Everyone has that extra special something when it comes to sex; that particular scene that causes that particular intense emotion. An author's job is to make the reader feel that same emotion just as intensely as the author. In order to do that, you must be able to draw the reader into the story and put them in the world you're trying to create; make the scene comes alive for them as vividly as the scene exists in your head or in your memory. Poor craftsmanship is your greatest enemy here. A misplaced comma, a run-on sentence, an inappropriate paragraph break (or even worse, no paragraphs at all) can jar your reader out of the story and even cause them to abandon it entirely rather than battle their way through a forest of bad syntax. Here is what we DON'T want to see in our submissions. These are requirements, and not optional.
1.) One paragraph stories - stories that are about 500 characters long don't really qualify as stories. A ten-minute reading time minimum. Any less is just not long enough to hold a reader’s attention and not worth the time to edit or post.
2.) NO paragraph stories - it doesn't matter how good your story is if the formatting is so poor that nobody can read it. Use paragraphs. See one of our linked style guides if you're unsure how paragraphs are supposed to work. There should be two line spaces between paragraphs and in dialogue. All stories should be in the default font face and font size. Use italics or boldface only for appropriate emphasis.
3.) Spelling and Grammar:
The biggest problem for most novice writers is a disregard for proper spelling and grammar. Yes, writing is a creative enterprise and yes, rules are made to be broken, but before you break the rules you must know what they are. Nothing will eject a reader out of a story faster than a glaring spelling or grammatical error. Learn the basics first. Your best friend as an author is a good dictionary and thesaurus. Your next best friend is software that includes a spellchecker such as Word or Notepad++. Another error that I see frequently is using 'i' instead of 'I'. When you're talking about yourself and you use 'I', it must ALWAYS be capitalized. Cormac McCarthy can play with the rules regarding basic punctuation. None of us are Cormac McCarthy.
i am not happy when i see someone using a lowercase i when referring to themselves.
I am VERY happy when I see someone using 'I' correctly in their dialogue.
Quotation Marks:
Learn to use quotation marks properly. Dialogue is a crucial element in most fiction and deserves correct treatment.
"Remember," he said, "that closing quotation marks go on the outside of the punctuation, not the inside."
Another thing to keep in mind is that the first word of a sentence requires capitalization, even if it's a quote. Don't put a space between your quotation marks and the sentence. For example:
" this is not good " ! but "This is good!"
Dialogue:
When you have a new speaker, you must have a new paragraph. This is extremely important. Here is an example of how to NOT do dialogue.
He was in a pair of blue boxers and nothing else. My face was red and I was sweating a little as he laughed loudly and said 'hello there bitch boi!' 'Hello' I replied weakly as stared at the floor. Immediately Ashley slapped me across the face with a loud smack, 'Address him as Master, you stupid whore!' 'Yes Ma'am!, And sorry Master!' I quickly blurted out. Ashley called me a.dumbass and demanded I follow her, so I crawled along at her heels, wondering if I hadn't fucked up coming here!! Soon we reached a bathroom, where she instructed me to sit on the edge of the tub. Out came the makeup, and so did the taunts, 'you are such a weak little bitch!' 'you look hot with your pink lipstick!' soon enough I was in a tiny green mini skirt, tight little top full makeup and no underwear. I was shaking with humiliation as she said 'crawl into the living when we call!' 'She is all set! Dewayne' I heard Ashley say with a laugh! Soon a loud voice called out 'hey cocksucker, crawl your punk sissy ass in here and kiss my feet!' Feeling an utter fool i began crawling to my fate.
Here is that same dialogue done correctly, with some minor editing.
He was in a pair of blue boxers and nothing else. My face was red and I was sweating a little as he laughed loudly and said "Hello there, bitch boi!"
"Hello." I replied weakly as I stared at the floor.
Immediately Ashley slapped me across the face with a loud smack. "Address him as Master, you stupid whore!"
"Yes Ma'am! Sorry Master!" I quickly blurted out.
Ashley called me a dumbass and demanded I follow her. I crawled along at her heels, wondering if I hadn't fucked up coming here. Soon we reached a bathroom, where she instructed me to sit on the edge of the tub. Out came the makeup, and so did the taunts.
"You are such a weak little bitch! You look hot with your pink lipstick!"
Soon enough I was in a tiny green mini skirt, tight little top, full makeup and no underwear. I was shaking with humiliation. She said "Crawl into the living room when we call! She is all set, Dewayne!"
