BLOG CHAIN: Thick Skin is Scar Tissue

Alyson asks: Have you developed thick skin as a writer? How do you handle having your work critiqued? Do you love revising? Hate it?

Cartoonist

I think I've developed a pretty thick skin (a nice way of saying scar tissue), but there's still a sting when I'm criticized, especially if a reader didn't get my character at all. 

My favorite critique partners mix the praise with the critique, and that goes a long way toward soothing the sting. When I receive scathing reviews someday (still unpublished), it'll probably be really hard for me to take. I plan not to read them whenever possible.

As far as revising to critiques, I love it, especially when the suggestion jives with me. Like a, "Why didn't I think of that before?" sort of thing. If it doesn't make sense like that, I'll generally skip the advice or else try to solve the lump in the road in some other fashion.

Revising by myself is the bane of my existence. I think creativity is a cooperative process that needs to involve at least one other person. I'm cognizant that not all writers feel this way. But then again, most solitary writers drank heavily and/or killed themselves.

How about you? Thick skin? What types of critiques sting the most?

Catch up with Christine Fonseca to see yesterday's blog chain post,

and check out Demitria Lunetta's tomorrow.

Afterglow Book Reviews: Jessica raves about SNARK AND CIRCUMSTANCE by Stephanie Wardrop

Blog Chain: All the Help I Can Get

Sarah asked...

Do you work with critique partners? How did you find your crit pals, and what influence have they had on your work?

Which is a great question. I've blogged about my critique partners before and how I met them. In fact, when I did a search for keyword "critique" all of these came up:

The Joy of Community

WIP it good: Share your reading and writing adventures

You want me to change WHAT?

More Gushing About Operation Awesome

Would you keep going? (if you were the only writer in the world)

The Perks of Fellowship for Novelists

Celebrate Michelle, Operation Awesome's Newest Member!

Writing Enablers: Who's Enabling You?

As you can see, my critique group is pretty important to my writing process. Both they and the online writing community are a big reason I don't just give up writing when life gets busy or the craft gets difficult. 

I had just written my fourth novel when I met Amparo in absolute-write forums. Agent Mandy Hubbard had held a query critique workshop thingy (technical term) and liked my query enough to request pages, even though mine was an MG boy book and you can see from the pink on her website that it's not her usual thing. To polish up my work, I requested help on absolute-write and a few people responded. Amparo was the one who got back to me a) the fastest and b) with the most helpful, thorough feedback. Not only did she point out when something didn't make sense. She also put in her funny little comments, like "Grr!" when somebody was mean to my protag or "LOL" when something made her giggle. After that, I was hooked on exactly her kind of feedback. 

But I didn't really know what it was like to be a critique partner. It wasn't, at the time, a reciprocal deal. Separately, I posted about a partial request I'd gotten on the same book (my so-close-but-not-quite-competitive-for-the-market book) on the query tracker forum. Kristal saw me there and was interested in forming a critique group, one that hopefully wouldn't fizzle out like the last one she'd been in. I didn't respond right away. Like I said, I didn't know what it was to be a critique partner. It sounded like a big deal. 

But eventually, I did write her back and we started the work of forming the group. She invited two people (Kelly and Angela) and I invited the one person I knew (Amparo) who invited someone else (Lindsay). We emailed about a group name and came up with Operation Awesome... which I have to confess I thought was a really silly name at the time. Now I can't imagine it any differently.

When one member got too busy to do the critique end of things, we sifted through a few people's pages to sort of try out different writers, see if they fit with our group. That's how I met Michelle, and also how I ended up part of this blog chain. Without Michelle, I'd have forgotten to do Blog Chain completely! Thanks, Michelle!

Each member of Operation Awesome brings something unique, whether it's an eye for grammar and punctuation, an understanding of what makes literature feel realistic, an affinity for beautiful descriptions, or an ear for authentic teen voice. Sometimes it's tricky having five people's work to critique, especially because we are typical writers, switching up projects like we change clothes. But I can't imagine who I'd do without. I hope we'll be together for a long time.

How did you find your critique partners?

Make sure you also read Cole's post before mine and Michelle H.'s tomorrow.

You Want Me to Change WHAT?

We all know how important it is to accept criticism of our work gracefully. After all, readers, critique partners, and agents are only trying to help us make our book the best it can be. We're all in this business because we love story! So why is it so hard to accept criticism? I think there are a few reasons:

• Deep down, what we really want when we share our work is for people to say it's perfect, because that would mean that WE'RE perfect, which is perfect. 
• Sometimes criticism is simply a matter of opinion. Therefore, it's easy to extrapolate that out to: all criticism is wrong opinion!
• We have an idea of what we're willing to change in our story (the protagonist's favorite color, a side character's foreign accent, the sequence of events leading up to the climax). When someone dares to suggest we change anything BEYOND that, it's horrifying. What?! You want me to change the point of view? The tense? The climax? The age--and therefore entire setting--of my characters? 

NO!! cries the inner delicate flower that is our writing soul. Say it ain't so!!

But it is so. That's why we submitted the book for critique in the first place. We knew there were imperfections that needed weeding out. We even guessed there might be structural problems. We just weren't sure how to fix them. That's where the critical reader came into the picture with advice we weren't quite ready to receive.

Did we shoot the messenger?

Today I vow to make a greater effort to accept literary criticism with grace and appreciation, with an eye toward improving the story at all costs--even if it means rewriting the whole darn thing! 

And above all, I will not shoot the messenger!

Want to join my e-pact? You don't need to sign your name. Just whisper the above vow to yourself (or say it in your head if your cat is giving you a look). Nobody will know but you. And you're the only one who needs to.