Writers Circles, Workshopping and Crit Buddies

 

Writing groups. Love them? Hate them? Love to hate them? Whatever the case, we all need feedback as writers.

I was amazed to meet a couple of writers last year who never showed their work to anyone. While showing my writing to other writers is scary, confronting and only occasionally unhelpful, by and large it’s been the #2 thing that’s kept my writing improving over the past few years. (#1, of course, is actually writing).

I must say, though, that in the early days, I did allow a few people’s opinions to really get me down. But that was largely because I cared too much, and because those particular people weren’t actually adding anything constructive to the mix. It’s been helpful to me to make it clear to my critiquers what kind of feedback I want from them, and also to keep my selftalk in the vicinity of “Learn from everything they tell you”.

For more:

• Engaging The Rules Of Workshopping by E.J. McLaughlin
• Writing Excuses Season 2 Episode 5: Writing Groups
• Riding the Wave of Critique Groups @ QueryTracker
• Can Critique Groups Do More Harm than Good? by Kristen Lamb