hi

sooooooo...

heh, it seems odd now. I've read so many stories on this site. hundreds...thousands...and much more then that. there was a time where I had read everything on this site.

that time has since past, at some point you start becoming a little more picky about what you read. And with the shear volume passing through I simply can no longer keep up.

So heres the knowledge only experience will bring.

1. If it has more the 3 chapters with a word count under 10k, it's probably not worth reading.

2. For romances: Life must go on. yes it's about a couple, but these people must have a life. I've read far to many stories where all you need to do is switch the names of the characters and you'll have practically the same story in a different fandom.

3. Do not make your own opinions obvious: yes everyone pours the spirit into there work and often that reflects in choice of vocabulary. However, having a character like Naruto or Squall refering to god as a she or giving a lecture on wiccan or being christian by default makes no sense unless it pertains to SOMETHING in the story. Otherwise its just you with a different name.

4. The best randomness is the kind that makes sense: I know that sounds kinda weird but just having a penguin float by isn't really entertaining. However, having that same penguin float by every time ranma winds up in the koi pond is a little more amusing. from there you could even add on to the penguin. Where did it come from? Why is it wearing swirly glasses? Why are Mouse and Ryoga having deep and profound conversations with it? Hopefully you see where I'm going with this.

5. Not so fast!: Sometimes we tend to rush through things. Even when we're doing things we enjoy...such as writing. So if your writing something really cool, that keeps intrest, that gives you hundreds of possibilities and really interesting outcomes...don't write yourself out of options. It becomes almost painfull watching all that potential entertainment spiral into mediocerty with a grand half @ ending, if you can even keep enough intrest to bother writing an ending for a story you no longer enjoy. Time travel fics are the biggest offenders of this.

6. If your reveiw count on a story with 1 chapter is over 500. PLEASE don't work on other stories for five years before adding a second chapter. Your cruel, teasing people and eventually someones going to pull a misery on you.

7. There has never been a single written page of fanfiction that has truly broken the 4th wall. Putting yourself in a story is not breaking the 4th wall. your simply putting an oc inside that wall. Asking questions or opinions of the reader or having characters looking over there shoulder to look at you and speak is also not truly breaking the wall. YOUR existence must somehow make make sense to the very characters that the author has written. And somehow you must affect the characters in a way other then speaking with the author.

Like I said, it has never been done.

so there you go. any who disagree with 7. well, your welcome to try for yourself and see what I mean.

(update oct 2009) Just Beat Last Remnant...so very very long. Now I gots me a hankering for a good Rush/Emma fic. Except there arn't any. -_-! not even a Rush/Emmy, so if anyone feels up for a challenge then have at er. then again, very few people have actually managed to sit through it so I figure this may take a while.