White Day Lemon Contest (2017) Voting and Judging

[Five_X]

I'd do actual reviews but I'd rather get the points out now and then maybe type more verbose thoughts out later, so here we goooo

#1: Untitled - an absolute gem, this is what we need in fanfic and it's in a god damn lemon contest of all things.
#2: The Wise Men - not gonna lie, I'm actually astounded by the effort that went into this, also Blavatsky is good!
#3: PASSION ACKNOWLEDGED - condom usage in a lemon, colour me impressed.
#4: Fighting Words - Ayako/Rin is lowkey one of my top Fate yuriships, for real.
#5: The Resurrection - and you thought it'd be a Mikiya lemon, you are wrong, why are you so wrong, but it's a good wrong.

Congratulations and thanks to everyone who took part in the contest!

[Frostyvale]

1. A Bumpy Ride. I've also written Astolfo so take it you shitter.

2. Untitled. You did what you loved.

3. Cerulean Ride. I laughed repeatedly. It was a grand effort.

4. The Resurrection. Frankly speaking, this was a good piece of work and felt proper.

5. Black Onslaught. You soared high. There are more infernos to divide.

[Kirby]

Voting's done. Link to results: http://forums.nrvnqsr.com/showthread...=1#post2632160

[SpoonyViking]

So as to not clutter up this thread, I've replied to some of the reviews for my fic over at the main thread, but I wanted to make sure proper credit was given:

"First, though, credit where credit is due to Kotonoha for her help. I had written most of the sex scene between Shirou and Shinji, but I was having difficulty with coming up with a good story around it. I had the basic outline of a post-UBW Shinji, deeply affected by what happened to him in that route, confessing his love to Shirou, but I had trouble visualising Shirou's response in a way that was in-character for him. Kotonoha is the one who suggested that maybe Shirou unknowingly had romantic feelings for Shinji all along, and that Shinji's confession would help those feelings come forth, and that's how I got the idea for a story about hidden passion finally being acknowledged."

[Seika]

C'mon, Kirby, really? You know how this goes. Judging lasts at least two months and several people drop out. You have a warning.

(I really thought I'd have the opportunity to meander my way around to this contest, then saw yesterday that it was closing. Didn't manage a write-up for the deadline, but I hope people won't mind some more feedback).


Comment the first:

(Plus one 'button' euphemism not in a 'fic already with clit).

This includes several repeats within single entries. In a contest where all bar one submission has at least one woman. Really.


Cerulean Ride
The initial prose is certainly meant to be purple, but there's an awkward element to it even within that paradigm. After that, there are a couple of decently erotic moments, but the writing remains just a bit stilted, and the humour and sex aren't juxtaposed skillfully enough. One can do funny sex, but 'pooper' has never been anything except a moodkiller. The sex just by itself is very dōjin, which I personally think just can't be sustained by prose alone. It's too artifical, too unreal. You have to be getting off on the images too.

The Wise Men
Ew, rape; ew ew ew, vividly painful rape. No.

Fighting Words
Dialogue was the strongest suit: it doesn't quite sparkle and wow me, but it's a solid portrayal of Rin and Ayako. (I also commend you for mixing speech and sex, which is a skill even some very practiced writers of erotica lack). The smut itself was competent enough, but again didn't quite have the edge to it I'd have liked. A missing je ne sais quoi.

Valkyrie's Pearly Tears
Blech, this title. And 'love-loaded heat', really? Gets slightly less absurd as we hit the porn, but still suffers terribly from run-on sentences which dilute each single phrase and clause.

Chivalry before the Fumble
Easily the worst technical English thus far, with persistent tense confusion accompanying misspellings and poor grammar. Sentences, by contrast to the last one, are very staccato and don't give anything room to build. Very little emotion or sensuality conveyed.

Crisis of Faith
Very decent in its general prose, reasonably effective emotionally, and I liked the use of intercrural. Still, didn't think you got the sex quite right - I think perhaps it could just have used a few hundred more words to expand some of the description and give the act a bit more time to breathe.

Resurrection
Fluent work with some good detail and characterisation of both Ryōgi and Tōko. The sensory play lead-in worked well, and this was generally a very consistent and tight entry.

Passion Acknowledged
Rushed in several respects - characterisation, pacing, and the absolute lack of foreplay. You better write really well if you want to go directly to the jackhammering and still expect it be considered hot. And you didn't write really well.

Untitled
WELL, I WONDER WHO COULD HAVE WRITTEN THIS 'FIC. Good prose (though actually with a fair few errors here and there), strong dialogue, solid characterisation. Smut could have used a bit of work on the pacing, I think, and would have ideally woven together dialogue and sex just a bit better: it felt like we were sometimes hopping in and out of the river instead of having a continuous flow. No cuts needed, just a bit of moving things around probably, to intersperse the two aspects a little more seamlessly.

Dedication: Love
It's probably possible to make blowing a dildo that's being awkwardly held in place sexy - and that is by far the most sizeable part of this 'fic, since you give Ciel using the dildo on herself only one proper paragraph. It's much harder if you yourself care so little that Ciel loses track of the action and settles into predictability.

