Original rant → Part 3~ I will POV your eyes out (rereading this, it doesn't make sense to me anymore)

Other original rant→ Part 17~My reasons for dropping a fic (written while pissed off at fics in general, so kind of mean)

If by some chance the foreword has not turned all readers away, they move onto the first chapter. The first chapters are arguably the best or the worst of the entire fic. I’ve found in cases from when I reviewed fics, read them normally, or wrote them myself, the first chapters are usually on a different level than the rest of the fic.

This is one of the things I’ve noticed as a reviewer. When I review, I often times don’t want to read the fic in the first place, but I do what I must. I find myself staring at the first chapter and basing my leniency on the quality. If the first chapter was written well enough, then the rest of the fic must be up to standard, otherwise the score goes down. If the first chapter is good and the style remains consistent throughout, the score is generally good. When a sloppy first chapter leads into a well written fic, I also grade a little better. I even have a section in my review where I grade whether the author grew or not. The reason is that you should get better at writing as you gain experience with each chapter and you read other fics.

One of the things I hate to hear from people is that they don’t want to change their previous mistakes because people already read it. That is not an excuse at all, and I’ll bet they are just too lazy to change it. I know because every time I post a chapter I reread it when it is already up, and I always find mistakes but say, “Oh well, they know what I mean.”

The truth is, not all readers are reviewers, so Chapter One should be written just as well as the rest of the fic just because readers expect quality always. They don’t care for growth and don’t give a damn that the author is inexperienced. Where there is access to internet, there is access to books. Readers aren’t obligated to read the entire fic because the author asked for a review a month ago and no matter how much they don’t want to, they have to. Readers can leave once they see the seizure causing, migraine inducing, mind numbing colors/bad grammar/clichés/all the other problems that makes someone hate a fic within the first five words.

Rule #1-Do not write your fic in the area provided by AFF. Writers usually forget to put on spell check, and AFF doesn’t correct grammar. Writers see all the ways they can edit the chapter- highlight sentences, change the color, change the font and the size, and turn everything into a reader’s nightmare. Resist! Resist the urge to make rainbows and experiment with the artistic look of the text. What is written is important! I used to write my blog directly into the box and my first few rants are filled with colors of every type; thus I have started going back and changing the colors just because I am so ashamed of them.

Write your fic somewhere like Word. Grammar is checked and sometimes automatically corrected, and colors and highlights are lost during the copy and paste between Word and the text box.

Rule #2-Put spaces between the paragraphs. Sometimes if you copy and paste things from another site you write in notepad, the text box does not default separate paragraphs. It is difficult to put tabs before the paragraphs manually, so AFF does it for you. Livejournal does this-Winglin does not. The space is needed because without it the readers find the chapter overwhelming and difficult to read. Readers usually don’t like to stop in the middle of a paragraph because they’ll lose their place easily, and without spaces, it all looks like one body.

Just the same, I run away from fics that don’t even have paragraphs, if everything is just one long as ramble. A story needs organization, and paragraphs provide this.

Rule #3-Script writing is forever banned. There are so many things wrong with script writing. People usually change color or every character or highlight the names. Often there are ways they indicate what the character is doing while they are talking by inserting breaks with asterisks (*), slashes (\ /), another font change, parenthesis (←→), something. Script writing is usually a substitution for putting in quotation marks (“  ”) and punctuation.

They’re also repetitive with how they present things.

Character 1: “sjdfjdjd” Character 1 said.

Scripts only show what is being said because the stage directions show what else is going on. As fanfics are not plays, there is never a chance for stage directions. Clearly, copying Shakespeare and trying to tell a story through dialogue only is not a proper way to write. Dialogues, a rant for another day.

Rule #4-Do not change the alignment of the text unless to justify. There are those fics that center the text or align it to the right and I don’t even try to read them. They could be wonderful, but I don’t want to make that effort. Why would someone even want to do that? Open any published material and weep at the text reaching both edges! The text isn’t aligned to the right or centered, it is justified!

Rule #5-The size and color is to remain default. Many of the colors are difficult to read and it is pointless to change the colors for a story just to show who is talking or to emphasize a certain scene. The size of the font shouldn’t change just because there is no need. If the reader has trouble with the size, they can change it themselves.

Rule #6-POVs are not to be pointed out directly and/or changed. POV changes show a reader that you can’t focus on one character and develop them properly. Directly pointing it out is also annoying and it takes up space. POVs, when written in first person (using I, my, me, mine, us, we, etc.), should never change. There can’t be Lee Minho narrating something then a random e narrating as well.

The narration is always done by one character or the author. That doesn’t mean that *Author’s POV/Nobody's POV/My POV* can be put. Fanfictions are not autobiographies and the author is not telling their life story. When the author narrates the story, it is in third person (he, she, him, her, them, theirs, etc.).

By simply sticking to one character, we eliminate the problem of repeats when the POV changes and the last event described is said again from the new character’s perspective.

Readers will also no longer guess who is talking through the terrible characterization. Many authors can’t develop their characters at all and it’s impossible to tell who is talking.

I am holding a copy of As I Lay Dying by William Faulkner in my hands. There are 15 different perspectives in the book. The difference between this book and every single fanfic with POV changes is that Faulkner changes the perspectives between chapters, fics do them sometimes after one paragraph, mid chapter.

Rule #7-Flashbacks must be included creatively. In what real novel does anyone write FLASHBACK to show that the event happening happened at a time prior to the one the story takes place in? None. It is a waste of space, it is uncreative, it shows you can’t write well. Instead, just put the flashback in italics, or lead into it smoothly. Also, don’t state how long ago the event happened as your way of creatively including the flashback because that is just as bad.

The worst kinds of flashbacks are the types that repeat what happened previously in the story, sometimes even in that chapter. It’ll be chapter 8 and there is a flashback to what happened in chapter 2, verbatim. Or there will be a POV change and the other person flashbacks to what just happened to describe it themselves. These are the most pointless of all flashbacks.

The other irritable types are the ones that go back to a time that happened before the story started, like when childhood memories pop up. The words, “I remember back when I was seven, I used to…” can make then entire flashback flow in smoothly. It is not abrupt and it seems more interesting. There are so many ways to do it when the fic is in third person as well. Just be creative about it, show your writing skills.

What’s awful is if the author does POVs, they more often than not also point out Flashbacks. POVs and Flashbacks are the two things I look for to determine the skill level of the writer. If they use them, it means they haven’t read a book in their entire life; therefore, I will not put myself through the torture of reading it.

I have accepted reviews before, read the first chapter, and never wanted to talk to the author again. I can tell, and within the time it takes me to read that first chapter, I am praying to the higher powers of writing for the fic to please get better and not worse.

One of the things I preach is to always read the first chapter. It’s unfair to judge by the foreword alone because people those up too easily. After the first chapter, if the story is still unappealing, by all means, don’t read. That is a message to readers and authors. Readers shouldn’t have to suffer more than needed (they need to suffer one chapter), and author’s need to try from the start and expect readers to turn them into the acclaimed writer they hope to be.