The Seven Deadly Fics · 2:31am Aug 9th, 2014
The Twilight's Library incoming folder must be sorted. However, there is no rule to say which order the stories must be sorted in. Inevitably, some stories must fall to the bottom and pool in the dregs, while others get kicked almost as soon as they are submitted. Neither is a good place for a story to be. Here are the seven smudges I doubt you want on your story description:
Easy Pickings
When submissions come flooding in, there are a few telltale signs that mark a fic as an easy kick. Of course, the rating and whether the wordcount matches the folder the story was submitted to are the first checks to make, but there are a few less obvious signs that tell me "read me first and clear me out!"
Under 2k Words
Shorter stories are easy to look through and be done with, but that is not why I like to take care of them first. When a story drops below 2,000 words, it is a sign that either the story is very small in scope or that it is a stub of a story. If the story is small in scope, making it 1-2,000 words long is reasonable. Comedies that exist simply to set up and deliver their punchline, for instance, make good very short stories.
The problem comes when the tags grow more serious. Sad or Dark stories usually need more than 1-2k words to build up their atmosphere and deliver. If I see the adventure tag, changelings, or Equestrian politics in the description of one of these fics, I know I can count on the situation being glossed over, not well examined, or otherwise rushed. Even with a skilled author, it is difficult to do such broad topics justice in that short of a space.
The interesting thing is that the more enticing the premise, the less likely a submitted story of this length is to succeed. This is because a thousand words are just enough for an author to dash off the barebones skeleton of an idea with enough trappings to resemble a story. It is not uncommon for me to wade through a few hundred words of padding and then notice "Aha! That is why this fic exists!" And then it is over.
In short: if you are submitting something under 2k words, you might want to look it back over for places where you can examine your plot or theme more closely. I can guarantee you can do more with your premise.
Errors in the description/short description
The short description is a handful of characters long. Main descriptions are seldom longer. If an author has not taken the time to proofread these small bits of text that will be the public face of their story, I generally doubt they could have been bothered to check the rest. As spelling/grammar kicks are usually short, sweet, and clear cut, a few errors on the front cover will usually earn a quick skim for anything easy to reject for.
In short: your description is the best advertizement for your story. Make sure it looks its best.
Comedy/Random
Random is a troublesome tag. When an author thinks they have a license to not make sense, I find they do not put a lot of effort into their writing. When you give someone a license to not make sense and then tell them to be funny, it only gets worse. The phrase "get it?" comes to mind: if no one gets your jokes, you will not make them laugh. You will be left hanging. Fortunately, these are mostly shorts, so they are generally painless to glance through. Easy to reject does not get your story a ribbon, though.
In short: should you find yourself combining these two tags, you need to ask yourself "What is the most amount of sense I can make and still deliver my punchline?" If you find you can make your joke AND make sense, you will make a far better story by editing until you can remove the random tag.
Rainbow Tags
With every tag comes the expectation that the story has another necessary component. If your premise simply could not be realized without being [dark][comedy][romance][adventure][crossover][au], then I suppose that's your place to decide. However, it tells me that the story likely has focus problems or a great number of moving parts that will not be done justice. To show you what I mean, let me break down that example tag set:
[crossover][au]
Notice how much our hypothetical story has changed our setting. Characters from another franchise have been added to an Equestria that is fundamentally different from the Equestria we know. This means both of these changes will need to be explained AND the author will need to have worked all those changes into their premise somehow to justify all the extra effort. Never mind the feat of making a reasonable world out of all these pieces.
[dark][comedy][romance]
This combination of tags is always going to be hit or miss. Dark comedy walks a fine line, and an author is as likely to cross it as they are to do nothing with their premise. Throwing [romance] in there complicates things further: romance asks for reader investment in the relationship. Comedy, especially dark comedy, is usually concerned with sacrilege. So now our author must make tasteful dark comedy while maintaining enough of a straight face for us to buy some sincerity. On top of that, the love interest must avoid feeling tacked on, not take time away from our other topics, but still be explored enough to be worth adding in the first place. I'll get the popcorn.
[adventure]
And behind all of these changed circumstances and conflicting tones, there is going to be an overarching plot with its own circumstances the author will have to explore and make sense of while finding enough time for the other tags. Even 100k words might not be enough for all of this. If it is that long, perhaps it has a chance. If I find all that on a 10k word complete story, I am going to be quite skeptical.
In short: if you find yourself with a 10k word or less story with over 3 tags, you might consider reconsidering whether some of them are necessary. If you've got 5 or 6, you had better have the wordcount to fully explore them.
The Dregs
Here we have the last stories to be sorted. Perhaps they are avoided like the plague, or perhaps every other story looks better to examine first. Either way, these stories always take effort to pick up.
The Anthro Tag/Humanized
Equestria Girls aside, the one thing that nags at the back of my mind is "why?" A clear artistic choice has been made to forgoe writing ponies as ponies in a medium where the visuals do not especially matter. I find myself looking for how the story was improved or altered at all as a result of this change, and I rarely find an answer. The most common effect is to make everything feel mundane.
