Furry Writers' Guild Forum

Group review blog

General Writing Discussion
#1

This was mentioned over in the topic about the role of reviewing as Something That Could Be A Good Thing, and I mentioned “Claw and Quill” in passing.

Right now, C&Q uses a custom back end which is explicitly set up to be a magazine: articles must be grouped into issues, it’s assumed that only editors have accounts and authors are freelance rather than staff, it has a built-in submission tracker on the back end, etc. This is all well and good in theory; it turned out to be less well and good in practice. I am not particularly good at being a managing editor, especially as I’ve been getting busier with my own writing.

Anyway: I think the idea of focusing it more explicitly on reviews is a good one, as is switching to a more traditional blog format (so articles can be published when they’re ready to go). I can almost certainly set this up and host it; I’ve been playing around with Ghost, a new blogging platform, and it’d probably meet the requirements I have (which are, in no particular order: let me do my own theming when I feel motivated enough, let me use Markdown for writing, and not be effing WordPress).

But the big question is: who else would be willing to write for it? There are a couple of you I would specifically like to corral for this – it’d be terrific to get at least four others who could post something at least every two or three months.

#2

Just to be contrary, I liked the issue concept for C&Q. The first issue was terrific, and of course you were blessed with excellent contributions from yourself, Kyell and Huskyteer, but I also really liked the niche that it seemed you were starting to carve out. Having said that I understand that such a format puts a lot of pressure on the editor/publisher.

Some feedback from the [adjective][species] experience: we have been running for almost three years, which isn’t that long in terms of a community website, but it’s a lot in terms of content. We have 200 or so articles that have gone live, the majority of which are more than 1000 words long. And that’s not considering the other content: all the Furry Survey stuff, polls and visualizations and whatnot.

There have been two big challenges: content, and editing continuity. We have found it to be too much work for one, or even two people. Everyone needs time away, and that means that others have to pick up the slack to keep the ball rolling. Makyo and I have done most of the writing, but I think a more important contributor has been the ability to share the editing/publishing load. Both Makyo and myself have a small support group who are pulling away in the background, and without those people [adjective][species] wouldn’t still be running.

I suspect that Flayrah has similar challenges. Their good reputation for jounalism and lower-bar-for-entry (plus of course the efforts of the prolific, mighty Fred Patten) means that they have a wealth of contributors; yet even they had a slow patch earlier this year due to Greenreaper - their key editor/publisher - being overwhelmed elsewhere.

So I would suggest, rather than looking for contributors to C&Q, look for people who can help you run the site itself. More editor/publishers means more contributors, because one of the way you find contributors is through the creative force of many minds.

To give you an example, Phil Geusz originally came and joined us because someone was a fan of his column in Anthrozine, and suggested it might be worth asking if he was interested in a new outlet given Anthrozine’s (apparent) demise. Without the engagement of this person, who has never actually written for [adjective][species], Phil wouldn’t be there.

(Admin note: Apparently using the abbreviated name for [adjective][species] doesn’t play well with BBCode.) :slight_smile:
(OP note: thanks Admin!)

#3

I think a group review blog of sorts is an excellent idea. I was actually about to start a thread suggesting an FWG-run or FWG-sponsored blog for that very same thing before I saw this one.

PT’s post from the criticism thread Yeah, I’m envisioning a group blog via Wordpress or similar, with ideally about 3-6 reviewers taking part. Anybody ever wants to start something like that, I’ll signal boost it pretty much everywhere I have an account. :)[/quote]

My thought is perhaps running something like this where reviews can be submitted by anyone, they just go through an approval process. Or perhaps limit it in some way-- say perhaps requiring one to participate in the FWG in some way? Not sure.

#4

I like the issue concept, too. (Obviously, I suppose, since I wrote a CMS to support it.) But I’ve come to the conclusion that being able to handle multiple users on staff is more important than being able to organize by issues. As much as I like aspects of my homebrew system, I have a choice between putting in a lot more time on the programming side to give it multiuser capability it lacks – or giving up on it and going to a more off-the-shelf system that already has those features, like what Flayrah and [adjective][species] use. (True to form I’m still looking at something kind of weird, so there’s that.)

While I may lose the issues, I’d still like to do a similar mix of content, so “group review blog” isn’t entirely accurate – I’d like to get articles, too. But I was surprised at how much the review part of the site was latched onto almost immediately, so that’ll probably be the primary focus.

