Just a Quick Inquiry...

[kriadydragon]

Yes, another curiosity moment.

Have any of you fanfic writers ever gotten into an argument - polite or otherwise - with a reviewer? Had to defend your story or tell them to just plain leave you alone? Or, maybe, in the throes of trying to defend your story, realized that they may have a point? I haven't experienced this myself or anything (not counting the times I've asked people to please be more polite about how they review), I'm just wondering.

Comments

[radioshack84.livejournal.com]

I've never really gotten into an argument with a reviewer, but my stance on reviews is that if the reviewer has a good point (even in the midst of a bit of a rant) I'll take it into consideration. If they are just ranting at me for the sake of being a jerk, I will probably ignore them.

My biggest worry when writing fanfic is that I'll inadvertently write a part of a story that's too similar to someone else's and they'll read it and get mad at me for it. Sometimes a line or a scene from a story I've read will get so stuck in the back of my mind that it will try to insert itself into something I'm writing, even if my plot is entirely different. I've actually spent entire evenings re-reading old fic to make sure I haven't accidentally duplicated. So far I haven't to my knowledge...I hope! :)

This can get especially bothersome when writing whump-fic, because while there are a lot of ways to whump someone, you inevitably get some repetition of injuries (concussions, broken ribs, etc.) and I'm one of those addicts who has read nearly the entirety of FF.net's stuff...so it's not exactly easy to remember which fic I read something in even if I think I saw it before. But anyway, I'm kinda off-topic so I digress. :)

[kriadydragon.livejournal.com]

My biggest worry when writing fanfic is that I'll inadvertently write a part of a story that's too similar to someone else's and they'll read it and get mad at me for it.

Heh, some may not think it but that is an issue. I actually knew someone in another fandom who accused another author of stealing her idea. But when I checked the story out, it wasn't that the other author had taken the first author's idea, it was just that they had similar things happening (both involved a female seriel killer, but other than that the two stories were totally different.)

since then, it's something I worry about myself. I'll even go so far as to warn other authors that I'm about to write something that might seem similar to their story, but promise that the idea came to me before I read their story. So far, the author's I've talked to have been nothing but understanding.

As for expanding your whump horizons, remember - it's not the injuries, but the whump that leads to the injuries that matters. The injuries I give to poor Shep tend to be the same (illness, broken ribs, arm, collarbone, etc.) but how he sustained those injuries are always different (beatings explosions, long-term abuse, etc.) I also suggest looking up stuff on line - in medical journals and what-not; seek out diseases that aren't well known, or make up a disease if it's sci-fi (in SGA, they are in another galaxy, after all.)

[radioshack84.livejournal.com]

Oh yes, I am a frequent visitor of the online medical sites, and the majority of my fic is for SGA, so I can generally come up with plenty different ways to whump, but I still worry for the exact reason you mentioned.

Hmm...made-up Pegasus disease...I'll have to see if I can work that into my next fic. I've kinda been wanting to do more of an illness rather than injury story (though the one I'm currently working on is sort of a combination of both), so we'll see what happens! :)