A couple weeks ago, I was talking to Adam Whitlatch, who has recently found himself wearing an editor’s hat and is refusing to give it back despite the infestation. In his short time reading slush, he has found himself uttering the most despised thing ever heard by a writer: “This is good, but I can’t sell it.” Adam’s not a bad guy, he’s been there himself. He just knew he couldn’t sell the story to the other editors.

I read writing forums, and I see a lot of complaints about gatekeepers.

Amazon has put new energy into self publishing (along with new money), and there is much talk about how books are about the author and the reader, not some third party arbiter. However, I also read a lot of fiction from authors that think they are God’s gift and could use a little more practice, or sometimes much more practice. Some may have to wait for the next lifetime.

Okay, maybe I shouldn’t trash on other writers–even if they are hypothetical writers, but I know how I felt 3 books ago, and 5 books ago, and 7 books ago. I knew I was ready. I just needed to get noticed. Now, I’m not so sure I’m ready. I fear my editor has made a horrible mistake. I wonder if going with a small press which rejects 80% of submission instead of a megacorp which rejects 99.5% of submissions just means I should have waited, that I wasn’t ready.

A weak plot but some of the stuff inside is Caliente

As a reader, though, I enjoy having a gatekeeper. Don’t get me wrong. I know there are good indie authors out there. I know some of those authors. Still, I have to face the hard reality that I don’t always have time to read 10 first chapters so I can find a book I like. I know what I’m going to get from a Tor, Baen, or Harper Collins book.

Wait, I think Harper Collins owns Tor.

Anyway, were were we? Gatekeepers. Right.

I decided to wait until I could at least get a small press to publish one of my books. Yes, some of the reason was that I wanted to make sure I didn’t completely suck. On the other hand, if getting your work published is a Sisyphean effort, I saw no harm in trying to drag my boulder up a somewhat smaller mountain.

Hawkeye Point, Iowa's only mountain. Elevation 1670 feet

I think small press is really going to be the second breakout success story of the bloody e-book revolution. Small imprints have a style, a flavor, which will make them more accessible and brand desirable. In addition, they have an editorial process which guarantees a consistent quality.

Of course, maybe I’m wrong, maybe it will all be anarchy, and the next New York Times bestseller will be a photo book of cute cats.

After doing my post the other day on what makes a good critique, I thought I’d add a post on how my critique group works.

Different kinds of critique groups

I wanted to mention that my model is not the only model. There are probably even more than I have heard of.

1. Novel-at-a-time: The Novel-at-a-time group meets every 1-6 months. They critique entire novels at once. This is great for big-picture plot work.

2. Read-aloud: In the Read-aloud group, the group acts as an audience to the author who gives a reading of a section of their work. This is great for people without time to prep, and it really helps voice.

3. Chapter-at-a-time: The Chapter-at-a-time group looks at multiple author’s work every session, which they have critiqued ahead of time. This is the kind of group I am in, and I am going to discuss.

Organization

We are a group of peers, but there needs to be an organizational go-to person, so we have a moderator. In our group, this position is given out by succession, passed down in a direct line from the group’s founder. It’s maybe not the best way to do it, but we do it that way.

Our group is a drop-in group. We let anyone join, but the moderator does have the ability to ask someone to leave. During my 2 years as moderator, I never had to do this, but I did come close a couple of times. In both cases, the people decided they the group wasn’t for them before I had to step in. Over the course of things, we have met with as few as 3 people and as many as 12. In my opinion, 8 seems to be a good number for our group, as we always a a couple beginners.

We also have recently appointed a webmaster, who was the only person who could be talked into doing it. He’s very good though–don’t quit Dylan; we love you.

One trick I am really proud of: We always had trouble getting out the news on bad weather cancellations. So, I instituted a policy that if the local community college closed evening activities, we would not meet. The local CC is a commuter campus, so they err on the side of reason when it comes to bad weather. It also has a website, it’s own radio station, and it sends cancellation notices to the local TV station. If you don’t know whether or not they’ve cancelled, you’re just not trying. Also, it took away the burden of having to make the decision.

Every week, the moderator sends out a newsletter to our email list, which is maintained by the moderator. The newsletter includes notes from the last meeting, any business that can be handled outside the meeting, and the schedule. Then people who have submissions for critique on the schedule that week do a reply-to-all to distribute their writing to the group. (Some people are a little paranoid about doing this and ask for a direct request. It works okay.) We critique 2-3 submissions a week of 5000 – 10000 words.

Start of the meeting

At the beginning of our meeting, we do three things: Introductions, Scheduling, and Victories. I am going to consider Introductions self-explanatory.

