Ok, I want to open it up for discussion because this is one I wonder about you opinions on.

I frewuently do reviews about certain fics I read and when I live read them I do the reviews there as well. Normally I have no problem, especially whn I have fun with them and bring out my usual quips and snark. However, there is one fic I just recently ran across that is kind of bad, While not horrible, it is not up to the standards of the rest of the universe or the usual storiess I read. Now, normally I want to leae the usual reviwew about how this is bad, what the author can do to improve, and why it fails. However, I know the author...he is a very VERY sensitive soul. I feel like giving him a bad review of his story will hurt him badly, and being constructive will only leave him saying "Well, I expected that," and would make him even worse.

Shoul I go on with the review as usual and risk hurting him more? Or should I leave it blank even though I have let reviews for everyone else and to not review would be selfish of me.

How do you review something that you know is going to hrt a person but they want one anyway?

4028519
Be careful about how you word it to minimise hurt, but don't lie because you think they might be upset.

Doing that could end up hurting their writing far more than any negative review could ever do.

4028519 you just do it. Then help him through it.

4028519 While punctuation is not my strongest suite, and I tend to avoid it in my reviews, so I sure hope you're staying away from critiquing someone's grammar yourself.

As to answer your question I think the best advice I can give you is for you and your friend to rewatch "It Ain't Easy Being Breezies".

4028519 You're referring to me, aren't you?

I do want to improve, but it'll be hard if I can't write anything worth a damn.

4028535
I don't think you're in any real position to be critical of another's grammar and spelling.

4028535

What can I say, this happens when I type too quick

4028539

Like I said, it feels wrong when I do it. IT feels like you are hurting your little brother when you see him put something out.

4028560
And you expect a hypocrite's advice to be taken seriously?

If you want people to actually listen to what you have to say, improve your goddamn grammar.

4028559 Well, make it clear that you're doing this to HELP him, not just to criticize and nitpick. It's gonna hurt bro, that's the nature of these things.

4028551

No, not you. I have nothing but good things to say about your stuff. You are doing fantastic!

4028549

Trust me, I usually don't.

4028519 First of all, you are a good person for asking this question. Have a cookie. You're right to be concerned. Some authors may truly be gutted by a bad review.

Here's what I'd suggest. Send the author a PM, and tell him that you have a lot of things to say that might hurt his feelings, but that it is about his fic, not him personally. Go ahead and take notes as though you were doing the review. Then you can offer him a choice: to send him your notes, or to have a more detailed, public review.

If you know the author cannot handle it despite everything he says, don't do the review at all.

From the title, I thought this post would be about feeling bad that one had given a review that, in retrospect, wasn't very good. I was all ready to help out, because man have I felt that before! But, no, it's something a bit different.

The key here is to ask yourself what the purpose of your review is. If you're writing it for the author's benefit, then your goal should be to present it in whatever way is going to help the author improve the most. Some people embrace a "tough love" ethos in this case, and there's certainly something to be said for not building up false confidence or unearned ego... but the goal, first and foremost, should be to give the author something where they'll come away thinking "yes, now I know what I can do to be even better!" This may or may not be compatible with tearing their story to shreds, depending on the person.

If you're writing (live-reviewing?) for the sake of an audience, whether it's potential readers, people who've already read the story, or just people looking to be entertained, then your goal should be to provide whatever you've promised your audience. Whether that's a detailed analysis, a broad overview and recommendation, or some AVGN snark, your primary responsibility is to the audience in this case, not the author. That doesn't excuse you from behaving in a basically civilized manner, however. If you're going to use a lot of mockery and hyperbole, it should be done in a manner that makes it clear that you're exaggerating for entertainment effect and that your comments shouldn't be taken as unbiased and reasonable criticism (again, a la AVGN), and if your ostensible purpose is more in the advice/legitimate recommendation vein, then you should be honest about your opinions, but avoid piling-on. Basically, the rule of thumb is "don't be a dick... unless being a dick is your shtick, in which case don't pretend that you're review is a fair and evenhanded assessment."

That would be my take on the matter, anyway. As someone who mostly writers reader recommendations, I've written reviews of stories whose authors I knew were... sensitive, and I've always tried not to let that affect what I wrote. But I wasn't writing the reviews (primarily) for their benefit, and I wasn't going out of my way to insult either the authors or their stories. As long as I feel like my reviews are honest but not insulting, I think I'm doing okay.

4028519

my usual quips and snark

"Usual" in the sense that every one of your reviews contains snark? Take caution if you deliver a softer review for your friend. If he notices that you're not snarking like normal, he might assume that you're being disingenuous, showing favoritism, treating him special... etc.

There are commenters out there who will tell him about the problems in his writing and who will not sugarcoat it. You're currently poised to comment on his story before the jerks do. As such, you have an opportunity to soften the blow. You have an opportunity to help him to correct the issue before it catches a wider audience. You have an opportunity to help him build a thicker skin. (Some people naturally have thinner skin, but building up a tolerance to well-intentioned criticism is a learned skill. You get better with practice.)

IT feels like you are hurting your little brother when you see him put something out.

"Little brother" is a good analogy. If your little brother's fly is down, and you point it out to everyone at recess ("Let's all laugh at him!") then you're a bad brother. If you let him get up in front of the class to give a presentation, without warning him that his fly's down, you're a bad brother. If you tell him to fix his fly, but in the process you call him an idiot who can barely dress himself, you're a bad brother. If you quickly pull him aside and are like "psst, dude, fix your fly", then yes he will be embarrassed for his mistake, but you saved him lots of further embarrassment. You are a good brother.

