“Here are some guidelines for reading and
doing the workshop letters. Best, Amy”
Fall Novel
Writing Workshop with Amy Parker, 2012.
Writers: When you submit your work, please make
sure it’s in 12-point font and double spaced.
Number the pages so we can refer to them in discussion. Please include a synopsis for context if the
pages you submit are from the middle of the manuscript.
Readers: read the material twice. First go
through with a “magazine read”, reading as you would if you just picked the
story up and were reading for pleasure.
What’s your first impression? Read like a reader. On the second read,
read like a writer. Go through the story and mark up the manuscript—mark
passages that delight you, things that confuse you, areas where you have
questions. Write comments in the margins.
The letter: write a letter to the
author, about a page. The letter should do the following:
First, describe the story. On the most
basic level, what happens? (We do this so the author gets a sense of what the
reader understands. It may seem obvious, but sometimes readers pick up on
things the author didn’t intend, and the author should investigate why). Where
do you think the story is going?
Next, note what the story does well. What
do you admire? What moved you? What worked and why? Be specific. Quote as necessary. (Few things
are more pleasurable than having one’s work quoted.)
Finally, what confused you?
Where does the story need developing or clarifying? Are there gaps,
inconsistencies? Is the language unclear? Are there scenes that could be
compressed, or summaries that need to be amplified? What questions do you have
about the material?