Oh heavens, ficrec is an enormous time-sink for me! I think next month I'm probably not going to sign up for any of the categories -- I've been doing two a month for several months now, and as much fun as it is to sift through fics I liked, it's starting to wear on me a bit. Coming up with new ways to describe stories without using the same adjectives over and over ... it's like being back in English class! Like you, I think I make it too hard on myself.

The idea of emailing crit to the author before reccing their story is very interesting -- it had never occurred to me to do that.

I don't want people to think badly of me (to think, for instance, that I didn't notice errors)

Ha. I have that exact sense of unease when I post a rec, especially if I'm aware of what seem to me to be flaws -- spelling/grammar errors, an ending I didn't like, characterization that seems off to me. On the other hand, I really can't think of a time when *I've* been upset by someone giving a glowing rec to a story that I thought was full of holes -- it happens, and I just chalk it up to different tastes and move on. If I know that a particular person's recs are consistently not my thing, then I just wouldn't read their recs; there are plenty of people out there reccing things, and no shortage of different places to look. I tend to treat recs more as a reading list than as critical reviews, anyway.