Quote by Seeker4
As a writer, I'm kind of leaning to 100% story these days and focussing on material that will end up on SS (or maybe other markets). But for here, I'd say somewhere between the 50-50 option and the 25-75 option lies my sweet spot. Where a given story lands depends on the story.
As a reader, probably around the 50-50 mark. If I'm reading smut, I generally there for the sex, not just a story.
That looks like a carbon copy of here, sans erotica.
At some point, if you're writing so much backstory, it may as well be a story in itself. There's ways to do it. I have an old novel where the mc has flashbacks. Currently working on a short story where it opens with a past scene of the mc's father dying, to help set why she's the way she is. I don't even think it's a whole page.
The Liberals Cookbook, like that Anarchist Cookbook, but with stuff like DEI and Sweet Baby Inc in it.
Quote by WannabeWordsmith
Absolutely. Novels was invented when the site was first created. Before we could link chapters together.
I get that a series isn't the same as a novel but we have good reason for the 10k limit.
Firstly, the volunteer moderators won't necessarily have time to read 150000 words.
Secondly, page speed, although less of an issue with larger bandwidths available, is still a concern on mobile devices and those out and about or in poor coverage areas.
And thirdly, a wall of text - even if it's broken up with formatting (which we don't offer much availability) into "chapters" isn't very helpful, especially if a reader wants to come back to a piece later. They have to scroll and scroll and scroll to reach the part they were at. That could of course be mitigated to some degree by an automatic ToC if they happened to be at a suitable chapter break, but if they were mid-chapter it's not going to help much. This is not a kindle experience.
Also, if one part had some sort of familial relationship, the entire piece would need to be moved to that category. And people can hide that category from their stories list so they'd never find it.
We used to put tags at the top of the story but since they're shown in the list, you know what you're getting before you click through sonthe actual tags are relegated to the bottom when viewing the story itself. Less to skip over.
Edit: site search and tag browsing are an ongoing annoyance. Hopefully will be fixed one day.
The 10k limit makes absolute sense to me. I honestly don't know how Laurel handles 750+ word submissions, and nearly hundreds a day, by herself. I don't remember the max count per page on lit, but it auto populates another page for anything longer than a single page. But really, and I may have explained it poorly; that's not what I think Lush should do, it was more so an example of a site that functions similar, but has that option. The issue is novel chapters are seperate submissions, instead of actual pages added, like Wattpad or Quotev does. I don't know how much restructuring that would be, though.
Have a few irons in the fire. Have had writers block for a long while, started rewriting some story layouts, that seemed to get things going. Two of them are erotica; a satirical generic high school story, and a transgender story. The others are for elsewhere. I just might publish them here first, and then to Literotica.
Quote by Kee
Having read all this thread my first thought was to axe Novels, but giving it more thought I suggest something of a compromise: leave it for those few people that really want to write what would legitimately fall into a Novel. In other words a multi chapter story with a connecting arc of characters and plot that has a real beginning, middle, and conclusion, where no chapters can stand alone. To me the difference between a novel and a series is the novel is as I just stated and a series is a group of stories that can stand alone but do have characters that may move in and out and there is no over arching story line that connects them all with a clear beginning, middle, and ending as modern fiction novels do.
That's what the difference is. A novel can be a series(Full series by Charlotte Huges), but a series isn't always a novel. It's like the difference between my Trigun graphic novels, and my Calvin and Hobbes books. One is a series of novels telling one story, while just one C&H book is a series of stories, that have no connections or order.
Quote by dronette56
My first thought was to keep the category because a novel is not (necessarily) the same thing as a series, but then I realized that the point was "Novel" as a category. I agree that we don't need the category, but there should be a way to flag the series as a novel, a longer, disciplined work with a beginning, middle, and end, and not a never-ending series. Using tags can help (e.g., Novel-in-progress and Novel), but perhaps we can add a Novel icon (like we do for comp entries, RRs, etc.). Perhaps an author gets a Novelist badge when they ask for one ("Hey, mods, my novel is done!").
