Well, I've done it.

[rabidsamfan]

Thanks everyone, for the input. I decided to break the story into four parts, and last night I went ahead and posted, knowing that the next couple of weeks are likely to be intensely on the Harry Potter side of the Force. I'm still not quite happy with the last line, but I can fix that...

The story is here, if anyone is interested. It's a New Avengers story where Purdey and Gambit first meet, based on a pre-series publicity picture and a comment Gambit made in the very first episode. I also brought in a character who shows up (very briefly) in a different episode, which was fun, but a bit angsty, since he kicks the bucket canonically.



Don't get me wrong -- I think ff.n does fandom a great service. It gives new authors a way to get out there, for one thing, and is a great place to dabble ones toes in the water.

But the limitations that are put on the files make me nuts. I couldn't even figure out how to tell the computer that I wanted extra line breaks between paragraphs to show point-of-view/time shifts, so I ended up using way too many horizontal lines.

It also frightens me to notice that, in a fandom as tiny as New Avengers, I'd had a bakers dozen of hits on the first chapter within two hours and two hardy souls had opened every chapter. It's slowed down since -- I'm not quite up to fifty hits total at the moment and some of those are my collaborator -- but still... are there people who do nothing but click on the "just in" story list over there? Or is this "spiders" or "web-bots"? No reviews yet -- the ratio of hits to reviews is always discouraging (often 1/100 or more) unless you think fondly of re-readers -- so there's no way to tell.

Hmmm.

*dives back into reading "Harry Potter and the Prisoner of Azkaban"*

Comments

[claudia603.livejournal.com]

ff.net is a strange, strange bird to me. I finally took down everything I had there because I used to get the weirdest reviews from there!

[rabidsamfan.livejournal.com]

I'll bet they were odd. I always deleted anything that really annoyed me, but left the stories up. I had some vague hope that it might be a model of "slightly better than average" writing for new readers/writers to aspire to. *polishes halo -- accidentally rubs off some of the paint and has to re-gild*

[rubynye.livejournal.com]

I'm glad you posted it, at least. Even if FF.net rather scares me.

[rabidsamfan.livejournal.com]

*grin*

What will really take nerve is if I ever post the story I showed you! This one is a little more romantic than I probably would have written on my own, thanks to my collaborator, but I'm still pleased with it.

[lame-pegasus.livejournal.com]

Instead of horizontal lines I usually use small v's to seperate several parts (instead of the little * I normally used before). And it's a strange thing with the reviews, really. This morning I added the small drabble I wrote a few months ago as an epilogue to Sub Luna, and the echo was phenomenal.

Funny enough Sub Luna has now nearly as many hits (4232) as Winterfire (4324) - which was posted three years ago! And before I posted the epilogue, there were about 3400 hits for Sub Luna; after checking the stats I have found out that at least two thirds of the "new" readers must have read the entire tale. One of them was friendly enough to leave a very nice review - which makes 3 reviews instead of the 41 I got for Winter Fire.

Readers are weird. *shakes head*

[rabidsamfan.livejournal.com]

Small v's, hey? I'll have to try that. It's very annoying, because sometimes I want a break that says "this changes a lot" and sometimes I just want a visual clue that I've switched heads...

I have to admit, it's funny looking at the hits. There are 2 more for the last chapter than the two in the middle, which is silly. Still no reviews, but 1 favorite, LOL!

When a story is posted in more than one place that skews the hits, I think, but I can never quite tell. In any case, though, you're right. Readers are... eccentric. And most of them are quiet. I looked at the Snape/Dursley epic this morning and did some math and it works out to 485 hits per review, so I'm not about to fuss about a ringing silence on this one. I'm just hoping I'll inspire some more folks out there to write New Avengers fic so I can read it!

[surgicalsteel.livejournal.com]

I find the number of hits to reviews on SOA a bit odd as well. Aside from the initial chapter, the one that's gotten the most reviews is the one covering the siege and Halbarad's death. The chapter in which Aragorn has a perianal abscess drained has far more hits, but less than half the number of reviews. *shrugs* Must be a lot of folks out there who don't want to admit that they enjoy reading about Aragorn's backside? I don't know.

I did a re-read of the HP books recently in prep for book 7 coming out. I'll be curious to see how that pans out...

[rabidsamfan.livejournal.com]

Either a lot of people don't want to admit they like Aragorn's tush, or you've got a covey of re-readers who are savoring every line...

I did some HP fics a few years back, and the most popular story of all has a ratio of 485 hits to one review. Scary, innit?

[surgicalsteel.livejournal.com]

lilybaggins might be re-reading frequently. She particularly enjoyed the dysentery and the gut wound. Wants me to give him prostatitis, too.

The hit/review ratio is an odd thing indeed, though.

[rabidsamfan.livejournal.com]

Prostatitis sounds darn uncomfortable and I haven't even got a prostate!

Did you see Order of the Phoenix yet?

[surgicalsteel.livejournal.com]

Not yet. Planning on seeing it at some point, haven't figured out when.

Probably not before next week - I'm on call this weekend and I refuse to pay a gazillion dollars to the movie theater and have my pager go off halfway through the movie.

You?

[rabidsamfan.livejournal.com]

Saw it last night. It was pretty good, I must admit. Liked it better than I remember liking the book, which is probably due to the things which got toned down and left out. (I went with a friend who kept going, "Huh? How are they going to explain THAT one?"

Umbridge is something else...