AO3 bookmarks prowling

[tiggymalvern]

Looking through the bookmarks on your own AO3 fics is a wild ride.

Obviously most of them are blank. Some are simple descriptions of what the fic is, but a few of those are hilarious in their own right. 'Hannibal and Will put the BENT in Bentley' cracked me up. 'Will fucking Hannibal over his stupid expensive dining table where he eats people' also made me LOL.

I found one with a tag that led me to a discord community's page. Someone recced me on discord? Cool, I would never have known that if I hadn't been feeling nosy.

A number of them are really lovely compliments from people who never commented on the fic. I know you're probably feeling shy, but if you talked to me, I'd love to talk back!

Occasionally people go off on why they love the characters so much, and that's a delight.

One bookmark was a huge wall of hearts. Well over 2500 of them (I started counting the rows and the columns before the numbers got crazy). They literally covered half the screen of my desktop monitor.

Then there are a few that are entertaining in ways the bookmarker didn't intend. '3/10 for some reason I hated it. And I usually like this type of things. idk'
Hey, I know! It's because I wrote that fic as a subversion of the trope and made it creepy as all get out. Good to know my choices were effective 😁

'WAY too long, this story would benefit amazingly by a good edit. Because it's clearly well written, and characterization is believable. So--20% shorter and it would receive a "LOVED".'
Something of a mixed report, but I write my fics for me, or occasionally for my friends, and I like atmosphere and suspense and slow build. So not sorry at all 🤣

I do wonder if some people know that bookmarks are public viewing, but I'm very glad they are.

Comments

[bymyverytoes]

I haven't done this in years, and I found my readers aren't very forthcoming in their opinions that way. It doesn't surprise me at all that your writing inspires greater enthusiasm and creativity in their remarks :)

[tiggymalvern]

Most of mine are from the Hannibal fandom, simply because it's an oil tanker fandom. I have multiple fics in that fandom with several hundred bookmarks, so even starting with 95% being a blank bookmark, that leaves some comments to fish through. In all my other fandoms, over 30 bookmarks is a lot. None of my Burn Notice fics even hit ten XD So it's going to depend a lot on which fandoms are involved.

I never add a blank bookmark myself, because that won't be helpful when I want to find something to re-read. I always add a quick summary of the fic and/or what I liked about it or else I'll forget and it will get lost in the ever-growing list! I honestly am surprised how many bookmarks are just blank, but I know some people use the feature just to mark which fics they've already read so they don't backtrack, and that might explain a lot of it.