Revision Help

[mrissa]

I'm not done with Sampo yet, and when I've finished the draft of it, I still have my own first pass of edits to do on Thermionic Night before I ask anybody else to make any sense of the poor mangled thing. But I've been meaning to say: it would be useful to have a filter for people on my friends list who might occasionally be willing to crit my stuff.

Electing to be on this list will not mean that you're willing to critique everything I ask for crits on. It'll just mean that you're sometimes willing to be asked. It is also not a test of your deep and abiding love for me or for my fiction. Some of my very best friends prefer not to crit my stuff, and I think we're both happiest with them not forcing themselves. I will not assume that you love someone better than me if you give them crits and not me, either; some of you have full dance cards in this regard due to preexisting groups, prior ties, etc., and that's not at all a problem. (For me. If you're sick of your crit group, I really can't help with that.) Is that enough disclaimers? I hope so.

Oh, one more: I'm not going to do everything you say. Anybody who critiques a piece should know that already, but I want to make it clear so's you're not mopey and disappointed. Unless you have a publishing house behind you and a check in your hand, in which case...I still won't do something deeply stupid if you ask me to, but value-neutral changes are a different thing entirely.

If you're already on my e-mail list, I'll still send out e-mail asking if you want to read the work in question. But a filter might be convenient for me, so if it would work for you and you're interested, now's the time to speak up. It looked like it worked all right for yhlee, so I thought maybe.

This only works for people I've friended, but if you don't have a livejournal or if I haven't friended you and you'd like to crit for me, let me know, and I can e-mail you instead.

Comments

[baronlaw.livejournal.com]

Sounds like fun, if you don't mind a complete amatuers opinion.

[jenett]

I am interested, if you are mutually interested. (and not offended if you're not...)

[mrissa.livejournal.com]

By mutually interested, do you mean if I'm interested in critting your book, or do you mean if I'm interested in hearing your crits? Because I couldn't give much of an insider's perspective on your book at all, and I don't know how useful an outsider's would be. (I'm not saying it would be un-useful. I'm saying I don't know.)

[jenett]

Mutually in the sense of "Interested in having me crit."

If you're interested in looking at my stuff, that would also be cool (and actually, outsider perspective/clarity of language crits are very helpful to me, even leaving the content aside). But not necessary :)

Re: up for it if you are

[mrissa.livejournal.com]

My grammar is usually fine; usually I'm looking more for things like "this part didn't make sense to me" or "I don't know why CharacterX did ActionY."

Re: up for it if you are

[mrissa.livejournal.com]

I have no idea what kind of fish you are like.

what the hell

[chance88088.livejournal.com]

add me to the list, too, please

[blzblack.livejournal.com]

Feel free to add me. I go through ups and downs, but I'm trying hard to get steady.

Mr. T

[blzblack.livejournal.com]

Hmm. Cut: "ups and"

See? What marvelous editing skills I have!

[apis-mellifera.livejournal.com]

Go ahead and add me if you'd like. :)

[dd-b.livejournal.com]

I'm willing to. I'm still on speaking terms with Steven and Lois and Jo and Joel and Pamela and Mike Ford, so it's probably not a fore-doomed idea from the start, anyway.

The disclaimers do seem to pretty much cover it.

[mrissa.livejournal.com]

Not responsible for books making head explode. Books should not be applied orally; if accidentally ingested, call poison control center. Remove plastic wrapper from books before baking.

As I am not wossname, uh, Dave Eggers, I will not be including all that on a future copyright page. I just say it when I'm tired.

[timprov.livejournal.com]

Books should not be applied orally

So I guess Yoon's out for a while....

[mrissa.livejournal.com]

You mean Ara's out for awhile. Gnawing the books is not a universal family habit!

[porphyrin.livejournal.com]

Me too. Or something like that.

[pameladean]

Theoretically, I am very much interested; practically, I'm not sure at any given time how much energy I have. But theoretically, yes.

Pamela

[mrissa.livejournal.com]

I had thought that my head had entirely converted you from "Pamela Famous Author Person" to "Pamela Friend." Apparently there is a small corner left, because it's going "Wow...ack...wow...ack...."

But not in a bad way.

[pameladean]

Not famous yet.

If ever.

I'm kind of rusty on the critiquing, you know.

Pamela

[mrissa.livejournal.com]

Well, everyone I know has heard of you. Hmm. Everyone I know has heard of me, kind of by definition, so perhaps this is not the best way to figure out if someone is famous.

I got in trouble with one of my friends for not being a sufficiently good name-dropper about you. I was relaying some story you'd told. It was either relevant to the conversation or amusing or possibly both, and it began, "Pamela says Will and Emma...." And about halfway through the story, he stopped me and demanded, "Wait, Will Shetterly and Emma Bull? Am I hearing a story about Will Shetterly and Emma Bull?" And he sat there looking dumbfounded, so I said, "Well, Pamela was in their writing group for a good while," and he said, "Pamela --" And then looked like I'd hit him in the head with a shovel as he figured out which Pamela you must therefore be. Then he told me if I was going to tell stories about famous people (his word choice), I was supposed to be much smarmier about it and make sure full names got used, and loudly. He is very silly.

So you're at least locally famous, in a non-geographic locale.

Clutching one's head and wailing, "This character makes no sense!" is like riding a bicycle, probably. It'll come right on back.

[merriehaskell.livejournal.com]

(raises hand and waits to be called on)

i.e., me, too, please?

[palinade.livejournal.com]

I'd like to be added, too.

[greykev.livejournal.com]

I'm a lousy critter, but for what it's worth I'm willing.

[mrissa.livejournal.com]

They have de-lousing kits for critters, if you need one....

I have added everyone up to this point to the filter in question. I'm not closing it. I'm just saying I've gotten this far.

[ksumnersmith.livejournal.com]

Me (of course). I'd love to.

[seagrit.livejournal.com]

If I'm not already in the filter (since I know I've loudly proclaimed my willingness before this multiple times), you can certainly add me.

[mrissa.livejournal.com]

Ooh, oh, hey, people reading this, that's a picture of my nephew-kitty. Who is Very Nice and plays Laser Pointer like crazy.

[oldmotherchaos.livejournal.com]

I'd be interested in being on the list -- I'm happy to help out where possible!

[scottjames.livejournal.com]

Theoretically, I am very much interested; practically, I'm not sure at any given time how much energy I have. But theoretically, yes.

What she said.

[flewellyn.livejournal.com]

I'm more than willing to read. Be glad to help.

My style of critique is not to suggest changes, however, so much as to simply ask questions. I figure that if the author can answer my question, s/he can then say "Oh, well, better explain that in the book." :-)

[dd-b.livejournal.com]

While there's immense variation in how authors seem to work with critiques -- there seems to be a fairly strong tendency for them to find pointing out *problems* (or questions you have) to be more useful than suggesting actual solutions, except in the case of people being consulted for particular expert knowledge.

[flewellyn.livejournal.com]

Well, yes. That's kind of what I was aiming at. :-)

[mrissa.livejournal.com]

Yes, very true. While I've occasionally seen someone in a crit group benefit from a direct "I think you should do X," or "I'd love to see Y," mostly "I didn't get this/I really liked this bit" is what's useful.

Hmm. Actually, that was mostly from Ken. One of my California crit group members had a talent for suggesting something interesting to do with a story even if it wasn't the right thing. He inspired alternate solutions when he couldn't provide them directly. It was great, but it's neither necessary nor expected in a crit group. It was amazing he wasn't annoying more often, but he wasn't.