Vinyl Scratch/Octavia 1,526 members · 643 stories
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I've been on this site for a long time, and I have had a great pleasure in making more stories... but I don't seem to be getting any constructive feedback on my works... Well not the stuff I've been looking for, it's typically good stuff and I know there are more things I can work on with my less popular works.

Aside from that, I can't seem to make my way higher with all the really really good writers, even when I get better in my style and story telling, I can't seem to find the key to making it.. Any advice?

5663431

Find the what both you and the general reader like, having something you enjoy writing is important to have a good story. But for that story to become popular it has to be something that the general reader populace likes, and it's not too easy to find that balance. For me it took from the beginning of my time here to about a few months ago to find that balance. Funnily enough, it envolved lesbian assassins (OctaScratch), which shows that it'll be quite unexpected when you find the balance. For me it's OctaScratch, but there's a few ways to find at least what not to do.

I reccomend checking out a few Badfic groups, that should give you an idea of what to avoid writing, along with how not to write. Read a few books on the genre you'd like to write, find the style that you like, it doesn't have to be fanfiction, go to a library or bookstore and check out some stuff in the genre your interested in. Then once you find what you'd like to write, try and find some stories that are writtten well in that respect. Baisically what you did with the genre.

Hope I provided some help, good luck on your writing endeavors!

Stop trying to make it. If you focus on just trying to rise in ranks rather than do this for fun, you are destined to fail because you will constantly be comparing yourself to others and over criticizing and analyzing your writing to the point you have zero fun doing it and eventually you'll get frustrated and give up.

So my advice is stop trying to "make it." Start doing it cuz you have fun doing it.

5663555 Thank you :3 I guess that would make sense, I have tried writing stories on things I enjoy, I mean to say in a tone I enjoy, but I think my tone is being lost in translation, it seems a lot better in my head, and it doesn't quite come out well on the story. I might need to hire a prof reader to be my second eye and let me know if my descriptions make sense. I even once read an OctiScratch story that suffered from issues I noticed in my own stories, notices and mentions of things that don't play on the story, or won't be important later on, and I grew very impatient with it. I'll be sure to work harder on that :3


5663923

My goal isn't really to "Make it", I'm not aiming for featured or anything, I'm aiming for feedback and maybe to be good enough to be noticed by one of my favorite writers. It's a goal I've set for myself, I greatly enjoy writing and I'm sure I always will. But then again I've never been one to see much in the desire to be good at what you love to do. :)

I did a quick peak at a few of your works and noticed they did not appear to be in many, if any, groups. Fix this. There are more than a few groups centered around your works. For example, there are Octavia groups, Vinyl Scratch groups, O+VS shipping groups, general shipping groups, etc. etc. etc.

In my opinion this is the best way to get your works known. When I want a story of type "X" I find an appropriate group and scour the stories that are part of that group. That's close to 100% of how I find my next reading fix. There is no limit to how many groups you can apply any given story to, so go nuts. But just respect the rules of the groups and don't put your stories in groups where they don't belong. You may have to join a group before you can add a story to it. That's fine. You don't have to remain a member after you do so. And there's nothing wrong with that. (Reminder, just abide by the rules of the group and you can't go wrong.)

Just spending a little time doing this will get you lots of eyeballs. And more eyeballs means more chances of feedback.

One more thing - yeah, that link Stella Regis dropped - definitely go read that.

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