Thinky- what makes fic well written?

[slashxmistress]

How do you decide that a fic is "well-written"?

I see this all the time in seek comms and elsewhere- asking for "well-written" fics and well - that just seems so generic and unspecific to me. (and actually kind of pretentious too tbqh)

Is it 'well-written' because you like it? If you don't like it does that make it not well -written?

What quantifies something as well- written? Good grammar? no typos? Long, pretentious, character studies?

I judge a fic by if I enjoy it , if it makes me think , or feel (and yes horny is a feeling :P if it's hot that totally counts), but some of my very, very favorites are probably not that "well-written" in the English major kind of way. Does that matter? Not to me.

Comments

[milenaa.livejournal.com]

To me "well-written" is mostly a question of style. No awkward word choices or descriptions, overuse of adjectives or epithets, no run-on sentences and no switching POV in the middle of a paragraph. It doesn't have to be high literature kind of writing (on the contrary, I think trying too hard is what makes for a lot of awful writing) but it just needs to be... readable.

Of course all of that is extremely subjective (eta: I wish it was objective, that would make this so much easier *g*), but it's also the reason a story can be beta read by a million people so the grammar is perfect and there are zero typoes and still be completely unreadable to me.

[slashxmistress.livejournal.com]

but it's also the reason a story can be beta read by a million people so the grammar is perfect and there are zero typoes and still be completely unreadable to me.

So true! And on the flipside it's also why a story can be riddled with grammar problems and I won't notice because I'm swept up in the story!

As Jen pointed out above- there's a difference between good writing and good story!

[milenaa.livejournal.com]

As Jen pointed out above- there's a difference between good writing and good story!

Yes, definitely! I think for me, and judging by the cries for good writing a lot of others, the problem is that bad writing just distracts from the story no matter how brilliant it is. If it throws me out the story too much I always hit the backbutton.

Or sometimes, with some of the fic I almost get the impression that the writing is getting in the way of a story that could essentially be awesome. Like say, someone is trying to write Brendon/Ryan and you can tell from the summary and plot etc. that Brendon's supposed to be a good boyfriend and it's supposed to be happy and angst-free, but the writing is bad and actually makes him come off as a raging psycho.

[slashxmistress.livejournal.com]

but the writing is bad and actually makes him come off as a raging psycho.

LMAO! I think I've read that one!! :D (probably read several of them actually D:)