McAnally's (The Community Pub) > Author Craft

Need help with a Writing Problem, Please

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belial.1980:
Whenever I critique someone's work I try to be as honest as possible. If something sounds awkward or doesn't work, I'll say so. Otherwise, I'm not doing the writer any good. But I try to be very gentle and use phrases like, "You might want to look at this..." or "I felt like this scene could've been improved by..."

I've noticed that some people tend to be very blunt when reviewing other's work. I'm not convinced that saying "I really didn't care one way or another whether this character lives or dies" is any more effective than saying, "I had troubles empathizing with this character."

I also try to find something good to comment on. If a writer is doing something that  does work, I want to point it out to them. Even if I thought the work sucked, I'll find the very best (or least awful) thing I can and show some encouragement.

Overall my critiques tend to be around 75-85% commentary on things I think need improvement. The rest as praise for things that worked. I don't put a conscious effort into this ratio but by in large it just tends to work out that way. If I think a work is pretty good then I tend to get pickier. If a writer's doing good things, I try to push them to be even better in a constructive way.

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