Column: Dirty Uncle WTVOC's Fandom Guide to Reviews Column

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Ok ladies and gentlemen. We are back this Saturday with our other Columnist - withthevampsofcourse. Now, her last post was a touch on the controversial side, however, that will not impact her future posts. Her trademark snark and witty banter is a part of this fandom. A huge part. It's appreciated by some and distasteful to others. Does that make her voice any less important? Hale no. So I'm going to DISCLAIMER READERS HERE because apparently my first disclaimer was not adequate:

A community requires ALL types to function. What's good or bad is completely subjective and therefore YOUR opinion may not be MINE, HERS or HIS and vice versa. Please respect that and behave with a measure of tolerance toward our fellow ficsters who ALSO happen to be real flesh and blood Human Beings with Feelings. So if this material is not to your tastebuds...please move right along. There are recs and other items on here that swim along the neutral river quite smoothly.

This Blog is meant for the Community as a whole and opinions expressed here are those of the poster...meaning I'm not into censoring peoples' voices for more delicate sensibilities regardless if we ALL agree on the content or not. So PLAY NICE or DON'T PLAY. Discussion, intelligent questioning, accolades and even blatant disagreement is encouraged...as long as it's RESPECTFUL to the Blogger and Commentors. If it's not...I won't allow it through moderation. Sorry. But I have a responsibility to the people who visit and provide to TLYDF to maintain a SAFE place for them to air their views.

Now, I step off my Smellyia Soap Box and dust off my chaps and present to you.....

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Dirty Uncle WTVOC's Fandom Guide To Reviews

Apparently, I am a pot stirrer.

And I figure I should have seen this coming and have prefaced my blog with a little blurb about why I feel that I’m slightly qualified to rant about reviews.

But to preface my review preface, I wanna make something clear here:

I will cut myself if my ranting discourages reviews.

This is meant more as my dry, subtle, witty (yes, yes. it’s witty, dammit) way of getting you to pay attention. Highlight the things in reviews that authors (read: withthevampsofcourse) love, cringe at, or spiral into a bad day from. I often get people saying, “I don’t know how to write a review.” Well, pull up a wireless keyboard, love. ‘Cuz I can and will type your ear off. But first, I wanted to address the whole “who the fuck does she think she is?” issue.

So allow me to do that for a bit before moving on with today’s rule: Your words can hurt. Have a care before clicking “submit”.

I am opinionated, loud, and verbose. So, when asked, I really can talk about any subject, and I will. I think it’s fun. Not everyone thinks I’m funny, and that’s totally cool.

Now, as a preface to the review thing-

I realize that in Twilight Fandom, there are tens of thousands of stories. But maybe, what, a few hundred that get over a thousand reviews? I use a thousand as the number because, well, when compared to say, B&B (if you don’t know what that stands for… then welcome to the fandom), which has over 10k, that’s well, only ten percent.

But most authors out there probably get stoked when they break their first hundred. I know I did the first time it happened to me.

I have three stories over a thousand. Two are co-authored. I’d put myself on that list of authors with a good following. Therefore… my perspective on reviews is vastly different from say, that of a new author. Or even that of one who’s written thirteen stories with under 100 reviews apiece. Or that of a reader. Not everyone is going to be able to relate to my views on the subject.

But here’s the thing-

To those of you who refer to me as a “popular” author, whether you like me or hate me or don’t give a crap about me- a lot of you don’t know what it’s like to get so many reviews a day. I’m not big ego-ing here, or what was it- self-gratifying myself. Trust me; when I’m self-gratifying, you’ll know ‘cuz I’m damned loud. I’m simply saying a lot of you don’t know because you don’t sit in my dilapidated Target desk chair and read things that call you a lazy ass who needs to update faster, the greatest duo in fanfic history, a disappointment, your next wife, or a fucking bitch (that will never stop chafing). So this whole column is from the perspective of someone who is lucky enough to write stuff people respond to who gets told daily how great she is. But I also get put in my place or the hater’s place or whoever’s place it is where the oft-chastised for lackadaisical updating-ness go on a frequent basis.

