For the Literotica authors you admire best, what is it about their work that causes your admiration?

[FrancesScott]

Yes this is a kind of alternate to that other thread, which went sideways.

Don’t just say, “CoolWriter38 is soooo amazing .”

Tell us what about their stories really grabs your attention. Technique? Humor? Ideas? Dialogue? Whimsy? Grittiness? Characters? Evocation of feelings? Descriptions of landscapes glimped in rain through a speeding car window?

The idea here is that other authors can benefit, not through imitation, but by maybe adopting some elements of what works for the best authors and melding this into their own work.

 

[Voyeurkenneth]

When an author uses a word (and not necessarily a fancy one) in a context I would've never thought to use myself. I'll think to myself, "Wow, that's brilliant. I like what they did there. Interesting how their mind just thought to do that."

 

[FrancesScott]

When an author uses a word (and not necessarily a fancy one) in a context I would've never thought to use myself. I'll think to myself, "Wow, that's brilliant. I like what they did there. Interesting how their mind just thought to do that."

Do you have an author in mind who does that well / often?

 

[AG31]

I just posted an encomium to @ElectricBlue on another thread yesterday. I daren't repeat, lest I be considered a groupie. I'm not a groupie!!!!

 

[Voyeurkenneth]

Do you have an author in mind who does that well / often?

Alas, I was speaking generally.

 

[FrancesScott]

I just posted an encomium to @ElectricBlue on another thread yesterday. I daren't repeat, lest I be considered a groupie. I'm not a groupie!!!!

A link would be fine.

 

[FrancesScott]

Alas, I was speaking generally.

No problem.

 

[THBGato]

The stories and the emotional journeys that they take us on with their characters. See the lists in my signature for whom I'm talking about.

Or check the reviews I've written of a couple for in depth analysis:

https://literotica.com/s/review-of-chiaroscuro-and-catgirls

https://literotica.com/s/review-of-the-girl-with-pink-hair

(I keep meaning to do reviews of Limentina's ouevre and AwkwardMD's Portland Saga, but as both were published years before I'd even heard of literotica there's no rush I guess.)

 

[FrancesScott]

The stories and the emotional journeys that they take us on with their characters. See the lists in my signature for whom I'm talking about.

Or check the reviews I've written of a couple for in depth analysis:

https://literotica.com/s/review-of-chiaroscuro-and-catgirls

https://literotica.com/s/review-of-the-girl-with-pink-hair

(I keep meaning to do reviews of Limentina's ouevre and AwkwardMD's Portland Saga, but as both were published years before I'd even heard of literotica there's no rush I guess.)

Thank you

 

[Erozetta]

Most of my favorite writers take my hand and bring me into a world of their own creation, then leave me to explore. They leave room for me to interpret sentences and motivations, they set up relationships that make sense, and they don't shy away from pain.

Their writing makes my heart hurt and my eyes water, but it also makes me laugh and smile and want to keep reading. Their sex scenes are flaunted and open door, full of sensual descriptors of human connection beyond the physical, and they take time to please the reader through the characters.

They practice the heights of lust, dominance, and control, then they carry the reader (not just the characters, but the reader) through aftercare with their words. They soothe the heights of sensuality and hurt that they cause.

Many of them also have a knack for teaching me something, either about writing, about kinks, or about humanity, but I can take something away from their works that I can ruminate on for days after. Sometimes to the point that I *have* to reach out and pick their brain. I'm not typically the type to reach out. I tend to observe and often want to contact someone I admire, but can't because I feel out of place doing so. Many of my favorite authors are ones who have reached out to me because of something I said, which gave me a path in to pick their brain on why/how they wrote a thing I liked.

They are human at an approachable level. They are intimidating at a writing level, but I also have a personal goal to get them to read something of mine and actually think it wasn't bad. (Which I've done with a few of them, so that's my own personal accomplishment and marker of success here.)

 

[TarnishedPenny]

Without naming names:

• Attention to detail. Good descriptions and personifications.
• Credible. Not necessarily realistic, but close enough that it’s believable. NB: that explicitly bars 36G wobblies and 12” willies!
• Passable grammar and spelling. I’m not a grammar Nazi, but really bad is a turn-off.
• The right genre. I have my own tastes and kinks, thank you!
• In general, some emotions, something at least more than endless Tab-A-into-Slot-B.
• Women are portrayed as something more than walking pussies and men are written as caring humans instead of mindless ambulatory erections.

I have a dream.

 

[yowser]

As a reader, for me there are two major elements to a satisfying story.

Intelligence. Are the characters (narrators) sentient beings with even the faintest gleam of cognition? Do they function even a centimeter beyond reach of their genitals? Cerebral is a huge plus for me, but mostly, I want to know whether we have sentient/cognitive beings involved in the events related. (This is the same criteria I have for any creative effort in the mainstream ( books, stories, films, etc.) If so, it is easy to get drawn into the work: ah, here we have people who think, feel, process events, react in an understandable or interesting way. Sam Scribble (alas, no longer with us) was masterful at presenting this sort of story.

Perception. What does the narrator (or by proxy, characters) notice? I am pleased when someone observes things that I might miss, brings me into their world in a way that is unique or not immediately obvious, but the noticing must be special (I do not care one whit about obvious sexual stereotypical attributes: sizes, over-the-top descriptions, etc.) Sex (at least in the telling here on Lit) shouldn't be perfunctory. To paraphrase (and mangle) a Jewish Passover ritual phrase, 'How is this sexual event different from all other sexual events?' Please clue me in.

Sexual experience that is flat and routine (and even taking into the account the old phrase: even bad sex is better than none at all) - so what? Tell me what is special going on for these participants, right now, in their moment. Tell me, tease me, lead me into their world. What did the actions of their fingertips do? How did their actions hit your buttons? What did you do that was special and uniquely arousing to your paramour?

These two attributes, in combination, are astonishingly rare qualities amongst the stories here. Everyone (everyone, not just here on Lit) thinks that relaying sexual contact is a universally arousing activity, but rarely can a story teller pull this off in an engaging and enchanting fashion. It takes skill, devotion to the craft, and an ability to experiment.

 

[TheLobster]

I have a dream.

...that the characters you read about will be judged not by the length of their dicks but by the content of their pillow talk?

 

[Cagivagurl]

stories that engage me...
In the other thread, I listed some writer who's stories I enjoy.
The reason for that... They develop interesting plots.
Not by narration only. They do it by clever use of dialogue. For me as a reader, I love dialogue that reads as if I was listening to an actual conversation. It doesn't have to be reality, IE: It might be in an imaginary world, and or a totally unlikely situation. The dialogue has to suck me in, make me turn the page...
Plots, they have to be interesting. Yes, I realise there are only a limited number of themes. It's how the author twists it, makes it interesting.
Characters, They have to be multi layered. They must be real, have flaws, that are exposed. They must make us love or hate them. The must make us laugh, cry, cheer, and feel their pain.
For me to read to the end, the characters have to be intriguing, interesting.
If the author can group enough of all those elements together to drag me in. Then it is a good story...
Make me need to stay to the end...
The authors I listed do that regularly. I genuinely love their stories for exactly that reason...

Cagivagurl

 

[FrancesScott]

Thanks again to everyone who has contributed. The idea is we offer different perspectives which can only help us in our own writing.