Writing for Charity
The Writing for Charity event was, first off, fun. I loved getting together with other writers and swapping ideas and criticisms. Shannon did a marvelous job orchestrating the whole thing, and enough money was raised to get over 50 wheelchairs!
It started with all of the authors (I think there were 16 of them) answering questions like “why do you write?” Then we broke off into smaller groups (I was in the fantasy group), and had a Q&A.
Then the part I was dreading and yet really wanting: the critique group.
Here’s where I, personally, made a few faux pas.
I mis-read the instructions. I just barely re-checked Squeetus and I don’t know how I could have misunderstood this. This is what Squeetus says:
I read it as 300 words of picture book text, or you can bring the first page of your novel. When I should have read it as: 300 words of picture book text, or the first 300 words of your novel. And, honestly, maybe my subconscious really was trying to cheat and get in more words for critiquing. Oh, geez. I hope not.
Celes (who’s story was AMAZING, by the way) can attest to this: I felt so bad. Not only was mine WAY over 300 words, it was single spaced and not in Times New Roman because I had literally just printed it off my computer that morning and I like to write in different fonts. *sheepish*
Despite my blunder, however, I loved getting critique/compliments! I had a lot of my heart on the first line of my story (first lines are my favorite), and I got a lot of compliments on it. My first page was also a lot of stream-of-consciousness and a little rambly, so I took their advice and re-wrote the first page as soon as I got home. I turned it into a scene and I already like it better.
I only wish that we had more time for each person. I really benefited from hearing other people get critiqued because I would go, "Hey, yeah, that's really good advice" or "Ooh... I do that sometimes." but we had to hurry because we only had 90 minutes to get through 13 people!
Overall the experience was very positive. And it caused me to want to start a weekly critique group (which we are going to do, we’ve already set a date and time). I’ll definitely be going to the future Writing for Charity events.
Thanks, Shannon, for organizing this! You did fantastic!
It started with all of the authors (I think there were 16 of them) answering questions like “why do you write?” Then we broke off into smaller groups (I was in the fantasy group), and had a Q&A.
Then the part I was dreading and yet really wanting: the critique group.
Here’s where I, personally, made a few faux pas.
I mis-read the instructions. I just barely re-checked Squeetus and I don’t know how I could have misunderstood this. This is what Squeetus says:
On the day of the event, bring 15 copies of the first page of your novel
or picture book text (maximum word count: 300 words) for some hands on workshopping.
I read it as 300 words of picture book text, or you can bring the first page of your novel. When I should have read it as: 300 words of picture book text, or the first 300 words of your novel. And, honestly, maybe my subconscious really was trying to cheat and get in more words for critiquing. Oh, geez. I hope not.
Celes (who’s story was AMAZING, by the way) can attest to this: I felt so bad. Not only was mine WAY over 300 words, it was single spaced and not in Times New Roman because I had literally just printed it off my computer that morning and I like to write in different fonts. *sheepish*
Despite my blunder, however, I loved getting critique/compliments! I had a lot of my heart on the first line of my story (first lines are my favorite), and I got a lot of compliments on it. My first page was also a lot of stream-of-consciousness and a little rambly, so I took their advice and re-wrote the first page as soon as I got home. I turned it into a scene and I already like it better.
I only wish that we had more time for each person. I really benefited from hearing other people get critiqued because I would go, "Hey, yeah, that's really good advice" or "Ooh... I do that sometimes." but we had to hurry because we only had 90 minutes to get through 13 people!
Overall the experience was very positive. And it caused me to want to start a weekly critique group (which we are going to do, we’ve already set a date and time). I’ll definitely be going to the future Writing for Charity events.
Thanks, Shannon, for organizing this! You did fantastic!
~Enna Isilee
The critique group sounds like a great idea. I realized I needed to search out a lot more feedback from my writing. It was so helpful. I looked through the first page that I got from Mette and Shannon, and it was so cool--their comments were great, and it was such a good experience.
ReplyDelete(And your long page was fine. Don't worry about it. A lot of people's pages were too long anyway.)
I'd be interested in learning more about this critique group--let me know!
ReplyDeleteAlso, it sounds like a great experience.
It was a very positive experience.
ReplyDeleteAnd speaking of the critique group, I totally need to write something for our first meeting. I'm such a procrastinator. :P