Individuality and Critique

Back to one of my favourite subjects critiques, and are they at any point in the life of a writer any good. They are I admit a necessary commodity, but when is the best time to listen to them?

 I have had a couple of people reading one of my stories from beginning to end, and I ask myself was it worth the time and energy? Does anyone really know how to push their personal interests aside and give a true account of what they have read? At the end of the day after these people have read the manuscript they can only give their own opinion. It is this point of individuality that I am referring to

SEVEN SISTERS-Nr Seaford-East-Sussex

Stephen Dawson

I have let two people read my story and both have come back with different points of view. Neither knew that it was me that had written the story so there was no bias critique. It is this point where I have to ask, was the exercise a pointless waste of time? They both liked the story they had read, and never once complained about my greatest problem with publishers, the lack of English Grammar. They are just two people out of the millions of readers we have in the UK. So was it fair to ask them to speak for the multitude, and the answer has to be no.

DEVILS DYKE North of BRIGHTON

Everyone reads a story or book in their own way, and they all know what they are looking for in a book. Not everyone thinks the same way or likes a style of writing that they are not used to. So by letting a person critique his/her story a writer might get a negative answer that has nothing to do with the story, but has everything to do with the person that read it.

The two readers also told me what they never liked about the story which had nothing to do with the content or the story itself. They were telling me how I should write a story that was in their format, which I would like to point out to all reading this post was as different as chalk and cheese. Now put these two critiques in the mix with the one that I already have from an editor and I ask myself what should I do?

 The editor only told me to put feeling into the characters so that it never read like a history lesson. Give the Hun an aggressive attitude which they had in real life. I have done what the editor told me to do, because he probably has the professional ability to know what the majority like. He never told me how he wanted the story written because he cannot write for me, however he did tell me what was wrong with the story.

PEVENSEY CASTLE

The story was a dated story about the time 480 a.d. and I have to ask the question—as long as the story runs smooth with 87% readability by my word processor, is perfect grammar necessary? Neither the Hun nor anyone in that century would speak perfect whether English or foreign.

I have decided that I will give it one more shot with five readers this time and see what falls out of the mix. I am not naive as to think one person is going to thoroughly like the story from beginning to end. Neither am I looking for all good critiques before going further with the book, but it might just give me an inkling of what is in the normal reader’s minds.

It is the last sentence in the above paragraph that I associate myself with, because I write stories in the way I like to read them. Yes I have returned once more to the word, individuality.

Be well Ian

The daily toil of a writer, and the pitfalls of doing it on a shoe string

The daily toil of a writer, and the pitfalls of doing it on a shoe string

The headlines above have been on my mind a lot recently because since about December I have been placing a free story on my blog spot. There are the few that are regulars that read it but I think most went there to look at the pictures and leave. I think a few genuinely read my smaller gripes on life and I hope I give them food for thought.

I am a writer but as I told you in an earlier post, none of the stories have been big enough to pack up my day job and go on a world cruise, but I keep trying.

To be honest I don’t think my blog spot is doing me or my stories any justice. I am very laid back about life but not to the point where laid back turns into lazy. Since I retired when my wife died five years ago, I think that I now work harder than I did when she was alive pushing me. I am 65 with a lot of free time on my hands but I am not about to sit down watching the cricket match on TV and drop dead from boredom.

I write every day, and on the bad days I put in about eight hours of writing. I think that writing stories was my only gift the teachers really appreciated when I was at school. One teacher in particular saw the potential and ability I had, but sadly she was the only one out of many. The big trouble with most secondary schools in the early sixties was the fact that the teachers had no time for the individuals. There were also far too many subjects that were of no good to the average fifteen year old boy leaving school.

I have written many books for the general public but it is money that lets me down. I have an inability to write in English grammar, and the agents do not like it. I thought I would get around this little problem by getting my stories edited, but I found to my dismay that they are a very expensive commodity. It seems that the world of writing revolves around money, and every one and anyone wishes to grab some of the potential cash the writer might earn.

I now have an editor that will take time to read my stories when I send them to him. I value his criticism as it is always fair, and he points out the things in the story that are missing. He is also hard in his criticism with professional knowledge to back it up. I always put feeling into my stories because I think it is hard to write unless there is a part of me in the writing. The characters are thinking my thoughts and talking my talk, they love as I would love or not love in some cases.

During my time on blog-spot I am going to talk about some of the things and people that have firmly placed their expertise in front of me to stop me getting my books/stories published. I am going to talk about people that over the years have feasted on the select few. They feast on those who write a book with perfect English grammar. People that can tell you the way they would write a story, but have never sat back to put pen to paper, or fingers to keyboards and write one.

I have a lot of complaints and a lot of people in professional jobs in the publishing world that have let me down. Thankfully their day of reckoning is close because the E Book is here and self publishing is putting the money sucking leaches in their place. I have been writing short stories for E Books for over four years and I am happy. I write stories for people to read, not for editors to destroy by taking the spoken word out of writing to replace it with English grammar that only one in twenty speak. There is more to come on this subject over the next part of my life in the writing world. I have about ten full story/books written, so giving one free for the public that might buy my others is not unreasonable.

Be well Ian