Critiques: What to keep, what to leave

A former student from one of my online classes asks:

"How do you know what critiques you should use and which ones you should not? I brought in and read some of my work to my writers' group this past weekend and received some feedback. I liked some of their comments but disagreed with others. So I wanted to get your thoughts as to how you should handle feedback."

I generally look for consensus. If a few people are saying the same thing, I pay more attention than if comments are various and random. That's not to say that I don't pay attention to the various random comments, because I do. I seem to pay attention to everything everyone says. Which is not necessarily a good thing.

But consensus speaks loudest of all because if a few people are saying the same thing, then it must be true (I reason).

I also pay more attention to comments coming from someone who writes and reads in my genre.

What I don't pay attention to are comments that sound personal and have more to do with the person offering their opinion than they have to do with the work.

And if there is even one lousy person in a group, it can ruin the entire group for me.

Once, in a group long ago, a member said (of my interracial novel at the time): Well, I don't like black people so I don't have anything to say.

I left that group fast. Ugh!

I also pay attention to comments that resonate. Sometimes someone will say something and immediately I'll say or think, Yes! You're right!

Maybe it's something I sneaked in, wondering if anyone would notice, vowing if they did, I would remove it. Or maybe I was lazy, or maybe it was a darling. Wasn't it Mark Twain who said, "Murder all your darlings"? You know, sometimes we're so in love with something we've written that really doesn't fit in the work, but we leave it in because we're in love with it. Praise those workshop members who find those sentences.

If anyone has more to say about critiques and what to pay attention to, please, have at it. I'd love to hear and I'm sure my former student does, too.

James Frey in Vanity Fair

Don't start reading this instead of writing. Save it as a reward for writing. A good story in June's Vanity Fair.

Back at it

Okay, so we've been spending time getting the studio behind the house together and it's finally become a place where it's quiet and I can work (although new neighbors just moved in upstairs, single guys who work as bartenders, so who knows!).

Yesterday, I pulled out Starletta, with ideas about how to revamp, including changing the title--any ideas? I want to remove "Kitchen" from the title, in part, because it's not a restaurant book. She's a food writer and also because I don't want guys to shy away from the book as some do from Pen on Fire because of the subtitle, which wasn't my idea in the first place, but there you go.

So in the studio, yesterday, I found I wanted to sit here and spread out my stuff. And I did. I worked. And it was good. (I just need to finish getting the courtyard together ... deliver things to Goodwill....)

The long and the short of it is, place is very important. And you gotta like the place in which you're working to do good work. Or else you'll think of any reason to do something else--anything else.

A Carolyn See op-ed piece

I just love this woman. Read this.

Know your audience

The other thing is audience.

It can help to know who writing your writing for. Pen on Fire began with an audience of one. My student Robin. A lot of you know this story. She would become inspired in class but at home her motivation to write fizzled. She jokingly said, If you came home with me, I know I could write.

I said, I'll write a book for you.

Pen on Fire started with my audience of Robin. Soon it spread to include all of my students and others.

Who are you writing for? It could be yourself. But it has to be someone.

Writing is the cure

A friend posed a dilemma about writing and here is what I said to her (which she said was fine to post here, for others to hopefully benefit from):

There does come a point when you (a writer, any writer) finds themselves at the point you find yourself at. Is it worth it? Is the self-disclosure worth raking through the muck of the past and putting it on paper, making art out of it? Is art worth it? Is it productive? Isn't cleaning a closet more productive?

What I didn't say last night, which I ought to have said, and if it's okay with you, I'll post this on my blog so I can say it! is, if there's something else you enjoy more than writing, then maybe you *should* give it up.

In my view, you're a writer. Sure you like other things, too, but you like writing and gain something from doing it. But that may just be my view.

I have considered over the years, at different points, giving it up. But when I ask myself, does anything do more for you, the answer has always been no. I love to knit, I love handicrafts. I studied music for a few years and played the flute. I was involved in the performing arts, and photography. But I always felt--and still do--that something was missing without working on a piece of writing.

Writing is the hardest thing I've ever done. Sure, brain surgery would be harder, but then again, I don't want to be a brain surgeon. And my guess is that for some brain surgeons, writing would be damn hard.

No one can tell you that you should be writing. No amount of strokes or encouragement can make you write every day if you simply don't want to.

But my guess is that if you write a bit every day, you'll want to. You'll work a groove in the brain and in your creative self that will draw you back to your pen and paper, or computer, most days. So much of writing is very much a habit. Like any habit, if you fall away from it, you might think, whatever made me think I liked that habit?

Anyway, only you know what writing does for you, and doesn't do for you. I do know that I've seen your excitement when you were working on a piece that excited you.

I know your friend discouraged you by telling you one of your pieces wasn't in your voice. Voice can take a long time to get to. It takes throwing a lot of words at the page. It truly does. You try out different styles, different tones, different ways of using words, and in this way, voice comes.

Writers need to stop thinking so much--about how we're no good, how we're frauds, how we'll never write anything of substance--and just write. Writing is the cure.

Publishing: Where do we go from here

That's the title of my panel on Sunday and I am greatly looking forward to it. My panelists will be Johnny Temple, publisher of Akashic Books; Susan Weinberg, publisher of Public Affairs Books; James Atlas, publisher of Atlas & Co.; and George Gibson, publisher of Walker & Co.

I am so looking forward to this panel. Saturday, 2:30, Young Hall on the UCLA campus.

.....

And to those who have been asking, illness has passed and I'm back at it, so thanks for asking! And I hope to see you Saturday.

Los Angeles Times Festival of Books

Okay, is everyone going to be there? If you've never been, it's a fabulous book festival with a ton of great panels for writers (and readers). Here's the web site. If you're around Young Hall at 2:30 p.m., say hi. My panel on publishing takes place then.