Critique as a Learning Tool for the Critiquer

The obvious way to learn from critique is to have someone else tell you what could be improved in a piece you've written. That is certainly a fast track to better writing. Even more intense is the experience of having multiple people critique your work. Then, you get the additional education that comes from sifting through different--sometimes completely opposite--suggestions. It can help crystalize your style to decide which comments you'll act on and which you'll leave by the wayside.

So, many writers critique others simply as a quid pro quo; they do the critique in hope of getting one back. There is a lot to be learned from critiquing another writer's work, however. Do you tend to use gerund phrases to begin your sentences? (i.e. "Jumping over the hood, he started the engine.") There's nothing like reading a few bad introductory gerund phrases in someone else's story to see why they can be anathema. How about said bookisms? Do you have trouble tearing the "he laughed" and "she snorted" type of tags out of your dialog? Just critique a few stories where they are used excessively and you'll root them out of your own work with enthusiasm. The opposite is true as well. You may find gems of sentence construction while critiquing another's work. Or, maybe they've come up with a way to show a character's evil side that you can adapt and make your own.

However you use it, critique is an essential part of the writer's life. I highly recommend Critique Circle for anyone who writes.

Another story to be published!

I received an email this morning from Everyday Fiction. They will be publishing my very short story, Covered Dish Supper.

The message included some lovely comments from three of their editors. Here's what they had to say:

Engaging plot, seamless pace, adept characterization, and terrific attention to detail. Well done!
-- Jana Seely

A sweet romance from a senior perspective.
-- Elissa Vann Struth

Is this romance, or is it humour, or both? Either way, I enjoyed it, particularly the unexpected and clever ending.
-- Camille Gooderham Campbell

So, take a look at their website and keep an eye out for Covered Dish Supper. It will probably be the only time you'll ever see a romance written by this author.

Lenten Luncheon

I'm late posting today because I spent the day in town. I got to Whiteford's Giant Burger, the local senior citizens hangout, at about 8:15 and gobbled down a biscuit or two before taking off for the church.

In the kitchen at First Presbyterian, ten of us "Kitchen Witches" chopped, diced, baked, and fried for three and a half hours. We cooked a meal for fifty using only one frying pan. It was a really large frying pan, but still... To do what we did with only one frying pan shows ingenuity, skill, and dedication, in my opinion. I don't know what happened to the other frying pans--there are bound to be more of them in a kitchen that size.

In other Laurens news, the lumber yard next door to the church now sells grits as well as honey. They have the honey advertised on one side of the sign and the grits on the other side. I can only assume they do it that way in order to catch customers both coming and going.

Blurb For My New Book, The Go-To Girl

Here's a little bit about my book-in-progress, The Go-To Girl. Feel free to tell me what you think.

Nat Rutledge is just an ordinary nurse working at an everyday job—until a dying patient tells her there’s a microchip inside his denture.

When ex-CIA operative Bob MaCaferty tells Nat Rutledge RN there’s a microchip hidden in his partial plate, she thinks it’s bound to be the morphine talking. But, the chip shows up on x ray. And, there’s a boatload of cash hidden just where Bob said it would be. Nat takes on the job of delivering the dental plate to Bob’s contact in Mexico. The errand will entangle her in a shadowy web of Mexican drug cartels, difficult for even a trained agent to navigate. Can this small town girl escape its far-reaching tendrils?

Cool New Website

I just discovered a great website,Query Tracker. It has the scoop on agents and publishers: who they've published, what they want to see, percentage of partials requested, percentage of fulls requested, percentage of rejections and response times, plus comments from other authors who've submitted to them. Sort of like a Duotrope's Digest covering agents and publishers.

Blog Hijacked!

My franchise blog was hijacked! I woke up this morning and wandered over to the computer for a look at Jan Melara Franchise Coach. Oddly, the computer was off, even though I had left it on. I switched it back on and waited forever for it to reboot. Finally, I was able to click on the link to the blog. The familiar page showed up and then, within seconds, was replaced by another page. I blinked a couple of times and clicked on the link again, only to be rerouted--to yet another page this time.

