Always trying to improve

This is my most recent story!

https://www.literotica.com/s/what-are-friends-for-30

I would be greatful for any feedback, critique, or comments!

The dialogue was good and flowed well. Though been a while since I was a teenager and I've never been a girl it seemed pretty realistic to me. Some of the sentiments came out as accurate, whether going along to get along, herd vs. loner mentality, bullying, what have you.

Not sure if transition from talking about sex toys to using sex toy would happen that way so fast, especially with history being what it was, though not saying it couldn't. Am guessing you may continue and if you do I'm sure most would want to know who Trish is communicating with though it seems clear she has decided to give it a chance by deleting 'evidence'.

Sorry, I'm not much of a reviewer but this my initial impression.
r5

Thank you very much!!

I have no problem admitting that the sex toy usage does come up more abruptly than I'd like, but the story would have dragged had I tried to stretch it out there. I had just enough inspiration to get them started and hint at more to come for them.

I'm glad it felt authentic. Some experiences are timeless.

AwkwardMD said:

Thank you very much!!

I have mo problem admitting that the sex toy usage does come up more abruptly than I'd like, but the story would have dragged had I tried to stretch it out there. I had just enough inspiration to get them started and hint at more to come for yhem.

I'm glad it felt authentic. Some experiences are timeless.

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No, I understand why you wrote it the way you did. One is always trying to find the right balance. As it was I read a comment where someone said it took too long to develop, of course many feel if by the second paragraph zippers aren't being pulled down and bras unhooked then it's too slow moving.

I'll give you some feedback in the comments section, too. But I'll go into more detail here.

I'm a big fan of a slow build and good dialogue that flows well. I think these are both things that you're really good at, and it's certainly on display here. I also really like Trish. She feels authentic and well drawn. She feels like someone I've known, and that's the highest compliment I can pay a character. Well done. The concept is cute and once the erotica gets going it's fun and sweet, so those are all good things.

If I have a complaint, it's that Quinn is a bit of a conundrum. She... kind of confuses me as a character in a way Trish doesn't. I think this is worth mentioning because it's a very character-driven story, & in particular it's Quinn's motives that drive the story. And she feels contradictory and hard to get a handle on; she doesn't have that sense of fit and instant recognition that Trish does. Which maybe you'd want for a story this length? So I'll expound a bit.

My introduction to Quinn is the words "Quinn whined." It's not optimal and I can't even tell in context whether she's whining aloud or internally or if the foregoing text-ese is meant to be the whine or what... but more to the point this and the rest of the paragraph sets up duelling questions that will keep coming up throughout the build-up. Is Quinn lacking in confidence, or is she actually as stupid as she appears to think she is?

On the one hand maybe she is actually supposed to be not very bright? There's something not quite consistent here: like, if she can use the word "microaggressions" correctly, she probably shouldn't need remedial explanations of concepts like "tangible" and "intangible."

On the other hand maybe she's not actually "stupid" per se, and that's just a slip. There are points where I think maybe she's a person who has played down her intellect, to herself and others, in order to fit with certain popular stereotypes. That's a person I've known in many forms... except that once a person has gone in for that sort of moral self-mutilation, the kind of direct reflection and atonement Quinn does is usually out of reach, especially if they've actually gotten some measure of the popularity they did it for (indeed the more they lack in genuine confidence, the more important the false confidence of the clique would usually be). And they would very rarely, having lacked any independent goal themselves, openly question the mother who assails them about getting a man (their resentment would come out in indirect ways and other forms of dysfunction).

So maybe her motivation for playing the role is something deeper than just popularity? Maybe she only retreated into the quest for popularity when she felt things for Trish that she wasn't supposed to? That would explain a lot -- except she doesn't really show much sign of specifically romantic trepidation, even of the sublimated kind, on her way to meet with Trish or through much of the first part of their encounter. So that does't quite feel like a fit either.

I found myself gnawing at questions like that as I read, which was a bit distracting. Of course it's a compliment that Quinn interested me enough that I was willing to think about her this much at all. Anyway, solid story, hope those thoughts are of some use.

