Questions about Recs

[gracerene]

In honor of Rectober having wrapped up (SO MUCH FUN! all the kudos to birdsofshore for being awesome!), I thought I would ask ya'll a few questions about recs.

Obviously reccing is a big part of what I do on here, and I read a ton of fic with a variety of pairings and in multiple different fandoms. But I was wondering how other people went about recs. My "

Comments

[eidheann_writes]

1 -- Title, Author, Summary, Working Link are mandatory. Rating and length are... almost mandatory, but I do occasionally poke rec lists that don't use them. Beyond that, I'm more likely to care about (and follow recs) that include some sort of content notes (be they tags or warnings or whatnot) and a sentence or two as to why it's being recced

[gracerene]

#2, I agree with all of what you said so much! :D

#3, Yeah, that makes sense. I rarely "follow" lists, though may bookmark them to come back to later. I do follow a few blogs, like capitu's, that do recs individually though.

[torino10154]

Taking all of this completely out of order but if you had to stop reading, then I can't imagine reccing it, even if it was good up to a certain point. Things like "I really didn't care for the infidelity in the fic" or "I wish the author had warned for X" and therefore pointing it out are still perfectly valid in a rec. To me a rec isn't always "OMG SQUEE!!!1!". But I think the negatives should be fairly minor or why rec it

[gracerene]

Definitely helpful! I sort of figured that a lot of the people on my f-list tend to operate similarly to you, where there are enough things on their f-list and fests they follow, that they don't really need to go searching out recs.

Yeah, if I can't even finish a fic, then I definitely won't be reccing it, but I do agree that pointing out minor things isn't a bad thing.

[torino10154]

Actually, there are people who I think only read from recs because they don't have the time to sort through everything that comes across their flist, you know? Or can't commit to every single fic in a fest so they wait and see what rose to the top, so to speak.

[gracerene]

Yeah, that totally makes sense, using recs as a way to filter through all the new content!

[inglevine]

"This fandom especially is super positive, but sometimes I feel like that hinders the ability to completely address problematic issues." *cough* You think?

lol.

I can only tell you what I personally want in a rec, and that's honesty. If someone recs a fic containing problematic issues and doesn't mention them, I'll assume the reccer didn't notice them and be wary of their recs in future. That being whether problematic means racist/sexist/otherist or extreme characterisation issues. Or even something like "There are a lot of typos and some ESL issues, but I found them worth overlooking because the rest of the fic was so wonderful".

I also like an explanation as to why the reccer is reccing. Recs that are just a title and an author are pretty pointless for me.

I also like an excerpt, although it's not necessary. It just gives a hint as to the quality of the writing, which is nice.

[gracerene]

Yeah, those are pretty much my thoughts as well. I definitely value honestly in a rec, and I figure, the nature of a rec means that you really liked it overall.

This particular fic had some Harry characterization issues IMO that I wasn't sure I would be comfortable not mentioning if I had recced, I would have felt like I was lying by omission.

[inglevine]

Lying by omission, that's it exactly. If I loved the fic but there was one element that for whatever reason really bothered me and which I suspect might bother other people, I feel compelled to mention it. Otherwise it feels dishonest. Also I worry they'll read the fic, come across the issue, and think: I can't believe Inglevine recced a fic with this in it! lol

[lq_traintracks]

First off, I like exactly what you do in a rec, and I don't read the excerpts either. I don't want to be spoiled with material the writer themselves didn't want to spoil me with in their summary. Not that I mind being excerpted by reccers myself, though I sometimes disagree with the part of the story they think is excerpt-worthy

[gracerene]

LOL, I'm so terrible at picking out excerpts! And then I just pick a random chunk, and hope it's good enough...

Thanks, hon! I definitely was curious about mentioning "issues" in a rec from a writerly perspective, so definitely helpful! <3

[lauren3210]

I agree with LQ; I once got a rec for my first ever m/m fic, saying that i went a bit OTT with the switching back and forth on povs, which I appreciated because i wouldn't have worked that out without someone pointing it out for me, lol. I think as long as it's polite and respectful, then concrit is always a good thing

[gracerene]

Definitely agree that reason why is super helpful.

And that's what I was thinking re: issues with fics. Thanks! :D