How-tos: Getting Your Full WiP Critiqued

(Or, Network, Plan, and Wait)

Okay. Yes, I know. I’ve been a smidge absent lately. I’m back in the saddle, reading everyone’s blog entries (so many fab ones!), critiquing for my writerly friends, and editing my own writing. I may even get back to Twitter soon (I heart my goat posse!). I’ve been a bit busy with a stuff going on in my real life, and also writing stuff. Writerly speaking, there’s something that has grabbed my attention and forced me to take a new look at the plots in my WiP, and (cue the shock) the plots of my upcoming WiPs. Now, I’ve been a total Pantser (vs. Planner) when it comes to writing. But I might just transform into a Planner, and I’ll tell you why.

But not until Thursday. I’m interviewing the person who has caused this shift in me, the change that’s gotten me soaked in the Planner mode over the past two weeks.

And? I’m going to give away her awesome writerly advice book on Thursday, too. Don’t. Miss. It. You want this book.

But that’s not the subject of this post. I want to dive into full critiques, since I’m doing a lot of them lately. We’ve already discussed chapter-by-chapter critiques, and now it’s time to talk about beta reads. Not the usual how-do-you-critique in beta reads, since I have a couple of posts coming up that will address this, but how to handle the process when your own WiP is ready for betas. If you are an experienced beta critiquer, please (please!) feel free to add and share.

1.       Celebrate. You’ve completed your first draft. Put it away and order a pizza or pour yourself a mug of your best wine. Eat some chocolate (my current fave: Fanny May mint chocolate squares), taking tiny bites and savoring the delicious melting euphoria that only chocolate can offer. Go dancing, sky diving, or some other adequately spirit-bolstering activity. Forget about your draft for at least a week, maybe two. You’re in celebration mode. If you must write, begin a new story.

2.       Read your WiP again. Of course, this step comes after the celebratory step with the week’s worth of wait in between. The best draft to send out to betas is a to-your-knowledge-perfect draft. Or, almost perfect. There might be things that you think can improve, but you can’t put your finger on how to fix it. That’s okay—that’s what critiquerly friends are for But, sentences that are missing words or 987 occurrences of the word very in your text? This is not what you want to burn your beta readers on. You’d like them to focus on those things that you can’t see or fix for yourself. You owe yourself one more read-through.

3.       Network. Hopefully, you’ve been working on your writerly contacts all along. You’ve visited writer’s group websites, blogs, attended conferences, and you know a group of people who you respect, who like you, and who’d love to work with you. In fact, you’d love (love!) to work with them, too. Even if your WiP isn’t quite ready, you can establish relationships and read/comment on other writers’ completed WiPs. It’s time consuming and a whole chunk of work, but the benefits way, way outweigh the drawbacks. Because now? You’ve got your group of serious-minded writers who adore you.

4.       Keep in Touch. When you’ve networked and you’ve done your part in critiquing other WiPs, make sure you keep in touch with these wonderful writerly people until your WiP is ready for them. Let them know every so often where you are with your efforts, and when you think you might need them to beta read/critique.

5.       Plan. As you get to know your critiquerly partners (CPs), you’ll get a general sense of their strengths. You’ll want your critiquerly pie well represented. Some CPs might be better with plot, some with character development. Touch all bases with your betas, and try to do so in logical sequence. Maybe you send your WiP to one or two betas to start, so the next set of betas can focus their specific efforts on a cleaner WiP.

6.       Ask for what you’d like. CP #1 is great with emotions and character depth, so tell her how much you appreciate her talent, and ask her to pay special attention to this in your WiP. Maybe you think you need extra focus on characters X and Z. Ask her. She’ll be happy to give feedback, especially with the green light you’ve flashed her.

7.       Wait. Patiently. It’s a good idea to let your CPs know your overall timeline if you have one, especially if you’re sending beta reads out to phased groups. However, you can’t control what is going on in everyone’s lives. If you haven’t heard from a CP in a long while, check in to make sure they’ve received it without pressuring them to finish. Once you’ve gotten your feedback, wait again before you revise. Let the ideas sink in. The solutions may be utterly obvious, but maybe not. Maybe you’ll come up with a better solution if you let it stew. Put your critiques in the slow cooker and let the ideas waft a while.

