I agree with you too; I have actually already been working on putting more description and making it a little longer already, though, so that's really why I said that. c:

I usually aim for about 1200 words, which is like 6000-8000 characters, but im just not getting places with my second chapter

Moving on... Next up is DarkMuffin with The Dark Secret of Rivendale! Here's hoping Muffin #2 brings us back to the 'yes'es.

"I've been a member since early 2012 and I quite enjoyed watching this competition back then. I even found my favourite Animal Crossing fanfic from it; Mystery of ACE.
Aside from that I love reading, music and playing video games."

BuZZyReCKy: DarkMuffin gets a yes from me btw. Her writing style is on the better half of what we've seen so far, so I imagine the other judges will agree with me on this one.

"I've never really written anything before aside from school essays and such, this is in fact my first time writing a fanfic so don't be surprised if it seems a little clunky and awkward.
I do enjoy reading many fanfics however, mostly ones with humor and mystery as I find them intriguing. I also spend a lot of time day-dreaming and thinking up ideas, both for stories and various other things. Though my trouble with stories is getting said ideas into word format, they never really come out the way I want them to. ^_^""

Liv909: Yes.

"I'd be surprised if I even made it in, so I guess the most I'm hoping for is 24th."

Dan_the_man: If this is really your first story, you've gotten off on the right foot. I'll Yes this.

Mamanator: For this entry being your first ACC fanfic writing I must say.... nice job! It sounds like there can definitely be room for plot twists and excitement.  It'll be interesting to see how you jump those hurdles and continue your story.  The first thing you must do?  Stop degrading your own work.  You're better than you think and I think you can make this work.  So it is in that spirit that I'm happy to say yes to your entry along with the other judges.

4/4 - THROUGH

Let the battle of the muffins commence!

Well done DarkMuffin!

Next Up: Jade10145!

..........0_o
Excuse me while I go over to my corer and faint from sheer surprise.

Thank you so much you guys~! x3
I'm looking forward to the Battle of the Muffins.

"I'll have to disagree with Liv on this one. I think obsessing over word/character count is pretty silly. It takes focus away from making your writing good and rather just makes it long. Lots of words =/= well-written. If your just putting into one chapter what should be three chapters for the sake of length that could ruin the suspense and pacing. And pacing can really make or break a story. I just write until I find a good place to stop. So sometimes the chapters are long and other times they're short.

Also too much description can be just as bad as too little. You don't want to bore the reader. Action and fast paced scenes actually work better with less description. Particularly if you're writing in first person too much description can throw off the story. Because let's face it we don't all see a table and think "The light reflected off it's glossy flat surface and into my enlarged pupils. The buffed elliptical edges felt smooth to the touch of my oily fingers. Sleek legs peeked out, barely concealed under the lightly scratched top." Well maybe you do, but I certainly don't.  Where was I going with this again? = A =

Anyway, while it's nice to have goals especially if you are just starting to write seriously, don't focus only on that goal. Don't stress out if you aren't meeting that goal. If you don't meet your goal but you're satisfied with what you wrote, that's perfectly okay."

This actually sums up all of my opinions perfectly

If you find a good place to end a chapter but its shorter than 8000 characters, no one's going to care. It's a problem when they're too short (ie only a few paragraphs), but I feel like most of the current good entries have their chapter lengths at a nice place.

And what she says about description is how I like it. Description sounds nice, but a lot of times it's meaningless to the story, and sometimes I really don't get why certain writers are praised at all for their description when it's boring, and in some cases even detrimental to the plot.

Congratulations DarkMuffin!

And, uh. Just jumping in with this:

I agree with kittysodapop10 as well, but I also see what Liv909 is saying, especially in the context that the advice was given -- some of the entries I've read where they're being criticised on lack of description do lack description. When you're just starting to write, it can be difficult to add meaningful description (that adds to the scene, tone, pacing, etc., which I think is what kittysodapop10 is basically saying) at first because you may not know where to start. I do see a lot of newer writers here and that's really wonderful, and I think that focusing on writing more description and setting a larger word goal, like Liv909 has given an example of, is a good start in terms of pushing writers to imagine the scene more -- visualising what is happening in the scene through all perspectives. Once someone's got the hang of that, then it'll be easier to choose what's relevant to the scene and cut it down, because (from my experience) it's easier to cut down description than to add more meaningful description.

BuZZy, I definitely agree with that last statement. I dont remember what book it was (I feel like I was forced to read it in Junior High ) where everyone said it was a fantastic book, but there would be an entire page of description that I just got bored reading.

EDIT: Also, If you don't meet your goal but you're satisfied with what you wrote, that's perfectly okay."

