El Andalous - Writing Critique Group

 

Alice in Wonderland in Sahl Hasheesh

I’ve mentioned that I’ve been sending my novel Space Shapes out to literary agents; unfortunately, all I’ve had so far is about twenty rejections. Although this is fairly normal, I’m concerned that I haven’t had a single agent requesting to see my full manuscript (I submit the first three chapters; next stage is to wait for an agent to be interested enough to ask to read the whole novel). I’m beginning to wonder if my manuscript isn’t sufficiently commercial.

I found this brilliant tool online called Query Tracker (QT). It allows you to keep a record of all the agents you’ve submitted to, their replies (rejection, request for full, etc), and the relevant dates. All the (anonymous) data are shared, so the more authors who use QT, the better idea you get as to where your query is in each agent’s queue. 

From the data, you get an impression of how many (or few) manuscripts agents are requesting to see. Some agents haven’t requested any manuscripts from anyone for three years or more! The tool also has links to the agents’ websites. You can sort agents in the database by genre, by who they represent, etc, to help you find a suitable potential home for your manuscript.

I paid for the full version (only 25 USD per year), which gives me access to additional data and reports (eg, which agents are currently requesting the most manuscripts, which agents reply the fastest, etc). If you like data, it’s fascinating. Sometimes you can see that agents read by genre (ie, they’ll respond to all the mysteries on one date, then all the science fiction novels on another date); sometimes it’s just unfathomable as to why they’ve jumped to reject one sooner than the other (was it super promising so they went to it first, was it appalling and easy to reject?). I love it!

There’s also an associated forum, so I posted my query letter, synopsis, and first five pages for public critique, which has been helpful. Of course, I’ve critiqued others in return. Anyway, an upshot of this is I was invited to join a small critique group of five, and we’re all critiquing each other’s novels. I’m not using Space Shapes as I am confident it’s sufficiently well-polished (that’s not to say I won’t change my mind at some point). However, I have another novel fairly far progressed (Time Tells), which I think might be more commercial than Space Shapes, so I’m having Time Tells critiqued in the group.

We have about a fortnight to critique 10,000 words from each of us (it took a bit of experimentation, but our novels all have different chapter lengths, so we settled on word count in the end), so that’s 40,000 words altogether. We’re a mix from Canada, US, and UK (me).

I’m enjoying it on several levels. First, it’s really interesting reading what others are writing (I’m loving all four of the novels!); second, we all have different strengths and weaknesses so it’s good to learn from that; third, it’s good to have a little group to share writer information, frustrations, and hopes; and fourth, I like to think I learn also by critiquing (it’s easier to spot things to improve in others’ work and then you realise that maybe it applies also to you).

We have the occasional zoom meeting for chit chat, but I’ve only attended one so far as my time zone is difficult for everyone else. We all lead busy lives in addition to writing (particularly the others). I think I’m the granny of the bunch, but that’s fine. The atmosphere is good as we all encourage each other while not holding back on the critique. Hopefully, at the end of the day, we’ll all win.

Anyway, it does take quite a bit of time to do the steady stream of critique. I’m feeling more like a proper writer now as I’m spending so much time either critiquing or writing. But that’s what I wanted to do and at the moment, it’s making me very happy, despite my current state of failure!