Soon a loud voice called out "Hey cocksucker, crawl your punk sissy ass in here and kiss my feet!"
Feeling an utter fool I began crawling to my fate.
5.) We are writing stories, not sex scenes. If the entire story is one long description of a sex act, or the entire plot can be summed up in one sentence - 'a guy came over and fucked my wife.' then it's not a story. It can be a scene in a story, but a description of a sex act isn't a story in itself. We need to know the characters a little bit, how these things happened, how the characters feel about it etc.
6.) Don't go overboard with the '********' stuff. I allow it in more or less general terms, as if you're speculating about the future or endorsing some idea in general terms, but I don't allow long, explicit descriptions of murder and brutality. The thing to keep in mind is that talking about a BNWO is one thing, posting jackoff material about specific methods of murder is another. Like all porn it's difficult to define but you know it when you see it. If the explicit violence is the entire point of the material and not incidental to some larger sexual fantasy, it's probably not going to pass the test.
7.) No posting actual abortions or gruesome depictions of abortions. This is not the same as saying you can't talk about abortion at all. For example, there was a story I read long ago about a girl who 'aborted' pregnancies by having sex with super well hung basketball players. I would allow stories like this more likely than not. If you're actually posting pictures or drawings or explicit paragraphs of text about a fetus being mutilated, I certainly would not allow it.
Members who consistently turn in quality stories will be given 'Author' status, meaning that they can publish instantly without having to wait for approval.
You may publish works from other authors, but make sure you credit the original author. For instance, I've just published every JetLag story I can find but I made sure that everyone knew that JetLag wrote those stories. If the author is still active on another site, link to his archive on that site. Most authors consider it a compliment to be so well liked that they are republished by fans, but some may request that their story be removed. If that happens we will always remove the story, but there are many authors such as JetLag who have been gone for years and sometimes decades, and it would be a shame to lose their work forever. That can and has happened. If you know of an amazing author from the old newsgroup days, for example, please post it so everyone can enjoy their work.
We don't ask or expect that you are going to be presenting us with a perfect document, but there is a minimum standard of quality that we must maintain, and the above is pretty much it. You've already made the big effort in writing the story. Take a few more minutes to make it presentable so people will read it! If your stories are being rejected and you don't know why, you can reach out to us and we will be happy to explain, but first please read all of the FAQs!
Please note: The Mods are here to help maintain the site and not to be your personal editors. We perform quick edits for good stories that need a polish, but we do not participate in the creative process. If you are looking for an editor who can help you more comprehensively, we have a thread in the Author’s Den for that. Ask for help there!
1.) One paragraph stories - stories that are about 500 characters long don't really qualify as stories. A ten-minute reading time minimum. Any less is just not long enough to hold a reader’s attention and not worth the time to edit or post.
2.) NO paragraph stories - it doesn't matter how good your story is if the formatting is so poor that nobody can read it. Use paragraphs. See one of our linked style guides if you're unsure how paragraphs are supposed to work. There should be two line spaces between paragraphs and in dialogue. All stories should be in the default font face and font size. Use italics or boldface only for appropriate emphasis.
3.) Spelling and Grammar:
The biggest problem for most novice writers is a disregard for proper spelling and grammar. Yes, writing is a creative enterprise and yes, rules are made to be broken, but before you break the rules you must know what they are. Nothing will eject a reader out of a story faster than a glaring spelling or grammatical error. Learn the basics first. Your best friend as an author is a good dictionary and thesaurus. Your next best friend is software that includes a spellchecker such as Word or Notepad++. Another error that I see frequently is using 'i' instead of 'I'. When you're talking about yourself and you use 'I', it must ALWAYS be capitalized. Cormac McCarthy can play with the rules regarding basic punctuation. None of us are Cormac McCarthy.
i am not happy when i see someone using a lowercase i when referring to themselves.
I am VERY happy when I see someone using 'I' correctly in their dialogue.
Quotation Marks:
Learn to use quotation marks properly. Dialogue is a crucial element in most fiction and deserves correct treatment.
"Remember," he said, "that closing quotation marks go on the outside of the punctuation, not the inside."
Another thing to keep in mind is that the first word of a sentence requires capitalization, even if it's a quote. Don't put a space between your quotation marks and the sentence. For example:
" this is not good " ! but "This is good!"
Dialogue:
When you have a new speaker, you must have a new paragraph. This is extremely important. Here is an example of how to NOT do dialogue.
