Grateful for Writing Groups by Lynn Lovegreen

November is a great month because of Thanksgiving. Thanksgiving is my favorite holiday because it focuses on family, food, and gratitude. What can be better than that?  I am thankful for many things in my life, including my family, my friends, and my home. Today, I’m going to write about something else I am grateful for: my writing groups.

 

I belong to several writing groups, including 49 Writers, the Alaska Writers Guild, RWA (Romance Writers of America), SCBWI (the Society of Children’s Book Writers and Illustrators), and local chapters AKRWA and SCBWI-AK. (Full disclosure: I’ve been active in RWA’s reformation toward a more inclusive writing community, and I am the President of AKRWA.) While my participation varies now and then, all of these groups have helped me grow as a writer.

 

Writing groups give many benefits to writers. They provide information about the craft and business of writing through programs such as classes, webinars, and conferences. Many host critique groups, which in my experience is one of the best ways writers can enhance their writing process and improve their writing. And I am thankful for the camaraderie—I love to hang out with other people who have characters running around in their heads and understand the highs and lows of the writing life.

 

If you don’t have one now, I encourage you to look into writing groups to find one that suits your interests. Here are a couple links for ideas:

https://www.rwa.org

https://www.scbwi.org

 

Whether you’re just starting out on your writing journey, or you’ve been on the path for years, I encourage you to create your own writing community. Find a writing group that supports you, and you’ll have much to be grateful for.

 

Happy Thanksgiving!

Lynn Lovegreen has lived in Alaska for most of her life. After twenty years in the classroom, she retired to make more time for writing. She enjoys her friends and family, reading, and volunteering for her local library. Her young adult historical romance is set in Alaska, a great place for drama, romance, and independent characters. See her website at www.lynnlovegreen.com. 

To Critique or Not to Critique

 

Critique groups specially dedicated to those writers whose 2023 resolutions include joining a group

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They can be tough for authors to deal with, even painful sometimes. But I have learned to listen, shrug off any pain, and use the feedback to improve my writing.  I would never have been published without a critique group or critique partner. That's why I am a member of four different groups right now. Thanks to these groups I have learned to understand voice better, and worked to make my own voice more distinct. 

Each group is different. I have learned that sometimes I have to say up front that I want them to tell me what is wrong, because sometimes they just want to tell the good stuff. They don't want to hurt my feelings. But I tell then, I am looking for ways to improve my story, I can't do that unless there is someone to point me to problem areas I am too close to my own writing to see. 

Critique groups and partners have always been instrumental in my writing. My very first group, which was part of an RWA chapter, showed me that romance was really not my genre, but that the young adult genre was. The result led to me signing with an agent and the eventual publication of my first novel, a young adult romance titled Pull, in 2009. 

 

Since then I have settled into writing for middle grade and young adult readers. My most recent books were Courage (2020), about a damaged family family learning how to find courage together, and Unlawful Orders (2022) a nonfiction historical that covers the twentieth century while chronicling one black man’s journey from life in a small town to tuskegee airman in WWII, renowned surgeon, and lifelong struggle for civil rights.

None of this would have been possible without my Critique partners and critique groups. One of my critique partners is looking over my current WIP right now, a story about a girl and her “evil” stepmother seeking friendship and sympathy in a small town. The tentative title is Family Reunion. I count on her to tell me if my tween character is realistic, and if her character arc works before I take the story to the next stage of development.

I also belong to a four person critique group. Although we went quiet during the height of Covid, we are all happy to be back to meeting in person. We have a poet, an essayist, a writer of adult novels, and me, proving that a good critique group does not have to be writers of the same genre. They are looking at Family Reunion on a more granular level. We go over several chapters in depth at each meeting.

By he way, this evening (Wednesday Jan 11)  I will have my first meeting with a new to me, on-line critique group. This will be my opportunity to size them up, see who is serious and who is not, and decide if this group is for me. Because that is numer one for any critique group or partner, finding out if their goals and procedures are compatible.  As important as critiques are to my success, an incompatile group is not only a waste of time, it can acually make your writing worse.  
 

In my early times in critique groups, I made some horrible decisions. I want to apologize to anyone I critiqued before 2015. I used to make suggestions and edits to help the author "improve" their work. Eventually, I realized I was really trying to talk then into changing to match a voice I liked, often my own. I became a better critiquer when I internalized that my purpose was to point out areas in a manuscript that might have issues and then leave it to the author. They get to  discover the fix themselves, or to disagree and ignore my well-intentioned but unhelpful comments. I now counsel newbies to critiquing that every piece of advice they get is just another suggestion. Nothing anyone says to them means they are required to run out and change anything in their manuscript right away.

Personally, I divide the critique commens I receive into three groups. 

1 - Things I totally agree with. 

2 - Things I totally disagree with. 

3 - Things that leave me uncertain, so I have to think about it in detail before I decide how to deal with the advice. 

I suggest others consider doing something similar when they join a criique group.