My first bomb

[Rob_Royale]

And it's in I/T of all places. I've had others that didn't do well, but those can be chalked up to 750 words and LW.
The plan was to do an unabashed slutty stepmom story. Her affairs are discovered and she's blackmailed by her stepsons friend.
Part 1 barely made it over the red H mark and took nearly a year to get there. Part two is being received poorly, not even reaching the four star mark. Clearly, I have erred somewhere. I thought it was a fun conclusion.

If anyone has some time to give me a review, I'd appreciate it.
Evelyn Ensnared Ch. 01 - 9100 words
Evelyn Ensnared Ch. 02 - 8900 words

 

[lovecraft68]

Without even looking I can tell you some issues

Step Mom is seen as a cop out among taboo purists and there are a lot of those.

Next, the step mom is screwing the son's best friend, and the 'mom should only be with the son' faction will now be displeased.

Blackmail isn't always well received there either. I/T crowd tends to like their stories to be either somewhat romantic or affectionate or fun stroke, getting into forcing someone to do something for whatever reason is a another sketchy box to tick.

 

[Rob_Royale]

Without even looking I can tell you some issues

Step Mom is seen as a cop out among taboo purists and there are a lot of those.

Next, the step mom is screwing the son's best friend, and the 'mom should only be with the son' faction will now be displeased.

Blackmail isn't always well received there either. I/T crowd tends to like their stories to be either somewhat romantic or affectionate or fun stroke, getting into forcing someone to do something for whatever reason is a another sketchy box to tick.

I was just trying do something a little different than the status quo. Step-mom fit the story better as I wanted both parents to have a history. Thanks.

 

[Andreas_Kreuz]

I was just trying do something a little different than the status quo.

Remember Coca Cola trying to taste differently?

 

[dirk2024]

If anyone has some time to give me a review, I'd appreciate it.
Evelyn Ensnared Ch. 01 - 9100 words
Evelyn Ensnared Ch. 02 - 8900 words

I read both of them yesterday. It was a little bit of a chance for me as I'm not normally a fan of blackmail and as @lovecraft68 pointed out, not a fan of a son's friend tapping his (step)mom. But I have enjoyed other stories you've written so I went for it. I will admit as I read the story I did look forward (hope) that the son's friend would eventually crash and burn.

The problem for me now is, how to comment on this without mentioning plot spoilers. I'll try to be vague for the others. You can DM me if you have any specific questions.

First off, how the story in Ch2 ended made what was at first painful for me worth it.

Second, the inclusion of the young woman in the story was great. The arc from where she started when introduced to the story to her ultimate interaction with the FMC was perfect.

The sex scenes were great.

The quality of the writing was fine, something I personally still struggle with in my stories, so I can't really comment there.

I don't have an issue with the "step" relationship, it just tweaks the dynamic. In fact, I wrote a story about step siblings myself. So that was fine for me.


Frankly, I'm a little surpised that ch2 is doing poorly in the ratings. It only has one positive comment (and no negative comments) so far. So its too soon to judge there. I gave both 5 stars.

 

[Rob_Royale]

I read both of them yesterday. It was a little bit of a chance for me as I'm not normally a fan of blackmail and as @lovecraft68 pointed out, not a fan of a son's friend tapping his (step)mom. But I have enjoyed other stories you've written so I went for it. I will admit as I read the story I did look forward (hope) that the son's friend would eventually crash and burn.

The problem for me now is, how to comment on this without mentioning plot spoilers. I'll try to be vague for the others. You can DM me if you have any specific questions.

First off, how the story in Ch2 ended made what was at first painful for me worth it.

Second, the inclusion of the young woman in the story was great. The arc from where she started when introduced to the story to her ultimate interaction with the FMC was perfect.

The sex scenes were great.

The quality of the writing was fine, something I personally still struggle with in my stories, so I can't really comment there.

I don't have an issue with the "step" relationship, it just tweaks the dynamic. In fact, I wrote a story about step siblings myself. So that was fine for me.


Frankly, I'm a little surpised that ch2 is doing poorly in the ratings. It only has one positive comment (and no negative comments) so far. So its too soon to judge there. I gave both 5 stars.

Thanks very much Dirk. I appreciate the feedback.

 

[WeShallUnclench]

Without even looking I can tell you some issues

Step Mom is seen as a cop out among taboo purists and there are a lot of those.

