Finding the Right Mix for Your Writing Group

The “Now What?” Months are here! In 2014, we’ll be bringing you advice from authors who published their NaNo-novels, editors, agents, and more to help you polish November’s first draft until it gleams. Author of The Trouble With Mojitos , Romy Sommer  espouses the critical importance of a critique partner… and how to find one :

I was very proud of the first manuscript I ever submitted. The only person who’d laid eyes on it was my mother the English teacher who corrected all the grammar with a red pen. But plot, character development… what were they? That was still back in the days when we submitted via snail mail and the response came the same way. By the time the reply reached me many, many months later I’d learned enough not to be surprised that it was a form rejection.

That rejection sent me off looking for a critique partner who knew a little about romance novels. I met a few through the Harlequin community forums who helped critique my first 1920s novella, Let’s Misbehave, which was later published under a pseudonym by a small ePress, but we all wrote different sub-genres, so we drifted apart.

In 2009, I won NaNoWriMo for the first time with a story I wrote for a contest run by Harlequin. It was through their lively contest blog that I met other entrants—and that was how I found the Minxes of Romance. Or how they found me.

When you find the right mix of personalities you know it. Magic happens when you meet a critique partner who understands what you’re trying to say and who has qualities that complement yours. I was lucky to meet eight of them. In our group, some are stronger at critiquing conflict or character development, some are better at sharpening wording or correcting grammar. Together, we are a powerhouse.

When we met, three of us had sold to the same small ePress. All of us were targeting bigger publishers. Four years later, we are published by HarperCollins, DC Thompson, Entangled Press and Harlequin. That only happened because of the support and help we gave each other.

We critique each others’ work less these days, but we still bounce ideas off each other, and we still share support and encouragement. Because that’s what best friends do.

A critique partner is an essential accessory on your path to publication. Whether you meet over coffee to swap chapters or whether you only connect online, whether you have one trusted partner or join a group of complementary talents, is up to you. For me, being part of a group has worked well because even when one of us is on a deadline and hiding out in the writing cave, there’s always someone else available to chat.

The right critique partner, that person who brings magic to your writing and who becomes a friend beyond the written word, is worth the wait. Persevere until you meet that person. But don’t delay! Get started meeting people today.

Join your local writers’ group or search Google for groups of like-minded writers. Read the blogs of other aspiring writers, or find them on Twitter or Facebook (my publisher, Harper Impulse, has a very active Facebook page where you can meet other romance readers and writers). Or join the NaNoWriMo forums, if you haven’t already.

I’m a romance writer, so a belief in Happy Endings is a given. I just know that the perfect partner (or partners!) is out there for you. You simply need to go out and mingle.

Romy Sommer is the author of The Trouble With Mojitos , and Waking Up In Vegas . By day, she dresses in cargo pants and boots for her not-so-glamorous job of making movies but at night she comes home to two little Princesses, and writes Happily Ever Afters. Though her heart lies in Europe, she’s not too good with the cold, so she lives in sunny South Africa.

Top photo by Flickr user Opedagogen.