Types of Critique Groups

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Part Five of the Critique Series

Part One, Part Two, Part Three, Part Four, Part Five

How Do You Group

I've been thinking about crit groups for the past few weeks and have some different configurations dreamed up.

The Hodgepodge: This is just a bunch of writers who happened to find each other. They likely all write something different. Face to face groups are more likely to end up like this. There's a Meetup.com group in my city that fits this description. Everyone who attends is a writer, but they all seem to write something different: mystery, paranormal romance, fantasy, westerns, so on and so forth. I honestly don't see how this kind of group can be of much help aside from grammatical and very basic style issues. Otherwise, what would be considered cliché in one genre would be spot on in another. They can be dangerous places for your writing to be edited, especially if you are impressionable.

The Forum: There are lots of these about, and often many genre writers end up finding their way to these at one point or another. They're great for finding like-minded people, just be wary of those who tend to be there ALL of the time. These people aren't writing; they are talking about writing and I question their seriousness with regards to it. The Forum is also notorious for not being very dedicated. You get random critiques, often from random people, and it's hard to count on them. Oh, and the fluffy bunnies! They're everywhere in The Forum. Tread lightly or they'll sneak up behind you and strike you down with their fluffy rainbow of sugary sweet emotionality.

Genre Group: “Hey, you write Fantasy, I write Fantasy, Bob writes Fantasy, John writes . . . well, terribly, but he's my roommate, we should get together and critique.” Nothing wrong with this one. I think that most personal groups fall into this category. These groups tend to be smaller and often the critiquing is done on a turn by turn basis. This usually works out well for those who are working on short stories or who need larger gaps of time between critiques so that they can get work done. But, if you're looking to churn out work; the gaps between crits can be agonizingly long in some cases, especially if meetings are skipped. My last crit group met once every other week. That means you get a critique every six weeks unless you start doubling them up like we ended up doing. But then there's a holiday, or an emergency, or who knows what and now you're looking at eight weeks or worse. 

Novel Group: I totally stole this one from the writing excuses kids; a small group of no more than five writers, all of a similar genre style, and all working on novels. Each person in the group submits a chapter a week of their WIP and each member critiques all the other chapters. This creates an artificial deadline that drives you to keep moving forward with your novel. No excuses in this group. You don't show up with your work and you get caned by the other members as punishment. But be careful, some people might join this group for the sole purpose of being caned when they fail to show up with their chapter. Naughty. 

Crit Guild: There's a temptation to find writers who are just like ourselves. We want them to have the same voice so that they can hear what we're saying and notice when something doesn't come out quite right. But what happens when everyone listens and no one looks, smells, tastes, or feels? 

This third crit group is likened to an RPG guild. In a guild you try to have characters whose strengths lie in different areas. You have the ranger who attacks from afar, the soldier who carries the front line into battle, the healer who keeps everyone's stats up. Super hero groups get this too. Heck, even we as writers understand it when we are creating our group of companions. Unfortunately, we forget this valuable lesson once we get to critiquing. 

In a Critique Guild you might have one person who is strong in dialogue, another at pacing, another at setting, you might even have your token grammar nazi. Alone, they can manage well enough, but bring them together and you are UNSTOPPABLE!!!11!!1ELEVENTY ONE PWNAGE!!!

Each member focuses on their strength when they crit. They can give broad opinions too, “The opening works really well,” but Dialog-man focuses on your dialog, Grammar Nazi Girl focuses on your grammar, token annoying guy brings the snacks. This way, when you get your WIP back, you can go through each crit and work on that focus area. Of course the trouble is, how do you find these people? Do you use Cerebro to search them out? Do you find the local guild house for Grammar Nazis?

Anyone have any thoughts on this? I think I'd like to try the Crit Guild but have no idea how I would figure out who is strong at what? Heck, I don't even know what I'm strong at. Dialog, I suppose. Yup, that's it, Dialog Dave. It works. Do you just ask what writers find comes easiest for them, what they get the most comments on (hey, that's a good idea)?

Feedback please. :)

Spread the Word Saturday: Emo Critics

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So I'm going to start a new feature for the blog. I've been finding so much great content out there in the blogosphere that I want to share with everyone and I don't want it to get lost in the sidebar. Since I don't do anything on the blog during the weekend anyway, I'm going to rename Saturdays to "Spread the Word Saturday." (Oh so witty, I know. Pft.) 

I'm going to highlight one blog post that I thought was ultra witty, snarky, or just plain ol' good advice. Most often they'll be people I know, so be looking for a link to your blog. Today's is not going to be someone I know. Today's relates to my own personal emo experience from this week. 

Dahmijva shared this with me today to cheer me up. Seems there are people out there that truly dislike me and I can only figure it is because I give it to you straight. That said, here's a link to critique guides for those fluffy bunnies who can't stomach my straight forward style. It's from Wired Magazine. 

Alt Text: Genius Strategies for Defanging Web’s Harshest Critics Please pass it along to all the fluffy bunnies in your life and let them know that we lubve them, we weelly weelly do. 