Next, the step mom is screwing the son's best friend, and the 'mom should only be with the son' faction will now be displeased.

Blackmail isn't always well received there either. I/T crowd tends to like their stories to be either somewhat romantic or affectionate or fun stroke, getting into forcing someone to do something for whatever reason is a another sketchy box to tick.

It seems to be a classic issue that you can "miss the mark" here in ways that have nothing to do with how fun and well written your story is.

It sounds like a great opportunity to "score well" if you know your audience and play exactly to what they want from you.

But to me that also sounds a bit stifling; ultimately you gotta know if writing what you want and believe to be worthwhile* means more than the thrill of hitting a home run with your intended audience.

*though I will say it is a bit upsetting if you cannot write in your preferred category without being "punished" for not catering and/or adhering to implicit genre rules. One would think that it's common curtesy to just not vote when one's only objection is something like, the story doesn't have one's preferred tropey outcome.

 

[Gamblnluck]

t seems to be a classic issue that you can "miss the mark" here in ways that have nothing to do with how fun and well written your story is.

It sounds like a great opportunity to "score well" if you know your audience and play exactly to what they want from you.

But to me that also sounds a bit stifling; ultimately you gotta know if writing what you want and believe to be worthwhile* means more than the thrill of hitting a home run with your intended audience.

It's a know your audience type thing. I have one (I think only one) story in I/T. It is about a older teen fantasizing about his sister taking him over when she catches him coming home drunk. I got over a 4 on my first 2 chapters but a lot of comments about it the femdom. The third chapter got only a 3.6 or so when I let his girlfriend's mother get involved.
It might have done far better in nonconsent.

 

[Andreas_Kreuz]

I think the rating should be for the quality of the writing and the creativity of the plot. But the rating is for matching the reader's personal tastes. There is the story Margaritas at the Mall. by LightningSeed. It has several enthusiastic comments, including one from me. But a rating of 3. And it seems to go down with every positive comment. Hate rating at its worst.

 

[dirk2024]

It seems to be a classic issue that you can "miss the mark" here in ways that have nothing to do with how fun and well written your story is.

It sounds like a great opportunity to "score well" if you know your audience and play exactly to what they want from you.

But to me that also sounds a bit stifling; ultimately you gotta know if writing what you want and believe to be worthwhile* means more than the thrill of hitting a home run with your intended audience.

*though I will say it is a bit upsetting if you cannot write in your preferred category without being "punished" for not catering and/or adhering to implicit genre rules. One would think that it's common curtesy to just not vote when one's only objection is something like, the story doesn't have one's preferred tropey outcome.

Which is a pity as I find the "step" relationship an interesting variation in the Taboo category, but then I am biased as I've written my own story about stepsiblings.

But biases shouldn't be factored into ratings.

 

[ElectricBlue]

Which is a pity as I find the "step" relationship an interesting variation in the Taboo category, but then I am biased as I've written my own story about stepsiblings.

But biases shouldn't be factored into ratings.

Huh? It's pretty obvious to me that a reader's bias will reflect in any score they give a story. That's Scoring 101, I'd have thought.

 

[dirk2024]

Huh? It's pretty obvious to me that a reader's bias will reflect in any score they give a story. That's Scoring 101, I'd have thought.

Oh I'm not saying it doesn't happen. Just that I shouldn't rank a stepsibling story higher than a gay male story simply based on the subject matter. if both stories take me somewhere happy, equally, as I'm reading them, then shouldn't they deserve the same rank even though I gravitate towards stepsibling stories? (and not gay male)

For me, Scoring 101 involves the author's ability to tell a story, paint a picture and captivate me. Frankly, if both stories can do that equally, should I not rate the gay male story even higher since author was able to overcome my bias? Factoring in bias muddies would muddy my rating. imho

 

[ElectricBlue]

For me, Scoring 101 involves the author's ability to tell a story, paint a picture and captivate me. Frankly, if both stories can do that equally, should I not rate the gay male story even higher since author was able to overcome my bias? Factoring in bias muddies would muddy my rating. imho

Readers score stories, based on what the story does for them. They're not going to sit back and think, gee, I wonder what the author was up to, I'll score on the basis of their writerly persuasion. That's an author-centric view of the scoring system, but has nothing to do with the way a reader responds.

You've said it yourself - if the writer can out-weigh your biases, then sure, give the guy a higher score. But that's you as a reader applying your own bias factor. Of course the score reflects bias, it can't do anything else. That's why the scoring system has some validity - it's every reader who bothers to place a vote, doing so with whatever criteria they choose. The writer doesn't get to choose that criteria, which seems to be sorta kinda what you're looking for in a score.

 

[RejectReality]

Without even looking I can tell you some issues

Step Mom is seen as a cop out among taboo purists and there are a lot of those.

Next, the step mom is screwing the son's best friend, and the 'mom should only be with the son' faction will now be displeased.

Blackmail isn't always well received there either. I/T crowd tends to like their stories to be either somewhat romantic or affectionate or fun stroke, getting into forcing someone to do something for whatever reason is a another sketchy box to tick.

Lovecraft nailed it in my opinion. It's not the story, it's just one too many "not preferred" story elements.

Odds are that on a site with more categories or keyword based navigation, it would have done quite well. It's the tribalism of the limited categories here that causes most of this. Most of my stuff cross-posts on sites like that, so I always have another yardstick to work from.

 

[Gamblnluck]

Oh I'm not saying it doesn't happen. Just that I shouldn't rank a stepsibling story higher than a gay male story simply based on the subject matter. if both stories take me somewhere happy, equally, as I'm reading them, then shouldn't they deserve the same rank even though I gravitate towards stepsibling stories? (and not gay mal

It depends where you post that story. We don;t have an 'Open Season' category where your story might be put. The gay category has certain criteria just as I/T pr LW. If you are gonna post, put your story in the right place.

 

[WeShallUnclench]

Of course the score reflects bias, it can't do anything else. That's why the scoring system has some validity - it's every reader who bothers to place a vote, doing so with whatever criteria they choose. The writer doesn't get to choose that criteria, which seems to be sorta kinda what you're looking for in a score.

Ehhh, debatable.

Obviously, you gotta work with whatever system ou have.

For instance, hypothetically, if you were to post a story in that LW category I hear so much about, and your readers bomb it for things like "the cheater doesn't get punished, you're doing LW wrong, that doesn't stroke our collective dicks " then what exactly does the score tell you about yourself and your work, that is worth knowing? @RejectReality said it well, the only thing you experience then is a sort of tribalism and how well you play to a crowd looking for a specific, narrow dopamine button.

Now to some degree, no scoring system is entirely safe from that sort of thing unless maybe you force people to score different parameters (and they answer honestly). You always gamble that what you happen to write just so happens to also be exactly what the crowd is looking for. But again, with tribalism of pleasure-seekers who look to categories to scratch one specific itch, this is kinda pushed to the extreme?

Anyway, my point was not that Lit needed to change its scoring system or that we should make some big propaganda effort to "educate" the readers so that they'll all be real sophisticated and show more interest in things like originality and individual styles.
Rather, it was that every writer here should keep in mind to what degree - in some categories more than others - they are essentially hot dog vendors and their customers people hungry for hot dogs, when they thought they were more like an artisan street vendor proposing all sorts of meats to a diverse crowd of curious explorers.

What is kinda unfortunate is that some things like incest, you are between a rock and a hard place: Post it in a more general category, and people go Ewwww incest, put that in the incest bin so we don't have to look at it!!! but over in the incest category people might go Nooo you're doing it wrong we only want incest that can meaningfully increase the probability of debilitating genetic deformities !!!

(Personally I am glad for the "Fetish" category )

 

[Andreas_Kreuz]

Many authors try to put warnings at the top. I have no idea if it helps.

 

[ScorpioRising71]

Remember Coca Cola trying to taste differently?

Yet here we are trying it again

 

[WeShallUnclench]

Sometimes all that a rating can do for you, both as a writer and as a reader, is tell you "Wow, those people are NOT my people".

 

[TheArsonist]

what exactly does the score tell you about yourself and your work, that is worth knowing?

Not much, but the score doesn't exist for the benefit of the author, but for the benefit of the readers. And to readers it tells them whether they are likely to enjoy the story. And of course, one factor that influences that is how well it fits the sort of story and sexual fantasy they enjoy, so it's a legitimate consideration.

I don't think readers ought to "punish" stories that don't hit their particular buttons by giving ratings at the bottom of the scale (as long as there is enough info in the tags etc. that they don't feel tricked into reading it), but it's perfectly reasonable to give less than five stars simply because you don't find it hot.

 

[WeShallUnclench]

Not much, but the score doesn't exist for the benefit of the author, but for the benefit of the readers.

