The Literature's formula for success.

[Eduard]

These past summer months I have been struck by an insatiable appetite for experimenting with distinct forms of writing, different subjects, ideas, even props and challenges in order to diversify my pool of themes, to test my versatility and adaptability when it comes to writing and its numberless challenges, and to improve myself.

However, these past few days I have been increasingly curious about the notion of delivering a work of fiction that contains the furfandom's formula for success. (to be precise: A literary work that incorporates the elements which make it a success in the eyes of the furfandom's many members)

Thus, I ask you, and for the purpose to start a little debate as well, what elements do you think a story should have in order to be well received in the eyes of furries? What do you think a story should have in order to be popular here?


And a more personal question for you: What should a story contain in order for you to love it?

[maugryph]

Furries seem to be obsessed with porn and fetishes, so I assume that those two elements have to be incorporated in a work for it to get noticed in the furdom. The most popular works on FA have at least one of these elements.

But I wouldn't worry about writing just for others, make sure its a subject that you will enjoy to write about.

What makes me fall in love with a story is great characters. Characters that you care about that motivates you to read the work to the end.

[feraldraco]

Not to mention that care must be taken to make sure the story itself is presentable. Use as little exposition as possible so that the reader can get to what is important to the story. Or, to take it a step further, use the worldbuilding itself as a way to advance the plot. And last but not least, when the story is finished, let a few knowledgeable friends look over the paper to catch any slip-ups or mishaps that may have been missed in the heat of inspiration.

[Frank LeRenard]

Success in the furry fandom... well the cliché answer has already been given, which is 'porn'. And that's somewhat true, at least so far as websites like FA or Weasyl are concerned, which are dominated by amateurish works and amateurish readers who aren't generally perusing things with such a critical eye.

If you want to consider the publishing world, though, e.g. fandom publishers like Rabbit Valley or Sofawolf or whoever else, sex still sells, of course, but the standards are quite a bit different. So for example, you could take a really popular author like Kyell Gold: Kyell does write mostly erotica, but the focus of his works (at least from what I've read) seems mostly to be on the romantic relationships between characters in the story, the struggles they go through because of those relationships, and so on and so forth. So in his case, there's a combination of good quality writing, likeable and believable characters and character arcs (with just a hint of melodrama to spice things up), AND excruciatingly detailed sex scenes. And I'd have to say it's probably the combination of all three that have made Kyell as much of a success as he is, within the fandom.

Furries as a demographic also seem to enjoy slice-of-life type deals; if you browse FA, you'll run across an awful lot of stories centered around high-school or college life, just with a cast of anthropomorphic animals instead of humans. I can't help but think that's because furries as a population are mostly in the 15-25 year age range, and so high school and college are the things that concern them the most (and sex, of course). Fantasy and sci-fi probably come in second place, and then there appears to be little room for most other genres.

So I guess if you want to write a popular furry work, do a slice-of-life college drama with anthropomorphic animal characters and several detailed sex scenes interspersed throughout.



As for your second question, I don't really have an answer. I tend to prefer stories that inspire philosophical thoughts upon reading them, regardless of genre. Which is an incredibly vague answer, I realize, so I guess to give a counter-example as an example, I've more or less given up on epic fantasy as a genre, because every epic fantasy series of novels seems to rely heavily and thoughtlessly on the old Tolkien-esque binary good vs. evil shit to drive the plot forward, and when you have archetypes battling other archetypes to fulfill an archetypical thread, I just get nothing whatsoever out of it. If that makes any sense.

[Lychee]

honestly it really depends on what your aim is in marketing to furrys. do you want to make a furry-centric work? do you want to make a story with only furries in order to satisfy the insertion aspect of fantasy when reading your book? do you want to accentuate the animalistic properties of various species of biota on the planet and give them an expose through some kind of narrative? do you want to write a story that is completely on its own and are just wondering 'what to hit' when editing for the furrry market?

depending on which intention you have, it could go many different ways.

to me, being furry has to have that beyond-human aspect of it, so accentuating any situation, feature or feeling of animalistic or even just non-human influence could hold reader's interests even if you catch them in the opening act with something else. often times transforming from human into an animal or even into a more feral being catches most interest. giving up a human quality in order for some trade-off has an appeal many fantasize about.

or, you know. you could make it porny and hit the low-hanging-fruit of readers. it will get you readers and hits most assuredly, but you'd be writing with a very certain inroad. erotic writing has its place but its not for everything.