And thanks for all of the comments on yesterday's post, it made me feel warm and fuzzy in spite of finding out that I'm a know-it-all jerk that no one likes, oh, and that I'm apparently wrong (thanks Dahmijva). Friday's will likely be filled with snark from now on so read with caution. :) 

First-Time-Unpublished-Series-Authors

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The first-time-unpublished-series-author. When I first started writing I too only thought in terms of series. My first book was a part of a series, my second book was the first in another series, in-between those were two other stutter start novels that were also a part of series and the current book … is a stand alone. 

 

You see, quite a while ago I realized something when I was looking up books from some of my favorite authors. If you go back far enough and find the first thing they published it’s often a standalone. While some agents and publishers will take on a first time series, many do not. Series are the exception, not the rule. So when I spin through my various online writing forums and find so many writers talking about working on book two of their unpublished series, I can only grown to myself and offer up a little prayer to the writing goddess in hopes that they will soon see the light.

 

As I understand it, the publishing industry wants to make money. And while, yes, series make more money than standalones, they only do so when the author is known. Not many readers want to invest time into reading the first book in a series that they’ll never get to the end of.

 

The other issue you’re dealing with is contracts. Who wants to sign a contract for three or more books when they’re not sure that they can sell the first one? That’s just bad business sense.

 

Now, for those of you getting ready to start book two of your series, I’d like to offer up some advice: Don’t.

 

I’m not saying don’t write a series, go ahead and write the first installment of your three part epic. What I’m saying is that while you’re out shopping for someone to buy it, spend your writing time working on a new project. The book industry is a fickle friend, one day they can be all about your urban YA and the next day they’ve jumped over to paranormal (I know, not much of a jump, is it).

 

Pay attention to the agent blogs. Take note of how they will specifically ask for a certain niche, or exclude others outright. “Sorry, not accepting Urban Fantasy at this time.” Now, I know that we are all writing genre redefining stuff, I mean who isn’t, but if the people you’re hoping to sell it to just aren’t reading it, then you’re out of luck. Sure, you could wait around until the market swings back in your favor, but why? You can continue to try and sell your story while trying to sell others. Look at it like an investment portfolio, you have to diversify. Don’t put all of your eggs in one basket. Don’t sink your company’s fortunes into SUVs and then cry for help when gas prices rise (because it defies reason that a finite resource should ever rise in price as it becomes more difficult to find) resulting in no one wanting your gas guzzling clunkers anymore. Sorry, tangent within a tangent.

 

Also, understand where part of your apprehension about starting a new project comes from: fear. You’ve invested all of this time into a world, you’ve peopled it, lived within it, you said “let there be light,” and there was. The idea of starting that all over again can be overwhelming. What if you don’t have it in you? How can you possibly create anything to rival it?

 

I have news for you, you can. Your best stuff hasn’t been written yet. And when you come back to that first novel in your series, after you’ve written all the books that come after it, you’ll realize that you are a much better writer and that the first book doesn’t stack up to those that came after. But it doesn’t matter if that last book in the series is out of this world because no one is going to read it. The reading of that last book hinges on the first book. Therein lies the pitfall of the series. It’s not that your series isn’t any good. It’s that the first book pales in comparison to the last.

 

I wonder where this drive to produce three, four, or even five and six part epics comes from. Is it because we’ve all been raised on movie franchises and Tolkienesque tomes? Or is it just the spiritual connection to the numbers three and seven that seem to live within the collective unconscious? Whatever it is, keep in mind that something came before LoTR, a little hobbit by the name of Bilbo. And remember that Tolkien started his great epic in 1937 and that it was not published until 1955. I don’t know about you, but I don’t have twenty years to gamble on one story. What I do know is this, I have yet to see an agent post that they are looking for “first-time-unpublished-series-authors” in any genre.

Edit 090826: 

Literary agent Rachelle Gardner recently blogged about the Five Myths about agents. Myth number five? “Most agents won't consider any manuscript over 120k words in length.” How depressing for me, wrong again.

Oh, but wait! She was pulling a fast one on us. She goes on to say that this is “NOT a myth - this one is true! Until you've proven yourself with a couple of books that sold well, you're not likely to sell an epic or saga much over 100k. There are always exceptions, of course. But if you're trying to break in, your 180k-opus is probably not the ticket.” (It should be noted that Rachelle does not represent Sci-Fi and Fantasy).

 

Market Research: Or Running Scared from the Doomsday Scenario

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Yesterday’s writerly thought really got me thinking. Writing out my rock bottom/doomsday story gave me a nice, swift kick in the pants. So much so that on Saturday night I dedicated a lot of time to market research for things other than just fantasy and science fiction. I looked up markets for handyman articles, environmental essays, a writing contest and even renewed my membership to writers market online (once again vowing that THIS time I’ll make the membership pay for itself by landing some writing gigs).