Yeah but see in some cases I find this REALLY doubtful as well.

When I see a story below 4, I expect something like poor grammar and a narrative core that boils down to "Uuuuuh... Big tiddies... Uuuuuh those tiddies... were so big... tiddies... tit... UuuArgh... Oh yeah, that's the stuff... Huh, weird, now I don't feel like writing this story anymore, guess I'll just wrap this up".

And often enough, that's kinda what it indicates. But then again, I stumble upon 4.6 stories that are not much better, and I know for a fact there are under 4 stories that ARE significantly better than that, and indeed better than some high scoring stories.

This can make it hard to find stories I like, as a reader, because my perfect story might hide behind an under 4 rating, while something genuinely painful to look at can parade with a big blazing Hot rating.

Again, all the rating might tell you, as a reader or a writer, is how similar you are to other people.

EDIT: One thing I would change, if I was to design a system and knew how to implement it, would be to include a proper "Not For Me" button feeding into a separate score. I might even home in on stories that people give a high "NFM" score.

 

[TheArsonist]

That is kind of the inherent nature of going by other people's ratings: it is only useful if your opinion is somehow correlated with theirs. I think it works well enough to be useful, but I absolutely agree that there are enough biases and noise that it is far from a perfect guide.

The rating is certainly not a reliably measured average of the enjoyment of all readers who gave the story a shot, due to various biases including deliberate manipulation. And even if it were, I would hope my taste doesn't match the average of the site's readership exactly, because based on the rating and comments on some stories, many readers are cretins whose opinion I don't respect.

To get the most value out of the ratings as a reader, you have to be familiar with the preferences of the readership within a category, and where they match and differ from your own. Then you can compensate for them, up to a point.

 

[dirk2024]

Readers score stories, based on what the story does for them. They're not going to sit back and think, gee, I wonder what the author was up to, I'll score on the basis of their writerly persuasion. That's an author-centric view of the scoring system, but has nothing to do with the way a reader responds.

You've said it yourself - if the writer can out-weigh your biases, then sure, give the guy a higher score. But that's you as a reader applying your own bias factor. Of course the score reflects bias, it can't do anything else. That's why the scoring system has some validity - it's every reader who bothers to place a vote, doing so with whatever criteria they choose. The writer doesn't get to choose that criteria, which seems to be sorta kinda what you're looking for in a score.

Okay, you're right about my biases. I thought about this post for a while and tried to recall some of my recent ratings. I recalled one story about a mom-son relationship (which I often enjoy). I reviewed the tags and didn't see any icks, so I proceeded with the story. I enjoyed the read, for a while. It was well written and the sex scenes were good.

The problem was on page 4 (of 4). The breeding kink popped up, and not just in an offhand (breed me son) kinda way. It was, 'Billy's gonna get a new little brother - and a son' level of story line. I don't like breeding storylines and so I avoid stories when its tagged. I especially don't like son breeding mom stories. I don't know why, its just a major ick for me.

Anyway, I one bombed my way out of there. The author hadn't posted another story for years, so I assumed he wasn't around anymore and didn't leave a comment.

That's my confession for the day.

 

[ElectricBlue]

Anyway, I one bombed my way out of there. The author hadn't posted another story for years, so I assumed he wasn't around anymore and didn't leave a comment.

Yeah, there you go. I think a one bomb under those circumstances is shitty behaviour. Fucking back click and leave the author and his story alone. You punished the author because of your squick, when he was writing his story.

Worse, you expect authors to mind read your squicks, and warn you with tags. Fuck NO on that. They're promoting their story using tags the way they want to use tags, they've got no obligation to cater for the delicate. You've definitely got the wrong avatar.

 

[WeShallUnclench]

Yeah, there you go. I think a one bomb under those circumstances is shitty behaviour. Fucking back click and leave the author and his story alone. You punished the author because of your squick, when he was writing his story.

Worse, you expect authors to mind read your squicks, and warn you with tags. Fuck NO on that. They're promoting their story using tags the way they want to use tags, they've got no obligation to cater for the delicate. You've definitely got the wrong avatar.

Look, I would be lying if I said I wasn't a little bit horrified when I read that comment about onebombing, that's essentially an author's nightmare, but:

I kinda want to buy them a beer for just coming out and saying it bluntly like it is. It might not be a NICE perspective to hear, but I'm glad we got to hear it. It's better than wondering where those 1 star ratings are coming from.