I called my husband, the resident IT expert, and we frantically searched the web for information on blog redirection and hijacking. As I had suspected, our search led us to believe one of my newish gadgets was to blame. It turned out to be one called "How to Cook Anything."

I removed the code and the redirection stopped. Thank goodness we found the problem! However, in the process, we lost the link list for this blog. I've replaced it and repopulated with what I hope are useful links, but I may have left out some that were there before the accident.

Authonomy

I removed The Dark Side of Town from Authonomy just now. I achieved my goal of stimulating some interest from agents and publishers. I can't give each of them an exclusive look at the book, but I can at least take it down from a very public site. So, now it's time to sit back and let the agents and publishers make their decisions.

Said Bookisms

To me, there isn't much that screams "newbie" more than the said bookism, especially when overused. Here's a good article on the dreaded creatures.

Characterization Through Clothing

Characters should be three dimensional. How do you make them come alive when all you have is words on a page?

Clothing can help, if you pay attention to detail. Instead of putting Jane into slacks and a shirt, try having her shrug into a silk blouse and tug Cruel Girl jeans over her slim hips. Or, she might wear a plaid blouse, ripped at the shoulder, and get her sneakers caught in the leg of her cotton pants.

I hope you saw two very different women getting dressed. By choice of verb and description of garments, bits of their personalities were revealed.

Hit a Roadblock!

I'm revising my newest novel, The Go-To Girl, and seem to have hit a brick wall. A critiquer from Critique Circle told me she couldn't picture the setting of one of the scenes, so I want to rewrite it to include a better description. I keep avoiding doing it, though--to the point that I find other things to do than write.

For instance, this afternoon I'm going to work in the yard! Scary thing to pick over writing, huh? But, that's how blocked I am. The best I can do is promise to think about the scene while I'm gardening. Or, maybe I shouldn't think about the book at all...

Interesting online format

Here's an article in an interesting format for an online magazine. Check it out by clicking here.

Drug Gangs in Mexico

I just read a bit of a book on Authonomy about Mexican drug gangs. I'm seeing more and more about them in all kinds of places lately. They figure prominently in my newest book, The Go-To Girl. I hope that's a good thing and not a tired topic by the time I can get the book out there!

My Story is Out Today!

My short story, Obedience, is available at Halfway Down the Stairs.
It's about a young nun who has some decidedly unorthodox ways to sort out differences of opinion about nursing ethics.

Waiting

I've had several people tell me waiting is the hardest part of being an author. Waiting for replies from agents and publishers, waiting for critiques from crit partners, waiting for publication when accepted, waiting for the check when published.

I think the the best thing to do in all these situations is forget about the manuscript that's in limbo and work on something new. That's why I'm trying not to even think about The Dark Side of Town for now. Instead, I'm going to concentrate on my newest effort,The Go-To Girl, and on our new franchise business, The Entrepreneurs Source.

To help keep my mind off the book which can't be named, give me a call at 864-498-4141 and let's have a chat about franchises. Or, visit my franchise blog: Jan Melara, Your Franchise Coach.

My Thoughts on Book Marketing

My experience on Authonomy has opened my eyes. I thought all serious authors realized marketing would be a big part of the writing life. Man oh man--was I wrong. There is an ongoing controversy about marketing in the forums there. The "purists" seem to think marketing a book is somehow beneath them. Their view is that a book should stand on its own merits, free from any efforts at publicity or jockeying for position.

While I agree that a good story, well written, should trump all other considerations, I am also a realist. How will anyone know your book is a great tale, written in a can't-put-it-down style? Are they supposed to hack into your computer to get at it? Obviously, some marketing is necessary to make the reading public aware your book even exists. Even if your work is picked up by a big publishing house, you are going to have to be involved to some extent in marketing and publicizing efforts. Anyone who is unwilling to participate in those activities might as well give up on selling any books, in my humble opinion.

