It's time for another peeve post

[estepheia]

If this will make me unpopular, so be it. I have to vent. Please do not feel insulted. It's nothing personal. Whatever floats your boat, etc.

Hunging season is open. Here's a list of words and expressions that I'd rather shoot myself than use (although I may have used them in my younger days...)

* chocolate orbs traveling the angular planes of his face
* cerulean orbs
* velvety orbs

What is it with those orbs? The only orbs I like are real objects. And the chocolate. Chocolate eyes? a) read it so often that it makes me gag, b) has a horrible eating vibe which doesn't go well with eyeballs. Eeew.
'Cerulean' is a nice word, very pretty. So is 'blue.' But we do know that Spike's eyes are blue, so maybe just maybe we don't need to be told every second sentence. Same with the hair-color. Which means that constant use of 'the blonde' is just as out.

* Spike's soft hair - Oh please. After twenty years of bleaching? You wish.
(There is a brilliant story by Zero that deals with the fact that even Spike has his imperfections and is on some level just a guy)

* childe - noooooo please. As a real parent I find the vibe off-putting. Makes me think of small kids, not of sexy vampires. The whole concept of vicious killers turning into cuddly poppa-bears for their adored childe makes me cringe. (However I *do* see different emotional ties when the vamps are souled)

* sable hair - Ask me what Nicholas Brendan's haircolor is and I sure as hell won't say sable. *snort*

* beautiful - a word to be used with care. How about 'handsome', 'good-looking' and 'attractive'?

* pulsing - in conjunction with certain parts of the male anatomy I think 'throbbing' is the nicer image. Just saying.

* baited breath - shouldn't that be 'bated'?

*sucking - a lovely word used to describe what mouths do. Not so great for other orifices. Anataomically impossible too.

I used to love the badfic thread at TwoP. *Sigh* I never got into the habit of visiting its new home. Sometimes I wonder if mikelesq shouldn't resurrect it here. Sometimes I even wonder if I shouldn't quote a few paragraphs of truly horrible writing, but I don't really feel like offending someone.

Oooh, maybe I can do it behind cut tags. Do not read if m/m smut offends you. Do not read if you think pointing out bad writing is mean. But if you do read it please tell me, is it just me or does this really suck? Is this so-called purple prose?



"Slowly, Spike raised his body until only the bulbous head of Angel's cock remained inside him. Watching those velvety brown eyes flare with gold as Spike slid down again joining them together again was nearly Spike's undoing. Angel's eyes were held mesmerized as he watched the place where his body joined Spike's. He stared as Spike rose again; seeing his hardness bathed in his
Childe's blood disappear into that hidden reasure once again."

later:
"Over and over, Angel slid his way home into the only place he felt truly alive. Inside his beautiful childe."
Wickedly Delicious by Amy.

Comments

[rune-vampyr.livejournal.com]

I must admit that a lot of these lists/sites/forums offering 'constructive criticism' make me cringe.

So I think there's a place in the fan fiction community for serious criticism.

I think that it very much depends on what your definition of criticism is. I’ve been directed to quite a few of these ‘bad fic’ lists over the years, and on practically every single occasion what I’ve read on list wasn’t constructive criticism at all. Rather, it was a group of people actively hunting out ’bad fic’ and then gleefully tearing both it and the authors apart.

According to the Merriam/Webster dictionary, criticism is...

the art of evaluating or analyzing works of art or literature

From what I recall, there was very little evaluating or analyzing going on - pieces of fiction were openly and repeatedly mocked and quite often disparaging remarks made about the author.

Whether or not the fiction was bad or not, isn't really the point. Last time I checked, everyone and his or her dog had the right to post fiction on the 'net if they so chose to do so.

However, the fact that the fiction is bad doesn't give other people the right to hurl ridicule and on some occasions abuse. And I must also point out that *some* of the people hurling said abuse, weren't exactly accomplished authors themselves, although they appeared to be laboring under the misconception that they are.

I've always thought that if you treat others in the manner in which *you'd* like to be treated, you can't go wrong. If you feel strongly that you need to criticize, fine - it's your right to do so. But ridicule and cruelty should certainly not be confused with, nor should it be passed off as constructive criticism. I see nothing constructive in insulting or hurting someone so badly that they feel they cannot post.

Most fic writers want to be good writers. More importantly, they want to become better writers.

True. But not everyone is capable of doing so. Does that give other people the right to drive them from their chosen fandom, though? Simply because in their opinion they aren't good enough?

Criticism helps.

I'm well aware that there are those who neither heed nor want criticism and are quite content to go on their merry way. That is their right to do so. However, I know quite a few authors personally who would rather someone would have mailed them with suggestions or genuine criticism, instead of finding that they were the source of ridicule on a site/list/forum/whatever.

BTW, I'm not suggesting for a second that all of the people on these bad fic lists are guilty of the behavior that I've described above, but there is no doubt that there is a certain element that thrives on it.

I don't think that pointing out bad writing is mean - it's the manner in which it's done that's important. I have on occasion mailed authors with criticism privately. My opinion is no more important than theirs is, at the end of the day - and even if I didn’t like their story, other people on the lists appreciated it. And I doubt very much that *any* of us would want to be the butt of other people's joke on a public forum.

I mean to offend no one, btw. This is purely MHO.