So please, understand that I don’t speak for everyone. I speak for me. And quite possibly others. But only my name is on this here thing.

With that, let’s talk about today’s rule. Hold up. Lemme put my ego-driven nonsense-writing hat back on. Enough of this somber shit.

1. Don’t ask for an update.
2. Your words can hurt. Have a care before clicking “submit”.

I have a theory about this that I’ve run by several of you, so go with me here.

Have you noticed that I say what I want? If it’s on my mind… I go with it.

The thing is… I reread what I wrote before posting, and I often find that I delete delete delete if it makes me sound like a complete douche as opposed to a partial douche, or if it doesn’t have the intended connotation of sarcasm/snark/disappointment/sardonic amusement/etc.

But I can guarantee that I have never left someone a review that called them a fucking bitch, even if I knew them.

I write hard, talk harder, and play hardest. I fucking enjoy life, man. So when I go to a website or post in a forum or guest write for a blog, I go balls-to-the-wall. I don’t LOL or say ^^^what she said^^^. I insert opinion here in that dry way that I have come to be known for.

Then, when I update, I write these crazy author’s notes that often get their own review. I just… have things to say. You don’t wanna read, we’re five by five, dude. I don’t wanna read your shit, either. The thing is this-

The way I type really is the way I talk. So people maybe read my shit for months, see the crazy verbal vomit I post on twilighted (or nice little blogs)… and then one day, they come out and review. Which I love.

However… they don’t know me, and I certainly don’t know them. Nothing wrong with that… until you sit back and analyze the crazy things people say to me in reviews sometimes. I am a stranger to you; you might feel you know me from my stories or my posts on twilighted, and hell. I invite familiarity with my words, and I do love it when people come and “talk” to me. I do.

This is not to say that I enjoy the rude. I do not talk with my mouth full of food, I try to sit up straight, I always signal when making a lane change, and I do not tell complete strangers that they suck for leaving it “like that”.

Alls you gotta do is PM or email me, and as long as you don’t sound like Jennifer Jason Leigh, I will most likely respond back. But if it’s your first few times reviewing, please. Don’t tell me I write egotistical nonsense. Don’t demand an update. Don’t call me any permutation of bitch, whether it’s dumb or fucking or stupid or lazy. At least until you buy me a Starbucks (venti salted caramel hot chocolate with four shots of espresso, s’il vous plait) and know what my first name is, anyway.

What I’m trying to say is this:

Reread what you wrote. Self-edit. If it’s something you wouldn’t turn in to your professor in an email, perhaps you’d best not post it. Or, if it makes you at all hesitate- read it out loud. This is also advice I give to my little beta-ettes, or anyone who is writing the fic, really, but that’s not my topic to discuss.

Now, let’s analyze a doozy of a review, shall we? And no, I ain’t telling which story of mine it’s for.

Wah ! You're telling me I spent 3 hours reading your story (well, reading and
sneaking outta bed to get food XD) for you to just write an amazing story
(partly, cus its not COMPLETE!!) 0: and I find out that it takes you a while
to update?! Do you KnOW how much that's killing me ?! Get yer LazyAss up and
get WRITING!! Sheesh! L0L! Jus GO! Please? I'll review and read every story of
your's and every chapter and jandco's if you hurry and update cus I really
need to know what happens to ExB !! Its killing me! 0: Anyways, did I mention
how much I love you and how great this story is? :)

Oh, Yeah.
So, I was totally just kidding about the get your lazyass up part XD
but please do hurry! I'll bake you some goody edwardness cake with bella (or
you XD) on top! :)
:) :) :) :) :) :) :) :) :) :) :) :) :) :) :) :) :) :) :) :) :) :) :) :) :) :)
:) :) :) :) :) :) :) :) :) :) :) :) :) :) :) :) :) :) :) :) :) :)

In many ways, this is an extension of rule one. But dude. I get that she loved it; I do. Almost all of my reviews are, at the heart, an excited reader who loved the story. I understand.

So, I’m not the only one who takes issue with this review, right? I swear, I sat down at 6:45am that morning, cracked open my Diet Coke, stalked jandco ‘til she validated my existence, and then checked my email. As per usual.

