Perhaps you’ve written a few chapters of a new project, or maybe you’ve just reached the end of a trilogy – at some point, you’ll probably want to get some feedback on how it’s all going. Is your main character coming through the way you intended? Will your plot hold attention? Does the whole thing hang together and make sense? A fresh pair of eyes is vital – it helps you to spot problems and fix them, as well as to identify opportunities for deeper work on your story’s layers.
When to Get Critiquing
There are generally three categories of people to share your work with: those in the industry, such as agents and publishers, freelance writers who offer varied kinds of editorial feedback for a fee, or critique partners, who can be the most generous, useful, and usually fee-free.
Getting and giving critiques is invaluable for first-time writers looking to shape up their work and is a vital step on the road to querying agents and publishers. At PWA, as well as individual tutor feedback, our students provide feedback on one another’s work (known as peer-to-peer feedback) using detailed critique guidelines. This way, students gain valuable feedback from others but also begin to see the strengths and weaknesses in their own writing with clearer eyes.
Five great reasons to become a skilled critter
Improve your own writing
Each time we critique others’ work, we refine our critical abilities, sharpening our ability to analyse writing of all kinds and helping us unpack the reasons for our intuitive likes and dislikes. Naturally, this means that our own craft improves too. Becoming an accomplished chef would mean eating a lot of restaurant meals and paying attention to the ingredients used; likewise, becoming an accomplished writer means reading with attention to all that’s going on in a text.
Learn to give empowering feedback – in art and in life!
Making notes on work is just one part of the process – putting those thoughts into words for the writer is another.
When you learn to critique, you learn the art of writing feedback that actually helps people, enabling them to progress in their ambitions.
The key is to phrase your thoughts as questions that will empower the writer to review their writing authentically, in a way that will help them, not you! – Improve it.
Take your work seriously
Moving work to the critique stage forces us into a reader-focused mindset. It means that we’re ready to hear some tricky truths, to kick some walls and see if they hold, to move to a new phase of reworking and pushing forward. It’s a process that asks us to put our ego aside as we look for next steps rather than simple flattery or affirmation – that’s what friends and family are for!
Learning how to take and apply comments about your work will also help prepare you for working with agents and publishers.
If your query turns into a contract, you’ll work with many industry professionals who will have their own input, which you’ll be expected to act on. This can be a tricky process for a novice, and experience in receiving critique will go far in helping you prepare for it.
Find creative collaborators
Creative work is so much easier with like-minded people! You don’t have to be writing the same genre or even format to critique with a partner, but finding trust in someone whom you know you can turn to when a midpoint fails to pivot or you fall out of love with a character can be invaluable in giving you the energy to keep on keeping on.
Being accountable
Writing can be a lonely business, and unless you’re enrolled on a course or have a publisher chasing a deadline, it’s unlikely anyone will hold you to your word count or chapter goal. Critiquing is the opposite – you’ll need to supply your own work and feedback on others’ according to agreed schedules, meaning you’ll simply move faster and force yourself through those sticky patches to complete chapters, drafts and edits.
A Brief Guide to Good Critiquing
At PWA, peer critique constitutes a key part of students’ work, so we’ve developed guidelines to help students give feedback that’s not just insightful but respectful and empowering too. Here’s how we suggest you go about it:
- Read the piece at least twice, making notes as you do.
- Start by checking the work for clarity: What’s going on? If you aren’t sure, why aren’t you sure? What’s missing? Check you understand who is telling the story, who the narrator is and when any pov switches occur.
- Consider the pace of the piece: Does it hold your attention throughout? Why? Why not?
- Are characters and setting clearly drawn and compelling enough to keep you wanting to know more? Why? Why not?
- How do you find the tone and style of the piece? How does the amount and type of description affect you? Is the language sharp and engaging, or do you find yourself getting lost in description?
- What are the strengths of the writing, overall?
- Word your feedback with care, and if you find any issues that you see as critical, try to find the most positive way to present them to the writer.
- Put your thoughts away for at least a few hours after writing them, and read again before sharing them. This will help reveal any confusing or heavy-handed statements.
Wording feedback
We cannot stress enough here at PWA that wording your feedback in both speech and writing is critical in serving your own and others’ creative spirit. If you are asking questions, make them open and kind, not closed and rhetorical. Always avoid suggesting new ideas or solutions – no matter how great you think they may be!
Examples of positively framed, open questions include: “What kind of emotion do you want the reader to feel?”, “How might this theme come through with more clarity?”, “How might you heighten the suspense?”, “What might be gained with a slower build-up?”. This is a skill set that gets better with practice, and it’s worth it! It’s a great feeling when someone says, ‘I hadn’t thought about that – but I’ve just had a great idea!’. No matter how you do it, in both giving and receiving feedback, be open-minded and be kind.
Finding the right Crit Community or Partner for You and Your WIP
Just because your friend, neighbour or cousin is writing a novel too, it doesn’t mean you’ll make good crit buddies. Sometimes it just doesn’t gel – and that’s fine. If you have a specific style or genre in mind, you might want to be sure your fellow critter likes or at least has experience in those areas. Sometimes, even when they do, their taste or expectations are just not in sync with your own. That’s all fine, we’re all different. The main thing is to find someone who understands the standards you are working to and will be as honest and kind with you and your work as you are with theirs.
Too soon or too much?
When it comes to knowing when you’re ready for feedback or where to go to find it, only you can be the judge. Will feedback on a half-baked plot inhibit or inspire its progress? If you hand over writing with the advisory that it’s still in the rough, will your reader be able to appreciate your intentions, or just provide feedback on plotholes you’re already aware of? Conversely, handing a fully formed novel for first reading risks feedback that could require dismantling some key elements.
As well as considering who you get feedback from, it’s also worth being aware of the limits of the advice you’ll take. I once received feedback from an editor who prefaced her thoughts with a fable about a man riding a donkey. The man, new to donkey riding, took all the advice he could about how to steer her, trying his hardest to put it all into action, but he drove them both into a river. Spoiler: they didn’t drown! But the donkey ran away, so make of that what you will!
Getting feedback is invaluable, but there are also times when you should trust your intuition.
At PWA, writing isn’t solitary. Our courses are all about getting support from professional writers and tutors, as well as a close bunch of peers. Our goal is to help you build up a network of contacts and make life-long connections to aid you in whatever you choose to do next in your writing career.
The primary focus of our writing workshops is to dedicate time to your writing, focusing on feedback and improvements to get your writing to the next level. We know that when students actively engage in critiquing, they embed the learning more quickly and soundly – by actively putting those skills into practice. This is why we base our approach to teaching and learning around peer critiquing.
Interested in taking part? Take a look at our courses.
