Critique Groups: The Good, the Bad and the Ugly

Part 1 - The Good

I have been writing stories my entire life, now that I think about it. It started one summer when I was in 4th grade. My favorite book was Little Women by Louisa May Alcott; I loved the fact that Beth had 3 other sisters.

I identified with Beth, the quiet, shy one, because I was most like her at the time. But something in me made me want to have that world all to myself. In a seventies type world. So at the tender age of 9, I wrote about 75 pages of a "book."

A woman named Mabel Guthat lived downstairs. She happened to be the editor for a little industrial magazine. She also had a typewriter.

Never underestimate your impact on a child.

She took the time to type out that entire summary of Little Women (well, that's what it was) and was touched that I dedicated the book to her. What a dear lady.

The one thing she did NOT do was critique this little manuscript. That was smart--it was intelligent and kind of her to keep her comments to herself. Her silence gave me the courage and the audacity to continue to write. However, my writing was my own and I dared not show anyone what my mind thought. What it could conjur up.

As I got older, my interests changed. I became interested in drama, theatre and music. However, always, in a notebook hidden under my bed, poems, journaling, thoughts. Maybe the beginning of a story never finished.

Years went by and eventually I joined a critique group called Christian Corner of Writers Group 1. It was not an accident that I joined this kind and generous group of people. When I showed them my work, they did not mock me or insult me. They also did not stay silent. They gave me a critique.

There are critiques and there are critiques. The critiques that I received from them were helpful, they were very thorough and they made me think. They--the members and their crits--made me learn and gave me a desire and encouragement to learn more.

They achieved this by using the sandwich method. Simply put, the sandwich method of critiquing is:

1 Say something nice

2 Say your peace - in other words, your critique

3 Say something nice at the end

I must have received 31 comments on the last chapter that I wrote; my infamous Chapter 11, where I stopped. Even with all the comments, I did not feel belittled. I did not feel sick to my stomach. I felt helped and encouraged, comment after comment after comment.

You would think that after all the good that came out of this group that I would just stay there and be loved. Well, I'm still loved there or at least I think I am (and that's what counts to me). I'm still treated with respect (one can only imagine why).

However, I gained courage. Boldness. So I ventured out into other groups. But that is for part 2--the Bad and the Ugly.

*Shortcut to the above picture by Doug Hyde.