Have I caught your attention?
I just wondered why, as a writing community we don't seem to communicate that well. As a frequent flyers of four writing related sites, why is it on this one, people are unwilling to critique other peoples work. Aren't we here to help each other in any way we can?
As to myself, I attempt to review at least two or three per week, even though I'm currently re-drafting my own MS. Please don't take this the wrong way, I'm only trying to get people talking and helping each other, because without that, how do we know if what we are writing is any good.
So come on, who's behind me on this? Let us make a brilliant writers community that will make others drool with envy.
Sarah. :)
It is a good idea to read and critique - we all need to know what people think of our writing. And of course it is expensive to get a book read by an editor. In the book I finished this morning the author thanks at least ten people for reading her MS, and I thought how lucky she was to have that many friends who are willing to read her work. I think a lot of writers spend such a lot of time writing (hopefully) or reading and editing it is a lot to expect us to do more. But, if you have a MS that needs reading through it is only fair to read and comment on another one.
I also agree with Jonathan that work needs to be pretty well polished before it is put forward as it is hard to make helpful comments if we have to spend time on the basics.
I hope our forthcoming blogs will be more specific for you - let me know what areas you'd like me to focus on and we'll do our best to answer questions that way!
100% agreed. There are few questions in the community's forum and even so few answers.