I'm most certainly a fool

[wiseheart]

Got a very bad review on FF.Net for "Out of Legends" - which happens, I see other good stories get even worse. So, why do I let such things get to me so much?

Two reasons. Firstly, because I put a great deal of work, research and love into my stories, and it simply hurts. I can't help it. Secondly, because while I do have some excellently positive reviews for the story, compared to the over twenty thousand hits, very few people actually take the time to give feedback.

Why is it that people find it so hard to say something positive but can't withstand the urge to smite an author down when the story doesn't go the way they expect it to do?

Comments

[wiseheart.livejournal.com]

I didn't want to start a flame war on my own review board. I guess he simply hoped for a different story and was disappointed not to get what he envisioned. Why he couldn't simply hit the Back button is beyond me, but I guess one needs a certain degree of maturity to leave without kicking the host in the belly first.

[crowdaughter.livejournal.com]

but I guess one needs a certain degree of maturity to leave without kicking the host in the belly first.

Well, there are occasions when I do that, too - tell the author exactly that, and why, I have been greatly disappointed by their fic. But those occasions mostly touch either on issues of characterization, canon issues, or occasions when I feel the author has broken the contract with me, the reader by failing to deliver what he or she promised tio deliver. For example, if a story starts out as drama and suddenly turns into a blatant Sue, or if the author says nothing of an AU, and suddenly the story becomes blatantly AU, and when you ask about that you get: "Oh, this is a no-ring-AU, I thought you would get that by yourself" (in which case you can see spout me froth at the mouth.) ;)

Or if it turns out to be a death fic without any previous warning. Or the other way round: the author promises slash, or a certain pairing, but the pairing (or the slash) never occurs.

But in these cases, I tell the author in question why exactly I felt was wrong, and why I felt disapp0ointed. And most of the times it has something to do with a specific plot point of the author. If the fic just does not is my cup of tea, I am most likely to leave quietly, without saying "this was crap and I was bored to tears, just so ya now!!!101!" Weird.

[wiseheart.livejournal.com]

Well, I for my part never left a negative review in my life. If the story disappoints me, or I find something in it I dislike, I simply leave. My time is too precious for me to waste it for such things. If I like the story a great deal but find a factual error in it, I usually write the author privately, so that they can correct it if they want, but that's all.