Fiction Critique

Why would you get a fiction critique?

There are a number of reasons. One is because because of the fact that as you’re writing your novel it’s very difficult to be objective about its quality. How do you know if it’s any good? Are you wasting months of your life on something that’s just never going to work? Do you have any basic talent at all? Or, even if you know you have talent, how do you know that you’re heading in the right direction with your novel?

Another reason might be that you realise that publishers nowadays expect manuscripts to be almost print-ready. Yes, they'll have their own editors to work with you once a manuscript is accepted, but this is more about fine-tuning than anything else. They're receiving so many submissions that they don't need to take a rough edit and bring it on - they'll wait for the polished manuscript. Make sure it's yours - and getting a fiction critique is one important element of that.

Or maybe you have received a rejection letter from an agent or publisher, and you don’t know why they didn’t like it.

You need feedback, which is what a fiction critique is really.

There are four different ways of getting feedback.

1. The first is that you ask your family and friends to read your work and tell you what they think. I really don’t recommend this option. With the best will in the world, family and friends aren’t experts. They might say they didn’t like it, but not be able to pinpoint why or provide a solution to its faults. Or they most likely will say it’s great, but in that case, are you any better off? There’s always the fear that they might be just saying that out of love and respect for you.
   
2. The second option is that you join a writers’ group. The problem with this is that it can be the blind leading the blind. It mightn’t be, of course. You can end up with an excellent writers’ group which is very supportive and knowledgeable. But just how qualified or expert are the other members of the writers’ group? Are they published themselves? Also there’s a big time commitment for this – you have to critique their work too. Is this time that would be better off spent writing? (To be fair, you can learn somewhat from critiquing others’ work, so it’s not a total waste of time.)

3. The third option on the hierarchy of effectiveness is that you avail of a fiction critique service. This is a very powerful option, and deserves individual mention, so I’ll talk more about that below.

4. The fourth option is the best one in many ways, and that’s by asking the industry whether your novel is any good, and letting it decide, by finishing your novel and submitting it to agents and publishers. The publishing industry is the final arbiter anyway – it’s the one whose opinion ultimately matters.

   Okay, it’s actually the readers’ opinions which are the final final important thing. But to reach them you have to go through the agents and publishers, unless you self-publish. And if you self-publish then it’s even more important that you use a fiction critique service as I explain on the page on self-publishing.

   The disadvantage of this option is that you’re back to the original dilemma. You have to write the whole novel before you can get any feedback, and you need to approach agents and publishers with your absolute best work, but you don’t know if it’s good enough.

Advantages of a critique service

As a best-selling author of three novels and creative writing teacher I offer you my services to critique your work. This is a powerful and comprehensive service, and I invite you to read this page to see what I can provide.

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