As the time of Tsuna's death drawls near, he tells his lover of his impeding doom. But what happens when all negotiations go Wrong...
Sounds interesting doesn't it? I'm sure it could be a lovely fic. It could be the best damn fic the world has ever seen. But I would not read it.
Why? Just look at that summary. The title isn't capitalized right. The description isn't spell checked and I can promise you that "Wrong" shouldn't be capitalized. And the whole rhetorical question makes it sound like they don't know what they're doing.
Now before someone starts complaining about me tearing apart someone summery and title, let me tell you something. "Don't Do It," doesn't exist yet. This is a description I wrote in five seconds after looking at my prompt list and choosing a random one. And I did it to make a point.
Too many times we spend hours or even days working on a fanfic, to blow over the title and description. Why do we do this? Because we are tired of working in the story, and we want to get it out to the world so we can collect our glorious reviews and favs.
But the summary and title are the first things people will see of the story. They are what people will judge your fic on before they take the time to open it and read the first paragraph.
In my oh so humble opinion, you should present three things to an audience - Title, Summary, basic warnings.
- Title - The title should almost be an initial summary of the story. It should have meaning, and depth. If you have a major motif working its way through your story then try to fit it into the title, or even call the story by it. Did a song inspire it, or happen to match up wiht the plot of the story almost exactly? Then you can use the song title. For example I was working on a Sora mpreg where almost every phrase of the popular Panic! At the Disco song "Camisado" fit one character or another. Phantom-chick's Poison is another good example of this. She titled her story Poison, because that song inspired it I believe. Or a good phrase. For example one lovely pwp I wrote was called "Gorgeously Warm and Delicious" - which just so happened to be a phrase I used to describe one of my characters. Another one is "Like Father Like Child," which is related to the last phrase of the story - "Yes, looks just like her father." The title should be inventive, but most importantly formatted right. Capitalize all major words, and PLEASE SPELL THEM CORRECTLY! No one wants to see "A tail of Love and Hattered"
- Summary - Be creative. Be unique. But most importantly - Be correct. Reread over your summary after you've written it. If you spell something wrong in the summary then people will think you probably spelled plenty of things wrong in the fic. Try not to give away the joke, or major plot twist, but at least tell the reader what to expect. And don't be cheesy about it. Avoid cliches such as "love at first sight," and "deep dark secret." Also avoid the rhetorical questions. There is no reason to ask what will happen. That's what the reader should be asking.
- Warnings - Some people might claim that you don't want warnings, because then people will know what they're opening up. But you want basic warnings on the summary so that people will know what they're opening up. Often times when I start hunting for fics to read I am look for particular phrases depending on my mood. Often times these will be PWP, Lemon, Mpreg, or Fluff. It's so much quicker if these words on on the summary at the end so I don't have to scan a description, or open a fic. By all means have another warning section in the fic, but please put a few out there so we know what we're looking at before we look.
