I’m going to break from our usual schedule and post the workshop submission page a bit earlier than usual. I would like to be able to get the bulk of this workshop organized and ready over the weekend rather than during my work week.
So for this workshop, I will not be taking submissions past the due date. You must have your submission to me by 8am EST Monday August 17th!
As usual, I cannot guarantee that everyone will be able to participate. I will do as much as I can, and get to as many people as possible. I promise!
Workshop 3: Peer Reviews – First Page Edition
In this workshop, we will be doing peer reviews/critiques. If you participated last year, you remember that we had a bit of a comments section fiasco. It became very difficult to organize the critiques and not everybody felt they had an equal shot at being noticed.
To remedy that issue, this year each participant will be given their own page and comments section for their work. You will be able to link to this page to ask friends, family members, etc. to leave critiques, and I will post a master list of all the novel openings as a blog post next week.
The other complaint last year was that writers felt they were not given enough space to show off their work. So this year I am allowing you to submit up to the first 1,000 words of your novel. The one caveat is that reviewers are not obligated to continue reading past the point that they lose interest.
The Golden Rule: Do not submit your novel opening if you do not intend to critique the openings of others. This is not fair to the other participants.
***Important: Please leave a blank line between paragraphs by entering after each paragraph after you’ve pasted into the submission box. This spacing will not show up for you, but it will show up on my end. If you do not leave a blank line between paragraphs, I will not add them for you and it will make the submission difficult to read. Thank you!***
The submission form has been removed. Thanks to those who participated!
This post is part of Novel Boot Camp. If you don’t know what that is, click here.
Ellen Brock 
Whoops, formatting error, that random “Leoberht” at the top of the draft shouldn’t be there.
And, managed to place this comment in the wrong place. I’m on a roll today! Har har.
This comment, and this reply, can both be removed. Though, I will say, looking forward to reading other people’s openings!
Ellen,
If we submitted our first 250 words for the first workshop, but haven’t received your critique, should we wait to participate in this workshop? Or should we go ahead and submit?
Go ahead and submit. Thanks!
Did I do something wrong? The breaks I added manually aren’t showing up. Jeepers! That dense copy looks scarier than any mystery I could ever come up with. ARGH! Oh, well, I’m off to go critiquing . . . sound like trick or treating, doesn’t it? Anyway, at least I know I’m doing that right. Thanks, Ellen. -PEACE-
Hi Ellen, if we submitted our first 1,000 words and then clicked the “go back” button, will our submission be deleted? I’m worried that my submission didn’t go through.
I have your submission. Thanks!
Thank you!
I’m a little confused as to where to find others’ submissions. Are they posted anywhere yet? Do we wait until you post them next week?
Also, I changed course and submitted the opening of my finished novella, since that’s my current project. I hope it’s okay since it is NOVEL Boot Camp, but I really do need feedback on this project and it’s a step toward gaining confidence to write something novel-length in the future.
I will post the submissions next week. Thanks!
Really looking forward to participating in this part of the Boot Camp Ellen! Will you be suggesting tips on how to critique constructively? And how long will we have to comment on them (so I can make sure I have time to do at least five!)?
Thanks so much for organising all of this. You’re a star. 🙂
I’m not Ellen, but this is the way I critique:
I start with an overall evaluation–does it fit the intended genre and demographic, does the hook work, is the piece engaging and original, etc. Then I go into specifics, starting with the positive–find at least one good thing, even if it’s just a compliment on the effort. Then go with the negative–don’t hold back but don’t be mean either. Be as specific as possible on both counts. Also, whenever possible, offer suggestions on how to improve the negatives. Close with a word of encouragement.
In my experience, writers, whether newbies or old timers, want three things: honest feedback, good advice and positive motivation. Don’t misunderstand me, I’m not advocating that you coddle the writer, just be careful you don’t quash the spirit. -PEACE-
I spaced it in my Word document did it not have spaces when I copied and pasted it. Darn!! Because I thought you meant to just space it in Word or something. Now when I submitted it I see its a long paragraph. What do I do?
Hi Ellen, I am really sorry to do this but I submitted two copies. After I submitted my first copy I went through and edited it and I didn’t think it made sense to have the old copy critiqued, so if possible could you please ignore the first copy and use the second one instead?
Thank you.
I swear I added a blank line between paragraphs in the happy box, but the resulting post looked like one paragraph. Sorry about that. Should I post it again and try double lines between paragraphs? If it will just cause confusion, you are welcome to delete it.
-Jeff
As mentioned in the post above under “Important”: the change will not show up on your end, but it shows up just fine on mine. Thanks!
Ditto. I indented the first line of my paragraphs in Word, then pasted it above, then added a blank line between paragraphs and it all looked right, but when I hit enter the indents and line spaces disappeared and it was bunched into one paragraph.
Let’s hope it does something to restore the gaps automatically.
I’m late, I’m so sorry. I had work issue and then my internet wouldn’t cooperate this morning