Free Critiques!
Posted by Andie Ryan Blog at 8/6/2010 1:15 PM 
Categories: Resources and Services
Tags: revision improving writing Peter Selgin writing workshop writing writing critiques Writers Digest
Categories: Resources and Services
Tags: revision improving writing Peter Selgin writing workshop writing writing critiques Writers Digest
For all of you looking for ways to get your work critiqued between workshops or in an anonymous forum, here's a terrific opportunity for you. One of my former award-winning writing teachers, Peter Selgin, offers on his blog a "first page" critique service. Here's the link:
http://yourfirstpage.blogspot.com/
And here's how it works:
1) You send Peter the first page if your story or memoir - the instructions are accessible from the above link.
2) Peter critiques it on his blog, and gives a little information about your genre and other work that you might find relevant.
So easy, there's no excuse not to do it.
Peter preserves the author anonymity of each page, though he does have a list of contributors that includes links to their own websites. Free critique AND free marketing!
Not only do you get Peter's feedback, but the feedback of others subscribing to Peter's blog who may comment on the comments, and on your responses as well. Do yourself a favor and take advantage of this. Peter is an insightful teacher who is not one for false praise or coddling. You'll get the straight skinny about how your work can improve, and your writing will be better for it. He is well-published in both fiction and non-fiction (check out his books from Writers Digest), and knows of what he writes.
You'll be thinking of the feedback you're given long after you get past the first page. The other terrific benefit here is that you can read other writers' first pages and their related critiques as well, which can frequently be an eye-opener even if the genre is different from yours.
We've talked about this in the revision posts here, but many comments you receive in Peter's virtual workshop, as in others, have relevance to your style, your way of presenting information, your way of introducing characters, and (the death blow) the tendency we all have to communicate -- to tell -- too much too soon -- to "pad" our first pages as we draft our stories and novels.
So go have fun with this, and let me know how you do!
http://yourfirstpage.blogspot.com/
And here's how it works:
1) You send Peter the first page if your story or memoir - the instructions are accessible from the above link.
2) Peter critiques it on his blog, and gives a little information about your genre and other work that you might find relevant.
So easy, there's no excuse not to do it.
Peter preserves the author anonymity of each page, though he does have a list of contributors that includes links to their own websites. Free critique AND free marketing!
Not only do you get Peter's feedback, but the feedback of others subscribing to Peter's blog who may comment on the comments, and on your responses as well. Do yourself a favor and take advantage of this. Peter is an insightful teacher who is not one for false praise or coddling. You'll get the straight skinny about how your work can improve, and your writing will be better for it. He is well-published in both fiction and non-fiction (check out his books from Writers Digest), and knows of what he writes.
You'll be thinking of the feedback you're given long after you get past the first page. The other terrific benefit here is that you can read other writers' first pages and their related critiques as well, which can frequently be an eye-opener even if the genre is different from yours.
We've talked about this in the revision posts here, but many comments you receive in Peter's virtual workshop, as in others, have relevance to your style, your way of presenting information, your way of introducing characters, and (the death blow) the tendency we all have to communicate -- to tell -- too much too soon -- to "pad" our first pages as we draft our stories and novels.
So go have fun with this, and let me know how you do!
Wow, Andie . . . What a find.
Thank you, thank you, thank you.
I checked out Peter Selgin's blogspot and learned a lot just reading other people's first pages and Peter's comments.
I'll be revising my own first page in light of what I found there . . . so that when I submit it, I'll get the next step for me.
Thanks again.
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