Sounds about right. By "harsh", I meant "honest, but tactful", which is difficult when you can never tell when someone's going to collapse and die from a gentle suggestion that they clean up their typos. This is a situation where I don't know the person, but just generally want to be encouraging. Tonight will probably not be the night when I manage to pull a comment together.

My next question: when a n00b asks for concrit and their story's pretty bad, how harsh do you get? I try to start out easy. It also depends a bit on the fic - if the grammar etc & the plot ain't so hot in total, I won't even bother unless I know the person or there's something so truly awful I have to get it out of my system! Seriously, its the gray area stuff that's difficult - really awful spelling or grammar with a great plot idea or vice versa because you can see there's potential. So even if its got some bad points, I'll try & say something positive too & hopefully balance it out. And lastly, most importantly, how you think the person will react - and you can usually tell from how they respond to other comments proceeding yours. If they are gracious & understand someone's trying to be helpful, I'll invest the time in return; if they're dismissive & its clearly about just getting their fic out there & they think its the bee's knees no matter what I say, why should I bother - they probably aren't being completely honest about wanting the concrit to start with.

I think "honest, but tactful" is not always going to be enough if you're going to beta someone's fic. Personally, if someone commented on my fic solely to the effect of, "You need to focus on getting the hang of US grammar," I would be completely deflated (despite the fact that I recognise it's absolutely true). I think the rule is that you need to be encouraging. What you need to say is something that will inspire the person to strive to improve whatever it is they lack. Personally, I would take a comment like, "This story shouldn't be posted anywhere, it's OC, it's poorly layed out and contains numerous spelling and grammatical errors" if it were bookended in positive feedback such as, "I think you have potential" or "I'm looking forward to seeing what you produce!" I think where people fail when it comes to giving feedback is recognising that the person on the other end - while they may honestly want to improve their writing - is not a robot. No one likes to hear endless strings of corrections without a shred of encouragement. Try this format: P-N-P for the comments in your feedback (Positive, Negative, Positive) and you'll be surprised by what you can get away with saying as the negative. Imho feedback is a two-way street; obviously the person accepting the crit needs to be gratious about it, but the person delivering the crit needs to be supportive about it.

Try this format: P-N-P for the comments in your feedback (Positive, Negative, Positive) Seconded. Useful in RL as well as in fanfic. As someone new to writing fanfic, who has still only posted the one piece so far, I can tell you I was absolutely TERRIFIED waiting to hear back from my beta about it, and if she hadn't been encouraging I might have fled and never come back. Which would have been a shame (for me at least, wasting the last few months of my life writing the damn thing!)

What Asynca suggests -- sandwiching the critique in between slices of encouragement -- is actually exactly what I do. Especially with writers with whom I don't have a strong relationship. That's one reason why I won't concrit something that I don't actually like. I have to have those good things to say. "I really like the image you used right here" or "This line is great, perfectly in character" -- I try to pick out specific things whenever I can. That seems a lot more helpful than just saying "it's got potential."

My next question: when a n00b asks for concrit and their story's pretty bad, how harsh do you get? If there's absolutely nothing good I can say about a fic I usually won't review it at all, however if there is at least something to work with I'll try to focus on the good and then mention where improvements can be made or encourage them to find a beta. I also believe that House world is far trickier to navigate than most others due to the medical jargon and characters that tend to be very closed off emotionally, so I try to be understanding in that regard and encourage the n00bs who at least seem to be trying not to be too hard on themselves in the beginning. It honestly blows my mind that there's any good House fanfic at all (and amazingly I've read quite a few), because it just looks like it takes a ton of research to do a House fic of any length, and even the shorter or more character driven fics takes very careful handling of the characters.

Part of the fun of writing House fanfic is that thought and research that have to go into it. A good quality work in this genre needs it.

