By Laura Armstrong

(From the May 2004 issue of the Update.)

The white Tyvek envelope on the dining room table looked familiar. Ah, yes, that would be my own handwriting. My critiques from the Marlenes were home.

There wasn’t a moment to survey them in private. I was just home from work, the kids were running circles around me smacking each other with pretend light sabers, and my husband was asking, “What time’s dinner? I’ve got basketball tonight.” I snatched up the envelope and made for the relative peace of my kitchen.

It took me a minute to process the contents of the envelope. It was no surprise that my score wasn’t the highest. The good news was it wasn’t the lowest. The bad news was it also wasn’t all that close to the middle. “Ow-ee,” as my youngest would say.

Judge Number 1 (not the real number) gave me reasonably solid marks and had nice things to say about some of the things I liked about the story myself. Her criticism was gently handed to me, and I nodded over it. Thank you, Judge Number 1.

Judge Number 2 (again, not the real number) was a different story. “Well, someone must have been in a bad mood that day,” was my first thought. She pretty well slammed me. She didn’t like my main character, she thought my dialogue was below average, and it was obvious she was scraping for something to say in the “Describe one thing the author did well” section. It stung.

Thank you, Judge Number 2.

Don’t misunderstand me. I mean that.

It took a few readings of the criticism to get to that state of gratitude. It took a couple hours of in-bed-ceiling-staring, too. Was I that bad? Was I pursuing a dream that was unrealistic? I had the expected talk with my husband. “Maybe I should just quit writing,” I suggested half-heartedly. We both knew it was a ploy for sympathy. He snorted and said, “Cut it out. You’re good at this and you know it. When did you write that thing, anyway?” (We are staying married, by the way. He passed the test.)

This was a good point. My contest entry was the very first book I’d ever completed, written five years ago, before I knew RWA or WRW existed or realized that writing was a tough business. I’d written it for fun, primarily just to see if I could do it. I hadn’t revised it other than make sure everything was spelled correctly and the punctuation was reasonably correct.

That was one of the things Number 2 was annoyed with me about, by the way.

The fact is, she was right. Her comments were insightful, and, ego out of the way, I could see what she meant. I had given very little for the reader to like about my main character. Knowing the full story in my head, I liked her, and I knew the reader would grow to like her, but had I convinced anyone of her worthiness in the opening chapters? Not really.

My use of dialogue, which I consider one of my strengths, did not show to its best in the pages offered. I got caught in that old trap of too much description. I yammered at the reader with too much backstory. My opening scene should have been the third scene. It established the main characters and gave the reader a better idea of what the story was about. Instead, I went for artistic impact. Number 2 was not having any of that.

Thank you, Number 2. You were right. You might have been more generous, but you know what? I’m glad you weren’t. I wouldn’t have paid enough attention to a “nice job.”

The next day I gathered my strength and reread my entry. Same words, but something had changed, like looking through a stereoscope. You look and look and for a long time you see two copies of the same picture. All of a sudden your focus shifts and there it is, a three-dimensional scene.

The judges’ comments gave me that shift in focus. I’m not going to stop writing. I’m a three-dimensional writer. I can fall in love with my characters, pour myself into the story, and then step back and acknowledge what’s wrong with it. My old book needs work. I have grown as a writer since that first effort. I’m excited about tearing it apart and making it better.

Maybe next year I’ll resubmit the first chapters of this book. I hope I get the same set of judges. Number 1 gave me encouragement. Number 2 sliced at the entry objectively. I almost hope Number 2 is in a bad mood again. Well, maybe not, but even if she is, she’ll be reading a better entry.

~~~~~
Laura Armstrong, between duties as the computer department for a trade association, Washington Romance Writers webmistress, and the usual wife-and-mother gig, writes (and rewrites) romance novels.