Couple things quickly

Trish is the one who uses Microaggressions, and I figured that was enough of a buzzword that a teen might recognize it more quickly than an abstract concept like diminishing returns.

Quinn's initial drive for popularity, years earlier, was partially motivated by not knowing what to do with her friend coming on to her, but she's not willing to admit that even to herself let alone Trish. Quinn is an unreliable narrator in this respect.

One of the things I've been experimenting with is not overexplaining, and coming as close to underexplaining as possible, as a strategy for keeping a plot lean and fast-paced.

Quinn is a girl of moderate intelligence who, as you suggested, plays herself down to the level of her 'friends'. Part of the trick of trying to make this story work, then, was crafting a wake-up call loud enough to get through to her. The idea of a callous, indelicate plastic surgeon was informed by having been in the room when a friend of mine saw one. She was told that her breasts looked like socks with a golf ball at the bottom.

I'm not saying that to build sympathy for my friend, but to help understand what it's like to stand there naked while someone ravenously picks over your flaws.

Quinn is definitely supposed to be a bit of a mystery, and I'm thrilled that she incited so much internal debate! Trying to get her motivations right was a difficult juggling act. In hindsight, it might have worked better to follow Trish the wholr time...

Good thoughts!!! Thank you!!

Oops. I didn't realize that was Trish who used that term. It does fit her, perfectly.

I don't think Quinn is the wrong choice of viewpoint character. Whether it works for her to be a mystery as such, I'm still on the fence about, but I see your reasoning. Thanks for sharing the story!

I found the lack of context prevented me from getting into the story. How old are Quinn and Trish? 18? 15? 21? How long has it been since they've seen each other? What do they look like? Where are they in life? Why is Quinn trying to re-establish a friendship that ended long ago? Why did it end?

Trish then verbally abuses Quinn. Why does Quinn take it? Why doesn't she say, "Fuck you" and walk out the door?

Mrs. Smith is weird. Why does she refer to Trish as Patty? Why doesn't she have Trish come down to meet Quinn? Why does she disappear into the house, leaving Quinn on the landing by herself? If she hasn't seen Quinn for years, why doesn't she ask Quinn what she's been up to? What was the deal with carrots? Is Mrs. Smith trying to get Trish to lose weight?

We finally get into some explanation when Quinn tells the story about the visit to her mother's plastic surgeon. Creepy story. But the line "She-she turned to me, right in the middle of the appointment, and said 'Don't you worry, dear. We'll make sure you're ready to get a man.' " made no sense to me. Again, we know almost nothing about Quinn. At this point, I'm guessing she's an 18-year-old cheerleader. Why the hell is her mom worried about her getting a man? Most 18-year-old cheerleaders are beating the guys away. She's unlikely to marry for another 5-10 years. If anything, the mom should be worried about Quinn spending too much time with guys and not enough time preparing for a career.

I'm sure a girl in Quinn's position - rich mother, a pretty cheerleader, doing poorly in school - has lots of problems. But you didn't sell me that she's having the particular problem that you state. As I didn't buy into that, I didn't buy into the things that flowed from it.

I think it would have worked better if something had happened and Quinn got blackballed. All her fellow cheerleaders suddenly started shunning her. Her boyfriend dumped her. Quinn suddenly realized how shallow all of her relationships had been since she decided to sacrifice her friendship with Trish for popularity. So she decides to make up with the person who liked her as a person instead of as a cheerleader.

What Are Friends For is currently posted on two sites. It currently has a total of 15 comments within the story sections of it's two postings, and now 3 different sets of feedback from authors. So far, 8letters, you are the first one to mention that there is basically zero personal information for Trish and Quinn. I was curious what percentage of readers would notice or care, and if the numbers above are any kind of indicator, that means somewhere in the range of 5-6%.