This is not to say that it cannot be done reasonably well. The better anthro or humanized stories will usually be darker and grittier with the disconnect from the Equestria we know helping to make the grim tone more palatable. However, if it is not EqG, and the story is supposed to mirror the show universe, every mention of hands or other human-centered details nags at the mind: "Oh, right, this isn't the Equestria I know, except wait, yes, it is supposed to be that way, except everyone has hands for some reason..." Imagine that thought happening a few times every ~1k words and you can see how it can turn a generically passable story into a slog.
In short: if you add the anthro tag, it had better be tied as close to your premise as possible. Not to say the tag alone is a deal killer, but it can be that subtle type of annoying that everyone will notice, but no one will be able to put their finger on. Like dark or random, it is not something to add casually.
Self-Deprecating Description
When an author submits a story publicly, there is an underlying assumption that people are expected to read it. No one is obligated, of course, but the idea of making it public is that someone, somewhere will take the time to read your story. To put on the front cover "the author thinks this story is bad, so be nice" is a confusing thing for a reader. If the author has no faith in it, are there not other stories we would rather be reading out there? If they know it is bad, why have the not cleaned it up? Why even tell the reader that your story is bad or you are inexperienced when there is a chance people might think otherwise? To point it out robs you of a lot of benefit of the doubt.
Now imagine finding a story in the incoming folder of a story quality review group (not editing -- there's a big difference). "This story is bad, but you should consider putting it in with your good stories, lol" is the nicest message I can make of it. But, of course, I have to read it anyway, and if the author happens to be mistaken about their skill level, I have to put my group's quality seal on a story that the author has labeled as being no good. It can make a reviewer cranky.
Of course, generally I find nine times out of ten when there is self-deprecation in the description, the author is as green as they say they are or simply did not care. However, it never has me going into a story in a good mood, which is why these usually sink to the bottom.
In short: if you know it is bad, fix it before you ask someone to judge it for quality. If you cannot find any changes to make, then give yourself the benefit of the doubt and do not call yourself out in the description. Let the readers make up their own minds.
Suicide/Abuse Fics
There is a difference between forced feels and genuine feels. The problem is that with these kinds of stories, the subject matter has so much baggage attached that it is hard to make a story that does not feel like it is propped up on the subject matter. It does not help that these unfortunate topics have taken up residence as some of the first sensational, dark and edgy experience teen authors come across, get shocked by, and have to work that initial shock into a story somehow. There is nothing worse than a new author aiming for feels while trying to cover a sensitive topic that they have no actual experience with. It is common enough that I cringe whenever I see a story with this subject matter in the incoming folder. Nothing good ever comes of it.
In short: leave these topics to people who have first hand experience, are close to someone with first hand experience, or have done their homework. Even then, tread with caution.
Thanks for taking the time to write this up. I'm not at a skill level to get a fic accepted in Twilight's Library, but all of this seems to be useful in writing a fic of a certain genre, so I'd say it's good advice for anyone wanting to write an enjoyable story. I won't be the first to admit that I've fallen to some of the things a writer shouldn't do in my earlier works, but I guess it's a part of starting out.
Good information as usual!
Now to go finish writing my Comedy, Crossover, Human, Slice of Life fic. I should probably add random in there too... because the Crossover material is...
Maybe Romance too.
It also has Rainbow Dash. Do I get rainbow tag badge?
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If you have no prior fandom experience, there is a lot to process as a beginning writer. It gets easier with time.
Just as Manaphy stated, this is good information. Though, I have no delusions of grandeur... at this time, so will probably not be submitting to the library until I get my writing better. I would not want to waste anyone's time when I know I still have along ways to go in writing. I am not being Self-Deprecating, I just know my current ability is... lacking to what I want it to be.
I suck at making those. Someday, I should figure out how to make a better one for my story as I am still not totally happy with what I have.
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The hardest part of getting accepted into Twilight's Library is making the 10 minute window in which submissions are open.
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See, there is a difference between you knowing you have room to improve, and constantly telling everyone else about it. If you know that you can improve in an area, that's cool. Pick the most grating thing and start correcting yourself whenever you notice you're doing it. You won't fix everything overnight, and you'll always find something more to improve, but you will end up more like the person you want to be.
However, no one needs a person to call themselves out or talk down about themselves. For one thing, if it is really that bad, we already know and are wondering why the issue was not fixed before posting. They saw it and took the time to point it out, so why was nothing done about the actual problem? If it is a general issue such as a person's opinion of themself, then there is not much point in bringing it up -- it just changes the topic of conversation to bad vibes that no one can do anything about at the moment. Not fun for anyone.
However, if it is not actually that bad, then it starts to sound like the speaker will not let us ignore those issues and be satisfied with noticing their positive qualities or having no opinion one way or another. Comes off as attention-hogging, truth be told. While we notice our own faults a lot, the secret is that no one else has the time or patience to track every suboptimal decision we make, and if we actually kept a tally on everyone, no one would be friends anymore. No one has time to focus on the negative. We make a fuss when it is in our way, but otherwise why bother?
In short: no one will notice your mistakes if you act natural, fix what you can when you notice, and don't call attention to them, as no one really wants to notice them in the first place.
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Too true, too true
Hopefully with the more frequent openings, people are working their submissions out of their system. Maybe incoming will be open for TWO whole minutes next time
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I have fixed a few things I noticed after the fact in my own story, that the editor I had and I missed. Doubt anyone knows since I didn't point anything out, like you said, and no one complained about it in comments. Well, I did on one thing, but I had to since it changed the time frame of something.