Stories Being Rejected

[silborscht]

Hi, I have a question. Is it honestly more important to the editors on here that the proper use of pronouns and punctuation are adhered to or is how hot the story is more important? I'm just wondering because I submit a story and it got rejected for no apparent reason. I sent it to a moderator and she sent it back with all kinds of corrections, saying that it was my use of elipses marks and having "raise" instead of "rise" in there story. Are we missing the point here? THIS IS AN EROTICA SITE...not the grammar police site...correct? Seems utterly ridiculous. Just a thought...

 

[Pure]

Hi S,
I do see your point, but as a consumer I like a minimum of attention to presentation. Do you really think of reading far in a short story that begins. "He was walking tords her, singeing a laffable litel song and she was...looking hes way not thinking of much of anithing that was so wierd her not thinking of anithing what the hell she thought."

Literotica has a bare minimum for punctuation grammar, paragraphing. The stories turned down are pretti lakking in thes thengs if ya know what i mean some are jes dam harda read cuzza the wiegh they r presentid.

Get assistance in the basics if you need it.

J.

 

[silborscht]

That is so very kind of you to suggest this Pure, but I assure you I have no problem with grammar. I am an editor by trade and have a degree in print journalism. But thanks again for your advice, I wont be needing your assistance "if ya know what I mean,"

 

[Pure]

Nothing adverse about your abilities was intended, S, that's why I said "if you need it." But if not from the viewpoint of a submitter, I don't see what you're driving at. The acceptance standards are pretty basic, as looking at 'accepted' stories indicates. Don't ya think?

Having looked a little at rejected stories over the years, theyre very seriously flawed, 90% of the time, though occasionally it's something picky like poor punctuation around quote marks.

J.

 

[silborscht]

Thanks for your input.

 

[KillerMuffin]

I can be of assistance; I have the inside scoop on things--this is the reason I am the moderator of the Editor's Forum. What, exactly, did the rejection notice say? If you don't feel comfortable saying so in public, you can PM it to me. If you don't know how--you never know!--just press the PM button beneath this post.

If you didn't know (after all, no one is born knowing this stuff, right?) you can find the reason by clicking the blue rejection link next to your story.

The site does have some standards regarding mechanics. The reason for this is the readership. It's difficult to get into a really hot story that's spelled badly, has no punctuation, and very little concern for grammatical convention. The editor does not judge stories based on content--except in non-consent and horror stories. The stories are rejected based not on having bad mechanics, but by having noticeable bad mechanics of some sort. This is why some slip through and some don't. That is to say, if the editor notices it and there is a pattern, the story is rejected. If the editor notices it, but it's isolated, it's not rejected.

The editors do not have rules against ellipses abuse at this time.

 

[Spacebat]

I know how you feel, but as an author I am sure you have yourself looked at some submissions on the site and thought how you could have written them better etc etc.

Unfortunately the curse of my terrible typing and the idiosyncracies of this laptop I have to work with mean that I am about to seek a volunteer editior to sort me out. I am sure I am writing the right sort of thing, its the layout that is letting me down.

Heres to the pair of us getting there soon *cheers*

love and stuff

Spacey

 

[Chicklet]

THIS IS AN EROTICA SITE...not the grammar police site...correct? Seems utterly ridiculous. Just a thought...

Well, imho, it's not very erotic to read a story with a bunch of mistakes. It turns me off when I can't make out what exactly the author was trying to say. I'd rather read a well-written, somewhat erotic story, than the hottest erotic story with most of the words spelled wrong.

 

[biscribe]

A couple of things I might be so bold as to suggest. I too, have had stories rejected for seemingly minor infractions - in one paragraph I had two characters in dialogue. The editor(s) obviously prefer only one character to speak per paragraph. I edited my story by clicking "return" once and my revision was accepted almost immediately. While I think there was nothing confusing about my dialogue, and though I may quibble under my breath about why the first version was rejected, I also do understand that there are many folks who might not have understood two characters quoted in the same paragraph. That is a rule that is pretty consistently applied on this site. If you have read other sites that are not as consistently or carefully monitored as this one is, you will understand this point. Sometimes, it seems to me, it is simply a matter of some rules are not allowed to be broken. It may seem very frustrating, especially to those of us who try to write from the heat of the moment so as to capture the emotions and passions of the encounter. Also, the use of certain diacritical marks, like elipses and so on, are spelled out pretty clearly in the submission area. Check it out. If what you have written seems to comply with the rules there then take up your beef with the powers that be. Otherwise, do what I do: shrug my shoulders, take another sip of wine, and make the corrections - however unnecessary they seem to be - smile and type "Is that all better?" Mentally, you may then add whatever expletives you may be thinking at the moment. One more thing, in the submissions area, you can check out how many times your story was accessed by an editor before it is accepted or rejected. That might tell you how your story is doing under review.

