Hello My Imaginary Friends,
Creating things is hard. Showing it to other people is like ripping a piece of yourself off and hoping people will like it. (Van Gogh understood and took it a little too literally.)
There’s no trick to taking criticism. There are rules however, (which I sometimes forget) the chief most of those is: Never engage or defend. If someone says that your setting sucks because of X, you smile and nod. Later you can cry and rant and scream, but to the person you smile and nod and even thank them.
The second rule is just as important. Don’t dismiss or accept criticism until you’re calm. Once you’ve gotten over the emotional reaction, you’ll be better able to judge if you should take the criticism to heart or throw it out.
As a writer, there are things that I do well. I can create compelling characters, silly jokes, and I’m pretty decent at adventure style stories. What I don’t do well is realism.
All this comes from a criticism of this years’ serial story. It was harsh, sarcastic, and a little condescending, but not wrong. I’m not a hard mystery writer. I’m also not practised at realistic fiction. Wargrave Island has been a little cartoony in the deaths and I’m ok with that. It’s been an experiment and it’s taught me that this isn’t the genre that I want to be writing.
If you’d like to help me decide what to write for 2017’s serial story vote in the poll below. So far we’ve only had 5 voters so tell your friends and decide what 2017 will be like:
What Should be the Genre of the 2017 Serial Story?
- Comedy & Fantasy (21%, 3 Votes)
- Romance & Science-Fiction (21%, 3 Votes)
- Science-Fiction (14%, 2 Votes)
- Science-Fiction & Fantasy (14%, 2 Votes)
- Romance & Fantasy (14%, 2 Votes)
- Romance (7%, 1 Votes)
- Action-Adventure (7%, 1 Votes)
- Fantasy (0%, 0 Votes)
- Comedy (0%, 0 Votes)
- Super Hero (0%, 0 Votes)
Total Voters: 14
Loading ...What Point of View should I write?
- Third Person Limited (43%, 6 Votes)
- Third Person Omniscient (29%, 4 Votes)
- First Person (29%, 4 Votes)
Total Voters: 14
Loading ...What Form should the Conflict Take?
- Person VS Nature (50%, 7 Votes)
- Person VS Person (29%, 4 Votes)
- Person VS Self (21%, 3 Votes)
Total Voters: 14
Loading ...How Many Main Characters Should Be in the Story?
- 2 (43%, 6 Votes)
- 3 (43%, 6 Votes)
- 1 (14%, 2 Votes)
Total Voters: 14
Loading ...What should the Main Character(s) Be?
- Normal Human (36%, 5 Votes)
- Non-Human (Alien, Elf, Dwarf, etc) (21%, 3 Votes)
- Special Human (Super Hero, Chosen One, Magic user, etc) (14%, 2 Votes)
- Personification of a Concept (Death, Liberty, etc) (14%, 2 Votes)
- Anthropomorphized Animal (Human looking fox) (14%, 2 Votes)
Total Voters: 14
Loading ...Should There be Time Travel?
- No (57%, 8 Votes)
- Yes (43%, 6 Votes)
Total Voters: 14
Loading ...If you have any extra suggestions, feel free to leave them in the comments. No promises that I’ll use all suggestions.
Thank you and Later Days,
Éric
I voted, but there was no submit button (on my phone). Hopefully it got through.
It looks like a grey box with nothing in it on mobile.
Never mind. I went and did it on my PC instead.
If the mentioned criticism is the comment I left on your story, it was not meant to be harsh, sarcastic, condescending or even actual criticism. I legit thought the comically over-the-top deaths were supposed to be funny (in the same way gore-fest movies are funny). The rest was just commenting on the mystical powers of the killer and how they point to it all being a setup. Didn’t intend any ill-will.
That said, don’t be afraid to engage. You are correct in that you shouldn’t do it while angry, and you shouldn’t get defensive. That just leads to argument. Criticism is how writers improve, but most readers are not editors or writers themselves so they often don’t understand how to word their critiques to cover the actual issue they have. Engagement, if kept neutral and encouraging rather than defensive, is a way to tease out the actually useful part of a critique. Ask questions, get into their perspective, see the story with the eyes of someone who didn’t write it. Even if you don’t agree with what they say, it’s a good exercise to understand why they said it.
Looking forward to reading more!
What I should have said is not to engage in a public forum. Also never defend only ask questions and see. Defending gets too… well defensive.