fandomsecrets | [ SECRET POST #3085 ]

⌈ Secret Post #3085 ⌋

Warning: Some secrets are NOT worksafe and may contain SPOILERS.

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Notes:

Secrets Left to Post: 03 pages, 062 secrets from Secret Submission Post #441.
Secrets Not Posted: [ 0 - broken links ], [ 0 - not!secrets ], [ 0 - not!fandom ], [ 0 - too big ], [ 0 - repeat ].
Current Secret Submissions Post: here.
Suggestions, comments, and concerns should go here.

Flat | Top-Level Comments Only

What grabs your attention to try a new fic? I don't mean that it has the pairing you want, it's an author you've liked before, the scenario looks interesting, it's the right length, etc.

I mean what have people done that have caught your attention to give a new author (or even a new pairing/fandom) a try?

(Examples: Artwork someone made for the fic, or a pretty photo-collage comes up on your dash, or someone you trusted rec'd it, etc.)

A good tagging system, to be honest. If you have tumblr tags going on, I am going to be avoid you. If you have clear, concise tags and a well thought out description (with no typos), I'll give you a shot.

"I'm not good at writing summaries" will make me avoid a fic as well.

Yeah. It's even worse when they have stuff like, "I don't know how to tag lol" in the tags. Well, clearly!

Exactly. :

^^^^^^ thiiiiiiiis

I cannot fucking stand the tumblr tags thing that is infecting other websites.

"I'm not good at writing summaries" also makes me assume you are 14.

Some of the criteria I use include: it looks like it's primarily f/f, seems cute, has lots of kudos on AO3, doesn't have any flagrant grammatical errors in the description

those are actually pretty much all of the criteria

Does the summary look like it's giving a reasonable description of something I'd like? Does the author keep their tags concise and to the point? How many words does it have compared to how many chapters there are? Is the summary full of the kinds of spelling errors that even a terrible word processor spell check should have caught?

If it passes those checks, I read the first couple paragraphs and go from there. If it doesn't do something to make me hit the back button with a migraine, I keep reading and give it a chapter or two, see if it's going to interest me in the long run.

All this goes out the window if I'm just scrolling for something to get the imagination flowing though.

This is exactly what I do as well. If the author can make a concise, appealing summary, than they're probably okay at writing a longer story.

Length. If it isn't over 20k words, then I'm not going to read it (that is just me having a personal preference and not anything for an author to worry about of course), a clear summary/synopsis that is being neither self-deprecating nor trying to be arty (I know summary writing is not an easy thing, so if you are stuck then give the reader the Friends title version "The One Where..."), simple tags Dark fic/Romance Fic/Gen Fic/AU/Coffee House AU/OC centric. Simple and clear. Tag in no more than four main characters, preferably less. Advise if it is a non-standard writing style, standard writing is still third person past tense, please tell me if it is not so as to save the reader the trouble of backbuttoning. The big thing is not to over tag your fic, tags are used to exclude search results as much as they are to find them. Do both types of searcher a favor and keep it simple and straightforward.

Advise if it is a non-standard writing style, standard writing is still third person past tense, please tell me if it is not so as to save the reader the trouble of backbuttoning.

You must have to hit the backbutton a lot.

Once upon a time, no not really. Increasingly yes though. There is an increasing amount of present tense, and even second person, writing however it is still not the majority except in very few fandoms where there source material itself was in a non standard format. It would be helpful, in fandoms where the source material is not in non third person past tense, to note in tags when the fic varies. The same probably goes for those who are in second person or present tense source material fandoms, and the fic is not.

There is nothing to be gained by not being upfront when the fanficcer's style differs from the source style (or in the case of non-literary fandoms, the non-standard writing style). It benefits the ficcer since they will cut down on angry comments and it benefits the fic-searcher since they can move on more easily to find something that might suit them better.

You'll note I'm not claiming any one style is superior, just that marking them out for ease of browsing is better.

Don't spell the name of a main character wrong in the description.

mte
I'll read whatever if it looks relevant to my interests but 'Vosh' in Trigun was a thing for some reason.

I look for plots I find interesting, so I rely on good summaries to clue me in. A well written summary that is descriptive without being spoilery or obscure will draw me in. Closer it is to canon the better too. Tag spam will put me off, especially if it has loads and loads of genres or characters. That just says to me the author has no clue what they've written and is just flinging everything at the wall.

I really don't have much of a system for this, I just click on anything that's listed as complete when I'm looking for a pairing and give it a go, I usually know from the first couple of lines if I'm going to keep reading or not.

I will sometimes avoid fic if the tags are bloated to the point of ridiculousness, but even then I've clicked on those as well.

If I like the fic though I tend to visit the writer's profile to see if they have any more fic.

Um...art, sometimes, if the image is well done and intriguing. An interesting story idea that makes me thing 'oooh, hadn't thought of *that*!'. A fandom i'm at least vaguely 'aware' of, since stuff that's completely foreign just isn't as fun.

Usually when the summary doesn't suck. I hate the really cheesy ones. I found one fic with nice artwork that was intriguing to me, but I'm really just looking for a good read if I want fic, otherwise I'd search for fanart. Obscure or low-key crossovers with old movies are intriguing to me. Some of my favorite fics were written this way. But I like original AUs or just plausible characterization for my favorite ships.

[ SECRET POST #3085 ]

Finding/Choosing Fics to Read

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Re: Finding/Choosing Fics to Read

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Re: Finding/Choosing Fics to Read

Re: Finding/Choosing Fics to Read

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Re: Finding/Choosing Fics to Read

Re: Finding/Choosing Fics to Read

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