8.       Drool with profuse amounts of gratitude. Your fantastic CPs have just read your 50,000-or-so-maybe-more word WiP, have focused as hard as they could on open opportunities in the pages, loved your characters almost as much as you do, and have taken the time to write up their thoughts. It’s a hard thing to do, and it takes skill. Love them for it, and then let them know how much you love them for it.

What else do you do when you send your WiP out for beta reads? I’d love to hear your experiences.

Why Writing/Critiquing is Like Online Games

(Or, A Hugely Overdue Meme)


I know that many of my blogging buddies completed the why writing is like *fill in the blank* meme months ago. Yes, maybe I was tagged, and yes, maybe I fell a tad short in completing the meme. A thousand apologies.

Since this blog is about critiquing, I have to throw that aspect into the meme. You know me—always breaking the rules. I'd apologize for that, too, except I don't want to give the impression that I'm going to try not to break rules in the future. Ahem. Bygones.


 
Why Writing/Critiquing is Like Online Games

About a year ago, I watched a video clip where Jane McGonigal (<-Harry Potterish last name. So cool.) gave a lecture about saving the world through video games. Jane uses World of Warcraft as one of her main talking points. Seriously. Her organization has already created some games centered on real-world issues, and I think they're onto something. I hope it works. While watching it, I realized that my gaming son is actually in training to be the ultimate save-the-world virtuoso someday. Jane is amazingly entertaining in this video clip. If you haven't seen it, block out some time to watch it. You'll get the gist of her philosophy after a few minutes.

 
One of my favorite concepts that Jane describes is how these online games provide participants with an epic goal (we must do this great thing!), create optimism (we can do this great thing!), constitute a social fabric (our cooperation brings success!), and result in blissful hours of productivity (we like achieving epic goals!).

Maybe you're already formulating in your mind how these four things relate to the writing/critiquing community. Here's my take.

1. Writing/Critiquing provides us with an Epic Goal. Our goal? To create stories that show the best of our abilities, submerge people in another world, and hopefully make them feel something. Yes, maybe we're all writing our own epicness, but it's a common goal.
   
2. Writing/Critiquing creates Optimism. Writers are fantastic when it comes to optimism (until they get stuck), but when we're writing, we typically believe that we can achieve what we set out to do. We can reach our Epic Goal.
   
3. Writing/Critiquing generates a Social Fabric. Look at the number of blogs about writing, the online writing communities, and the conferences we have available to us. Furthermore, our critique partners are enormously helpful with the optimism and motivation behind our writing. When we're stuck and our optimism falters (e.g., stuck), our CPs are there to help us through. This bond is wonderful, deep, and so important to our Epic Goal.
   
4. Writing/Critiquing results in Blissful Productivity. Holy schmoly, writerly/critiquerly friends. How many hours have we spent typing away on our projects? Or reading and critiquing someone else's projects? And we still can't get enough. We forget to eat. We forget to sleep. We like achieving our Epic Goals!
   

 
There you have it. Now, go save the world.

3 Feedback Traits I Adore

(Or, There’s no Faking a Critique)

Sometimes my critique group is demanding. There’s almost always something posted to be critiqued. But then again, sometimes? I simply don’t have it in me. Or I’m not in the mood. That’s right. Sometimes I’m not in the mood to do a critique. And if I force myself to do a crit, the time it takes drags on. I can’t get into the story, can’t feel the characters, and I end up making notes about simple, surfacy things.

I can usually detect the warning signs when I’m not in a critiquerly mood, such as:

·         Taking multiple breaks while reading to check twitter
·         Coming up with ideas for blog posts
·         Re-reading a passage several times and feeling like giving up

Although I’ve critiqued through some of these situations, I try not to ignore these warning signs. If I’m not in a place where I can provide the best critique possible, it’s best to step away. Because If I’m going to take the time to provide feedback, I’d like to make sure it’s helpful and worthwhile to the writer.