That was intentional. What Are Friends For is not a story where the characters were looking for someone to have sex with. They're not appraising features or judging. I had been looking for a story where I might try avoiding any kind of physical description of any kind to see how that was received, and this felt like the right opportunity. Don't get me wrong. I enjoy describing characters lovely bits. To date, this story is the only one like it in my catalog, and if I ever write a sequel, the sequel will only follow suit to allow readers to keep whatever mental image they constructed on their own. I just felt like there were circumstances here where the characters would be looking at each other for emotional support rather than cataloging dimensions, and wondering how well I could translate that into the narrative.

**

I have been described, multiple times, as a writer's writer. One of my stories features an elaborate punchline about a dangling participle, and I feel safe in guessing that jokes like that fly over a lot of readers heads. I do not have broad, universal appeal, and I've accepted that. I write pretty good niche material, and I'm comfortable staying in my lane even if I'm trying to improve. Better doesn't mean broader.

You, once upon a time, left a comment on one of my stories. Chapter 1 of my story Violet. You said it didn't have a descriptive enough title, so you weren't going to give it a try. I think what you wanted was "Girl discovers long lost sister, BUT WILL THEY BANG?", and I'm just not going to name things that obviously. That's not my style, and it's fine that it's yours.

As I stated in earlier responses in this thread, What Are Friends For is experimental. Prototypical. It's not the whole story, but I definitely attempted to imply answers for all the questions you're asking. The story is set in high school, so the range of ages they could realistically be is about 15-19. I thought Laurel was going to put an "All characters are above the age of 18", but she didn't and I'm not in a hurry to correct that.

Trish is an introvert who lives her life through her computer. She wants to do her work through skype and spends more time messaging her friends than seeing them in person. Quinn is a popular, outgoing cheerleader with a brisk social life. As far as re-establishing their friendship and where it went wrong, those things are blatantly answered in the story. It's just not front-loaded into an info dump.

Quinn doesn't fight back when Trish yells at her because she feels like she deserved it, which Quinn herself stated explicitly. She's there, hat in hand, to try and fix things with Trish.

Mrs. Smith refers to Trish as Patty because her name is Patricia. Patty was a childhood name, but as she got older she decided she wanted to go by Trish. One of the underlying themes in the story the fractious relationships between mothers and daughters, and I tried to paint a snapshot of Trish's relationship with her mom by having the Mom use the wrong name.

If it helps, think of it like your mom calling you Johnny, and you're all like "It's John now." Rolling your eyes at the unfairness.

Quinn and Trish were childhood friends. Quinn Smith and Patricia Smith (no relation) were so close alphabetically that every time students were put in a line they were together. As was stated in the opening few paragraphs, Quinn had been over to Trish's house literally thousands of times growing up. In simply leaving Quinn on the landing, I was attempting to imply a relationship where, once upon a time, Quinn's presence in the house was ubiquitous and she was basically like another daughter. She was allowed unsupervised access around their home.

Yes. Mrs. Smith is trying to get Trish to lose weight. That was discussed very directly in the story. Did you write these questions as you were reading the story and then not edit them later?

We finally get into some explanation when Quinn tells the story about the visit to her mother's plastic surgeon. Creepy story. But the line "She-she turned to me, right in the middle of the appointment, and said 'Don't you worry, dear. We'll make sure you're ready to get a man.' " made no sense to me.

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I want you to take this to heart, as best you can. You are glimpsing something that you admittedly don't understand, and I don't think it's because I didn't portray it well. I think it's because a parent not supporting their child in a healthy manner, or supporting their child in an unhealthy manner, is foreign to you. What I was attempting to imply is that this is essential what Quinn's mom did. This was how Quinn's mom bagged a husband and got herself a life she liked, and she sees nothing in Quinn that says Quinn can be any different. Yes, it's abstract. Yes, it's not heavily implied. I know.

Your suggestion, Quinn getting blackballed, is a totally valid one, but that's not my style. In an age of competing comic book universes, each equipped with bigger, badder and flashier action, I will stand here and argue that Unbreakable is the greatest superhero movie ever made. A movie you probably didn't even realize was a superhero movie at all because it's so subtle. THAT is my style. THAT is what I'm trying to emulate, for better or worse.

