How Critique Groups Can Help You

I've been writing a lot about getting into a critique group lately, so I thought I'd write share more about how critique groups can help you grow as an author and perfect your writing project. You may say that you've spend plenty of time reading books about how to write a novel and spent plenty of money going to writers' conferences, so why should you bother with critique groups as well?

Writing is a difficult craft to master. Learning about the craft in any way is going to help you. Critique groups, however, are personal and interactive. Most other ways of learning about writing are one-way. You absorb the information from books or classes and you apply what you've learned to your writing. In a critique group, however, people look over YOUR writing and make suggestions and corrections specifically for YOUR writing project. Once you make changes, you can then resubmit your chapters to the group to make sure that you are properly applying the lessons. 

As an additional benefit, you can also see what suggestions are made for others in your critique group, which may apply to your work as  well. You also have the opportunity to offer changes and suggestions to the submissions of other members of your critique group. Together, you all support one another as you write your novels and you root for each other to succeed.

How does a critique group operate? Each one will have it's own unique set of rules, but in general all work in a similar way as this example below:

1) You will be able to submit a specified number of chapters or wordcount for critique per week. 

2) In turn, you will be expected to critique a certain number of submissions by others in the group. Often this will be double or triple the number of submissions that you are allowed to submit. This way, everyone will receive more critiques per submission made for each week.

Where to look for a critique group? You can start with any writing groups you are a part of, like I did. Online, Scribophile is one of the largest sites which offers critique groups for all genres, as well as other options to improve your writing. You can find other writing groups and critique groups by doing a searches online and on Facebook in their Groups section.

I have had wonderful experiences with the critique groups I have been in, and I hope you find a groups where you will be able to learn and grow as an author as much as I did.

Suzanne Hartman

Author of the Fast Track Thriller series:

Finalizing the First Two Chapters...Again

I've been working on Book 3 of my Fast Track Thriller series for so long, and I have come back to the beginning more times than I can count. Now that I'm starting to write again, I needed to return to it one final time to polish it up and slim down the wordcount as much as possible to leave only those words which are absolutely needed

It can be very easy to spin your wheels like you're on a hamster wheel when it comes to writing the first chapter, especially the first several paragraphs. After all, they're some of the most important pieces of the book, right? So it makes sense to get it right before moving on or to keep coming back to it every time you have a thought for a slight adjustment, right? 

Actually, no. The most important thing is to get the book written. And that means giving yourself permission to make mistakes, because your first draft is guaranteed not to be perfect. To put it in mild terms, first drafts are crap--that's just the way it is. 

So you need to be able to let things go--including when it comes to the first chapter and the first few paragraphs. The best time to finish the very first part of the story is actually after finishing the very end of the story. Once you see where the story has ended, it can be much easier to see where the it needs to begin.

And don't worry that you're not being a "real author" by leaving such an important part of the story for last. The beginning of the story is probably the most difficult part of writing the story...even for "real authors" who have multitudes of published books.

Suzanne Hartman

Author of the Fast Track Thriller series:

Another Critique Group Update

I've been spending the past week looking through the critique group's messages and getting a feel for the way this one works. It's been quite a few years since I was last in one, and the technology has changed from e-mails and forums to online tools like Google Docs and Sync, so I have a little learning to do. I've been SO excited to get started, but didn't want to step on anyone's toes, so I waited until I was officially introduced to the group and had received information on how to join the online tool this group had chosen to use. 

Finally, I could start participating! Or so I thought. One technical difficulty after another reared up. As soon as I figured out the solution to one, I'd smack into another. FRUSTRATED! 

More. Waiting. (did I mention that I'm not very good at waiting?)

Suzanne Hartmann

Author of the Fast Track Thriller series:

Critique Group Update

I heard back from the person in charge of the critique groups. YAY! But now I need to wait to hear from the person who runs the crit group I've been connected with. {sigh} I'm really not very good at waiting. (WAIT is a 4-letter word, you know.) But I understand that everyone involved is a volunteer. And they have "real lives" beyond writing, too. So, more waiting for me.

On a more upbeat note, I had a great conversation with a young man in the Realmsphere, the same writers' group that oversees the critique group I'll be a part of. He was willing to look over the two beginnings for my book that I've been waffling over and gave me good feedback. We also had a good discussion on what his book is about and I hope I can help him similarly when he has something ready to look at. Helping each other out is one of the best parts about being in a writing group.

Suzanne Hartmann

Author of the Fast Track Thriller series:

Joining a Critique Group

Now that I've settled on which beginning I want to go with for Revenge: Fast Track Thriller #3, and have reviewed the first several chapters, I feel like I'm ready to join a critique group. They have been SO helpful with my writing in the past that I can't imagine putting a book in front of a publisher that hasn't been past the eyes of caring critique partners who want to help me succeed.

So I have submitted the form required to join a critique group within the Realmsphere, a large writing group I belong to, and I am so EXCITED! It will take about a week for the volunteer in charge of crit groups to pair me with a group, but I can't wait. I'm like a kid waiting for Christmas to come!

In the meantime, I need to polish up some more chapters so I'll have a number to post for critiques right off the bat. 

Suzanne Hartmann

Author of the Fast Track Thriller series:

Welcome to My New Blog

The thought of starting an new blog has been rattling around in my head since I discovered that Google locked me out of the two blogs I've had with Blogger for a long time. I kept thinking that I would just redo what I've already done with an new format and updated content--the whole newer, better thing--but it just wasn't working.

Now that I'm writing again, however, a thought dropped into my head to do something I've never done--something I've been afraid to do, to be honest--write about my writing experience. I'm at a point where it's almost like when I first started writing and everything was exciting (although this time it's a lot less scary), so I think I'm ready to do this.

This blog won't be too formatted, because I want to be able to jump on and write a little bit about what's going on in my writing, what's going well or not so well, or with insights, suggestions, and advice to help other authors, or anything else that might be of interest to authors and readers.

I hope you'll stick around to follow my journey as I begin to write again.

Suzanne Hartman

Author of the Fast Track Thriller series: