Permissioned Critique: A Guide

Critique can be incredibly liberating, and it can be devastating.

When you’re asking for permissioned critique, it helps to know what you can ask for, and what you can ask people to steer away from.

Some parts of our work may be too unfinished for critique to be helpful. Some may still in in progress. Some may simply be too tender to talk about in this way. Knowing this is gold.

This page is simply to give you the language to hold up sign posts. “Over here”, “Nope, not over there.”

“I would like critique on” or “I would not like critique on”

• The overall clarity of the work

• The emotional impact

• The presence of cliches

• Anywhere that it went on too long

• Anywhere where I might have been holding back

• The beginning as a place to start

• The ending as a place to close

• The voice or tone

• The pacing

• The title

• The spelling and grammar

• The honesty of it

• The tenses

• The point of view

• The form

• The plot arc

• The character development

• The believably

• The wordiness or brevity

• The balance of showing and telling

• Anything that could be experienced as harmful or biased

• Anything that could be experienced as a trigger.

• The sense of place

• The poetry of the language

Do you have more? Hit us up! This is a living document, it keeps evolving through conversation, connection and growth.