First writing assignment critiqued
I've already received my instructor critique on my first writing assignment. It was short. It was spot-on, I think... there isn't enough of the character's reaction in the text. The focus of the assignment was setting, and the feedback only said that I did great with the setting and criticized stuff that had nothing to do with setting. It was a valid critique, and I have nothing wrong with it in general. But somehow, I expected something more substantial for my money.
I paid $320 for a 12-week course of six two-week sessions. Each session, I get a reading assignment out of a published book ("Fiction Writer's Workshop" by Josip Novakovich), a "lecture" written by the course designer (not the instructor), a writing assignment, question and answer with the instructor, feedback from the instructor, and feedback from the other students.
Look closely at that, and ask yourself where the $53.33 worth of value is coming from? The course "lectures" are written one time and used for every class. I can find other writing students to critique my work at a hundred different sites on the net for free (and I don't put much stock in the critique of my peers at this point). So I'm pretty much expecting fifty bucks worth of critique from the instructor, and I was a little underwhelmed. (A simple view, but that more or less is the way it goes.)
I can drop out for a full refund within the next week, but I don't think I will.
First, the first assignment is kind of "soft". How much can you say about 500 words taken out of context, and not necessarily even part of a bigger story? In the later two segments, the assignments turn into "several connected scenes, 2000 words" and "a 3000 word short-story", so the assignments become more substantial. I expect that the critiques later in the class become more substantial as well, as we turn to issues of plot and characterization. This also opens up more room for discussion with the instructor.
I signed up for this class for primarily one thing... not the lessons and not even the instructor feedback. For the structure of regular deadlines. The fact that I paid for those deadlines make them more important, and I can't ignore them or casually drop out of the project because "it doesn't really matter".
I'm sure I'll benefit from the whole process... lessons, instructor and even peer feedback, and structure.
Now, if only I could figure out how to turn my one scene into a 3000-word story, it'll make this whole process a lot easier. The 2000-word connected scenes can be a sub-set of the 3000-word story assignment... so if I can take this scene, develop the characters and develop a plot, I won't have to do quite so much creative lifting. The hardest part of writing this first assignment was coming up with an idea for a scene (where setting was important)... once the idea was there, writing it wasn't so hard. Now if I can just figure out where it's all going. The next assignment requires writing two character sketches, so presumably I'm going to have to have two characters. I think this ghostship will be kind of dull with just one character anyway.