The thing about this site, and those like it, like Literotica(despite it's page auto population, once word limits reached per page), is they aren't conclusive to novels. and one has to be submitted as multiple submissions. A novel and a series is not the same thing. A novel can be a series, but a series isn't a novel.
It seems the issue is more with site design, than the section itself. If I'm writing a novel, I'm wanting to get paid for it. It doesn't matter what the character limit is, the site seems to be designed more for short standalone style works, or at least not very intuitive of chaptered stories, like, say Wattpad, or AO3. Which is another reason I haven't done anything over 10k words here. With those sites, it's essentially like sub pages.
As far as the novels themselves, not knowing what they are goes back to site design, and is really an issue with every section, even if they are more catered to something specific; you don't know what it is, until you read it. The bylines are awesome and it's the only site I know that uses them. But they don't help much in determining what the story is. Tags should help. But what would really help is if there was a synopsis, and/or story information, especially in the list, instead of the first few lines of a story. Something like:
Sex Story
"Byline"
Man/woman, Outside, Mature, Novel, Interracial, Young Adult, Monogamous
A 50 something black man and 30 something irish woman, like to add spice to their relationship by having sex outside.
I believe StoriesOnline does something like that. The only reason I see a section like Novels stand out so much with this issue is because of how broad it is. Given site design, even more focused catagories come off just as broad, and honestly they are within the catagory they are. Like Transgender, for example; you don't know what you're exactly getting into, unless it's in the byline, until you read it. They only given is at least one trans person will be in the story. I could be looking for a typical My Trans Roommate story, and have to literally wade through everything not that, blind, until I see a story that eludes to that.
Breaking up novels to scatter the chapters across the catagorical winds, just doesn't seem like a good idea. I know I always don't have sex in every chapter. Mine are also in some way consistant in theme, which might be offputting to some readers seeing something where the main theme of a story is somewhere it shouldn't be, just because of a secondary theme a chapter is wrapped around, like a chapter of an story, because of an anal sex scene.
I find it slightly amusing that even with all the mods, it can take just as long here as it does on Lit, where it's just Laurel.
Quote by joe71
Then the whole world is lazy. NO ONE ON EARTH has the time to get done everything that they want in life. We all have to pick and choose how we spend our time. To not do this is to lack executive functioning skills.
For I, one author out of thousands on this site, to demand that people read every one of my precious nine thousand words would be the height of self-importance. Not only is it not going to happen, it would be arrogant to insist on it. I'm not that important. Neither are you.
Lemme clarify before you keep thinking I think I'm anywhere near a god my namesake may lend one to falsely believe. Because I know my station, sir, and it's the rundown bus station on the bad side of town.
[quote]...or has too much going on in their lives[/quote]
Because that's a perfectly good reason for one to limit what they wanna read, especially if they're in the mood for a complete story. How you managed to miss that part, yet still made the same point, while trying to chastise me for self-importance that I don't have, is a quandary. No it isn't. You were just too hyped up on the first part and wanting to put me in my place. There's an or there for a reason, and the first part was facetious at best, even if there's an ounce of truth.
I'm not arrogant, but I can be "lazy" when it comes to reading something longer than a novelette. Or I may read a novel length story and see a ten paragragh forum comment and say; "nah, not reading that".
Quote by colin123
The cover maker here is so much worse than it used to be, seems they are forever making changes that make things far more difficult for members. As a platinum member i expect a lot more from this site.
The only saving grace is they aren't required, like [removed]. It's the only thing keeping me from writing there, and the funny thing is; I used the app they suggest to use, and the cover wouldn't meet the requirments. As far as here, my problem comes with adding words--it doesn't. Won't even activate the keyboard. Even with assist mode, or desktop mode.
