I try not to treat authors like idiots when I'm offering critique, even if I disagree with the direction and approach they've taken to their stories. Review is the major reason this account exists, and it's most of what I've ever done. It's a matter of respect, because I know how hard it is to do things well and I understand the trepidation that comes with putting yourself out there.

And it is, at that.

When you hit that publish button, it's all too easy to hesitate; to ask yourself: "Am I really okay with this?"

...and then decide that no, you really aren't and what you have is rubbish and you'll never bother again.

I've come to appreciate this most acutely in my own forays in the realm of fanfiction. It's taken me a long time to make peace between the creative and perfectionist sides of myself and accept that I'm just a human who decided to tell a story and it's going to be imperfect and that's okay. We're allowed to be imperfect, because that's part of what it is to be human.

Oh, don't get me wrong: I'm still wrestling to reconcile them, at times (which is why I had 25,000 words of Loopholes written before I ever allowed someone else to read any of it).

Speaking of which...

I'll try not to treat my readers like idiots either, because they're willing to bet their priceless limited time on this earth on my skills as a writer and that's pretty amazing. It really puts the whole "reviews motivate me to write" thing in a new light, though! The motivating power of an audience is not to be underestimated.

Fanfiction.net Feature Wishlist:

1. Reading List to track things you'll get to later
2. Reading History so you can find things you read in the past
3. User-created lists so curation isn't tied exclusively to clunky communities
4. Fewer hard limits on story metadata because stories have more than four characters
5. Author's notes and footnotes offset from story text
6. Prologue/Epilogue support so chapter numbering doesn't get messed up