What usually happens when I get all worked up like this is that I do a bunch of research, find potential outlets for my writing, and then stop and think “but I don’t really know how to do that.” Then I let myself get distracted, move on to other things, and never get any paid writing done. But, my little horror story scared me so much that I decided to actually treat writing as though it were a job.

I dusted off the printer, grabbed reams of paper and new ink cartridges and started printing. I gathered information from a couple of my prospective writing outlets, stuff that they’ve published that I think I can replicate, collected it all in a couple different word documents and then started printing. On Monday I made time to sit around with a couple of highlighters and started reading through what I had printed out.

With one highlighter I noted descriptions that were specific to the genre I was dealing with. There are some parts of writing that are just good writing, and if you follow the general rules about plot, character development, conflict and the like, then you’re ninety percent there. Beyond that you have telling details that work within each genre and style of writing.

I tend to read a lot of fantasy and science fiction, so when I read another genre, the areas where the two are dissimilar tend to stand out. That’s when I break out that highlighter. I make note of those differences because that’s obviously the telling detail that sets this genre apart from others.

The second highlighter was used for editor specific details. These were things that seemed to be important to that particular publication. Key words or phrases tend to jump out at you when you can collect a large quantity of writing and read it all in one go. Tastes that the editors might not even be aware of suddenly jump out at you when you can look over a year’s worth or writing that they had to look at broken up over twelve months. It’s almost like looking at someone’s subconscious desires.

I’ve also got a little movie viewing scheduled because one of the potential avenues that I researched was a writing contest. The judge for said contest happens to have written the scripts for two movies and has a couple of books under his belt. As writers we write what we like and therefore we appreciate those things that are similar to what we do. By analyzing what he produces I’m hoping to get a better feel for what he will lean towards during his judging.

Both movies appear to be very character driven with a strong tie to solitude and nature. If memory serves, he also edits an environmental magazine. His short stories sound like (from the reviews I read) they also follow the vein of strong character development and the connections made between people with a fond look back to the way things used to be. After a bit of research I’ll be ready to formulate my story.

Now the fluffy bunnies out there might be saying, “But David, what about your MUSE, what about ARTISTIC INTEGRITY?” And to you I say, “What about getting paid? What about getting published? What about my doomsday scenario?”

We all have to sell out a little in life if we want to find a way to enjoy it. Remember, as a writer you may be running a small business but as anyone who has ever run one knows, you aren’t your own boss. That’s a myth. Your boss is your client, the person paying you. You may have a say in how the work gets done but you definitely don’t have control over what the product is or even when it gets done.

As a graphic designer I used to try and steer clients towards the correct choice all the time, but sometimes people want what they want and it doesn’t matter if you know more than they do about a topic or not. So in the end you design their sign with a beautiful script font with all sorts of flowing, flowery lines . . . THAT NO ONE CAN READ. But that’s what they wanted and that’s what they’re paying for, what they want, not what your artistic heart is crying for. Because you know what, something else is crying too, your stomach and it can’t be fed on artistic integrity.

Fluffy Bunny Writers

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Alright, so I need a little something to get me into the mood for Monday night writing, and what better way to do that than to ramble in a blog? Today’s topic is Fluffy Bunny Writers. I borrow the term from new age Paganism. A fluffy bunny witch is usually someone who is new to the practice of witchcraft and is more or less in love with the idea of it rather than the actual practice of it. Real witches take a great deal of pride in what they do, they study, practice, meet with others, for them it’s not a stylistic choice or a form of self expression, it is indeed a craft.

 

As of late, it seems like I’ve been coming across a lot of fluffy bunny writers on message boards. These are the sorts of people who continue to push the notion that we are artists and therefore free of any form of constraints on our writing. Industry standards, critiques, and studying the craft of writing are nothing but are nothing more than other people trying to stifle their creativity.

The great master, Christopher Paolini,

For some reason, when I typed "fluffy bunny" 

into google image finder, this came up.

But I also place another group into this category, and that is those who study too much, and who become far to high minded about their writing. There are publications that are beneath them, and those who write for them are “selling out.” These folks have thrown in extra Downey with their load of ---- and come up with the elitist fluffy bunny.

 What both warrens of bunnies fail to realize is that we all work for someone. If you don’t have a direct boss making you do things that you don’t want to do, you have customers demanding things that you don’t want to do, and if, by chance you have cut all ties from either of those worlds, walking the “true” path of the artist and only produce what you want, then you have to understand that the people buying what you create are indeed your bosses. If you don’t create what they want to consume, you don’t eat. Sure, you can sit around all day expressing your inner child by hurling monkey poo at a blank canvas, unfortunately few people are going to buy it. 

So please, in life, don’t be a fluffy bunny with your writing. The way I see it, there is no selling out, there is putting food on the table, making a living, paying bills, surviving. In order to live long enough to write that great masterpiece that no one will appreciate until long after your death, you have to do something to fund it. Maybe you work a day job not associated with writing because you see working in a field that does not produce what you are passionate about as a form of selling out. Guess what, you’re still selling out.

 

So knock off all of this feel good nonsense and get down to the business of writing.