In this news article: Results of `conorschild's Workshop on Brevity | Personal Review Week | First time you've heard of *Writers-Workshop? This section is for you.

Results of `conorschild's Workshop on Brevity

A word from *Writers-Workshop: An interesting and difficult challenge, this brought in several interesting revisions. Thank you `conorschild for hosting this workshop and for offering critique to each participant!

You can read all the entries here.

Special Mention: ~Sprawwl, who isn't a member of our group (but only technically), but offered a concise and exacting critique of one of the entries here.

`conorschild's Top Picks

In Take the Plunge, *Erin88 possibly achieved the best reduction of the longer piece. In particular, she wasn't afraid to mess around with the chronological order of the story in order to keep the word limit down, rather than just take out sections of it. I didn't feel that I knew the characters any less for reading the shorter version, and the newer version is also a good show of how much this writer has progressed with her work over the past few months - not just in terms of completing the task but in general writing ability.

In comparison, berylalexandros's During Murder In The Dark's shortened version didn't come out so well from the workshop - but I can assure you this is a fault of the process rather than the writer. The reduction of the piece was clearly a hard task and not one that I would envy, but I think *BerylAlexandros did well to retain the claustrophobic atmosphere of the original. A comparison of this to the excellent original would be very helpful in spotting exactly what elements are really needed in a story.

The full version of `conorschild's comments can be read here.

Something New

There has been a change in workshop dates because of scheduling difficulties; and we thought this the perfect opportunity to take a break from writing and critiquing to do something else. `Beccalicious came up with this idea, and she and I (^lovetodeviate) will be hosting this week's activity.

(For newcomers, `Beccalicious and ^lovetodeviate are the admins of *Writers-Workshop.)

PERSONAL REVIEW WEEK

The purpose of this week is to reflect on your writing so far and think of where you want to go with it. It is a non-fiction exercise and you can approach it any way you like. However, we will ask that you proofread and use correct grammar as much as possible.

A few things to consider while writing your review:

Strengths and weakness in your writing so far
Changes in theme, style and genre
Defining moments in your writing: any incident, critique you received, article you read, anything at all that made you sit up and realise something new
Major and minor problem areas
Ways in which you can deal with these problem areas
The benefit of workshops and critique: this includes *Writers-Workshop and other workshops to which you belong(ed)
Challenges faced and overcome: these can be particular workshops, dealing with critique, learning how to use punctuation, anything writing-related
Goals: what do you want to achieve with your writing? Do you want to get published? Do you want to write a novel? Do you want to use writing as a personal way of dealing with life?

The above deal with craft, for the most part. Feel free to include other observations about your own writing, how it relates to other things you do. You can talk about how difficult it is to make time for writing -- or how easy it is.

Don't be afraid to ask questions. Sometimes, the worst thing about finding flaws in your own writing is realising that you don't know how to fix it. So ask away. When we come around reading your reviews, we will try to help you by offering suggestions. The same thing goes for everyone else. You can relax your crit skills for this exercise, but commenting on each other's reviews is a good way of offering support and advice to your fellow writers. You can discuss your writing hurdles and achievements at this forum thread: Have you grown as a writer?

Writing is a process of growth. The more you write, the more you will change -- usually for the better. Stopping to think should help you realise what you have learnt and what you still need to learn. What forces shape a writer? Why are you the writer you are? We hope you enjoy this week of reflection.

How to submit

Do NOT submit your entry as a deviation. As these are personal reflections, they are unlikely to belong to any literature category. If you feel your entry is an exception, it is best to check with a GD (^GeneratingHype, ^StJoan, ^LadyLincoln or ^lovetodeviate) or `Beccalicious, the unofficial, but efficient, head of the anti-miscat squad. The best way, however, is to submit your review as a scrap or a journal entry and link it to us in a note, with the subject line "PERSONAL REVIEW" before midnight, April 3. All entries will be posted in a journal so that we can discuss each other's reviews over the weekend. `Beccalicious and I will respond to the entries on April 6.

First time you've heard of *Writers-Workshop? This section is for you.

*Writers-Workshop is a literature community that focuses on the development of a writer. We intend to provide a non-competitive workshop environment on dA, as well as to push good, polished writing over winning prizes or "networking".

Workshops will be conducted every fortnight; prose, poetry and free-for-all sessions will be rotated. For more information, read our FAQ section or note us with queries.

We have been working on a list of resources for our writers: Resources for Writers which we think is worth going through. We are open to suggestions as well.

Our Diary has a list of upcoming workshops.

You can host a workshop, too.

Look out for =MSJames's workshop on tanka and haibun, coming up in a week!

Staff