Tag: critique

Trust the Process

~ Meg ~ 23 Comments

“Trust the process” is a slogan used by fans of the NBA’s Philadelphia 76ers, though it has since become popular elsewhere in sports and culture. Coined during a rough patch for the team, it basically means “things may look bad now, but we have a plan in place to make it better.” – The Urban Dictionary

So yeah, the Sixers looked bad last night, but this isn’t about basketball.

Writers have rough patches, too. Maybe your work in progress is stalled. A project that started out with great potential fizzled the further you got into it. Perhaps you wrote your plot into a an unfixable mess and have to trash the whole thing and start over. You know what? This is the process. Working through all of the ups and downs, the mistakes and the disasters only makes you a better writer on the other side of it. That is of course, if you stick with it and trust the process.

The other day, a friend of mine who has been reading through all the Bucks County Novels sent me an email. In it he praised the first three books, loved them, in fact. But when he got to the fourth book: Tainted Inheritance, he noticed a change. Sloppy editing, spelling and grammar errors, a plot that dragged. He actually said he was thinking: “C’mon, wrap this up, Meg.” And you know what? He’s absolutely right.

Tainted Inheritance is my NaNoWriMo book. It’s the primary reason I will never, ever write like that again. I was so tired by the end of that marathon of writing that I avoided revision and neglected to have it professionally edited. And the result is a substandard novel. Now to be clear, I do think the overall story is good, great even. I just need to clean it up and pass it along to my man Kevin for editing. But the fact is, I do not have hurt feelings or wounded pride at the critique of my friend and fellow writer. Why?

There are differences between having a reader not like your book because it just isn’t their taste and having them not like it because it was badly written. I am not going to rewrite my story to satisfy someone else’s taste. However, if a reader genuinely points out an inconsistency, a flaw with the concept or some other sort of error, I am more than willing to accept the criticism and revise accordingly or apply the advice to the next project. I try my best to learn from the experience. And ignore the people who are just negative because they are mean.

This is one of those cases where the reader gets it. Valuable criticism and feedback are gold for a writer. It only makes us better if we listen and apply. Trust the process. It always works.

When comments become collaboration…

~ Meg ~ 44 Comments

One of the main reasons I began my blog four years ago was to use it as a place to feature my written work and to establish an online presence. At the time, I hadn’t written anything but the first rough chapters for what would eventually become my first novel. An unintended consequence of blogging was finding a community of writers (and readers) who would become invaluable sources of feedback and support.

There are some things to consider when you post your writing on your blog. Most of the fiction I’ve shared over the years has been in the rough draft stage. This is when the work is most vulnerable to criticism. The readers are going to find all the flaws and inconsistencies in the story, all the things you haven’t worked out to complete satisfaction. (Especially if you are writing by the seat of your pants!) Hopefully, your readers will be kind and constructive with their feedback and hopefully you have the spine to use the critique to improve the work rather than be hurt or insulted.

Occasionally, something really special can happen though… In posting sections of serial fiction, the readers may envision the plot heading in a completely different direction from the one you intended. The same is true of a short story. A reader may see the ‘what happens next’ when you see the ending. It is fantastic when your followers are invested enough in the story to comment and speculate about the next chapter. Even if you don’t use the idea a reader presents, having another perspective can inspire future writing. Now this is not to say that you should be driven off track by the demands of the reader. Nor should the reader feel impelled to impose their will on the writer. After all, this is your creative work. But having that collaboration among writers and readers can make the story even better than you had imagined.