This was maybe the fourth or fifth one I read. And dude. I was pissed. I almost didn’t finish reading the thing to realize she was simply excited. (I’m not even devoting time to that mini smiley wall o’doom over there. Hot mess.)

Confession: I enjoy when things like this fuel my fire by having egregious errors in not only format and grammar, but in spelling, alternate-spelling, and in containing chat-speak and the smilies. SMILIES. Wall o’doom, people. Wall o’doom. Okay, maybe more like picket fence o’doom.

Now, allow me to say this: I don’t mind criticism. It DOES take me a while to update. And I almost felt the need to defend myself to this person, to say something like “I’m sorry. I’m validating seventy-one stories for the Awards I’m doing with Limona as well as beta-ing for several people, trying to remove the broken-off portable USB drive in my heart over that blog comment by Anonymous Ashley while dealing with a certain-unnamed phone carrier who can bite my twat and oh yeah, both my grandpa and uncle died in the last week.” But you know what? She didn’t need to know that. Why should I defend my three week in-between to a total stranger?

I shouldn’t.

So I didn’t. I did, however, send her a url for this blog. So if you’re reading this, honey, know that I ain’t mad or anything. But please… listen to what I’m saying.

Reviews make me happy because they can say some truly lift-me-outta-fail things. In fact, I’m writing this end bit here post-Scotch update, and hell. Either all of you awesome reviewers read this blog or people are just getting amazing up in this interwebs thing because the reviews are stellar. And so many! I don’t think I’ve ever had such a spate of long, well-articulated, and lovely reviews for an update before. You guys responded to my “challenge” and have left me a little breathless from it all. And I haven’t responded to so many reviews in ages.

Now, go look at them. Count the number of “update soon”s. There aren’t many.

In fact… they’re all sweet, wonderfully composed, and well, most of them are just shocked about the wrench that we threw into the works. Heh heh. Suckers. But seriously…. thank you guys, from the bottom of my cold, dead heart. I am humbled and in love with everyone’s reviews this week.

No, wait. Review etiquette. Right.

YOU DON’T KNOW ME.

That’s where I was going. So when you act familiar with me, I’m cool with it. But not with the rude. Please. Never with the rude. What would your mother say? Or more importantly, what would my mother say, because she has no problem with correcting people’s inadequacies to their face, but to be fair- Mom doesn’t do it unless she feels it’s a serious transgression in etiquette.

To put it simply: in the review barrage I got for Scotch, reading one hundred reviews in one sitting… ninety-nine were so amazing and long and wonderful and just heart-warming. But the only one I can recall with clarity is the one person who said she is going to stop reading because we are going Bella/Jasper.

Your (probably unintentional) harsh words hurt. They just do.

So this is me as my little brown mother, asking you to self-edit. But REVIEW. Please, review. Not just me, but any story you love. Twilight has such an amazing fandom that is filled with the wondrous, the strange, the lovely, the frighteningly shocking and the superfantasmagorical; so click that little button and tell the author something like “Dude. You’re killing me and I can’t remember the last time I enjoyed my own homicide so much” or “ACK. I cannot believe you ended it there, and I will be refreshing my browser in the vain hope that I somehow missed the new chapter notice every hour” or “You are so amazing that I wish you were my neighbor so I could come over to borrow a cup of sugar and distract you while I download your hard drive” or whatever else you can come up with that is a super subtle way to ask for an update. Without being rude. Or calling the person a bitch. Come on. Do it. Make Mama proud.

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wtvoc’s quickie review etiquette number 2:

“Your doing a good job.” First off… “you’re”. It’s “you’re”. Secondly… not my job. No one pays me to do this. It makes me feel like my boss Bill Lumberg just came up with his coffee mug and mm’kayed me about my fic.

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withthevampsofcourse's Must Have Been Love and Welcome Home are treasures of the sexy snark lovers. Her collaborations include Saturday School and Scotch, Gin and The New Girl and also betas 5464686486 fics. She is a collaborator on the Twilight FF Awards - The Eddies & The Bellies. This sister soldier of Brown may talk dirty and throw down even dirtier, but her class knows no bounds.
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