by Joyce Good Henderson

Created on: January 04, 2009

Self-editing, or that one-hundredth rewrite of the same paragraph can only go so far in polishing your manuscript. Sometimes what you truly need is another pair of eyes, an impartial reader, a critical mind to review your work. The person who says, "I'd love to read your stuff," is not the one to be your critique partner. Nor is your mother, your child, your spouse or your co-worker. You need another writer, someone who won't try to please you, who doesn't want to prove you can or cannot be a writer. You need someone whose opinion you trust, who will share constructive suggestions and ideas with you. One person reading, editing and critiquing your work is a critique partner, two or more and you have a critique group.

A critique group brings together two to no more than six writers to help each other. Usually, a group of three or four persons seems to be the work the best because the more members in the group, the more work. Working with too many critique partners can become unwieldy.

To start a group, select several writers you know and trust and invite them to join a critique group. Select a meeting time and place. Then, decide what "business format" your group will take. Some groups exchange a chapter at a time, others a few pages at a time either at the meeting or prior to the meeting. They might mail copies to members, email or post it on the Internet. Some read the material at their meetings, others work on it between meetings and only discuss it if there is a problem that warrants the group's attention. Our critique group studies a book together. At a typical ninety-minute weekly meeting, we discuss our current work, plot problems, blocks, or where we think we are heading. We exchange pages or chapters to take home and return the following week. We may work on an exercise, hold a plotting party, interview our characters, or study a chapter in a book.

One of our most successful and fun meetings involved a "field trip" to a nearby community where we shopped in antique stores and had lunch. During the meal, we interviewed two of the writers about their characters. Why would they eat at this restaurant? What would they order? Are they hearty eaters or pickers? What dessert would they choose? What sort of interaction would they have with the servers, or with other customers? From our discussion, each of the writers constructed an entire scene and had enough ideas to build a scene before and after the meal. They couldn't wait to get home to their computers.

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