PrevertOne
Really Experienced
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- Oct 21, 2009
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A question for writers. Has anyone wrote a story where the first part does spectacularly well but the second does . . . well, not quite.
First part does great, the second . . . meh.
- Thread starter PrevertOne
- Start date
Quite the opposite
I dont know, for me it was mostly the other way round: I started off with a new story, lots to explain, maybe also sharpening the focus while I wrote. And submitted part 1. reception so-so. and then part two was really hot and steamy and everybody liked it.
I dont know, for me it was mostly the other way round: I started off with a new story, lots to explain, maybe also sharpening the focus while I wrote. And submitted part 1. reception so-so. and then part two was really hot and steamy and everybody liked it.
NotWise
Desert Rat
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I have a two-part story in which the first part did better than the second. My other multi-part stories get a better scores on the second part than on the first.
C
CoffeeWithMonkeys
Guest
Yep. I've only posted one multi part story here but the stats go like this.
Part 1 had 16.5k views
Part 2 had 3.1k
Part 3 had 3.6k
Part 4 had 2.2k
And the ratings were equally confusing
Part 1 4.45
Part 2 4.60
Part 3 4.49 (someone go give me a 5 star so it goes to 4.5, hehehe
)
Part 4 4.54
I always wondered why part 3 had a little more reads than part 2, maybe people going back to read it again, but it has lower ratings than part 2. Who knows!
Part 1 had 16.5k views
Part 2 had 3.1k
Part 3 had 3.6k
Part 4 had 2.2k
And the ratings were equally confusing
Part 1 4.45
Part 2 4.60
Part 3 4.49 (someone go give me a 5 star so it goes to 4.5, hehehe
)Part 4 4.54
I always wondered why part 3 had a little more reads than part 2, maybe people going back to read it again, but it has lower ratings than part 2. Who knows!
H
HandsInTheDark
Guest
If you set up expectations in one chapter and shatter them in the next, you take a ratings hit. It also happens if readers being their own assumptions to a story and by chapter 3 it's obvious they are wrong. (No more stories about princesses here for me - too may people grew up on Disney stories).
There's nothing wrong with shattering expectations. You can get good pathos going that way. But readers may respond poorly.
There's nothing wrong with shattering expectations. You can get good pathos going that way. But readers may respond poorly.
C
CoffeeWithMonkeys
Guest
My ratings got better, but my views went way down with each chapter.
I can only figure so many people at least started to read chapter one but it wasn't their cup of tea so they did't read any of the other chapters, but the ones that did continue liked it so ratings were better.
ETA so many people hated how it ended but at least they understood why it had to end that way. Well except for that one person who said they just skimmed the story fast...sigh...
NotWise
Desert Rat
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I think those are both normal trends, but your drop in views from the first part to the second part was really big. The ratings go up because your story builds a specialized audience that likes the story. The views go down because some of the folks in that specialized crowd drop out, don't find the story, lose track--whatever.
ElectricBlue
Connoisseur
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Yes, that's the sane as my multi-part yarn. Folk settled in around Chapter 3 for the long haul, some chapters I could see roughly how many back and read it twice, and the Views count at the end was pretty much the same as Chaps 3 and 4, within 5% or so.
Green_Knight
Literotica Guru
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I've had them go just about every which way.
The only thing that seems certain is that a story in four or more parts will see rapidly declining views in the later parts. I see people who write 30 or more parts to a story. It must get dispiriting to see the views for chapter 30.
The only thing that seems certain is that a story in four or more parts will see rapidly declining views in the later parts. I see people who write 30 or more parts to a story. It must get dispiriting to see the views for chapter 30.
tomlitilia
Literotica Guru
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But the ones that read that far likes it a lot and will vote high. Which is why the top lists are littered with chapter 20+ and above, and very useless in terms of finding good stories.
Bramblethorn
Sleep-deprived
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I've only got one serial up so my experience is limited, but for what it's worth, the views dropped off in the first three chapters and then pretty much stabilised. Chapter 14 (last chapter) has about half as many views as the first. Presumably anybody who wasn't interested in the story had already dropped out in the first few chapters.
tomlitilia
Literotica Guru
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I think the performane of chapters also depends on what kind of series it is. If the series is well thought out story with an arc that reaches across all chapters, the score should likely increase with each chaper because non-interested readers are filtered out along the way. But if the actual story line and character development happens in the first chapter, and the sequels are just piling on sex scenes, then it's likely that the story grows uninteresting after a few chapters.
Green_Knight
Literotica Guru
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I've recently been experimenting with a new form of multi-part work. It abandons traditional chapter or part numbering for titles along the line of:
Girls I have Fucked: Alice
Girls I have Fucked: Brenda
...and so on
The hope is that they will be seen more as a collection based on a central theme to be dipped into at will rather than having to be started at Chapter 1 and followed the whole way through. It also allows me more freedom to switch categories. I can add a LW one, for example, to draw the punters in, in the hope that they'll then read others in less popular categories.
I'll let you know how it goes.
Girls I have Fucked: Alice
Girls I have Fucked: Brenda
...and so on
The hope is that they will be seen more as a collection based on a central theme to be dipped into at will rather than having to be started at Chapter 1 and followed the whole way through. It also allows me more freedom to switch categories. I can add a LW one, for example, to draw the punters in, in the hope that they'll then read others in less popular categories.
I'll let you know how it goes.
