We're still here!

[healingmirth]

I'm sure many of you are super-busy with all manner of writing things, but I looked up from the rock I've been living under and realized it's been... a while.

So. Whatcha doin'? Anything we can do to help? Want to cheer about how well your writing is going? (or complain about how it isn't?)

Comments

[vanessagalore]

I don't believe I've ever posted here...

Right now I'm finishing up an online writing course, the first creative writing instruction I've ever had. I started writing fanfiction in the summer of '07 and spewed forth until August of this year, when I decided I needed a break from fandom, but not from writing.

The writing class is hard; the other students are kind of douchey and to me it feels like the teacher has lost control of the class (ignores it and then whines that no one is participating). I guess I'm learning though, trying to listen to the critiques without my ego, and working really hard on ideas that are new to me. Some of the instructor's critiques on my and others' submissions have really puzzled me (some very odd interpretations that are indicating a bias, I believe). And since every homework assignment or story submission gets a "good job" or "nice work" at the end of their critique from her, I can't really tell if I'm actually improving or not. (I think I am, for whatever that's worth.)

Tonight though I took a little break and wrote 2200 words of fanfic for one of my fandom friends, who's been super-encouraging as I've struggled with the class (she was bemoaning the fact that she misses my smutty fics). Felt really good to slip back into fandom, although I probably won't post it and will just give it to my friend when it's done (like all my fics, it will probably end up being an epic). I saw some of the techniques I've been working on in class asserting themselves in fanfic.

Maybe I'll post links to the two original stories I worked on in the class, if anyone's interested in reading and critiquing.

[healingmirth]

Can I ask which course you're taking? I've been pondering the Gotham Writers' Workshop offerings, but I'm not ready to commit to it yet.

[vanessagalore]

That's what I'm taking. Fiction I, which you have to start with. If you decide you want to take it, I can suggest a few things which will help you get more out of it. What I don't like is my classmates and my teacher, and it sucks that you can't see who the teacher is before you sign up. Only 9 out of the 16 students are actively participating: I only had 6 critiques from my classmates on my 2nd story, which upset me (that's touted as a big plus for the course, all the feedback you get). Also the lectures are pretty much straight regurgitation of the textbook (and all the exercises are from the textbook as well). (Maybe this is how all the sections of the class are.) I checked out some of the instructor's short stories and I think I would have passed on the class knowing what her writing is like. She's nice enough, and her critiques are valid, I guess, although I've been completely puzzled by some of her critiques of my fellow students, even more than what she's said about mine. I've definitely learned a lot, because I really put a lot of effort into it, and I'm incredibly motivated to improve my writing. But I've also felt pretty shitty about my writing, which is new for me.

If you want, I can send you screen shots so you can really see the class in action. There's much less participation and effort from the instructor compared to the sample class you see on the site, which I consider false advertising. The instructor checks in with the class online once a week, twice max. She has a real knack for asking questions in the classroom tab that stop conversation dead in its tracks.

There's a few things I could suggest which would help you to get more out of GWW: have two short stories of around 3500 words already at least planned out. Excerpts of longer works don't work at all for this class. Although the class guidelines indicate that any genre of writing is okay, my classmates were pretty snotty (**OMG, a curse word**, your character is unlikeable), so you're better off with ~~literature~~. Admittedly, I was foolish about the stories I submitted. I emailed the teacher asking if it was okay to have sexual content and cursing in our stories, and she replied "Own your writing, you're so brave to include sex in your stories. There's a lot of sex and cursing in my stories." Then in her critique, visible to the whole class, she called my sex "gratuitous". Awkward!! (She should see the stories I've written that are hardcore. Now THAT'S gratuitous.)

Some of this is crashing into harsh reality after the fluffy comfort zone of **OMG squee** fanfiction, of course. Fanficcers are definitely different. And our attitude toward sex in our writing has been completely skewed from mainstream. (I don't necessarily consider this a bad thing: I write consensual sex between loving grownups and my female characters enjoy sex. But I know from a thriller workshop I attended that the publishing industry is practically prudish in its mindset.)

I think I'm going to take a class at this site in January on mystery writing, which is what I want to do (mystery/suspense, maybe erotic thrillers). I've ordered a couple books by the instructor to read ahead of time so I can get a feel for what she is like. I haven't given up on GWW though, and I think that as you move into higher classes like Fiction II and Novel Writing the class participation problem would go away. You might take one class, and be intimidated about participating and blow it off, but you wouldn't continue on in the sequence wasting your money. And I assume the better instructors teach the higher courses. I know I would get more out of another class at GWW because I would have much different expectations and I would be sure to have a couple stories ready to go that would be a little more mainstream.

Sorry for the novel. I do go on.

[rubberbutton]

Ugh. Writing! Don't talk to me about writing!

I've hit some kind of wall, I think. About six months ago, I finished a novel (the one I posted a few chapter here, actually). Then I started another, hit 40K and just quit. Started another, hit 20K and quit again. I don't know why -- I'm usually good about setting goals and meeting them. I just all of a sudden hate everything I write -- like I can suddenly see how bad I've suck, when I never could before. I've been really bad about starting fanfic stories and quitting those, too.

I'm so useless! It's driving me crazy.