In an email originating at another site I post, one of my regular readers asked me a simple question. "Of all the stories you have written, which is your personal favorite?" While the question might be simple, the answer isn't, at least, not for me. At this site, I have 35 published stories. Some of these stories appear at other websites, and others don't. I have erotica on Amazon that are listed only there. Then again some of stuff is exclusive at other websites and online stores.
In fact, my favorite what? My own favorite story or the one I'm most pleased with reader reaction? Believe it not some of my narratives at other sites have outstanding scores. The same tales here, not so much. The tale I'm most pleased with from an income point of view is another of my favorites.
I told her, "The next story I write is hopefully my favorite. The one I call my favorite, so far, is "In the Arms of the Succubus." The story was written for last year's Literoitca's Halloween contest, while it didn't win, it has a respectable 4.44 out of 5 there and here carries a score of 7.04. I don't know for sure, but I believe it's the highest score I have at this site. On another place where I publish, it carries a 90.3% ranking. If I count the downloads from all the websites I have published In the Arms of the Succubus, it has over 75,000 downloads to date.
None of those reasons make it my favorite. I like it best, so far, because I enjoy reading it. Other writers will understand this, it is one of those stories when I read it, I think, "Wow, I wrote that?"
I do not consider myself a great writer. My stories are too short, my characters are underdeveloped, too many are too violent, and I still struggle with proper grammar. I'm not even confident I'm a good or competent writer. Yes, I know that is an open invitation to get email's that tell me I suck as writer. And that's fine. While you get to read my stories, if you want to, they aren't written for you. I write for me…there are personal reasons I write violent stories. There are reason for every story I write. They are my reasons. I write to get out whatever I need to while I write them.
Most of the time I look at what I write and think, I could have done better. Not always though, some I think, "That's not bad." Then again, ever now and again, I'm really pleased with one of tales. I think to myself, "Hell, yes, I wrote that!"