When the introductions are done, we talk about our Victories. A victory is defined a anything you do to advance your writing career, including rejections. This usually starts some interesting conversation.

Then we do Scheduling. We generally schedule out 3-4 weeks out. Sometimes, when multiple people are producing lots of pages, we have to make people wait for a turns.

The Critiques

Each critique is broken into four pieces: author setup, individual critique, author response, and general discussion. For us, the whole critique generally takes about 1/2 hour.

We start with Author Setup. Basically, the author gets a chance to tell the readers specific things that would be appreciated in the critique–this should also be included with their submission, making this more of a reminder. We mostly skip this part, as most people are looking for general response to the piece, rather than working something specific.

Then we move to Individual Critiques. We take turns giving our (up to) 3 favorite things about the writing and the (up to) 3 we think need the most work. This gives everyone a chance to talk uninterrupted. If another person agrees with what the reader says, they should call out “ditto.” We encourage the author to hold their peace during this time, but they can answer direct questions.

The Author Response is a time for the author to go over the suggestions made, and make any comments they might have. I think the key to this is to keep it (as) non-confrontational (as possible). Sometimes, things do get a little personal. Everyone has bad days.

General Discussion is a time to talk about specific ideas brought up in critiques, or to brainstorm. There are where you ask the, “Did anyone else think?” questions or “We all thought the chapter needed X. Does anyone have any suggestions?”

The Good and The Bad

It hasn’t always been smooth sailing. Occasionally, egomaniacs have joined the group, only to be disappointed that we didn’t love their work. We’ve lost great members because they felt ready to move on or had outside issues like health problems pull them away. We’ve had college students join to get us to grammar-check their homework and had to ask them to leave.

I’ve also seen one of the most abrasive, arrogant writers do a complete 180 and become a valuable member of the group and a much better writer for it. I’m glad he stuck with it, but it was a long road, and he was on double-secret probation more than once.

I’ve been with my group now for 5 years, during which I’ve become a reasonably good author (IMHO). I probably would have managed this one my own, but I’m not sure I would have done it as quickly.  Belonging to my writing group has also allowed me to make contacts and meet some really interesting people.

I would like to leave this as my parting thought. When you finished being critiqued, I think it’s important to remind yourself that the things said by your readers are only suggestions, that most** of them aren’t out to get you, and that most** of them want to become a better writer.

* I was going to call this article “Critique Group Nitty Gritty,” but I found out that Nitty Gritty is a racial slur. I’m still in trouble for saying gypped in front of my Romani-activist friend. I suck at titles.

**Hey, there’s always going to be personality issues.

I suppose this could also be called “First World Problems.” I’m only writing it here because I had to really search around to find this information.

The editor who is publishing my book is an okay guy, but  he’s not technologically savvy. He pays someone to put is books on Smashwords, which means they are available on Sony, Nook, and other miscellaneous sites. But to me, the most important thing is to get my book on Kindle. That is were I believe I will reach the widest audience. Other authors who are using both are seeing more sales through Amazon than all other sites combined.

Currently, the only way to get a Smashwords book onto a Kindle is side-loading, a not-difficult-but-tedious process compared to the direct delivery options. Many authors are releasing their books on Smashwords and via Kindle Direct Publishing.

Smashwords has a deal with Amazon, they do plan to deliver their books to the Kindle store, but the technology isn’t in place. They were saying that everything would be ready in November. Now they are saying “next year.” My book doesn’t drop until April, so I guess I’ll cross my fingers.

At this point, I guess all I can do is wait and see if Smashwords and Amazon play well together. If they don’t, because I do have a small publisher who’s willing to work with me, maybe I can work out some kind of deal.

An awesome essay on writing by one of my favorite authors.

http://litreactor.com/essays/chuck-palahniuk/stocking-stuffers-13-writing-tips-from-chuck-palahniuk

There’s no easy path to becoming a good writer, but if you’re willing to work really hard, you will eventually see results. One thing that can help you on your way is a good critique.

There’s a lot of different ideas to what constitutes a good critique, but here are some guidelines I try to stick by. I know that some groups read things on-the-fly, but or these guidelines, I’m going to stick to the format of my group, where notes on paper beforehand, and ideas are discussed in a group.

Don’t overload the author.  Just because you found tons of things that needed improvement doesn’t mean you should air them all in your critique group. Focus on those things you think are most important for the author to work on. Leave the not-so-important stuff on the sheet.

Don’t speak over the author’s head. I am in a drop-in group. Some authors are just beginning, and some authors are published. The critique that I give to someone who’s struggling with basic grammar is very different than what I give to a published author with a set style. With the beginner, I might talk about tense inconsistency. With the published author I might pick out things like pacing and cadence.

