The Etiquette of Holiday fics

[geoviki]

Like all the rest of you, I'm delighting in the reams and reams of new stories and art (and this year's art is especially terrific!). There's the granddaddy, merry_smutmas, and then others like harry_holidays, hd_holidays, smutty_claus, lupin_snape.... an embarrassment of riches!

As we are encouraging each other as writers and artists, I'm trying to leave feedback as well. One thing that caught my notice, though, has left me feeling uneasy, and I wondered what your views are: In your opinion, is it uncouth to leave concrit that's negative on a fest fic? (Disclosure: this is not anything that's happened regarding my own fic, just other folk's.)

I don't see the author requesting any, for one thing. Personally, I won't do it, but then I never leave anything less than praise unless I'm asked specifically and privately. If I don't like something, I just pass it by. Which unfortunately is the same response to something I've not yet read, so the writer is never sure if I'm unhappy or just behind (if the writer even cares what I think), but there you go.

But IMHO, these stories are gifts. And I can't see criticising a gift. Am I over-sensitive? What do you authors and artists think?

Comments

[furiosity.livejournal.com]

Like you, I approach fest stories as gifts. I think leaving negative feedback to an anonymous gift fic closely mirrors this scenario:

In a spectacular moment of OOCness, the cast of HP are all celebrating Christmas together, and they're just in the midst of opening gifts.

Draco: omg a pony! Pansy, you shouldn't have!
Kreacher: That's the ugliest pony I've ever seen. Draco Malfoy deserves a better pony. Look at it! It's black. It should at least have a silver mane.
Harry: Wow, Ginny, thanks for the nose hair trimmer! That'll, uh, really come in handy.
Kreacher: Ridiculous. The filthy half-blood has received a gift that is completely useless, since he doesn't even have any nose hair, at least not if fandom is to be believed...
Dumbledore (conveniently back from the dead): Socks! I love socks! Who gave me socks? Was it you, Minerva? omg I love you. Gimmie some sugar.
Kreacher: Socks are for fags.
etc.

[emmagrant01.livejournal.com]

*sporfle*

I love that the "anon" commenter here is being compared to Kreacher. :-D

[slytherincesss.livejournal.com]

Which leads to the question -- which jlh actually discussed the other night -- why is there not more Draco!fic where our lordly, noble boy is a Palomino Animagus?!?! Because, yeah, Palomino=flaxen mane=Draco, natch!

Kreacher ♥ !

[slytherincesss.livejournal.com]

jlh and I discussed, that is.

[geoviki.livejournal.com]

Damn you, now I want this! Palomino!Draco. Didn't we all go through a horse-loving stage?

Although I hope there's no photomanip with that.

[ravenclaw-devi.livejournal.com]

Link, please? Strictly for morbid curiousity reasons, of course...

[geoviki.livejournal.com]

I should have saved it, but if you're dying to see it, I found it on the harrydraco community about 2 months ago. It was centaur!Draco.

[ashe-frost.livejournal.com]

Why did I for some reason picture something crack-ish or (possibly from FF.net) where Draco is in hiding from the war and Harry's daughter (by Ginny/Hermione/Luna/Cho or all of the above) wants a Pony.. And then they fall madly in love.

With or without beastiality.

Rimming a must.

And just to be on topic: Nothing but good things, unless possibly there's something wrong with the formatting that the mod needs to be aware of, like half of the fic being in italics.

[kethlenda.livejournal.com]

I agree with the last point--if formatting is fubar, telling the mod is good. There have been times when I've left anon comments on my *own* fest fics saying, "Hey, this is the author, I seem to have bollixed up my formatting, could you please go in and close my italics tag?" LOL.

[slytherincesss.livejournal.com]

You know, I think I'm the only girl alive who didn't care about horses or Barbies. I was a LEGO chick all the way.

I suppose it's very wrong of me to want to see a photo manip of Palomino!Draco . . . *whinny!*

[mijan.livejournal.com]

Gah, why did it use the default one! Let me try again...

[mijan.livejournal.com]

*points to avatar* red_rahl and I were discussing this exact thing. I'm rather fond of pony-play as a kink. I said that Draco would make an excellent palomino. And thus, red_rahl drew it!

[mijan.livejournal.com]

*points to avatar*
Better type of palomino!Draco. *giggles*

[slytherincesss.livejournal.com]

AHAHAHAHA! I will definitely accept pony!Draco, as well as Palomino!Draco -- that's an awesome icon!

It gets a double *whinny!* from me!

[xochiquetzl]

I totally agree. I was going to leave a similar example:

Mrs. Weasley: Happy Christmas, Harry! I knitted you a sweater. Try it on! I think the green will bring out your eyes.
Harry: Thanks, Mrs. Weasley! It's great! I love it!
Percy: Look at those arms! They're much too long. That sweater must have been knitted for an orangutan!

[ravenclaw-devi.livejournal.com]

(here via metafandom)

Yeah, that. If someone wrote a hideous fic as a gift for Suzy - well, the fic was written to make Suzy happy, not you.

[imkalena.livejournal.com]

Absolutely. Criticizing somebody else's gift is just WRONG. For all the commenter knows, those things they don't approve of could be exactly what the requestor wanted.

[maya231.livejournal.com]

*leaves positive feedback for your comment (the invisible kind)*