Today some marvelous writers have made some marvelous posts about reading fic that is not marvelous—that is, the stuff that makes you “want to grab your red pen.” Oh my laws yes. I’d like to mention the other side of this problem: how hard it can be for a new writer to…
A critique circle is actually my fantasy. I am shy about asking for betas, and really like the idea of having multiple opinions on my fic. It would also be fun to help beta the work of a few other writers. Raising my hand high if a Sherlock circle ever happens.
Groups of fandom friends tend to also function as critique circles. There’s one at #innercircle, for example, which is an IRC chat channel populated by a bunch of fanfic readers and writers. We don’t only talk fanfic, and not only Sherlock, but that’s where it got its start. Anybody and everybody is invited to drop in at any time! The population on the channel changes, but usually there are at least a couple of people in there.
(The link I posted opens the channel in a browser version of Mibbit, but you can access it using other IRC clients as well.)
The BBC Has Ruined My Life: “Will you be my beta?” and other pitiful propositions