A couple of days ago Damien Isaak posted a question "Cover letter. Go for it.. Tell me good or bad" and added "Just give it to me straight....."
I took time and care, recognising that on some points my view is biased, to give as honest and positive a response as possible.
I did not expect my comments to be liked but I hoped that they would provoke thought and, possibly, be of some positive benefit.
I have re-submitted some amended work and asked for comment.
While the response "Damien Isaak1 hour ago
David the fishmonger Butcher.
Would you like to borrow my WPB I have room..." might be seen as humorous is it useful, positive or informative?
I have no objection to being criticized for my work and often find even negative criticism useful when it can be applied to achieve improvemnt. Positive comment that helps me to develop my work is even more useful.
Just being told that anything is "great" is very pleasant: but it doen't do much to help me to develop.
So, what do we want on here? Unbridled praise or to be "given it straight"?
Perhaps Damien would like to explain why my effort should go straight into the WPB or, possibly, what would improve it?
Then again I would really like comments from anyone that would be kind enough to take a look.
David
Victoria,
Thanks a million for the clarification I appreciate it. And I see what you mean about not being pressurised to review alongside our normal busy lives. I think I picked up the discussion incorrectly as I seemed to have missed the later posts, I am really not a friend of computers!
I actually being using this site predominantly for finding out info about the basics that some more experienced writers could do in their sleep ie what format should a submission take etc, and in this regard this has been very helpful.
Here is to continuing interesting discussions and not feeling quite so isolated from like minded people.
Thanks again.
Maggie
Margaret, I didn't say it wasn't acceptable to post your work. Jonathan put in best when he said this site only caters for reviewing on a very basic level. I used to belong to a site which monitored my reviews. I had to keep my read/review percentage up to maintain my status as a good reviewer. This ensured everyone reviewed everyone elses work, but on the nights someone's humour was misunderstood it descended into chaos because everyone would be quite willing to join an argument knowing it all added to their review percentage.
Having seen that happen and watched several sites close over the years because of that problem, I was relieved to see W & A didn't expect reviewing in order to be an active member. What makes this site unique is that you can gain support from people in the same situation (preparing an MS/submitting/surviving rejection) without being in the awkward position of being given work to review that still needs more than just tweaking by the person who has supported you most. The regular posters in the questions section write in all different genres and wouldn't necessarily read the work of those whose help and advice has been so useful to them. It doesn't matter if you write graphic novels, children's books or sci-fi; everyone can the understand the elation or deflation caused by a letter back from an agent and people with very different backgrounds, cultures and writing styles regularly share information and experience. I love that W & A is such an open house and anyone on the quite lonely journey to being published can pop in for advice or reassurance without having to commit several hours to reviewing first. You can wander in, ask a question and wander straight back out again, which is useful for the part-time writer, full-time [insert day job here].
Or you can stick around, get to know people and follow their journeys to publication. Having chosen to be a writer alongside any other commitments you have in your life you've already been hard on yourself, I think, so why not treat yourself to a few online friends with similar goals minus all the usual reviewing drama associated.
I can't speak for the highest users so perhaps shouldn't have pointed out that none of us regularly review as I can't offer every explanation as to why. I just know I appreciate being released from that pressure and I doubt I'm the only one. That doesn't mean there aren't regular reviewers here, though. There are.
As I said, I have no problem with people who do use this site for peer review. The facility is there. However, I would like to reiterate the first thing seen by a new visitor when they click on community is our questions section so it would be better if disputes didn't travel from the shared works and make us all look bad. Disputes here are very rare so they shouldn't be the first thing a prospective new member sees. We're so much better than that.
Vxx
To everyone (at this point),
I am rather confused at this point. I have no intention on commenting about the above debate as I didn't see the original post. But I would like to ask about one thing Ms. Whithear said.
"You'll note the highest users on this site don't submit work for comment."
Seeing as there is a section for sharing work why is not acceptable to post for comments. I would think that some people would not have access to people to independently critique their work. The shared work section was one of the reasons that I signed up to this site, and if this is not in fact a possibility I think I may have to find another location for this.
I congratulate anyone who is brave enough to post their work and I would assume they are not all looking for out-right praise but in actuality looking for constructive criticisms.
If anyone could shed some light on this issue for me it would be much appreciated. And as a note of interest I love banter, being Irish and having very dry friends it is automatic for me and I don't think I have ever taken offence. Banter can actually be a very good part of the day.
Thank you for reading this. M. O' Toole