vorchagirl:

rederiswrites:

Sometimes I feel like we authors circulate a lot of “please comment on fics” posts and I don’t want people to feel pressured or guilty because they’re too anxious or tired or busy or whatever reason you have for not commenting.  But definitely getting comments is really important to keeping me upbeat and inspired about my writing in a way that kudos or likes or whatever just really isn’t, and I think the reason, for me at least, is that while kudo count is just a number, a commenter is a person–a person that I now have a relationship with.

If you leave me an excited comment, you gain a ‘face’.  If you comment fairly regularly, you become someone that, believe me, I think of with fondness.  The thing is, you become someone I’m writing for.  When I’m plain tired, or unsure how the next bit goes, or staring some potentially unpleasant research down, you’re in my head as a reason to keep pushing.  If you’re insightful–you notice things, you remember things–you’re part of what keeps me pushing to be good, you’re part of my reason for continuing to make the effort to slip these details in and keep track of all my threads.  You’re paying attention, and that means so much, in a way that clicking the kudos button just can’t do.

Of course I write because I love to write; otherwise it’d be a fairly ridiculous misallocation of time.  And I write because the stories in my head want out and because I love my characters and want them to live and because I want to improve.  But writing is storytelling, and storytelling isn’t done in a void.  There’s nothing wrong with wanting–needing–an audience.  And when you leave comments–even if it’s just a moment of incoherent yelling in reblog notes–you become part of my audience, a real person that I can make metaphorical eye contact with as I spin my story.

I love this! 🙂 And I’m going to add to it a tiny bit –

I’ve met some of my closest friends through my writing and fanfiction – they’re the people who’s fics I read and comments and on and who read and comment on mine. We became friends because we got chatting about characters and fanfics, and about Mass Effect and it’s romances.

Your comment isn’t just words on a page – you become someone who I look forward to hearing from when I update. I know each and every one of my reviewers – don’t think I don’t. When someone doesn’t review, I notice and wonder why. When someone loves a chapter – I absolutely glow! If someone of my reviewers takes the time to message me on FFnet or Tumblr to chat about a chapter I lose my mind. Never think I don’t care if you don’t review or that you’re just a review number to me – you’re not. You’re a person who I look forward to hearing from. I want to know what you think – I look forward to it!

Comments are not about a review number, it’s about the relationship with reviewers. It’s about sharing my story and seeing your reaction. And in some cases it’s about becoming friends with incredible people. I’m so glad I worked up the courage to message and tell my favourite authors how much I loved their stories – I’m friends with so many of them now! 🙂

Thank you for writing this – it sums up perfectly why I love writing reviews and why I love reading them each time I update.