Hello Melly, I'm with you. Sometimes I say to myself: 'that was awful' and not review. I don't review all that often for a number of reasons. This is fan fiction and people do it for all sorts of reasons and are of varied ages. As someone upthread mentioned - telling someone they suck might be fun but can also hurt them because it is their first story and unless you are a literary genius I would imagine most peoples' first stories are a bit on the whiffy side when looked back on. I was a bit luckier than most. I was a cartoonist - then a non fiction writer and without consciously doing it I ended up writing fiction (on forums and such - even now when I am stuck I'll go over to Sara M's web blog and hash out a review - confuses the poor gal no end as to why she suddenly asked what she likes about some odd foreign film). Also Alex brought up a good point. For some people ff is just fun. Something to do on the plane or at work when bored or just a bit of wish full thinking about their favourite show. So there is no great angsting over the odd typo or dodgy comma use. I know of people who were ff writers and are now writer type writers, but what always amazes me is this inbuilt ability of humans to believe they can all write from the word go. You wouldn't even suggest that everyone could just pop into the cockpit of a 747 and set it off around the world, but apparently anyone can grap a pencil in their prehensile toes and go for it - and woe betide you if you tell them otherwise. I was chatting to my friend who has a 'degree' in writing - and we were discussing the difference in fiction and non fiction writing - just on a simple punctuation level. For me non fiction writing is harsh: getting the message across. Saying what has to be said. Fiction writing is a dude with a beret communicating the feel and it changes the way I punctuate. Where was I going with this? Doesn't matter - betas are great. When I beta I like to ask questions to make the author think... you said this - what is he feeling and such. Stuff about the story that, as a reader, intrigues me. Because I feel this encourages the author to imagine and expand and make the work more rounded. And asking seems to be a nice way of getting around the seven steps of fanbratishness: 'Now from what we have seen on House do you really think it is plausible he would leave medicine and buy a kitten farm?' Some of the best AU stories I have ever seen I have just left messages saying 'wacky idea, but wonderfully done'. I'm very tolerant. If you write it well I will read it. No matter what.

Part of the fun of writing House fanfic is that thought and research that have to go into it. Hey A- can you pass that along to the House writing monkeys!

Something to do on the plane or at work HA! I find if I am reading a work and it is just setting off all sorts of alarms, the first thing I will do is check to see the person's age and whether or not English is their first language. This will determine how I react to their fics and more imporantly how I respond to their fics. A lot of times, I will send a PM to a writer who maybe has a good idea but is very off base as far as how the working environment or a relationship works. I know I have been embarassed when someone uses reviews to tell me I Fed up royally, so I try to remember that when I am writing to someone else.

If I can't stand to get through the first paragraph of a fic because it's so bad, I'll usually just stop reading it. It's selfish, but I've only got so much time to read for pleasure in between working, school, and other surreal life nonsense. On the other hand, if somebody asks me to beta a horrendous fic, I'll do it. I'll try to be as thorough as I can, offering to beta a second and even third draft if they need it, because I love editing almost as much as I love writing. I understand that not everyone who writes fanfic has done a lot of previous writing, or speaks English as their first language. The point of feedback is to help a writer develop, not scare them off of writing ever again. That said, I really freakin hate it when people can't take honest critiques, and get mean and defensive about it.

I *very* rarely leave a negative review. If I do criticize something, I try to make sure it's constructive. I've told people how to properly separate lines of dialogue, for instance. They may have had 3 people speaking in the same paragraph. I also hate the idea of MSTs (even though some are quite funny) because it seems so cruel to rip apart someone else's work. Yeah, it may be bad... but I'm such a soft hearted person I hate the idea of hurting someone just because you don't like what they wrote. No offense to people who write MSTs. It's just not something I could ever do. I put a lot of myself into the things I write: heart, soul, time. Who am I to assume that someone who writes a really *bad* story didn't also put their heart, soul, and time into it? So I just hope people consider that they're replying to a real person with real feelings when they leave reviews. I think it's better to not say anything rather than be cruel.

I also hate the idea of MSTs (even though some are quite funny) because it seems so cruel to rip apart someone else's work. Even if the author of the fic in question begs it to be MSTed? I wrote a bad fic one time, REALLY bad, and just pray for someone to MST it (it probably has been. It featured Paula the hooker). In my defense, I was on prescription painkillers.

I have a guilty habit of reading them but I never write them. I'm not that mean. ;) Well, I'm mean, but in a different kind of way. *g* I usually only review if I really like a story. If I do find a reason to leave a negative review, I always find at least something good to mention in my post. Writing is hard, and I think people need as much encouragement as they can get.

I usually won't leave a review at all on something terrible, and I'll only offer to beta for somebody for a) someone who has written at least one thing I've read, or b) someone who specifically asks *me* to help them. And I do read MSTs, but firmly believe they should be in a seperate community where (hopefully) the original authors won't see them. Putting a MST into the site where the fic came from is cruel.