A question for my readers... · 6:17pm Sep 7th, 2016
Okay, so a small part of the delay in updating The Mad Seeress of the North has been my back-and-forth struggle with what to do about the escalating turn in violence and sex in future chapters as regards the story tags. War is hell, and it was always planned that once I get into actual skirmishes and in the aftermath of the war's outcome that these two factors would far outstrip the level the story started with - perhaps even moreso now that I am actually mapping out the scenes in detail.
I just didn't realize when I started how little it took to warrant stronger tags than I began with. Adventure and Drama are fairly tame tags, but what is coming is going to definitely need sex and probably gore tags for certain. So I have been back and forth about making the new, stronger scenes into a separate story - an Act Two, if you will, that will contain these elements separately from their tamer Act One counterpart.
Now I also know there are a few of my regular, dear readers that won't read graphic sex and I totally respect that. For those of you that adhere to this policy, would it be enough to flag those chapters if I kept them in the same story as the gore? Would you still read, like and/or comment on the story or shy away from it completely? Please let me know your thoughts as it is far more important to me to accommodate my current reading audience than to court new readers and risk alienating fans of Mad Seeress so far.
Now I'm not one of the readers who is averse to gore and violence and sex. However, I think it is important that if you plan in the future to have such things happening in your story, to have the tags up from the beginning. I think it would be more damaging if you suddenly had chapters at this point (eleven chapters in) that have gory deaths or graphic sex since right now those tags are not present and the readers, especially those who might not like it, are not expecting it really.
You have already established that violent death's can happen (certain idiot's Pegasus springs to mind) but you haven't really established the story to have graphic sex. There have been mature implications certainly but nothing that would hint that we are about to get steamy.
So I think you're safe regarding the violence, you have already established that it will happen. The sex is more iffy, I would either have it in a separate bonus story, or somehow work in a "fade to black" before anything too graphic happens.
That's at least how I would do it personally, then again I am a paranoid bugger who likes to have his bases covered.
Whatever you chose to do, I personally don't mind. But there is a chance that no matter what, some readers will be put off if things suddenly change too much.
Well I've actually seen writers handle this shyness in two different ways. Either one you create an uncensored version of the story, and then gave a link in the title description of the original. Or two you create an unposted chapter, solely for the sex scene and provide a link in the chapter it was originally was set in(Usaully around the part the sex scene was originally going to take place, or in the author notes).
I recommend the second choice, because I seen the first can have some minor issues with the upvotes and downvotes of the uncensored version.
I read ANYTHING as long as it's good, even if it contains gore, rape or death.
Personally, I adore a good rape story, even though gore and death kind of turn me off.
Still, as long as it is good, I will appreciate it!
This is a problem with stories that have many chapters. I've seen it before with other stories here. Think of your entire story arc as a movie. You can't change the rating in the middle of a movie, you have to let your audience know what they are getting into. That being said, it's a problem if you had sex and gore tags, but the sex and gore doesn't come until chapter 8. You will have people who are looking for a good Sombra story that will stick with you, but you will loose those who are only looking for sex and gore. So I guess it depends on what kind of audience you want to attract. If a reader has followed you this far, they are probably not the sex and gore crowd. They may be all right with sex and gore, but that is not the only things they were looking for.
The problem group are those readers who dislike sex and gore in stories. To your credit, you did put a "Mature" tag at the very beginning of this whole endeavor. So you did kind of cover yourself. I think the only thing you can do at this point is put a warning in the author's note at the beginning of these chapters. It is unfair to some of your more sensitive readers because now they have to decide whether to skip whole chapters of a story they've been enjoying, or read something they might find offensive. But at this point, I can't think of a better solution.
Another thing to consider is just how graphic the violence and sex has to be to make your point in your story. The movie, "Inglorious Bastards", was violent and bloody and deserved it's "R" rating. It was a war movie, so you can understand why it was made like that. But Star Wars is also about war. People die, people lose their limbs, but it still got a "PG-13" rating. It all depends on how you handle violent scenes. how much detail do you really need to make your point? Sex scenes are the same way. Do you really have to describe every action, or is innuendo enough. Sometimes it's more powerful to leave the details to the reader.
In the end, you have to write the best story you can, and that might include sex and gore. You can't please everyone, but I think the people who are truly into your story will go along with it.
I know I'm kinda late for this but I'm fine with the sex and gore (not the extreme gore but you know what mean). Heck I read Fallout Equestria and Project Horizon, Homeland. So if I'm fine for they throw at me. I handle this.