Lois & Clark Forums Forums General Discussion Fun with Polls How many pages of story per week is acceptable?

I'm being nagged to begin posting my latest story, but if I post too fast, I'll run out of buffer and I really don't ever want to be in that position again. I'd like to know, therefore, whether readers would be prepared to follow a story with a pretty slow posting schedule.

Yvonne

I voted other - basically, I'll take whatever you're prepared to give me. But if you find yourself restricted to being able to post about ten pages per week, I'd prefer one post of ten pages.


Wendy

Back when I was still writing fanfiction I wrote episodically. Meaning, I was aware that I'd be posting in instalments, or chapters, so I planned my story breaks accordingly.

I have always felt that once I committed to posting that I owed it to the gentle readers to post at least once a week. For me a chapter, or instalment was generally between 10 and 14 pages long.

I got in the habit of writing until I hit 10 pages then looked for a logical stopping point. Sometimes things got carried away, and the chapters ran long, but most of the time I was able to reach that goal.

What I've been trying to say in my round about way is that I feel 10 pages of a once a week post is an acceptable minimum.

Tank (who doesn't really like significantly shorter posts because not much can be developed story-wise in too short instalments)

Sorry Yvonne, hijacking your post here, but I was wondering.

Generally, when writers talk of number of pages, do you mean pages with single or double spacing?

I'm just trying to get a mental picture as to how much a writer has to already have before he/she begins posting. :p



metwin1

*agrees with Wendy*

I voted other because I generally don't read the story until it is finished. I have gotten into too many stories that either were never finished or so much time had pasted due to other obligations for the authors that I didn't remember what I had read. So I find I'm much happier waiting until the story is finished. I have even emailed several authors asking if they were going to finish a story and was told yes and as of yet a year later story is still unfinished and no more postings. I understand all the difficulties involved for the authors. I also have my obligations and don't have the time to give to reading a story that winds up never being finished.

/me nods and agrees with Wendy and Rivka

Ten pages once a week would be great with my hectic schedule! Though... if you wait until May or so, when I'll be done with classes and softball... I may nag you more.

Sara (who is a little at the thought of a new Y fic )

I chose "other," too.

I think a regular basis is more important that the length of the posts. Readers can get frustrated and lose interest if they need to wait too long, or lose the thread of the story entirely. Once or twice a week doesn't matter.

On the other hand, each individual post should be long enough to carry the story forward. It doesn't matter to me how long the post is, as long as it's a coherent story section.

One thing I do agree with, though: the author should make sure to have a decent buffer. I'm still embarrassed about the story I started posting several years ago without finishing it... not to mention the one that a certain fellow FoLC is twiddling his thumbs about.

So give us what you can, Yvonne, and when you can. But we'd all appreciate consistency.

Hazel

Good question, metwin1! The definition of a "page" can vary so widely as to be practically useless for comparisons.

When I decided I needed to know what people meant when they said a page, I got together a few comments from people who'd mentioned page counts, and then saved the relevant story parts to my HD to do a comparison. Turns out most people seem to mean between 2 and 3 KB per page - I think Wendy's are about 2.5 KB.

Hope that helps.

Mere

Many, many pages as often as possible!

But if that's not practical, I like the 10 pgs twice a week schedule. Enough to move the story along, keep me involved, no forgetting what bad things were happening to altClark during the last part...

I used to read long fics solely on the archive. I'm an impatient sort, and that guaranteed no waiting. (And in your specific case, Y., skipping ahead to make *sure* it ended well. At some story points it was really hard to trust you!)

Also, when a new story starts, I like knowing the writer's schedule. And I'll admit if their opening comments start with "Not sure when I'll finish this, how often I can post, etc.." I tend to run the other way.

That said, curiosity often gets the better of me, and if I fall in love with a story, despite my best intentions to remain merely on friendly terms with it, I'll read it however I can get it.

I know this is way more than you wanted, but while I'm here and waxing on...

This is a big point of insecurity for me as a writer. (I guess I worry that a lot of readers have my same attitude!) So, I'll be really interested in your polls results, Yvonne. Once I start posting a fic of my own, I have this *horrible* fear of stopping- for whatever reason. If my characters come to a halt, will the audience grow bored and wander off to greener patures and completed fics?

CC- who in the tradition (albeit a rambling one) of 'do as I say, not as I do' recommends you just jump in. No guts, no glory. Seize the Day, and all that good stuff...

Thanks for all the advice, folks. You've really helped me figure out what to do. Bearing in mind both the poll results and people's request for consistency, I went through my story last night and marked it up into 10 page (or thereabouts) chunks. I've never done this before - usually I just decide on the fly how much to post - so I'm really looking forward to trying out this new method. Gosh, do I feel organised!

The benefit of marking the break-points in advance, I've discovered, is that I now know exactly how many weeks it will be before I run out of buffer. Coupled with an estimate of my average writing speed, I can see that a weekly post of 10 pages means that I should be able to maintain that schedule without ever running out of stuff to post. Yay!

(Unless real life interferes, of course. And apologies to CC and anyone else who asked for ten pages twice a week.)

Kerth voting will be over on Sunday so I'll probably start posting on Easter Monday.

Thanks again for your help,
Yvonne

As much as you can, whenever you can.

I know too late, but there you go.

TEEEEEJ

On behalf of myself and whoever voted with me, I accept your offer of ten pages a week, Y. I think I can live with it. Maybe I'll come to love it.

<heavy sigh> Is it Monday yet??

CC

Could anybody give an example of a ten page post (like a reference to a post of a story being recently posted, or if none are available, the number of pages of a post of a story), so I can have an idea?

Thanks!

malu

EDIT: For example, how many pages does "The Longest Road: The Roads They Walked Alone Part 26" have?

I make Rac's story part about 10.5 pages (I use Arial 10 pt). Or, to put it another way, it's 31,923 characters including spaces. 5,743 words.

The first part of my new story is 9.5 pages long; 27,760 characters; 4,942 words.

Yvonne

*checks calendar* No, CC, not yet.




*fidgets*

*fidgets*

*fidgets*

Maybe it's Monday now?