Writer Critique Groups - Yes? No? Maybe?

An essay by Terence Blacker, entitled "Are you really, truly an author?" roused my memory of a little piece I'd written several years ago with regard to writer critique groups. One paragraph in Blacker's essay particularly caught my eye:

 "You are alone. When you started out, you might have gone on a creative writing course which peddled the myth of teamwork, consultation and 'feedback'. You have discovered, as you grow as a writer, what nonsense that is. Yours is a private project. If anything, sailing your rackety little boat as part of a flotilla actually increases the chance of it sinking."

Here are my thoughts from a while back:

I recall an interview with C.J. Box that appeared in the Rocky Mountain Fiction Writers (RMFW) newsletter some time ago. Box is the author of the Joe Pickett series,  and the 2007 winner of the Writer of the Year award from the RMFW, not to mention a whole slew of other awards and acknowledgments. He is a practiced, successful writer with the accolades to prove it. The part of the interview, however, that I recall most vividly, was when he was asked if he participated in a writer critique group. His answer was instructive. He said, yes, he had participated in a group, but the experience was “painful.” And, I can only paraphrase here, but he then went on to say that his critique partners just didn’t get it; they just didn’t understand where he was going with his writing. He also went on to say that writer critique groups are great for some, and, yes, painful for others.

I’ve participated in both face-to-face and on-line critique groups sponsored by the RMFW.

My first reading before a face-to-face critique group, huddled in an alcove formed by three bookshelves within a book store north of Denver, is memorable not so much because I had never done such a thing, but, rather, because first principles of critique were then revealed. To wit:

WIP - "Saving Skylar Hand"

The following is theoretical only and cannot be relied upon unless it actually happens. (I promised a while back that any WIP pronouncements I make would be preceded by what you've just read above. Okay. Promise kept.)

I'm currently working on three projects: two Christmas (kinda) themed stories, and, yes, I continue the trudge with a sequel to "Big Diehl - The Road Home."

Not too long ago--but long enough that I became a little edgy waiting for my editor to respond--I finished a little 15k story entitled, "Saving Skylar Hand." I sent it to my editor and began the interminable wait--something that all authors experience--for my editor to acknowledge yet another sparkling gem from one of the authors in her stable. As I've noted, I waited, and waited, and waited some more before determining that either my editor was very busy and would get to it when she had the time, or that she had gotten to it and had decided that her silence might, just might communicate that the little gem wasn't that sparkly. So, to spare her the effort to formulate--and me the heartache of receiving--a "Well, this one really doesn't fit our needs at this time" scenario, I decided to withdraw the story from her consideration. Truth told, after taking another look at what I'd sent her, I saw what the problem was--surely she'd seen it, too. So, after agreeing to write a Christmas-themed story for her (do we write for our editor's or for our publisher's?) I decided that I'd take "Saving Skyler Hand" and do it right this time, but with the additional intent to put a little Christmas into it. And that's what I did, um, am doing. And, to answer my own question posed above: I write pretty much for myself. The icing comes when an editor says "Yes," with an even more sweet confection forthcoming when a reader takes the time to affirm the editor's opinion once the story is published.    

"Saving Skylar Hand" is about two kids growing up in Big Spring, Texas. Although both the families ranch, one family is quite successful at it, while the other, Skylar's family, struggles with the almost impossible task of turning a bad ranch around. Cody Pinnt, Skylar's lifelong friend, has the best of both worlds--parents that nourish in him a love for the land, and the critters upon it while, at the same time, instilling in him the notion that ranching is only a temporary stop; his education will give him possibilities never dreamed of, and certainly not what he would find if he took up ranching himself. Skylar Hand, though, can't seem to see beyond the call of the land and the critters. And, seeing no real alternative for him, quits high school and begins a desperate struggle to turn around the failure of his own daddy's endeavors upon the land.

The story takes the boys, Skylar and Cody, through several Christmases--beginning when they are ten-years-old--and through their eighteenth year to the particular fate that life has handed both of them. Cody, of course, will head to college. Skylar will remain on the land. Through all of this, they both deal with their sexual natures, Cody accepting that he's queer with barely a second thought; Skylar denying it with an ego-satisfying conclusion the he's "...just experimentin'..."

This is a story about families, hard-case cowboys, bull riders, Texas ways, a faithful dog, two boys' love for one another, all of it mixed, ground into into an inevitable dynamic that may or may not (I'm not telling!) have a little HEA. And, yes, there's some coming-of-age here, too.

I'll let you know if my editor says, "Yes." Ain't tellin' if she says, "Well, George, this one really doesn't..." You know the drill.

P.S. The pic is my friend Fred's family's ranch in the Yampa Valley area of Colorado. That's a squeeze shoot he's showing us. Nasty business, that...         

This and That...

Guess it's probably about time I acknowledged (more to myself than to anyone else) that my great horse adventure has come to an end. I would qualify that with a "maybe" but do believe things will work out fine for my little boy and his new owner, Sarah. That's them, Shy and Sarah, at Shiloh Farms where I'd kept Shy for nearly three years, before moving him to Standley Lake Stables in June. The picture was taken in March--you'll notice he's still got a bit of his winter coat--at a time when Sarah was leasing him from me. You may also notice that he's wearing an English saddle, and Sarah is wearing the English get-up. Yes, he's devolved from Western to English. A wee Harrumph! is in order.

If you've watched the Shy video (linked on the bottom of the right panel) you'll know I purchased Shy in April, 2009, from what some might call a "collector" (of horses) who kept a large herd just outside of Oak Creek, a tiny town in northwestern Colorado. I brought Shy to Denver in August, 2009, after a pretty harrowing period during which Shy--he was five-years-old then--experienced care from a vet for the first time in his life, was gelded, was loaded in a trailer, hauled fifty-miles away to Craig where I was told--and certainly expected--he would be "gentled" by a trainer the "collector" had hooked me up with. Suffice it to say, after two months in Craig--July and August of 2009--he was found to be a "problem horse" and not responsive to the trainer's methods.