And how does a person provide helpful, worthwhile comments? We’ve already discussed a few things that a critiquer can comment on when providing feedback here and here, but we haven’t discussed how to comment. When I look at the critiques that I have received, the ones that make the most difference to me and my writing have some comment elements. Three particular elements are common among my most worthy CPs, who bring these traits to the table almost every time.

~~~

Honesty. Writer/critiquer groups maintain Circles of Trust held together by complete honesty. When someone points out a flaw, most writers are grateful for the comment (okay—maybe it stings just a little, but then gratefulness takes over). Why? Because we want to polish our work, and do a better job than we could have done all ourself. Of course, it’s most helpful when critiquers phrase feedback in positive ways so that instead of arguing with the comment we get, we can hear their message and correct the issue.

A short “this is perfect as is,” rarely comes off as genuine, and instead might come off as, “I really don’t have time for in-depth commentary, but from what I’ve skimmed, you’re doing just fine.” However, there are times when a critiquer cannot find any significant flaws to point out but they still comment on some positive aspects, or talk about how they appreciate the themes or imagery, such as “I loved how you began and ended the chapter with the same imagery.” These pointed comments help the writer know that the critiquer has taken their time to look for issues, didn’t find anything to improve, but wanted to make sure the writer knows that they appreciated the artistic devices used.

Thoughtful Reflection. There is nothing more endearing to a writer when they can see that their critiquer has taken time to think through different aspects of my writing.

·         “I thought about this chapter while walking on the treadmill”
·         “When I re-read this chapter, I was able to catch so much more than I did the first time around”
·         “This passage is comparable to the writing in (some published work) that I think you should read”
·         Any commentary on plot, character development, or moral message

These comments help the writer to know that the critiquer is invested in their work.

When my critiquer thoughtfully reflects on my work, I tend to fall in writerly love with them and want nothing more than to return the favor.

Personality. A critique partner might be across the country, or may reside on a completely different continent. But the CPs with whom a writer feels closest share a bit of their personality within the critique comments. Whether they are humorous, share personal trials and tribulations, or their energy bubbles through, when they reveal a little bit of themselves within the critique it does a few things.

First, the ability to know the critiquer better makes critical analysis just a little easier to take, because then it’s not just a lot of words summarizing weaknesses (ouch!)—it’s a dynamic, breathing person who responded to a writer and who wants that writer to succeed. Just like we need voice in our writing, we need personality in our critiques.

Second, it makes reading the critique a lot of fun. What’s the next comment going to be? Will it make me laugh? Will a cleverly worded compliment make me blush? It's like opening a present each and every time.

~~~

Getting to the point that each and every critique comes together with these three traits take work, patience, and practice. But it’s worth it.

What elements/traits do you find most helpful within a critique?

Pilot Post: A Writer's Family

I read this remark today on one of the forums I frequent:

“What I love about writers is that we encourage each other and think there's room for all of us!”

Sure, the statement is fundamentally true, but that's not what struck me when I read it. What struck me is that it’s a sentiment that every plugged-in writer feels every time we ask for help from our community. We are each other’s biggest fans, cheerleaders, and marching band all in one. Once we’ve found our beloved critique partner(s), we’ve found family.

This blog is dedicated to my cyber family of writers. We’re not each other’s editor, but we provide editorial feedback so that our writer-cousins have a better chance at success. 

But when I first started out, not as a writer—as a critiquer, I didn’t know what the heck to say to another writer. Who was I to tell them that their story didn’t work for me? I tended to re-read their piece until I figured out what they meant, and then congratulated them for the intention behind the piece.

Helpful? Nope.

Now further into my critiquerly journey, I’m strengthening my skills and providing more helpful feedback.

Not An Editor will focus on the critique process for manuscripts, query letters, and any other piece related to professional writing. Guest critiques, common writing tics, and self-editing topics will each take turns in the spotlight on this blog.

Take a second to let me know what critique topics you’d like me to cover. Or, ask questions and I’ll research for an answer (grammar, structure, etc.). Hopefully, the journey of this blog will be one of critiquerly growth, which is just as important and very related to writerly growth.