Writer's group as support group.

Sometimes you take something to writer's group that you think is great.  And they disabuse you of the notion.

Other times, you take something that you think has problems...and they like it.

Either way, just getting feedback is wonderful.

You see, most of the time I'm writing I don't get feedback.  Days, weeks, months go by of hard work and I don't know if I'm writing something good or not.

Sometimes I don't get real feedback until I send it to my editors, or even when it's published.  Linda is always willing, but I try not to wear out my welcome.

Anyway, I took the first three chapters of Tuskers to group last night.

When I was writing this, I loved it.  I thought it was fun.

But my first beta reader didn't care for it much, which brought me back down to earth.

I followed his suggestions, tried to beef up (pork up?) the danger quotient for the Tuskers.  I took the first person chapters and made them third person like the rest of the book.

But reading it over, I was pretty uncertain.

The writer's group really liked it.  They seemed impressed, (I believe I can tell when people are genuine and when they're just telling me what I want to hear) and they found little beyond a few typos to suggest changes.

So, yeah. That's what I needed.  I was starting to feel a little insecure about it.

This make me feel like I'm on the right track.

Not to get all egotistical about it, but I think I'm getting the hang of it.  Mostly from having done so much writing over the last couple of years that I'm avoiding the worst problems from the beginning and I'm learning a few tricks, both in writing and in my work habits. 

I don't know where it leads.  The next book could be something awesome, certainly I didn't expect Tuskers to come along.  Whether Tuskers ever hits it big or not, it has been so much fun to write that it has been a great experience.

I want more of that.