Critical Me

Last year sometime, over on the Working Stiffs, I wrote a post about this certain romance writer’s contest I entered once, and about how my entry was demolished by one of the judges, over what was really, in the scheme of things, a pretty minor grammatical error. Consistent throughout, and easy to fix; I was just doing it wrong. I won the contest anyway, so I guess I got my revenge, but I’m thinking about it today, since the same thing happened to one of my Facebook friends lately. She entered a contest, one of the judges complained about her grammar and told her to read a grammar dictionary before submitting anything anywhere again. Now, this lady happens to be a college English professor, so I’m sure her grammar is just fine, but she got worried. And changed everything to read the way the judge suggested. When she showed it to her editor, the editor promptly changed it back to the way it was, and had a good laugh.

Just goes to show we should have the courage of our convictions, right?

In the next month or so, I’m going to be doing a bunch of critiquing for Killer Nashville. (That’s our local mystery conference, for those of you not familiar with it. It actually takes place in a small town called Franklin, about 15 miles south of Nashville, but I guess Killer Franklin doesn’t have the same ring to it, somehow.)

I’ve never done critiquing before, except for friends, but I imagine it’s probably a lot like judging entries in a contest, which I have done. So I’ve been thinking about what constitutes a good critique. And I’ve come up with the following points:

1) It should be constructive, not destructive.

2) It should be sensitive, and I should remember that it isn’t my writing, and shouldn’t necessarily be written the way I would write it.

3) Even if I hate it with a passion, and would like to recommend that the writer never put pen to paper again, I should find something good to say about it.

As you can see, it’s a little skimpy. And that’s where you come in. If you do critiques, and you have some tricks of the trade you’d like to share, I’d appreciate it. If you don’t do critiques, but you receive them, how about telling me what you like and don’t like? What makes your heart happy, and what doesn’t?

6 Responses to “Critical Me”

1. Jennie, you’ve made really excellent points—-it’s so important to be constructive. And your advice to remember that it’s not your writing, and therefore not going to be written the way you would write it is dead on.

   Great post!

   by Tasha Alexander on July 20th, 2009 at 7:15 am
   
   

2. Back to my college creative writing class we always had to find at least one good thing to say about the writing. We started with the good points and then talked about our suggestions to improve the writing. Good luck. I know you’ll do a terrific job!

   by Sara on July 20th, 2009 at 7:28 am
   
   

3. When it comes to critiquing, I bring 15 years of being a high school English teacher. First, as you’ve said, always be constructive. I also found, especially with 9th graders, that I couldn’t always fix everything, so I’d sometimes just focus on three main things that could be improved so as not to overwhelm the poor kid.

   by Judy Larsen on July 20th, 2009 at 7:36 am
   
   

4. I’ve been on the giving and the receiving ends of crits, and the one main thing I’ve learned is to be aware of voice. As in, don’t mess with theirs and don’t let them mess with yours.

   Another thing is to make sure you celebrate the successes - even when they’re inside a bunch of mistakes. Saying ‘I loved this… (scene, sentence, phrasing, etc.)’ can make even a harsh crit easier to accept.

   by B.E. Sanderson on July 20th, 2009 at 8:15 am
   
   

5. Everyone else has said what I wanted to say, but I’ll add this about grammar: Most people don’t have a clue. One common example, the many who use “he and me”, when “he and I” is more appropriate, just because they still remember that “rule” from grade school. I’ve even heard national newscasters use the incorrect form of this one. Not that newscasters have a lock on intelligence or anything, but you would think they’d at least know this one.

   So take all criticisms of grammar with a helping of salt, is my advice.

   by Karen in Ohio on July 20th, 2009 at 8:52 am
   
   

6. Thank you, ladies! So far I’ve read through three or four, and although the writers are clearly at different points in the journey, it’s been easy to find the positives. There’s one waiting in the wings, though, that I took a quick gander at the other days, and I’m not looking forward to it. Just… not. But I will keep your excellent points in mind, and muddle though!

   by JennieB on July 20th, 2009 at 12:49 pm
   
   

Leave a Reply

Name (required)

Mail (will not be published) (required)

Website