About Writing Groups–And Writing For Free

This first appeared as a post on 11/14/10.

PLEASE NOTE: These comments are drawn from years of writing classes, groups, conventions, and discussions with other writers, and are not intended to refer to anyone or any place specific.

About writing groups

Never, never, NEVER say to a writing group or reviewer:

“Be brutal! I have thick skin, I can take it. I want to know what you really think.”

This is analogous to poking several dozen needles deeply into your skin and then jumping into a pool of forty thousand starving piranhas. Why on earth would you want to provoke such gratuitous cruelty? Ask for polite criticism, it’s much harder to give and more likely to be accurate, if only because the critiquer actually has to think about what he’s saying in order to avoid being offensive.

The reverse is also true. If a potential critiquer or reviewer says to you, “Be warned–I’m brutal,” or anything along those lines: get ready to receive a hatful of drek disguised as wisdom. In the murk might be a pearl or two, and there’s always the chance that he or she actually will deliver a truly thoughtful and well-phrased critique. But don’t wait with bated breath for them to tell you your work is good, or even passable; most people who hide behind that warning would rather come across as jerks than admit that they couldn’t give a decent critique to save their lives.For a good start on etiquette and professionalism regarding critiques and reviews, I suggest visiting the Critters Writing Group pages and Writing-World.

About Writing For Free

When you’re just starting out, your writing is going to suck. There’s really no shortcut. One estimate I heard: you have to write a million words of crap before you get it right–but you’re not home free after your first million words have gone through the shredder.

Once you really grasp the basics, then it’s time to start writing for the public–not before. And even so, getting paid to write is going to be really, really tough. So write for free. Pick topics that interest you and write articles about them, just for fun. Write reviews of your favorite books. Write an article about treatment options for canine cancer. Set yourself a deadline; say, two weeks for a thousand-word article or book review. Polish your work. Compare it to other reviews and articles in the field you’re writing for; see how the “pros” do it differently and revise until your stuff sounds like theirs. (Sad truth: being ‘different’ isn’t usually a good thing in this area.)

Then start applying to book review outlets, local alternative magazines, niche-market rags and newsletters; anyone looking for good writers who can cover a subject for little or no pay. Only take on one or two such gigs; more than that will be overload in short order. You will be swamped with assignments if your writing is any good, and the time commitments can quickly get out of hand.

Once you have a sheaf of clips to present, move up to better and better markets, little by little. Take your time. This is not a business for quick study and fast money; for most of us, it takes years to get to the point of competence, and more years to get the first inches across the starting line. Writing for free is a great way to edge across that intimidating line and start your journey towards becoming a professional writer.

PLEASE NOTE: I am emphatically not suggesting that in order to succeed, your stuff must fit a cookie-cutter mold of what everyone else is doing. But in order to succeed, you need to learn what does work; and that is best achieved by learning how others have succeeded. Then you put your own unique spin on it. It’s like learning to bake: in the beginning, you need a cookbook, and you need to learn the basics, then the theory; once you have that and a lot of experience, you can start inventing like mad and taking the world by storm with tasty squid-ink cupcakes.