He was in a pair of blue boxers and nothing else. My face was red and I was sweating a little as he laughed loudly and said 'hello there bitch boi!' 'Hello' I replied weakly as stared at the floor. Immediately Ashley slapped me across the face with a loud smack, 'Address him as Master, you stupid whore!' 'Yes Ma'am!, And sorry Master!' I quickly blurted out. Ashley called me a.dumbass and demanded I follow her, so I crawled along at her heels, wondering if I hadn't fucked up coming here!! Soon we reached a bathroom, where she instructed me to sit on the edge of the tub. Out came the makeup, and so did the taunts, 'you are such a weak little bitch!' 'you look hot with your pink lipstick!' soon enough I was in a tiny green mini skirt, tight little top full makeup and no underwear. I was shaking with humiliation as she said 'crawl into the living when we call!' 'She is all set! Dewayne' I heard Ashley say with a laugh! Soon a loud voice called out 'hey cocksucker, crawl your punk sissy ass in here and kiss my feet!' Feeling an utter fool i began crawling to my fate.
Here is that same dialogue done correctly, with some minor editing.
He was in a pair of blue boxers and nothing else. My face was red and I was sweating a little as he laughed loudly and said "Hello there, bitch boi!"
"Hello." I replied weakly as I stared at the floor.
Immediately Ashley slapped me across the face with a loud smack. "Address him as Master, you stupid whore!"
"Yes Ma'am! Sorry Master!" I quickly blurted out.
Ashley called me a dumbass and demanded I follow her. I crawled along at her heels, wondering if I hadn't fucked up coming here. Soon we reached a bathroom, where she instructed me to sit on the edge of the tub. Out came the makeup, and so did the taunts.
"You are such a weak little bitch! You look hot with your pink lipstick!"
Soon enough I was in a tiny green mini skirt, tight little top, full makeup and no underwear. I was shaking with humiliation. She said "Crawl into the living room when we call! She is all set, Dewayne!"
Soon a loud voice called out "Hey cocksucker, crawl your punk sissy ass in here and kiss my feet!"
Feeling an utter fool I began crawling to my fate.
5.) We are writing stories, not sex scenes. If the entire story is one long description of a sex act, or the entire plot can be summed up in one sentence - 'a guy came over and fucked my wife.' then it's not a story. It can be a scene in a story, but a description of a sex act isn't a story in itself. We need to know the characters a little bit, how these things happened, how the characters feel about it etc.
6.) Don't go overboard with the '********' stuff. I allow it in more or less general terms, as if you're speculating about the future or endorsing some idea in general terms, but I don't allow long, explicit descriptions of murder and brutality. The thing to keep in mind is that talking about a BNWO is one thing, posting jackoff material about specific methods of murder is another. Like all porn it's difficult to define but you know it when you see it. If the explicit violence is the entire point of the material and not incidental to some larger sexual fantasy, it's probably not going to pass the test.
7.) No posting actual abortions or gruesome depictions of abortions. This is not the same as saying you can't talk about abortion at all. For example, there was a story I read long ago about a girl who 'aborted' pregnancies by having sex with super well hung basketball players. I would allow stories like this more likely than not. If you're actually posting pictures or drawings or explicit paragraphs of text about a fetus being mutilated, I certainly would not allow it.
Members who consistently turn in quality stories will be given 'Author' status, meaning that they can publish instantly without having to wait for approval.
You may publish works from other authors, but make sure you credit the original author. For instance, I've just published every JetLag story I can find but I made sure that everyone knew that JetLag wrote those stories. If the author is still active on another site, link to his archive on that site. Most authors consider it a compliment to be so well liked that they are republished by fans, but some may request that their story be removed. If that happens we will always remove the story, but there are many authors such as JetLag who have been gone for years and sometimes decades, and it would be a shame to lose their work forever. That can and has happened. If you know of an amazing author from the old newsgroup days, for example, please post it so everyone can enjoy their work.
We don't ask or expect that you are going to be presenting us with a perfect document, but there is a minimum standard of quality that we must maintain, and the above is pretty much it. You've already made the big effort in writing the story. Take a few more minutes to make it presentable so people will read it! If your stories are being rejected and you don't know why, you can reach out to us and we will be happy to explain, but first please read all of the FAQs!
Please note: The Mods are here to help maintain the site and not to be your personal editors. We perform quick edits for good stories that need a polish, but we do not participate in the creative process. If you are looking for an editor who can help you more comprehensively, we have a thread in the Author’s Den for that. Ask for help there!