"It was a dark and sexy night." -Snoopy, the worlds greatest writer
Quote by colin123
Also, is it better to have a picture to go with your story or not ?
Yeah, but I find it quite the bitch to use the cover maker here, so I make one elsewhere, that fucking works right. My current submission doesn't have one, and I think another might not. Call it showmanship or whatever, but for stories I'm not getting paid for; it's just extra work I really don't wanna do, anyway. Besides... ya shouldn't be judging books by them, anyway--that's what the summeries are for.
Quote by joe71
I will add that I’ve found this to be true from an author’s perspective and not just as a reader. My “Dick Job” story, for example, absolutely crackles with action, with not a boring paragraph, and it is my only submittal to have placed in the top ten of a competition. Yet despite that recognition, it has only received 3300 views and 32 votes. That places it in the bottom half of my stories for attention. Because at 9000 words, it is just too goddamned long to attract many eyeballs.
Those are lazy folks, or got too much going in their lives.
I look for what I'm in the mood for and go by the summary. It's what its there for.
My stories are never too long, or too short. They end precisely when they need to.
I met Muhammed Ali as a kid. He was going to see somebody that lived in the apartment building both my granny's lived in.
Somehow we were invited to the birthday of the woman who played the wife on the show Roc.
I met Funk Master Flex at his car show, and met DJ Unk there.
I met Jesse Combs at a car show where she was spectating. She actually waved me over to touch the big afro I had at the time.
I think it was Dave Atell I used to talk to on Myspace, before he got real famous.
One of Nappy Roots used to cut my hair when I was in Middle school.
My nephew claims we used to hang out with Jack Harlow when we were kids, but I don't believe it. Supposedly a few times when I was in middle school.
No. I'm not that desperate, or lonely. If I got to the point of blowing good money on a sex doll, I'll just swear off sex all together.
My life sucks, and it's all probably because I was born on a Monday.
I have a story about two people having sex on a moving motorcycle. Something I'd like to try, actually.
Hmmm.... I wouldn't say getting fixated on a certain thing makes one lazy. A one trick pony, maybe, surely. Doing the same thing in different ways, at least when it looks like improvement or some sort of innovation, is not really the bad thing you make it sound like. But I think those people can get stuck just doing the one thing, then it's not so much laziness still, but stagnation. The key probably lies in the stories, all the same thing on the basis, but what's inside. Steven King only writes horror, but I'm sure few books could be said to be just like the others. In a way any of this could be pidgeonholed, but they do it to themselves, anything else is "too hard" or whatever excuse.
I wouldn't say trying something new is jumping the shark, at least as far as the new being something different; going from bondage to watersports, or whatever. Perfecting the craft goes as far as ones mental conception, but is that perfecting ones own craft, or doing something that changes the entire thing as a whole? At some point a subject will be exhausted, at least with their own personal creative attempts, but I guess that depends on how flexable a certain thing is, and how specific a subject is. Bondage and Watersports seems like two narrow themes, while say, Lesbian, as the other user mentioned; so much can be done with that.
Dated; she was 18 and I was 28. I'm 30something now and hooked up with a 21yo last night.
A fat ass is nice, but big tits are best, especially with big nipples. Real or fake, can't go wrong, bigger the better.
Quote by danl2019
s for immoral, ive had sex with two different sisters, and there mother, all at different times all within 48 hours. None of them found out for weeks as I kept pulling this off. I am NOT proud of this, but we were all young and dumb at some point and that was one incredibly sexy family.
I would be proud. I tried to do the same thing, actually.
Fucked in a church? Got caught by the preacher and she slammed the door in his face. Does that coint?
Yeah, I'm Pagan, but it's been a while. I consecrated a house a while back.
I've had dreams where there were people I didn't know in real life. Sometimes they're dissapointing to wake up from. I've also had dreams where it was more me waking into the already active life of an alternate version of me, who lives in an alternate version of my city, but those stopped about two tears ago when he killed himself.
