Through the years I’ve belonged to several critique groups myself.
Quite often though, I’ve seen writers get discouraged from the feedback they received through critique groups and a few of these writers even gave up trying to write for children.
That should never happen!
Here are some tips for helping everyone make the most of a critique group:
1. Be sure to join or start a critique group that includes at least a few published children’s writers. If no one in your group has been published, it is a case of “the blind leading the blind.” Writers in the group might not know what to look for in a manuscript. As a result, comments and suggestions will be based more on personal tastes rather than any real knowledge of what makes a children’s manuscript marketable.
2. Make sure the comments and suggestions given to each writer are positive and constructive. Too often, manuscript critiques turn into attacks on a manuscript rather than any positive and constructive criticism of the work itself. Also, beginning writers tend to nit-pick over small details (the color of a character’s hair or the word used to describe something) rather than the elements that will make or break a story – elements such as conflict, rising action, point-of-view, etc.
3. Start by critiquing short pieces rather than novels-in-progress. I recommend this for a couple of reasons.
First, critiquing short pieces will allow time for everyone in the group to submit work for critique at each and every session. You want each person to feel he/she received something of value at each session. With shorter manuscripts there is less of a tendency to get bogged down with a single manuscript and spend too much time on it, leaving little or no time for critiquing all the other manuscripts presented for critique.
Second, shorter pieces are easier to critique, especially if everyone is checking to see if these short works include all the key elements of a marketable story. It’s often difficult (particularly for beginning children’s writers) to identify just what needs to be changed or revised in the chapter of a novel, for example. But generally, the problems in a short work, like a picture book manuscript or a short-story, can be easily identified if writers know what these are.
4. Give yourself time to get to know and trust each member in the group. Your critique partners can become valued friends and associates over the years. But it takes a while to really get to know and trust someone new.
When you join or start a critique group, before each and every meeting, remind yourself to be positive, helpful, and constructive in your criticism.
Try to never leave the session knowing that you’ve made a writer feel hopeless about his or her work. Do everything you can to make each writer in the group feel comfortable, even if you are not the leader of the group.
Over time, members will begin to trust each other and be willing to share more and more of their work with the group.
5. Celebrate each member’s publishing successes.
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Happy writing!
Suzanne Lieurance
