4.6 KiB
Writer seeking advice
-
Author: u/Arganthonius *
-
URL: https://www.reddit.com/r/rational/comments/4bzxp2/writer_seeking_advice/
-
Score: 3
-
Created: 2016-03-26T04:22:50
Post:
I have been writing a rational Naruto fanfiction. However, because this is the first time writing a fanfiction, I've been worried over a lot of the aspects of the story and my writing. Mostly, I'm wondering about the best way to get feedback, keeping in mind that I may end up tossing out the fanfiction and beginning it over again if it's too bad. I'm unsure about asking for a beta, because I don't feel comfortable asking for a lot of someone's time to review my work, so I'd also like some advice on that.
Comments:
u/GaBeRockKing [+3] Horizon Breach: http://archiveofourown.org/works/6785857 (38 minutes later)
I volunteer as tribute. No, seriously, I'm willing to beta. I unfortunately can't guarantee that I'll do it long term, and I'm a relatively slow responder (up to a week) but I like to think that I'm fairly thorough. If you're interested, PM me.
The last story I beta'd on was this one: https://www.fanfiction.net/s/7768113/1/Inexorable-Tidings
Although it died.
u/FuguofAnotherWorld [+3] Roll the Dice on Fate (8 hours later)
Essentially you can either try to get shallow feedback from a lot of people by engaging them on a fanfiction site by posting chapters, or deeper feedback from a smaller number of people by contacting them directly as betas/sounding boards.
If you want a mix of about 60% praise, 10% spelling and grammar corrections, and 30% discussion about various plot points, inconsistencies with canon, the mechanics of xyz ect, then post to SpaceBattles. SufficientVelocity is similar but you'll get about half the readerbase and replies. If you want very accurate statistics on viewer numbers, but far less actual feedback, post to fanfiction.net. If you want to spend more of your time uploading and updating stuff in return for more flexibility, post to all three. There are other sites, but to my knowledge their readerbases are far smaller which is sub-optimal for a first story. There's nothing particularly against tossing it out and starting from the beginning on any of the three platforms, indeed it happens fairly often.
As for betas, generally speaking these are people who want to spend their time doing this for their own reasons that are probably largely similar to the reasons writers have for writing fanfiction. Maybe they like the idea of contributing to something that makes people happy, maybe they enjoy helping out, maybe they have some other reason. At the end of the day, they're volunteering because they want to do this thing. So long as you're polite, don't act like an arsehole and credit them for their work then there's nothing to feel objectively uncomfortable about - as little as knowing that may help.
If you stick a little sign that says "looking for a beta." or similar at the start of wherever you choose to post, you'll likely get a volunteer before too long. Or just post "looking for beta" here in /r/rational and you'll likely get a bite or three. Otherwise you could find a writer/person who knows how to word good who is willing to look over your work, but at that point it's really just semantics whether or not they count as a beta. There are a couple of writers I know of who post in their thread in order to get a different beta every time, which is more random in what quality you end up with. Choosing any of the options outlined above does not necessarily preclude you from also taking the other options as well.
Any more specific questions?
u/Arganthonius [+2] (15 hours later)
No, thank you. You've been very helpful.
u/FuguofAnotherWorld [+1] Roll the Dice on Fate (17 hours later)
Then I'm happy to have been of use.
u/callmebrotherg [+2] now posting as /u/callmesalticidae (a day later)
To add to this, Archive of Our Own has substantial audiences, but I say "audiences" in the plural because it depends a lot on fandom.
Naruto looks to have half as many works as Homestuck, which means that it probably has a decent audience. Even if you don't post it on ao3 first, you should do that at some point because of the tagging system. If you add the "rational" tag to your work, then it'll be found by anyone who's looking for rationalfic.
u/FuguofAnotherWorld [+2] Roll the Dice on Fate (2 days later)
There's a rational tag on ao3? News to me.
u/None [+2] (2 hours later)
Just ask. Remember, a beta is a volunteer.
He wants to do this.