#5

I’ll have to see what the software is capable of in that regard, although there are probably workarounds no matter what.

#6

I’d be up to doing this since I review any furry story I read and I can always make sure I am reading one at all times if need be.

#7

I’d also love to contribute. I’ve written a few book reviews on Flayrah and I usually knock off a couple of sentences for Goodreads on whatever I’ve just consumed.

#8

Okay, I’ll get in touch with people soon. Ish. :slight_smile: I have some work to do in figuring out how to get the original C&Q posts imported and to make sure the theming isn’t too awful (although I will try to resist spending months tweaking style sheets), and then figuring out minor bits like, uh, how to install Ghost on my Linode server and how to add users. You know, little things.

#9

While it’s been a bit, this is moving forward, slowly. I think I’m settling on WordPress despite my annoyances with it. There are a few other things to work on – namely what to do with the existing issue #1 content.

#10

Sadly, my budget for furry fiction is exactly zero, most of my reading these days is course-related as I wrap up my senior year of college, and I feel terrible asking for reviews because I can’t contribute the same amount of effort or to the funds of my fellow authors.

That being said, it would be nice to have a process to submit work to be reviewed by one of the contributors. I was thinking you could have a queue of works to be reviewed that would be reviewed by whoever picks them, rather than assigned. I’ve had a devilish time getting anyone to post reviews of my books despite their slow but steady sales.

#11

Threetails, there’s already a thread where people are looking to give away copies of books for reviews.

#12

Thanks for the link! :slight_smile:

#13

As an update on this: I’ve completed moving Claw & Quill onto WordPress, hopefully without losing the first issue (or breaking links). So, anyone who’d like to get a contributor account should let me know – that basically means that you can send me reviews/articles through the interface, but they won’t go live until I edit and approve them.

I’ll also be looking for editors – basically, other people who can edit and make articles go live, so I’m not the single point of failure anymore. :slight_smile: I’ll likely “promote” a contributor or two when/f things get going again.

#14

There’s a chance I could help with this, if you would like. Are we talking just evaluating articles for content/clarity and giving a yes/no on them?

#15

I’m not 100% sure yet. The couple of things I have (woefully) outstanding I did some more editing work with, as I wanted to get at least one review into greater depth than I thought the first draft had. But I’m hoping it’s going to be relatively “low impact” editing for the most part.

#16

Okay. Odds are I’m in, but just let me know what I should be expecting. Do you have any idea if you’re looking more for reviews that would spoil a story by going into a massive amount of specifics, or one that’s more generally pointing out what the author did well in/could have improved on in a story?

#17

Also, technicalities vs storyline/plot/chara development? And how ruthless and blunt do you want the reviews to be?

Yep, this is why I’m waiting for others to do it first >.>

#18

Well, you can get an idea of what my own review style is like by reading the one review I have up currently. :slight_smile:

Nature vs. Nurture in San Iadras

My ideal is the kind of book review you see in The Atlantic or the New York Review of Books – discussions about the writing style, story construction, and (assuming the book has something more to offer than escapism) the ideas. I want an actual opinion to be expressed – a recommendation or a lack thereof – although criticism needs to be constructive. I’m hesitant to use words like “ruthless and blunt”; while one can argue that furrydom has a tendency to praise stuff that’s pretty meh solely for being furry, that can’t be countered by tipping the other way, which I’ve seen happen. (Praising a surprisingly good story serialized on Fur Affinity that people would never find without being led to is terrific; trashing a lousy story on Fur Affinity that people would never find without being led to is mean-spirited.)

#19

Just as a topic bump: I’m actively looking for reviews – and occasional articles – for Claw & Quill! I just published the first one submitted through the new WordPress system (although it’s one I had before, if I’m honest), Dark End’s review of Nathan Cowan’s “Technofox.” This could raise eyebrows, since it’s a review of a self-published book with a lot of BDSM, but in the immortal words of Ernest Hemingway: neener neener.

Anyway, I need more content! If you think you can do a review or article occasionally, message me and I’ll add you as a contributor. I prefer authors use either real names or real-sounding names, although that’s not an absolute rule.

If you already have a login, please use it to contribute. :slight_smile:

#20

Yes, I strongly encourage everyone to take part in Claw & Quill! As someone who has never used wordpress before, I found the system reasonably intuitive.