Don't know if any of this meant anything to you, but I do hope it helps to make some sense of the situation.

biscribe

 

[JP 64811]

Let's face it. This site is dominated by a few that apply criteria as best suits their mood at the moment. No, I have not submitted. I have read quite a bit and am all for following gramatical rules - even to those of us that can not write using them it makes it much easier to read and become a part of the story.

I have found several pieces that were impossible to follow or become absorbed in due to distracting use of grammar and punctuation. But guess what? They made it through.

Go figure.

Whatever happens don't let rejection at this site stop your creativity. That's the real release; not if rejected or accepted.

 

[Barnaby]

Reasons For Rejection

As I have posted elsewhere, three segments of my recent INTERVIEW PROJECT were rejected at first but in each case, the rejections noted quite specifically why, giving me clear indication as to what need to be changed. I naively thought that, being non-fiction pieces, the age question wouldn't be a big issue, especially since I did not get extremely explicit in those areas when talking with the girls. Still, Lit, and rightly so, steered me around the issue so I was able to get the pieces approved. Check on your Submissions page and see exactly why they rejected you. Then you can rewrite or, as in my case, re-edit. Good luck!

 

[KillerMuffin]

Let's face it. This site is dominated by a few that apply criteria as best suits their mood at the moment.

Actually, this publication is privately owned by two people and all stories are read and approved by one person--just one--whom we call the editor. The number of stories read during any given night runs right around 100. The number of stories actually posted runs between 40 and 80 a night.

The criteria are applied as fairly as humanly possible given the circumstances.

As for the few who dominate the site--as in some of the people who appear to "run" things or who are moderators either n the forums or in the chat room--if it is not the site owners, they have no absolutely nothing to do with whether a story gets approved or not. They--we--do not have access to the story database.

 

[JP 64811]

The criteria are applied as fairly as humanly possible given the circumstances.

Considering the popularity (and success) of the site maybe it's time to expand horizons and explore wider (and more serious) participation by non-owners that might be willing to contribute the time and expertise needed to take us to a new level.

Is there really a valid reason for anyone to 'dominate' the forums, chat or other aspects of the site other than through quantity of contribution? And would that be dominance or enthusiasm?

I have found no other site that serves as a forum for erotic literature, posting of stories or discussion of erotic content that is as well presented or well organized as Literotica - A big thumbs up for the 'two owners'.

That doesn't change the fact that 'fairly as humanly possible' might be stretched to the point of discouragement for some new contributor.

 

[destinie21]

As a reader and an author here I like the way it is. Yes some of my stories were rejected and so I edited them. Some of the stories I've posted have contained mistakes and I'm doing my best to go back and edit them. The reason I enjoy the lit so much is because they do have some requirements. When I read a story that's poorly written or that I can't follow I never get to find out if it's "hot" because I click back. I also do the same with poorly spaced stories because it's just to hard to read.


The folks on the editors forum are quite responsive, spell and grammar check can't catch everything.

 

[Seattle Zack]

I don't know, if you ever hope to sell anything you write you need to get used to being edited. I've had insightful and provoking 1200 word magazine articles hacked down to 600 words of barely recognizable crap. I've had editors apply their draconian grammatical prerogatives to the point where the story became almost unreadable. Lit's standards seem quite lax, and at least they give you the chance to fix and re-submit it. The struggle between writers (who want every word presented as they wrote it) and editors (who want to produce something they think people will read) is as old as writing itself, I think.

I've known people who scribble in journals all day long and complain that their writing is "too good" or "too insightful" to be published, because they got a few rejection slips or refused to make editorial changes. That may be, but that attitude ensures that they'll never get published. Your writing is a product, and you have to put some effort into making it a marketable product. I think Lit makes a balanced effort to produce a quality product while allowing writers a good deal of latitude in matters of style.

--Zack

 

[bridgeburner]

biscribe said

It may seem very frustrating, especially to those of us who try to write from the heat of the moment so as to capture the emotions and passions of the encounter.

I think this is an issue for a lot of writers at Literotica. What I've wondered about as a Volunteer Editor, however, is what prevents people from going back over their first rough draft and cleaning it up? That doesn't wreck the spontaneity or put brakes on the Muse.

I know what it's like to get into a creative frenzy on a story that you just have to get out of you right this very second but when you reach the end of the tale that doesn't mean you're done working. What you have is a first draft. So you go back and you find your flaws and you correct them and then when you can't find any more flaws you turn it over to an editor.

Not every word that flows from an authors mind is perfect and golden at its birth no matter how talented the writer. I'm not sure why people assume that their literary genius is insulted because editors don't accept their first draft efforts.

--I just realized that biscribe may think this is addressed to him/her and I wanted to state emphatically that it is NOT. I just got sparked off on a rant because s/he mentioned something that I've been mulling over the last few days having just turned down a couple of authors who wanted me to edit for them.