a Calufrax confession

[dbskyler]

I've already previously confessed in my journal that I am one of those sad people who becomes obsessed over how many reviews they get for their stories on Teaspoon. Here's an even sadder confession: after doing a week of recs on Calufrax, I got obsessed over how many reviews other people were getting for their stories on Teaspoon. Yes, after reccing a story in the morning, I would check back multiple times in the day to see if that person got any new reviews on the story.

I really am a crazy person.

But I guess I felt that if an author didn't get new reviews, then my rec hadn't done a good enough job of explaining how wonderful and awesome the story is and why people should go read it right away and leave reviews telling the author how wonderful and awesome the story is.



Looking back, I'm not sure if I always did a good job of explaining why I was reccing a story. First off, it's sometimes a little hard to explain why a story is wonderful and awesome without giving away spoilers (and also sometimes hard to decide what crosses the "spoiler" line and what doesn't). I also found that the more a story hit a lot of my personal buttons, the harder it was for me to write a coherent reason why other people should read it. I especially had that trouble with "Memories Are Killing." That story hits every damn one of my personal Doctor / Sarah relationship buttons, and in my "why the rec" paragraph I didn't mention that at all, or indulge in personal squee, but instead I concentrated on what the story says about the Doctor. I suppose I just felt that it would be stupid to say "read this because it hits every one of my personal Doctor / Sarah relationship buttons," and off-putting to people who don't care that much about Sarah, and I really wanted the largest possible audience to give the story a try, and I truly felt that even people who don't care that much about Sarah might enjoy the story for the Doctor!angst and what the story says about his relationships with companions in general (still do).

Anyway, I did the best I could, and every story did pick up at least one new review, so I succeeded in helping at least one new person per day discover a new story they enjoyed. (thisbluespirit, I'm counting the comment you got in the Calufrax comm since you didn't pick up any new reviews on Teaspoon itself.)

All in all, though, it was fun to rec, and I intend to sign up again after a decent interval. Speaking of which, I encourage everyone to go sign up to rec. It's not hard at all -- you just have to join the calufrax community, then leave a comment here saying you'd like to rec and promising not to rec the same kind of story all week. That's it. Give it a try. Hey, if they'll take me as a reccer, they'll take anyone. : )

Comments

[curuchamion.livejournal.com]

SNOWBOUND. *flails at you about Snowbound and Primsong in general*

(That was the first of Prim's fics I read, and the story - since I had no access to Classic Who at the time and was trying to get a feel for the different Doctors via poking the fic - that made Three "My Doctor". Eeee!)

The most annoying thing about reccing on Calufrax, for me, is that I come from started out in a fandom (Stargate SG-1) where really long fics are the norm. As in, 70k is close to average, while 40k is definitely short. So I never quite know how to balance my own squee over "finally, a really long Who fic!" with the Who fandom's apparent expectation that you'll be apologizing for the length. O_O

[thisbluespirit]

Heh, where are all these randoms comments from, I wondered? And I see, you are trawling dbskyler's archive, as it were. Nice, of course! :-)

Also, yes, Prim's fic is wonderful - I am especially fond of her One and Two fic, because they are so rarely found, and her marvellously thought-out aliens. And it was a privilege to rec Snowbound, which I adored - so glad she extended it to two parts!

There are certainly some amazingly epic fics about on Teaspoon, but, yes, long fics never tend to do as well on Calufrax. Not that you should let that stop you, and I don't think you have to apologise - your reccing style is your own and being apologetic is a bad thing when reccing stuff. I shall have to not to do that next time, too, now taht I think of it. Although it's probably wise to give people breathers on between days to catch up! :-)

Actually *looks at the topic of the original post here* I should add that all of my recs are equally as marvellous as Snowbound in their own very different ways and you should go and read them all to see for yourself. Absolutely. And leave many appreciative comments. :-D LOL (Not that on occasions I do still go back and look... *cough*) ;-D

[curuchamion.livejournal.com]

'Not that on occasions I do still go back and look... *cough*'

Hey, so do I sometimes... ;-)

(Also: PRIM'S ALIENS. YES. They are the most incredibly creative and well-written guest star aliens in all of sci-fi, I do think - and there are so many of them! She is amazing.)

[thisbluespirit]

I am all in admiration of Prim's aliens. They are proper creations, whereas my own are always... well, I'm just not much interested in aliens, really. *blush* ;-)

[dbskyler.livejournal.com]

'Not that on occasions I do still go back and look... *cough*'

Hey, so do I sometimes... ;-)

*raises hand* Me, too . . .

[curuchamion.livejournal.com]

I always check back for new reviews on stuff I recced, too.