a dehumanized HP is a plausible and *interesting* extrapolation from canon. -- The problem comes when the approving fans and the author him/herself seem to ignore (or be turned on by) the extremely problematic behaviour of the character. In this particular case, the simple 'squee!' review is unhelpful to other readers. (I know you said I'd been among those whose reviews of an early chapter led you into 'Empty Chairs,' and I still cringe about that.)

In this case, the 'squee' review suggests that a huge number of H/D readers must have well-developed abuse kinks in order to allow them to read those fics and find them 'hot' instead of registering any distance from or distress at the plot and characterization. It is difficult to know whether this is the correct inference to draw, however, and your response (and Reena's?) suggests a suspicion that these readers are somehow too stupid to have noticed what the fic is using to make them 'hot,' because if they did, surely they'd have a problem with it. Or perhaps it's that these readers do not, in fact, register the particular plot of a given H/D fic anymore, but are so Pavlovian that they respond to any scenario that sets the two in conflict by becoming automatically aroused. (I may have just completely misrepresented what you meant.)

I'm not comfortable assuming that the H/D community is not filled with readers who get turned on by rape and abuse fic (implied by both scenarios above). I'm also uncomfortable about suggesting that it oughtn't to be if it is.

The politics of such fics bother me a lot, but I know that there is a complex relationship between a person's reading kinks and their real world behaviour, so I'm not willing to climb on a moral soapbox to denounce the reading habits and desires of this group. We all depend on the other side of that argument to justify writing slash at all in countries where doing so would be summarily judged by the 'moral majority.'

I'm also uncomfortable about rants where 'we' condemn other fandom subsets for their obvious stupidity and plebishness. (And yes, I must be sensitive about the fact that I apparently squeed at some point about that story. Why do you ask? Obviously I hate being lumped in with the plebes; that's why I spend so much time cultivating my persona as a pretentious bitch.)

Re: idea! (part two -- less long, but no less pretentious)

[conversant.livejournal.com]

One last thing because I don't dare start a new 'short' post in response to Reena: I lament the fact that review boards are public. There are several ways in which people give feedback and several motives that prompt them to write a 'review.' The squees and the positives-only are, among other things, sent as messages of encouragement to the writer. They are rarely conceived of as 'reviews' in the sense Reena favours; they don't seek to provide a service to other potential readers. That's not wrong. It's simply one kind of review among many. I think it might be well to simply acknowledge that there are different genres within the form this fandom calls a 'review.'

This is an issue for me personally: I review less and less these days, not only because I have limited time, but because I grew anxious about the fact that at one point I became recognizable as a reviewer and a positive comment from me might lead someone else in to read a fic they would then hate and that would in turn make them think less of me and so on. (Case in point: my residual horror at having led you to 'Empty Chairs,' which I don't even remember reviewing [which is why I sometimes think it would be a good idea to give up reviewing altogether]. I'm embarrassed because I actually share your point of view about the fic, but I think I'd be just as embarrassed if you reacted with contempt to a fic I continued to like. I'm not sure how you reacted to spare change's statement that she hated most of the fics you recently recced, but I suspect that at some level it caused some angst because her opinions have earned your respect.

Even though you/I know that it is to be expected that we will not all always like the same stuff (and it shouldn't be a cause of embarrassment or cause a crisis of self-worth), it's still a queasy feeling to have someone you respect lay out their long list of obvious flaws in a story you liked.

Final side note: Academia and the non-academic intelligentsia are communities that cultivate fears of intellectual inadequacy among their members. -- Even/especially the most acclaimed worry that they will be exposed as poseurs and will plummet over the curve of Fortune's wheel to the muck below. Status is gained and maintained by convincing others that one is smarter/more discerning/more skilled/more bold than those who receive the stupid adulation of the uncritical masses. I smell that sort of blood all over the waters of this thread. I'm not shocked or surprised, but it's worth pointing out.

Re: idea!

[kerri]

Hmm. You *could* do that - just get everyone to post anonymously, and turn off the IP logging. The thing would be to find a place to do it. :P

Re: idea!

[lieblich.livejournal.com]

haha, someone really really should.

of course everyone would then naturally say they can't stand love under will and i would be crushed. :D :D :D :D

Re: idea!

[manna]

haha, someone really really should.

Someone set up an review/discussion community called twist_of_lemon, which is for anonymous dicussion of popslash fics. It's gone rather quiet at the moment. I read some of it, but having everyone posting anonymously made it really hard to follow the discussions ("No, I'm not the anonymous who doesn't like Rhys's use of bodily fluids, or the one who loves it, I'm the one who likes it normally but thought Box was OTT.")

Re: idea!

[bookshop.livejournal.com]

i shall NOT be doing 'star' ratings. i detest stars.

AHAHAHAHA. *FACEPALM*