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Your readers are precious. Help them
My first foray into the How-to category. Some notes on making your stories more 'readable' and therefore, more enjoyable.
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Let's face it. The readers here on Literotica have a lot to choose from. If they have any issues with your story, it's easy enough to drop out of yours, and start up a new one. If you're lucky. Often they'll skip to the end and give you the old one star for pissing them off.
My simple advice? If you want to keep your readers, make their reading experience enjoyable.
Why should you listen to me? I have had some success on the site. I've been posting here for 12 years. I eliminated a lot of backlog in 2001, posting numerous stories, including one that made it to the top spot in the Group Sex Top List. I took a break for a couple of years, then from 2004 through 2008, I posted a few stories a year, hitting the number one spot again, with The Perfect Game, which now has nearly a million views. In 2009, I started attending a writer's group and worked diligently on my writing skills. It paid off with The Accidental Nudist Cabin, which spent a few years at #1 in the Loving Wives category, and was my first contest winner. Since then, I've had multiple #1 stories in 4 different categories (Group Sex, Loving Wives, Exhibitionist & Voyeur, and Romance), had two more contest wins, and have gone from less than 500 favorites, to number 6 overall with nearly 4000 favorites. I have 140 stories posted, over 90% of them have the coveted red H, indicating a score of 4.50 or higher. I may not be one of the best writer's on the site, but I've had success connecting with the readers. I'm willing to share what I've learned.
There are 6 components to creating a story on Literotica. Six. Really. Probably more than you would think. Allow me to elaborate.
1)
Story.
The Content, the message you're trying to get across
2)
Introduction and Postscript.
A chance to talk about your story to the reader
3)
Presentation.
Using the spacing, italics, bold, breaks, quotes, etc.
4)
Titles.
Title and one line description to hook your reader
5)
Tags.
Key information about your story, to make it more searchable
6)
Category.
Information about what kind of story it is
Of these six, three have to do with creating your story, and three have to do with the submission process and how your story is found on Literotica. This document will deal with the three elements of your story. We'll deal with elements of submission later.
* * * The Story * * *
The most essential part of your submission, is a story worth telling. This is not meant to be a guide to improve your writing. Better authors have done the job, and I'd refer you to them. Still, it's worth repeating the essentials.
1)
Have a Story to Tell
Plot, compelling characters, interesting setting. Without such basics, you're wasting everybody's time. Yes, there are exceptions. No, you're probably not good enough a writer to ignore these elements. Then again, feel free to make a liar out of me. I'd love to be surprised.
2)
Watch Your Spelling
Use a spell-checker. Please. How people fail to do this still amazes me. Is it that difficult? One button press, on most editors, and all your very worst flaws are exposed. Half a dozen spelling errors in the first paragraph, and I'm moving on. And I'm patient.
3)
Check Your Grammar
Writing tools like MS Word have a built in grammar checker. I don't write in Word, I write in a simple editor. Still when I'm done, I load the text file into Word, and let it point out the worst of the Grammar errors. Great for catching double words, mixed tenses, sentence fragments, etc. Don't let its recommendations ruin your writing.
4)
Know Your Weaknesses
- check for them
We all have them. I do the your/you're thing all too often. Readers will think you don't know the difference and castigate you for it. Yes, I know the difference, but when I'm typing as fast as I can, the words in my head already out-pacing the keyboard, things get messy. Do a search, check for your common mistakes, especially homonyms. There/their, your/you're, to/too, it's/its, whatever you're own personal foibles are. Two recent stories I read used passed for past repeatedly. Drove me crazy. Don't get me started on lay/lie...
5)
Willing Suspension of Belief
It's fantasy, we know. Still, a 15" cock? Really? Face it, 8 inches is big, anyone who tells you otherwise is lying. Nine is huge. Ten pushes the bounds of reality. Suspend Belief, don't destroy it. It's fiction, not Manga.
Same for 32FF tits. For that matter, you probably never want to use precise measurements, D cup gets the message across. Screwing two hours without coming (cumming?)? Three different studies (including Masters & Johnson) place the average time between penetration and orgasm for man between 2.4 minutes and 7.3 minutes. Not 24 to 73 minutes. Be reasonable. Pacing and control can allow a man to last 15 to 20 minutes. Two hours fuck-fests are kind of ridiculous.
Your hero benches 500 lbs easily? Right. Every woman is 5'2" weighs 100lbs and is a blue-eyed blonde, the most beautiful woman ever seen, with 36DD breasts, a 20" waist, and 34 hips. Except that every third woman is a natural redhead of course. 6'1" tall is average height. By the way, there are a limited number of Navy SEALs. Every SEAL ever born has appeared in at least three Loving Wives tale. The lottery is a one in 20,000,000 shot, not a sure thing. Billionaires? C'mon. Give me a break.
6)
Consistency
Don't mix up the names of your characters. It happens all the time; I've been guilty of it. Be consistent in your stories. Time lines, names, locations. Your readers will remember if you don't. For any longer story, I keep notes of my characters attributes, relationships, backgrounds, etc. I write chapter summaries. I use a calendar to maintain a reasonable time line. Mess up these details, and I assure you, your readers will call you on it.
7)
Write Better
After you get past the essentials 1-6 above, it's time to worry about better writing. Dialog. Show don't tell. Read out loud. Edit ruthlessly. Murder your darlings.
No way I'm going down that path. Not here. This would be 100 pages long, and I'd never say it half as well as others have before me. Stephen King wrote a great book, On Writing. Read it. Take Elmore Leonard's 10 rules to heart. Zen in the Art of Writing by Ray Bradbury. Bird by Bird: Some Instructions On Writing and Life by Anne Lamott. If you want to be a better writer, read. Better yet, read with a purpose.
If you don't have a copy of The Elements of Style, and haven't read it at least once, cover-to-cover, stop writing. Stop. Now. I'm not kidding. It may seem arbitrary and old-fashioned, but the advice it provides will never go out of style.
Alright, enough about the story itself, let's move on to the...
* * * Introduction and Postscript * * *
At the beginning and end of your story you have a chance to clarify things, and connect with your readers. My suggestion is use them.
Introduction (NOT Prologue)
Provide a short introduction. Some people might call these Author Notes. If you do nothing else, you can put the same short description that accompanies your story listing here. I like to make the introduction in italics. PacoFear, in his magical Words on Skin does a perfect job. You might want to check it out. (With over 2 million reads, and a thousand favorites, you probably already have.)
http://www.literotica.com/s/words-on-skin
The elements of the Introduction are:
1)
Any required declarations
Characters over 18 years old, copyright, celebrities, etc.
2)
Heads up to the reader for surprises
Anything that crosses category lines fits well here. Gay themes in an Incest story, for example. Incest in Group Sex. Whichever category you file it under, you might want to mention the other.