Coming Back from a Break

I am sorry Storm but you do sound like your whining because the comments are not what you expected or wanted. I get very few comments that are "constructive", most are on how the readers feel about the story and that can be + or -. It takes a lot of time to give comments beyond what the reader feels about a story and very few will bother, if we set that as a standard for comments then very few would ever comment.

I appreciate whatever I get and if I can use what is written I do, if I think the comment is not correct I thank the commentor and then ignore the comment. Not one of the comments on your stories as far as I can tell felt you were a bad writer, or it was a bad story, the only negative things was on the abuse given to a child, and if you are going to write such things in any story you are going to get such comments.

As I and several others have said, just write your stories, whatever comments you get that you like then use them, otherwise just thank the commentor and drop it. If you would prefer no one comment then write that at the bottom of the story and likely no one will but if you do that I think you miss a valuable resource.

Hi Storm,

I rarely read stories with children involved and only looked in your Foster serial because of the discussion. But I really like the story and will continue to read. It's a very interesting setting with strong characters about whom I want to read more. I don't think that the punishments are more severe than in other stories I read on this site. I think I would feel more discomfort, if I would follow the story from the adults point of view. As an adult I would prefer to hug Liz rather than to spank her, independent from the severity. And I think you must be really a very sadistic spanker to find the imagination of spanking this poor orphan delightful.

As I tend to slip in the role of Liz I have no problems with the severity of her punishments. The world is bad and all people have been mean to her. If the adults would be nicer, there would be no story to tell, so what? More important than the severity of the punishments are her thinking and emotions and this part you describe perfect. From Lizzies' point of view the story is very enjoyable, I think it's a theme genuinely made for masochists.


If this was your intention, you failed indeed - I like Liz and its easy for me to understand why she is acting like she acts, even if it's mostly not the best possible way. She is a very lonely orphan!

But please just continue to write as you intended. If I want a story which completely match my own fantasies I could write it myself. I'm reading here to learn, how other persons interprete the (spanking) world.

I've written stories that have got no comments, or at least no comments for months. Actually, I think I have some stories on this that haven't received any comments since they were added here.

I've learned to live with a lack of feedback, because sometimes weeks or months after a story has been posted I get a comment that makes it all worth while.

If you're looking for a discussion of what you're posting, a back and forth discussion on the merits and flaws with constructive criticism, you're at the wrong site. The audience here reads far more than it comments. If 1% of the views lead to comments then you're batting above average and most of the comments will be "I liked the bit where blah happened" or "I didn't see that twist coming but when it did it made sense" or things like that. A few, a very few, commenters go into details but that's uncommon here.

Checking on your stats I see you have three favorites which, when added to the number of comments you've been given, means people really like your work. I've got 43 serials posted here and about 20 of them don't have any comments at all. One of the serials that I put a lot of work into has only had about 21 people read all 5 parts - but I don't mind that because I had fun writing it. It helped me get over some of my problems with the first person - and while I would like if every on this site had read and commented on it I'm okay if only a handful of people like it. As long as one of those handful is me I'm fine with the reception (or lack there) that the story had received.

Goodgulf
(who hope that you post the entire series so he can start reading it)

mati, you have pretty much hit the nail on the head. What I think people aren't understanding is that the feedback surprised me, because people are reading these characters much differently than what I intended. Amidst praise of my writing style, I'm being told that the characters are sadistic, or intentionally abusive, or horrible people. Since that's not what I intended, then I'm going to have to go out on a limb here and say that I am not such a good writer, obviously. I may paint a pretty word picture, but for the majority of people commenting I have not adequately communicated what I'm trying to convey.

Even when I'm writing from the adult perspective, I'm sympathizing as the child. At least most of the time. Less so in my new series. I'm having a hard time understanding the children just yet.

You said:


Do not other writers look for excuses to put spanking into a story that otherwise could clearly go by without it? I'm glad that people enjoy the characters. And it does make me wonder if what my husband has said is true. Maybe there is a story here without the spanking. I'm experimenting with that as well in an entirely different setting. Sure, it's a stretch. But I think that most spanking stories are. And I've read much, much more extreme than what I'm writing here. My problem clearly is the length of the series more than it is the content thereof.

Goodgulf,

Most of us know what it's like not to get feedback. I have a small handful of people who generally do a beta on my stories before they are posted to my blog or my site. Anywhere from one to five people read the stories and give me feedback, do some minor editing (and very little proofreading as my grammar is generally pretty good to begin with) and then the stories get posted there, and later on, loaded here.

But outside of those handful of people, I have not typically gotten a lot of feedback. Most of it is sent privately via e-mail when I do receive feedback, and most of what I've gotten has been positive. I have noticed that the more provocative stories generally do get more comments. I may define "abusive" (in terms of spanking stories) differently than other people, but those that get the most feedback in my experience are the ones that go so far over the top as to be... I'd say inappropriate for posting here, because yes, we're talking about things that become unnecessarily sexual and I'm talking X/x sex. I don't understand some people's tastes. So I don't generally comment.

But then, I absolutely love to hear "nice story." And I'm also very careful in giving criticism if it isn't requested. I have made the mistake of unsolicited critiques before and nearly lost friends over it. And I'm a very good critter, as I've said. That, and I'm overly sensitive.

I posted here honestly asking for advice, not for further criticism. My intention was to seek help in how to proceed based on the feedback that I'd gotten. Clearly the stories have gone in a direction that was unintended for me, and I wanted to know "how do I fix this?" Not "should I fix it?" Maybe people misunderstood. I'm not sure what happened here.

The truth is that I want to continue. I had a very distinct direction that this was going in, and that direction had me very excited. My concern at this point is whether or not it's plausible to anybody other than me, since I've been thinking about the entire thing from the perspective of the one kid in the story in particular, and not from the point of view of the adults.

Oh, well. Not everything works out. I just hope people will give the new series a shot. It's vastly different.

Oh, and Goodgulf, it could be years before I'm finished. When I write a series, it just keeps going until I get bored in general.

If you want to know how to fix it, perhaps you should tell us what, precisely, your goal with this story is. What was the direction and where has it deviated?

-LK