A Bumpy Ride
Solid on writing, characterisation, comedy, and most of the sex, but please stop it with the suddenly jamming things into people's untended arses. No lube, no stretching, no nothing? It's not likely to even work in the first place, and if it did it would really hurt. A shame, I thought.

Black Onslaught
Much better at funny sex than Cerulean Ride, though occasionally leant too far into the humour over the erotica. Also showed hints of a not uncommon problem - indeed several other 'fics were actually worse about this in the set, but here it's not being outshone by other issues - of describing bald mechanics and expecting that to be sexy, instead of describing the feelings and sensations that thrust-thrust-thrust brought about. (Also, frankly, your prose did a poor job at trying to convince me that Herakles wasn't just way too big for the girls and that this wouldn't founder on the rocky shores of blunt physical limitations).

Lioness & Rich Girl
At least Chivalry's English felt like it could be an ESLer who wasn't quite up to scratch. This reads like a deliberate imitation of someone who tuned out of every English lesson they were ever put in.
Grammar and syntax aside, the prose as a whole might (just about) fit the register of diary entries, but it does so by being entirely unevocative. Snatches of detail appear entirely at random and nothing has the space to develop; it's just a series of bald statements. At no point was I aroused, amused, or even interested.

To Create Happiness
I liked the portrayal of the power dynamic, with Marie obviously holding all the cards but being caring all the same. Unfortunately, there was too little here to give much credit otherwise; you can make a story erotic in very few words, but this isn't the way to do that.

Boundary of Loneliness
Solidly worked for the most part. Good at communicating the pleasure of the participants, which is frankly the point of porn and something too many of these stories have failed at. Nonetheless, given you weren't writing a hard, rushed shagging 'fic, there was definitely time and space for them to have more foreplay instead of the precipitous rush toward penetration. Could maybe have used a bit more filling out generally.

One Night at Fuyuki
This is a chore to read, primarily because of appalling punctuation and sentence structure. Though that's far from an exhaustive list of all the hurts done to the English language in this 'fic. Credit for some actual build-up toward the dicking, but that's still let down horribly by writing that never flows and never shows. Description of sensation is minimal, we're meant to take enormous glosses as erotic, and an immersion-breaking, pace-stopping, pointless digression appears in the middle for no good reason.

Side B
Competent technically. Still, there's BDSM, and there's straight-up physical abuse, epitomised by someone gnawing on a cock. I presume someone finds this erotic, but it certainly isn't me.

Fairytale for King Cruel
Little girl sex, please no. Especially with blood and physical distension. Get professional help. Outside the awful parts, good solid writing with a descriptive flair.

CROSS-PATH DOMINATION
This is more like actual BDSM, at least when Lorelei gets to it. Both instances of sex are a bit rushed, IMO, and could have been afforded some deeper description, but they're at least workable.

Indoors Squirt Duel
A little more fluent in its prose than Cerulean Ride, but didn't feel as cohesive in the dialogue or action, as it were. Cerulean Ride at least went right for its absurd premise: perhaps by nature of an aphrodisiac being more generic, Squirt Duel doesn't pull together properly and feels even more like the low-level dōjin in whose genre it has placed itself.



Commendations to 1) Resurrection, 2) Fighting Words, 3) Untitled, 4) Crisis of Faith, and 5) Boundary of Loneliness. Honourable mentions to Bumpy Ride, Black Onslaught, and To Create Happiness.

[Five_X]

You've stunned the thread silent, is what you've done. Good reviews.

[Rafflesiac]

I'll take that hit Seika, given I contemplated adding foreplay to the butt stuff but dispensed with it for the sake of comedy.

[Bloble]

I mean, mine had rape. Can't exactly deny that. Astute observation.

As for the dick-biting... well, I don't personally find it a turn-on but maybe some masochist will.

[SpoonyViking]

Speaking only for myself, it was a fair review. Maaaaybe a bit harsh, but still fair.

[Seika]

I mean, mine had rape. Can't exactly deny that. Astute observation.

There are kinds of dub-con I can take in my porn: other entries in the contest even featured them, and were therefore left unremarked upon. On the other hand, there's also deciding to describe how painful it is to be unwillingly violated while dry, at which point I am right the hell out of there and not coming back. Take your knocks if you're gonna write that.

[SpoonyViking]

Seika also wasn't the only one to comment on those issues, although I guess I was much more roundabout.
For what it's worth, I maintain it was well-written and fulfilled the prompt perfectly.

[Polly]

there's also deciding to describe how painful it is to be unwilling violated while dry

See this is why men are garbage.

[Leftovers]

Thanks for the review.

[Polly]

You're welcome.

[R.Lock]

I wanted to comment on each entry, but I realised that I didn't read half of them due to being uncomfortable with featured characters or kinks.

[Bloble]

See this is why men are garbage.

garbage is

an aesthetic

[Rafflesiac]

Garbage is a great band.

[Frostyvale]

I wanted to comment on each entry, but I realised that I didn't read half of them due to being uncomfortable with featured characters or kinks.

Y'all can come back once your name's off that wall.

[R.Lock]

Y'all can come back once your name's off that wall.

Mean.

[Rafflesiac]

Justified.