The Librarium has seen a recent boom in content, and many members are submitting reviews for the stories and other literary art within. This is good.
Since the Librarium is a place where members' creativity finds a home (and usually comes from a very sensitive emotional place) we wish to engender an attitude of acceptance. While not every story is going to be stellar, there is a way to factually critique a work without being inflammatory or rude.
We haven't had a problem with that sort of thing so far, but the internet being what it is the possibility exists. Aditionally, and WAY more commonly, there may be members who are new to writing or critique and may wish to have a procedure in place for exercising their nascent skills.
To wit, I submit a guideline for both writers and reviewers on proper ettiquite and form for their contributions.
[spoiler=WRITERS]
- Present your work in a finished, cohesive form. It's a great temptation to write in the New Topic box because you feel your Muse without knowing if there will be time to complete the work. Resist! Use a word processing program to write untill the story's completion, then copy and paste to the forum. WP programs are useful for other things too, see below. Aditionally, present the piece in a visually appealing format.
- Understand that not everyone at RMRK can handle adult content. If your work involves anything that would get a movie an R rating (such as but not limited to: strong language, descriptions of sex, drug or alcohol use, gratuitous violence or hate speech) please indicate it as such in the title OR in the original post and put the work in spoiler tags.
- Use Spell Check. Proper spelling is important to capturing your reader. If the work is ful of mispelnigs, than you run tha risc of alianateng yore awdiyince. This is another instance of how WP's are good for editing your work.
- Posting your name is optional, but appreciated. From time to time, RMRK Librarium plans to compile our works into a bound book or eBook. While you are free to use any name you want, the convention is to use one's name.
- Save a copy of your work. There is nothing so frustrating as to have written a masterpiece and see it swept away in the digital sea because of a minor server or system hiccup. Please retain a copy for yourself, again using your favourite WP. This ensures your work is preserved, and it also hold the added bonus of giving you the opportunities to edit AND keep a collection of your writing.
- If you make a major edit after your Original Post: Revise the title of your work to reflect the edit (i.e. V2.0) and post in the thread again to bring attention to the revision and let us know it should be reread. However, make sure you keep acopy of your ORIGINAL just in case your revision turns out to be, ah, not what you expected.
- Give us a word count. Marginally less frustrating than losing a complete work is sitting down to read a story and discovering it makes James Clavell's Shogun look like a concert flyer when you only have 15 minutes to read. Please indicate a word count somewhere toward the beginning of the post, and if you go above say, 3000, use a spoiler tag.
[/spoiler]
[spoiler=REVIEWERS]
- Read the entire work before giving critique. Sounds basic, but I'm continually baffled as to the number of reviews that include "I didn't read all of it, but..." If you didn't read the whole thing, please don't comment. Even a positive review is pointless if you don't have all the information you need.
- Read the previous reviews. You may find that another reader has said the exact same thing you were going to post. If this is the case, and you still want to post, please indicate that you share sentiment with said reviewer.
- If you don't like a piece, state why in a non-inflammatory fashion. Cite your reasons. It could be as simple as the work not being in a genre you enjoy, or not matching the mood you wanted from your read, but understand that there is a vast difference between not liking a story and the story being crap. Point out errors in grammar, spelling, usage and so forth factually- that's the part of this craft we can look at objectively.
- If you do like a piece, state why in detail. Let the author know what worked. If you experienced an emotion while reading, relate that in your review. Use smileys and color to express your feelings. The point of art is to evoke emotion, and if the author has succeded, reward them! "It was good. I liked it," is not a review. It's padding your post count, and that's insulting to the author.
- Offer alternatives to the flaws you find. We are all writers here. Not everyone has this gift, and not all with the gift have cultivated it. Some are learning to write without the benefit of raw talent, but this doesn't mean they'll never be good writers. Let's nurture each other by allowing our fellows to learn from our wisdom and knowledge. When you see consistent mistakes, offer an alternative: "Instead of X, perhaps you could try Y to acheive a better effect." That kind of thing.
- Be tolerant of other views. Art is expression, writing is art. Therefore, writing is expression. We are all entitled to expression. Unless you suspect something has been written specifically to flame or demean, let it go. Don't read it. If you do, report the post to me or any Moderator above me. We'll look at it.
[/spoiler]
Acknowledgement goes to the participants of the 2014 Short Story Theme Challenge writers, who inspired this post by their courteous, self governing and wise behaviour.
And of course, if you have any suggestions to make these guidelines better, feel free to suggest them.
Loooove it! ;) You make a good mod, my friend!
I was also thinking that maybe a proofreading guide would be awesome? You know, kind of like a check list to have friends (or yourself) go through after your work for editing purposes.
[Spoiler=Example]
==Intro==
Separate what you consider to be the intro of your story.
-Did the Intro capture your attention? Have a third person reassure this, if needed!
-Was the intro paced well? Make sure it isn't too slow or too fast!
-Does the intro successfully depict the situation at hand? It should be fairly relevant!
==Character Development==
Briefly list each character and a few key words of what their personality is. Next, ask yourself the following questions:
-Is each character developed well enough? Will a third person recognize their traits?
-Does each character react to each other in a way that makes sense?
-Did you depict the character's thoughts, feelings, and actions well enough to fit each situation? (Look over each line involving them if you have to!)
==Dialogue==
Separate each line of a dialogue and ask yourself the following questions:
-Did each character speak in a way that suits their personality?
-Does the dialogue depict the proper emotions?
==Descriptions==
This is going to require you to look over nearly every sentence that is created for purposes of depicting or describing an event, emotion, place, person, etc.
-Did the descriptions say a lot with few words? (I like to call this is "Sophist Effect"!)
-Consider the use of metaphors and similes to get your point across by ways of comparison - but be sure to use relevant ones that make sense!
-Does every sentence have a purpose? Even if not a literal purpose - does it add on to the entertainment/mood of the story? This is crucial to cutting back on unneeded fluff!
==Ending==
Now, separate the ending of your story and think on the following questions:
-Was the ending satisfying - basically, did it fulfill the needs of the story?
-Did the ending create strong emotions? (If that was the intention).
-Positive or Negative?
-Was the ending too drawn out? A good ending should know where to stop!
-Does the ending get your point across?
==Overall==
This for the overall look of the story.
-How did the story flow? Make sure it's not unevenly paced! No parts of the story should particularly feel slower than others, right?
-Was the story interesting?
-Did the story carry a message or purpose? (Consider that some stories will simply have a purpose of entertaining)! Did it fulfill the needs of this purpose?
-Does the story remain focused on its direction?
(etc!)
[/Spoiler]
I sort of made one for myself, but it didn't do me much good because I had a biased viewer (Dr. Mc ;o) helping me out, haha.
Quote from: Queen yuyubabe on March 28, 2014, 12:28:02 AM
Loooove it! ;) You make a good mod, my friend!
:D Really? Thank you! I'll definitely look at your material and see what I can do!
Another thing I just thought of:
I've been meaning to go over some of my stories (mostly Miser) and revise them. Maybe we should include something here about editing? For example: if someone were to change their story enough that warrants a re-read or critique by their peers, they could mark it as [Ver. 2] or something. They could then make a major post, listing that they've changed it enough to request re-reads or whatever. B)
Of course, people should keep their old stories somewhere, in case they change it for worse (though I can't see that happening often). B)
I'll put that in!
Loving all the love the librarium is getting these days!