With regard to details, there are two kinds of people in the world. There are those who read Agatha Christie's masterpiece The Murder Of Roger Ackroyd and get mad and cry foul, and there are those who nod and say "Ok, You got me. I didn't see that coming."

It's just not in me to cater to the former.

Note: I tried to write this reference to a literary work in such a way as to avoid a spoiler, not to try and be snooty about "look how well read I am!" because I'm super not. Agatha Christie is one of the few authors whose works I'm familiar with because my Grandmother and I shared them.

AwkwardMD said:

What Are Friends For is currently posted on two sites. It currently has a total of 15 comments within the story sections of it's two postings, and now 3 different sets of feedback from authors. So far, 8letters, you are the first one to mention that there is basically zero personal information for Trish and Quinn. I was curious what percentage of readers would notice or care, and if the numbers above are any kind of indicator, that means somewhere in the range of 5-6%.

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My guess would be that readers who found the story unappealing because of the lack of description would just stop reading instead of leaving a comment.

AwkwardMD said:

I have been described, multiple times, as a writer's writer. One of my stories features an elaborate punchline about a dangling participle, and I feel safe in guessing that jokes like that fly over a lot of readers heads. I do not have broad, universal appeal, and I've accepted that. I write pretty good niche material, and I'm comfortable staying in my lane even if I'm trying to improve. Better doesn't mean broader.

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There's nothing like this in the OP. If you had said something like this, I probably wouldn't have bothered to give you any feedback.

AwkwardMD said:

You, once upon a time, left a comment on one of my stories. Chapter 1 of my story Violet. You said it didn't have a descriptive enough title, so you weren't going to give it a try. I think what you wanted was "Girl discovers long lost sister, BUT WILL THEY BANG?", and I'm just not going to name things that obviously. That's not my style, and it's fine that it's yours.

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I don't remember leaving that comment. Oh well. Still a valid one - "Violet Discovers Her Long Lost Sister" would have been a lot more informative than "Violet".

AwkwardMD said:

As I stated in earlier responses in this thread, What Are Friends For is experimental. Prototypical.

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Not sure what type of feedback you want then.

AwkwardMD said:

Did you write these questions as you were reading the story and then not edit them later?

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As I read the story, I typed my thoughts. I find that must useful to me when beta-readers give me feedback.

Your story is in a category that doesn't interest me. I read long enough that I thought I'd be able to provide some feedback and then stopped.

AwkwardMD said:

I want you to take this to heart, as best you can. You are glimpsing something that you admittedly don't understand, and I don't think it's because I didn't portray it well. I think it's because a parent not supporting their child in a healthy manner, or supporting their child in an unhealthy manner, is foreign to you. What I was attempting to imply is that this is essential what Quinn's mom did. This was how Quinn's mom bagged a husband and got herself a life she liked, and she sees nothing in Quinn that says Quinn can be any different. Yes, it's abstract. Yes, it's not heavily implied. I know.

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I understood that Quinn's mom is the type of person who constantly worries about her looks and has had multiple plastic surgeries to maintain her looks. I can see a women in that position pushing her daughter to do many things - to work out, to keep at probably an unhealthily-low body weight, to have plastic surgery to fix minor body problems, to hang out with the popular kids, to have the "right" boyfriend - but I can't see her worrying about Quinn getting married. Instead, she'd be worried about positioning Quinn so that Quinn can marry well in 5-10 years. You may have had very different life experiences than me on this issue.

There's nothing like this in the OP. If you had said something like this, I probably wouldn't have bothered to give you any feedback.

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Again, you want me to front load you with information. It's just not going to happen.

I don't remember leaving that comment. Oh well. Still a valid one - "Violet Discovers Her Long Lost Sister" would have been a lot more informative than "Violet".

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What is the point of expecting the title to tell you the story? Isn't that the point of the story?

Not sure what type of feedback you want then.