Don’t be the star of the show. Your opinions are not a special little snowflakes. Yes, you’ve been studying writing for years now. Yes, you studied under two Iowa MFAs, who used to smoke pot with Vonnegut. Still, try to show some reserve. Yes, if you think the author really needs to work on something, get your ideas out there, but don’t take up fifteen minutes of a half hour critique, slowly paging through your notes in case there was something you missed. They’ll see your notes later, and if you forgot it, it wasn’t that important anyway.

Take the conversation offline. If you think a topic is too complex for the sheet, and explaining it might take up too much time in the group, send the author an email beforehand. If the author has consistent issues with commas, don’t bore the pants off everyone by going over basic grammar–download the information and hand it to them or email them a link.

Don’t mistake your taste for bad writing or Genre happens. Unless you have a nearby group focused on a specific kind of story, chances are you’re going to have to deal with genres you don’t like. (For me it’s high fantasy,) So, get used to not liking everything you read. And, if you complain that dirigibles and horse-drawn carriages don’t make sense, and the two people in the group who’ve read steampunk say it’s genre-apprpriate, drop it.

Don’t cut to the bone. If anything, this is probably a corollary to the first two guidelines, but I think it’s important to state. Even the best, most open-minded writers have fragile egos. It’s part of the process. We want everyone to like us and to like our writing, which is basically the same thing. I know a good critique is a brutal critique. However, to me that means not pulling punches, not refusing to throw in the towel. Don’t hesitate to take someone past their comfort level, but don’t beat someone so bad they never want to come back for more. There will always be people ready to tell the author their writing sucks. Those people are agents and editors.

Some of these guidelines may seem contrary to what people learn in college courses, but a critique group isn’t a one semester writer’s workshop class. I work with authors  over months and years. Those that listen to their critiques seem to get better. Those that don’t seem to get worse.

I’m always looking for a good way to punch up my writing or get over a patch where I am suck. One of my favorite ways to do this is by adding random elements. The side trips you take might not always be productive, but they are interesting, and if nothing else, they will keep you writing.

Lately, someone suggested that I start a special box of interesting words. Then I could draw words from the box whenever I got stuck and needed a quick prompt. She had a special box filled with hundreds of words that she had decorated by printing them with amusing fonts.

Being a lazy man, I did not want to print out hundreds of little slips of paper decorated with interesting fonts, but I did realize I had a card game, “In a Pickle,” which would be nearly as good.

“In a Pickle” and “Apples to Apples” are both party games, which you may already have in your home. For the purpose of this discussion, I’m not going to get into game-play mechanics, but the important part is that they both contain big stacks of cards with common nouns printed on them.

So, I split my “In a Pickle” cards into two piles and put one by my downstairs computer and one by where I like to use my laptop. I don’t always use them, I don’t always use the words I draw, but occasionally, I find useful information from one of the cards I draw.

You might even find you enjoy the party games. I don’t.

Lorne Michaels

Recently, while reading Tina Fey’s Bossypants, I came across this wonderful quote.

The show doesn’t go on because it’s ready. The show goes on because it is 11:30.

–Lorne Michaels

I think it would be hard to argue that Saturday Night Live isn’t a success story. Even if you don’t like SNL’s comedy, I find it impressive that he’s still producing live sketch television in the 21st century. The number of spin-off movies alone would be enough to justify SNL’s existence. The number of mainstream actors who have emerged from the SNL crucible is hard to believe. This quote reminds us that despite all the great talents involved, they were working under tight time constraints and did not age their skits like wine.

With my book deal impending, I’ve been fighting against worries that I have not done enough with my book, which I’m told will be called Minion of Evil. Could I have given it one more rewrite? After all, I haven’t worked on it in over a year. I could do better now, couldn’t I?

Honestly, I think the resounding answer to both these questions is yes. I think it’s one of those things you’re not supposed to admit, but given more time, I could probably make my book even better. After all, I was working full time at my day job when I did the last revision. I was spending every free moment trying to finish a book that I had been working on for most of a year. By the time I edited the last five chapters, I was in a daze. I couldn’t focus beyond a paragraph at a time. I just wanted it to end.

So, after sending it to my small press editor and getting it approved, I worried that it wasn’t ready, that it wasn’t good enough. That some day, I would regret releasing such an amateurish novel.

Lorne Michaels’ quote above reminded me that done doesn’t mean perfect. It means the best you can do given the time you have. I could work and re-work Minion again and again,  hoping my Sisyphean effort would somehow produce great results. Instead, I have chosen  to push it out of the nest, or put it into the Nile of a raft made of reeds, or whatever metaphor you prefer. Hopefully, it’s the right decision, but there’s only one way to find out.