4028549 That's "suit," not "suite." There are a few others who have made that same mistake, which is why I'm telling you; since this is a reviewer's group, it would benefit you to recognize it when you see it.

4029646
Suit is for reference to an idiom about cards, specifically the power matching in the games Hearts, or Spades.
Suite, its definition include a number of things forming a series or a set such of tools and/or related skills.
In short, either would work, depending on how literal you feel like being (and I felt like being literal).

Identifying idioms vs direct definitions can be tough with Homophones, so just thought I'd let you know why I said what I said, we both being editors and all.

4029792 No, seriously, it's "suit." The expression you were using is "strong suit." The Merriam-Webster online dictionary defines it as:

1) a long suit containing high cards
2) something in which one excels

Another way of saying it (and one Rarity might use) is Forte. This is apparently pronounced differently from the musical term of identical spelling.

Suite, on the other hand, is:

- a group of rooms that is used for one purpose
- a group of rooms in a hotel that is used by one person, couple, family, etc.
- a piece of music that is made up of many short pieces that are taken from a larger work (such as a ballet)

If you Google "strong suite," it gives you "strong suit" instead. I checked, and I really don't think "strong suite" is an accepted way of saying it. I have seen this expression written, I have heard it said, and the first time I saw someone use "suite" instead of "suit" was on this site in a story with obvious mistakes. I'm pretty certain that's one of them.

4029792
I'm afraid you're wrong. Suite is about rooms in a house, a musical suite, or many other things but it has nothing to do with cards. It's a suit of cards

Strong suit is the idiom.

4028519

Give them the bad review, especially if they asked for it.

You're not doing anyone any favors by holding back.

The author will benefit by having the flaws pointed out, and any readers of your review will benefit from getting the true story about it, not sugarcoated. Reviews are sometimes bad... often bad. And they should be. Only by having bad reviews to compare them to do good reviews really stand out.

...If you're not willing to do a negative review, you shouldn't call yourself a reviewer... you should call yourself a praiser.

4030063

Noun:
1. a number of things forming a series or set.

Source.

4030122
Yes, but that isn't the same as a suit of cards.

You really can't argue against this, I'm afraid. It's strong suit, and a suit of cards, and you can't change that by posting on a ponyfic website

4030055
4030063

Credentials: I'm an English professor, and an idiomatic phrase is an idiomatic phrase.

4030611 It's easy to claim you're right if you're just going to ignore dictionary.com.

4030645
I provided you with multiple sources, including wikipedia, Merriam-Webster, Cambridge Dictionaries, and "thefreedictionary.com"

But you want proof from dictionary.com?

Here
Look at #7

Now tell me I'm wrong.

4030647 No. What I am saying, is you couldn't be arsed to look up the deffinition for "suite" like I fucking did 8 posts ago. You also couldn't be arsed to fact check the things you're claiming I'm making up which I'm not.

4030651
What I'm saying is that the idiom is Strong Suit, and that it's called a Suit of Cards. The definition of "suite" is irrelevant, as neither Strong Suit or Suit of Cards use that word.

Now you're just being petulant.

4030652 The idiom is only relevant if I'm using it, which I'm not, I'm using the literal definition of the word in question, which in turn makes your asinine insistence that it's not relevant incredibly relevant. You're on my blocklist now for being willfully ignorant and perpetuating misinformation under the guise of education; so you can stroke your own already overly inflated ego.

I'll not respond to you again.

4030656
See 4030615. And how would a suite even be strong in the first place? Also, if it only contains one item, it is not a suite according to the dictionary you used. It uses plural phrasing. If you don't like how technical I'm being, you shouldn't have tried to be technical.

4030656
Actually, this "discussion" came about because you said something wasn't your "strongest suite". Which is you attempting to use the idiom, but using the word suite where it should have been suit. Sorry if you'd forgotten that.

4030666 Are you saying you don't know what a set is? That's what it means when you say that because it only contains one item, and that item is a set of skills, that it somehow doesn't meet the definition I listed.

4030680 It specifies more than one item in your definition.
A suite by this technicality is a set of more than one item. Not all sets are suites, but all suites are sets.

I hate being this technical, but I can keep it up all day if I need to.

If you're not willing to accept that you could be wrong, get out. Why were you even here to begin with?

4030699 You're not actually being technical. Nor are you clarifying your objection, nor what you're asking of me, nor accusing me of. From what I can surmise you're being intentionally vauge to give the apearance that I am somehow less intelligent than you for not understanding what you mean, when you can't or won't clearly articulate it yourself.

Your advice applies to not only you as well, but everyone else who has refused to fact check the things they're saying, or consider the literal definitions of the words in question. Given that I have sourced both words in my explanation, I don't really see how this advice or accusation is befitting of being turned toward me.

One can't only claim an idiom is being used when the literal definitions of the words chosen mean exactly what the author has chosen those words to express. That said, this is where the problems with homophones comes in that I referenced before every busybody on the internet decided to make a fool of themselves.

4030701 I believe that I am articulating my point rather clearly. I am saying that your own definition of suite does not fit your usage. It's not a good argument, but neither is yours.
I'm not saying that you meant to use the idiom; I'm saying that you would have to use it to create your desired meaning.
If you gave me a claim that I could not refute, I would accept that I am wrong. You have not done so yet.
And I'm pretty sure that you're the one who's making a fool of yourself. You're the one whining about the word "suite".

I'm locking this thread; it's been almost entirely pointless arguing.