Critiquing Omniscient Viewpoint

One of the pitfalls of writing in omniscient viewpoint is that it can be very hard to get a critique.  If you run into a piece written in omniscient viewpoint, these are some things to remember:
Critique the work.  Okay, this sounds obvious, but people can get so focused on the use of the viewpoint they [...]

Benefits of Doing Critiques

Everyone’s first thought when they jump into the world of critiques is about getting their work critiqued.  Maybe they want to know the story is good or have someone identify what phrase in the first chapter is getting rejected (flashback to writer giving me a critique and saying, “Agents hate writerly words and will reject [...]

Being Helpful in a Critique

We’ve all seen critiques that say something like “Great story!”  It’s not helpful because it only gives vague information.  Thinking about why helps not only the writer being critiqued, but also the person giving the critique. 
Example of unhelpful critique: “Rewrite this sentence.”
That doesn’t tell us anything about what bothered the critiquer about the sentence.  Maybe [...]

What Not to Do When Receiving Critiques

Learning how to receive critiques is as much as a skill as giving them.  It’s not easy.  These are some things that are likely end future critiques from people:
Getting defensive or hostile.  No one likes spending time doing a critique and then getting a nasty response.  It always seems like the ones who do this the [...]

How to Critique When You Don’t Know How

Critiquing a story for the first time is a tricky thing.  It’s easy to go overboard in either direction and end up with a comment like “This is great!” or telling people “Don’t use adverbs!”
I learned how in Toastmasters.  We had to evaluate speeches, and our club’s practice was to start with three good things [...]

Best and Worst Writing Advice

Worst Writing Advice

“Narrative tells the story.  Get rid of all your dialogue.”

This came from a critique I received.  Sometimes, with critiques, I have to read into them a little to get why the person is making the comment.  In this case, the individual read only non-fiction, and his one recent fiction experience was Cold Mountain.  [...]