What if my goal is to be satisfied with what I wrote

Congradulations, DarkMuffin! I do have to say, just by a quick glance-over I'm incredibly impressed that your entry is your first fanfiction. Most people first fanfictions are garbled messes, myself included. xD

Regarding chapter length – I think a lot of it depends on the story itself. Some stories might need multiple posts per chapter, others might be thousands of characters less than 8000. It depends on the pacing of the story. While I do think it's a good idea to establish some level of consistency regarding length, so long as each chapter ends in a natural place and way, it's okay to have outliers.
When it boils down to it, quality over quantity.

I like detail, especially emotional depth, but I find purple prose distracting. I think length should ultimately come not from excessive levels of description, but from the aim to show instead of tell.

That's just my two cents on the matter. ^^ I think all of the judges hold some very valid opinions on writing, and I'm very much looking forward to their thoughts on my own style.

I'm going to address everyone in one giant post if that's okay.

Laura- You don't have to cut off your chapters if you don't want to. It's okay to go into two or three posts. Grant you, from the distance, it looks intimidating but if that's what you want to do then go for it.

Jade- Great to see you're working to write more!

Gina- I definitely agree with you on some points. Lately I've been stopping short because I feel it's "right". In the context that I talk about description, I'm talking about having too little. Too much description, I feel around here, is rare but definitely existent. There's times for description, and there's times for less description and I wholeheartedly agree with that. However, description is important and shouldn't be slacked on either.

I can't stand anything more than seeing a few words on one or two lines preceded by a bunch of

"kgjdgljdfogd"

"kljflkgjfklgjkl"

"dgiljfoigjdopgjdfio"

I mean every now and then is understandable but if that's the majority of your writing, you need more description. I think everybody can use more description. Clearly no one is going to be going into long polysyllabic words that you have to consult the SAT Guide for.

Also, just because you're descriptive doesn't mean you're good. Sorry yugioh20 but I'll bring you up for a second. Your description is nice and your paragraphs are thick but your writing itself still needs work. I don't just judge an entry on description alone. While I bank a lot of importance on description, I check other things as well.

Buzzy- I agree that most of the chapter lengths are decent.

But overall, too much description is bad too. Victor Hugo is a great author but I lost interest because he has too much description Too little description is bad as well. I urge authors to work on their description first, because I feel that once you have the description edge going for you, you can more easily work on other aspects of writing. That's how it worked for me, and that's how it felt for my students at ElizabethPrower's boot camp last year. My first lesson was description and then I worked on the other stuff. I felt that once I taught them description and length, the other stuff came more easily to them and we were at a closer level. Once they knew how it looked, I could teach them how it should be written.

BTW sorry this is like super long.  

I guess it's quality over quantity. I find it hard to condense anything of mine into a single post, but I tend to drag things out. Other people prefer to get to the point. It's a matter of preference, and if it's a good read then I don't think it matters either way.

My story chapters are actually naturally longer than 8,000 characters.

Does this mean that I've got length down?

Personally I think everything is put into a story for a reason so if you're spending paragraphs describing something that's barely relevant to the story, don't. So basically quality > quantity. If you think you've described everything you've needed to described, then that's enough.

Hadger- No. Because you're dry dialogue.

So basically, I need to remove a lot of dialogue, add a lot more description, put a lot more time into my story, and I will improve?

It's not necessarily removing dialogue. It's more scrunching the dialogue but still having it...I thought I told you about combining the lines? Or was that someone else?

So I need to remove unnecessary lines, add a lot more description, and put more time into my story, and then my story will be better?

Yes. But it's not just 1-2-3. Your dialogue itself still has to be less random, if you're going to go for comedy.

^ My brain hurts.

I definitely agree with that, Liv. I compared Adventures in Anvil and An ACC Life, and An ACC Life was definitely more thought out, in my opinion. To be honest, I just scrapped Adventures in Anvil together so that I could enter this competition. Huge mistake on my part.

Congrats DarkMuffin



Now we must be enemies

I like what Keno said about fanfic chapter lengths.  I don't like saying "make it this long" or "keep it this short".  A writer should know what they want their chapter to be about.  And if you need a lot of words to meet that personal goal then there ya go.  If you use less to reach your end then, so long as the story flows in one direction and isn't all over the place, then hey!  Who am I to say it was too short?  Just because ACC says there are 8,000 character's per post doesn't mean you need to use all 8,000 characters.

And if you do use all 8,000 characters I caution you on how to break the "overflow" into a proper new post.  Don't interrupt a paragraph, thought, or speaker to do so.  At least, that's my opinion.  Keep what you can of the specific scene in one post before breaking it down.  In other words....

Post 1:
"So I told her that, like, it was super special of him to do that for her and

Post 2:
she was all like 'I know!  I know!  Wasn't that awesome of him?!?'"

All of the above should be in one post even if you have to move your breaking point to some point before that characters speech.

Congrats on those who are making it through this afternoon.  

Congrats DarkMuffin!
Can't wait for my audition. c;

I'm actually going to specifically count out 8,000 characters and split the post right there.

Threshecutioner - Good luck with that = u = You know there are websites that do that for you.