As a reader, which of the following are your most tolerant and least tolerant: story content, storytelling, and language?

Story content is what is told in fiction, including characters, worldbuilding, plot, and conflict.

Storytelling is how the story's content is conveyed to the reader through narration so that the author's imagination can be transferred to the reader while minimizing cognitive barriers. Storytelling includes POV, pacing, emotional depth, foreshadowing, stakes, tension, immersion, etc.

Language is the narrative medium in the form of symbols (text). Language includes grammar, diction, style, and prose.

As an illustration, each of the above factors have different form of errors:

For example, in story content, plot holes can appear due to inconsistencies in the story's internal logic, or they can also be not logical errors but rather the use of clichéd tropes that make the story's direction easy to predict.

Meanwhile, in storytelling, the form of errors is more varied. For example, providing inconsistent POV writing in a chapter with dense characters can cause head hopping, leaving the reader confused about which character is speaking. Or it could be that providing an info dump of information unnecessary to the current plot makes the reader lose focus on the current plot.

Finally, in language, errors are usually the most obvious to the reader. For example, incorrect use of punctuation, incorrect use of tense, or prose that is too flowery, full of excessive metaphors that make it difficult for the reader to grasp the meaning.

The question is, how tolerant are you as a reader when encountering errors in these three factors?

Please answer using the following format to facilitate the direction of the discussion:

1. What I tolerate the most (so I can continue reading the story) are errors in language because... (fill in your reason if possible)
2. What I cannot tolerate the most (so I stop/drop the story) are errors in storytelling because... (fill in your reason if possible)

Regards.

Lately, it seems CN authors false advertise their stories.

You expect A plot.
They give B plot.

Or is it bait by writing fake sypnosis.
Or they fucking suck at their writing hence write what they are accustomed to.

So (1) Error in story content.
I came to see A, not romance, or fighting focus. Which btw is boring. Just as much is fighting in manwhas after a while.

Not any one type, but just a lot of them. They all add in to make the experience progressively less enjoyable.

1. What I tolerate the most is language errors. I’m not a native English speaker anyway, so I’m definitely not an English supremacist. A lot of what I read is translated from other languages, so imperfect language doesn’t really bother me.

2. What I absolutely can’t tolerate is errors in the story itself, especially inconsistencies in plot logic or character behavior. Unlike number 2 and 3, that’s the one thing an author has full control over no matter how much is your experience.
It’s your own imagination, how do you not think it through more carefully?

Bonus to my previous post :

It feels like xianxia, or romance authors, try to switch genre. (bc oversaturated market or people not interested like before)

So they start a series/fanfic, that have lot of readers.
But then they write what they good at.
But that is the problem! Its false advertising.

Would you consider character work to be content or storytelling? For me, you can have as many plot holes and spelling errors as you like, but if I'm pulling for your MC, I'll keep coming back.

Bimbanana said:

1. What I tolerate the most is language errors. I’m not a native English speaker anyway, so I’m definitely not an English supremacist. A lot of what I read is translated from other languages, so imperfect language doesn’t really bother me.

2. What I absolutely can’t tolerate is errors in the story itself, especially inconsistencies in plot logic or character behavior. Unlike number 2 and 3, that’s the one thing an author has full control over no matter how much is your experience.
It’s your own imagination, how do you not think it through more carefully?

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OR WORSE :

3. They contradict themselves (and their own writing)

just so they can pad more words to their stories.
Like, you totally know perfectly the MC bc of how long you follow him. But then, suddenly MC do a thing totally out of character. So the enemy survive (or something else/example) and as a veteran reader you totally see that the reason author did that, is to fucking pad more chapters to their novel. Like wtf.

ps : I know its usually frowned that fans/readers headcannon stuff that is totally contrary to the vision of author. But in this case, its like the anti-thesis of this thing. Author just troll the readers by writing stuff totally non-canon of their OWN WRITING. Just to get more chapters (hence $$$ bc CNs are paywalled per words/chaps).

Tsuru said:

OR WORSE :

3. They contradict themselves (and their own writing)

just so they can pad more words to their stories.
Like, you totally know perfectly the MC bc of how long you follow him. But then, suddenly MC do a thing totally out of character. So the enemy survive (or something else/example) and as a veteran reader you totally see that the reason author did that, is to fucking pad more chapters to their novel. Like wtf.

ps : I know its usually frowned that fans/readers headcannon stuff that is totally contrary to the vision of author. But in this case, its like the anti-thesis of this thing. Author just troll the readers by writing stuff totally non-canon of their OWN WRITING. Just to get more chapters (hence $$$ bc CNs are paywalled per words/chaps).

Click to expand...

And it feels even worse once you start writing your own story. You hit writer’s block not because you’re lazy (maybe), but because you don’t want to betray your own story logic or your characters. You actually care about consistency.

That’s why it drives me insane when I watch some of the Netflix shows my wife likes (Bridgerton, Emily in Paris etc.). I keep thinking, why is the world like that? why are the characters doing this? This makes no sense.

PS: When we watched Queen Charlotte: A Bridgerton Story, I was like, “THIS. This is what a good story is supposed to look like.” Still riding that high. We just watched it last week.

Least tolerated to most: Content >>> Telling > Language.

I can't tell if it counts as storytelling or language, but the one that kills my interest the quickest is just the narration and the dialogue itself. Like seeing a dozen paragraphs in a row describe how the beautiful sexy protag is beautiful and sexy, in case you didn't get it the first time, then the "wise immortal" characters start talking and it's something along the lines of "Holy shitballs that's FUCKED!!!" "Yeah dude like ong it's just fucking NUTS yeah?" In this case being too flowery and indulgent while also being too immature and uncaring.

I'd just call it a fundamental flaw and leave it at that. There has to be some level of self-awareness for the writer to recognize just how disconnected the characters' words and actions are from how they're described. Without that self-awareness, you really can't give any advice. It's easier to just accept that's how their style is going to be, and thus the written work is not for me. Maybe someone else will like it. I mean, Borderlands 3 still sold well with its own writing.