A New View of Your Prose

Here's a fun way to get a new insight into your prose using a word cloud. Paste your text into a box on Wordle's website and click "go." In a few seconds, a word cloud will appear on your screen. It's a graphic display of the most frequently used words in your selection. I put in the first two chapters of The Go-To Girl, my novel-in-progress. It was obvious exactly what each chapter was about. Amazing and fun.

Click here to try it yourself!

Not on Topic, but important

We went to a Pecha Kucha presentation at The Warehouse Theater in Greenville, SC on Thursday night. A wonderful group of architecture students presented their class project: quick, affordable emergency housing for disaster victims. They can convert shipping containers, those big metal boxes we often see whizzing by on railroad cars or being loaded onto ships down at the docks, into basic shelter--with surprising efficiency--for homeless people. Check out their website: Seed Haiti

Secrets of Synopsis

A synopsis seems like such an easy thing to do; just write out a summary of your book and keep it down to two pages or so. Then, you sit down and start writing. A couple of hours later, you've got ten pages of material and still don't feel you've captured the essence of the book.

Here's my secret for clearing this hurdle. Keep a summary of chapters as you write them. Weave those summaries together and voila--you've got a synopsis!

Check out this article on how to write a synopsis: The Fearless Synopsis

Be Ready for Action When You Query

For some authors, there is a great temptation to query before a manuscript is polished, or in some cases, even before it's finished. Let me add my voice to the the horde of others crying out for patience in this matter. I had an agent request a partial less than five minutes after I sent my query. Another agent requested a full one day after my query. If I hadn't been ready with a full manuscript, I would have been in an embarrassing position with both those ladies.

So, resist the temptation to query before it's time.

Agent nibbles and Franchise Sales!

Well, two agents have contacted me about The Dark Side of Town. One, Kae Tienstra from KT Public Relations and Literary Services, asked if I had an agent yet. I replied that I didn't. I haven't heard anything else from her. Her blog said she has some three hundred emails in her inbox, so I know she's probably overwhelmed. I just hope my reply didn't get lost in that mountain of mail. Or maybe she was just asking and didn't mean anything by the question.
The other agent, Mollie Glick from Foundry Literary + Media, asked for a partial within minutes of Ms Tienstra'a inquiry. I know she's busy, too.
The waiting is killing me, but at least I have our new business to think about. We signed the papers on a single unit franchise of The Entrepreneurs Source yesterday morning at ten thirty. We are now the proud owners of a business that's in the business of selling franchises. We're off to a franchise Expo in Raleigh, NC. this afternoon and already have one lead. WooHoo! Bring on the wheeling and dealing!
If you want to represent my book or buy a franchise, I'm your woman.

How I use critique

One of the hardest things a writer must do is accept constructive criticism. It's not fun, but it's one of the best ways to grow.
Our books are our babies. We nurture them in our minds, tentatively jot them down, polish and cosset them along until finally one day we present them to the world. And then, the world finds flaws in them. How dare they?
But, wait, maybe that one little thing would sound better that other way. And, that one bit might be a little confusing now that you mention it.
I usually take in what all my critiquers have to say, thank them profusely,then wait a few days. After a week or so, I sit down to edit. Anything that stuck in my mind as a problem, I repair.
I used to print out each critique and pore over it as I edited. Then, one day I noticed I was going in circles trying to please everyone else. That's when I adopted my "use what sticks" method. It works for me.

The self publishing venture is a no-go!

I've messaged Amazon Kindle to remove my book from their publishing queue. My book's been "in the pipeline" for days and days now. So much for being available for sale in thirty six hours!
I've been hearing less than stellar things about the quality of CreateSpace's printed books. And, scuttlebutt has it the ISBN number they give you is really just an identifier exclusive to the Amazon site.
I'll try the traditional route once again.