Posts tagged critique
Posts tagged critique
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…which means you should really start working on your writing again!
Join us tonight at 9pm EST and until 10.30 EST for the coolest online literary crit session ever!
Y’all should know the drill by now, but if not, here goes:
Most of the HOOT staff (3 out of 4) will be sitting in a specially created chat room (which you can find by clicking http://www.hootreview.com/workshops) to talk about your writing! Bring a piece, 150-words or less and in any stage of the process, and let’s discuss! Or, if you don’t have a piece, help us work through others’ pieces!
Why you should do this:
If those things don’t convince you, you’re probably hopeless.
We hope to see you there!
—James
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In case you’d forgotten that we do this, tonight (Wednesday night) is our usual online workshop! Bring a short piece (150 words or less) and your literary lenses and get ready to critique others’ work/have other people help you with yours!
Go to our website, http://www.hootreview.com/workshops/, and click on the link. We’ll be there from 9-10.30 EST, so we’d love to have you!
—James
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Sometimes it’s hard to think about the necessary mechanics of a functional narrative in a short-format piece. How can you cram all that stuff into something short (in HOOT’s case, 150-words-or-less!) and still make it readable? Moreover, how do you go about taking APART a piece of flash/micro?
Take a look at Bob Thurber’s piece and think on it! I thought it was helpful and gave good insight on how to read critically.
—James
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Today is #FridayFiction!
#FridayFiction is a flash fiction workshop that runs every week on Twitter from 3 - 6 p.m. PST, facilitated by Richard Hugo House. Each week, we pick a theme and create a story based off of that theme. We share it with the community of #fridayfiction writers by using the tag in our tweets. You can contribute more than one story. You can use the same character in every story, or multiple characters. The important thing is that your story, with the tag #FridayFiction, not exceed the 140 character limit that Twitter sets.
Why do we do this?
Flash fiction gives us a chance to re-examine our language in a way that we normally wouldn’t be able to do. The confines of the tweet force us to think of different ways of saying something, finding the word that communicates the biggest idea in the shortest way, and using Twitter allows us to find other writers on social media.
For more on why we write flash fiction and use Twitter to do it, read “Exercises in Brevity” on our website.
Last week’s #FridayFiction was “Endure”. We received a lot of wonderful stories last week on being pushed to one’s limits and choosing to go beyond it. I was blown away by how people handled the prompt and the creativity that each story showed!
This week’s prompt is “Forgive”. There is nothing tougher for a person to do than to forgive. We often confuse forgiving with letting go of our rights. Often, “I forgive you” can mean “I’m going to let you do this again to me”. Forgiveness is supposed to mean that releasing someone from the debt they owe you, a moral, emotional or physical debt. What keeps us from getting there? What happens for a relationship when real forgiveness, real release, is achieved? How does it affect the person who’s forgiven? How does it change the person who forgives?
Write a story about forgiveness. Your character can be the one giving it, receiving it, or refusing to give it. Maybe forgiveness is just too hard to give. Maybe your character receives forgiveness but can’t accept it.
Hint at the hurts, the mistakes, the problems that drove the divide in the first place. Create a story that shows us how forgiveness would affect the characters were it given, received, denied or accepted.
As you write, try and experiment with POV, different characters, and feel free to write more than one story! Writing within the confines of a tweet is difficult, but it gets you into an incredible mindset. Find the right words to create the mood, the plot and convey character in the tiny space that you have.
Also, interact with the community! Every week, a lot of amazing writers gather together and share their stories. These people don’t just offer up great stories, they are great people to follow throughout the rest of the week as well. Being on Twitter is all about curating the conversation you want to be apart of and this is a great way to meet people who love being creative.
If you’ve been reading for a long time, please continue to enjoy our great stories, but also, feel free to offer up your own! You wouldn’t think, as vast a social network as Twitter is, that it’d be a safe space to offer up your fiction, but it is, and it’s a wonderful way to network with other creatives online.
Hope to see you and your flash fiction this afternoon!
How cool is this?! If you can’t make it to HOOT’s crits online from 9-10.30 EST every Wednesday (http://www.hootreview.com/workshops) (or even if you can) you should check this out!
—James
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Hoot Review’s Wednesday night online workshops provide a unique opportunity to gather in cyberspace with other writers and Hoot Review editors for an intimate discussion. Participants have the option to submit a microfiction piece for specific and thoughtful feedback. This workshop is extremely helpful for writers who wish to explore the art of condensed fiction. I plan to visit again soon!Best,Chelsea Covington Maass
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Thanks for @Wahidao for the Twitter shout-out (she has so many followers!) and for coming to our Wednesday workshop! It’s awesome to have cool people from across the country who are able to take part in our workshop experience.
If you haven’t had the chance to check us out, make sure you mark your calendars for Wednesday nights at 9pm EST!
—James
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We always talk about how awesome our online workshops are, but for those of you in the tri-state area (or better yet, those of you in the Philadelphia area), we also offer real-time, in person writing workshops!
We had our first fantastic micro-fiction workshop this last Sunday afternoon at Moonstone Arts Center at 13th and Sansom in Philadelphia from 1-4.
Despite it being the day-after-St.-Patrick’s-Day (with the entire city wearing their green shirts from the night before), we had a strong turnout of strong people ready and willing to work and share.
What we did:
Our participants were absolutely FANTASTIC, thoughtful, and supportive of one another. Not only that, but everyone came from diverse writing backgrounds, which made both our writing and our criticism much more interesting.
Bummed you missed out?
We’re having another one next week (3/25) discussing the combination of text and art! Same bat time, same bat place! Come join!
A big thanks to Moonstone and Robin’s Books for letting us share the space, and for the fantastic people who came to our workshop and shared with us!
—James
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More workshop reviews! This time from our friend Shawn Proctor:
“Tonight’s online critique with HOOT Review was a first for me. I’ve met with fellow writers to discuss stories in workshops and coffee shops; I’ve emailed critiques back and forth with friends. But I’ve never received feedback to a story online in real time from editors.
