A Self-Indulgent Celebration of Success · 10:04pm Jan 9th, 2021
Last night, The Last Duel managed to be toward the bottom of the feature box with about 100 views. I woke up this morning to find that 600 more people have read it since, and that it hit the top of the feature box. That gives it the honor of being the most popular story I have published on this site. (EDIT: It's also my first story to get 1K views, and is still climbing.)
Four Truths has also been in the popular box, which I can only assume is because of my most recent story's success. I have learned a valuable lesson from this. Namely, that I am terrible at guessing what stories will be popular and what won't. I didn't expect this story to be anywhere near this successful. I hoped for it to be featured, obviously, but Number One Story of the Day is not what I thought would happen. (EDIT: Top story for two days in a row, but who's counting? 
) (EDIT 2: Three days? What?)
There have already been some thoughtful comments, along with plenty pointing out all the ways I misused my thous. (I'm slowly but surely trying to clean up all those problems.)
Still, the immediate and mostly positive reception was a nice way to start the day. Thanks to everyone for reading!
I'd argue Why-Hole and Afterword are both better stories, but the stuff that gets popular is usually whatever has the most general appeal. Or weird Anon fics.
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I know that there is often a difference between what is good and what is popular, but I still got a nice dopamine hit to see numbers go up. It's nice to humor that feeling every once in a while.
Honestly, the fact I even have a body of work for people to talk about is something I haven't really internalized yet. Thank you again for all your comments. I'm trying to get better about responding to them, and I have noticed you on a bunch of my stories. It's nice to know when someone has taken time to read and think about them.
You definitely deserve this self-indulgent celebration of success! Congrats!
Thanks!