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That's just silly. Nobody knows what they're going to get back when asking for feedback. If I already knew everything about my story, why would I ask?

The difference here is that your feedback isn't giving me bugs. Those are features, and they're working as intended.

Imagine you had decided to wear your shoelaces unlaced as a fashion statement, and as a statement against the expectations of you to be 'straight-laced' and a good little soldier. The idea is that you're pushing for a reaction, except the only reaction you're getting is a guy who keeps saying "Yo, my dude, you're laces are untied."

Duh-doy!

AwkwardMD said:

Again, you want me to front load you with information. It's just not going to happen.

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And you wasted my time and yours. Swell.

AwkwardMD said:

What is the point of expecting the title to tell you the story? Isn't that the point of the story?

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Do you want people to read your story? "Violet" is an incest story and every day there are many new incest stories to read on this site. A non-descriptive title gives the reader little reason to click on your link. "Violet Ch 01" has 16 comments and 41 Likes. Not a lot for an incest story with a red "H". The story in my signature has received 50 comments and 188 Likes in 2 1/2 months.

If you want people to read your story, use a title that hooks the reader.

PS In Incest, don't publish a two-chapter story. Many incest readers avoid chapter stories. You would have gotten more reads if you had published it as a stand-alone story.

AwkwardMD said:

Imagine you had decided to wear your shoelaces unlaced as a fashion statement, and as a statement against the expectations of you to be 'straight-laced' and a good little soldier. The idea is that you're pushing for a reaction, except the only reaction you're getting is a guy who keeps saying "Yo, my dude, you're laces are untied."

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I'd realize that leaving my shoes unlaced wasn't getting the reaction I wanted. I'd tie my shoes and then try something else.

I enjoyed it. I agree with the first poster here, your dialogue drives it well and I think you captured the characters feelings well enough to be convincing. All around pretty good job. I haven't read much in that category, but your piece made me think maybe I should.

None of this is wasting my time. Like I said, this story was an experiment. This conversation right now is part of it, and part of the learning experience.

I'm not motivated by likes or comments. I enjoy the exposure of sharing my work, but the results are not my motivation. My motivation is to improve by my own scale. Unfortunately, there's only so much i can learn working on my own, so here i am inviting critique and opinions.

I wasn't really wanting to turn this thread into a review of Violet, but we can do that if you want.

P.S. P.S. stands for post script. The term comes from the Latin postscriptum, an expression meaning "written after." It should only ever come at the end of a message, not in the middle.

8letters said:

I'd realize that leaving my shoes unlaced wasn't getting the reaction I wanted. I'd tie my shoes and then try something else.

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This is an interesting answer, and i'd like to talk about it more.

In this scenario, let's say 10 people have had favorable reactions (that is, they've had the reaction you were attempting to ellicit) and then one person is missing the point. Would you still heed the advice of the one person who missed the point and tie your shoe?

Now it's a party

"Anonymous" negative feedback!

I welcome all opinions. I'm glad for the ones that disagree with me, and try to get as much out of them as I can! There are no wrong opinions, but I reserve the right to question them. Any author should be critical about the feedback they get, good or bad.

When someone says "I didn't like X", it's not unfair to try and find out why. If someone doesn't like your main character because she's blonde, and what they prefer are redheads, then there's a ceiling to how seriously you can take that criticism.

To a certain extent, my stories always have an unstated goal of trying to push readers and broaden their horizons. Challenge stereotypes and nornalize fringe concepts that have merit. If you're too comfortable, you're not learning anything.

That goes for me too.

P.P.P.S. Fun fact about Literotica comments. The anonymous ones don't show up on the "Recent Comments" section of the genre front pages. If you want to make a statement that anyone else will see, you should put your name on it.

AwkwardMD said:

I welcome all opinions. I'm glad for the ones that disagree with me, and try to get as much out of them as I can!

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I find this hard to believe given your response to my feedback.

P.S. I didn't leave the anonymous comment. And I already knew the origin of P.S.