Helpline
Your writing problems solved with advice from Diana Cambridge
Diana Cambridge
Email your queries to Diana (please include home-town details) at: diana@dianacambridge.co.uk or send them to: Helpline, Writing Magazine, Warners Group Publications plc, 5th Floor, 31-32 Park Row, Leeds LS1 5JD. She will answer as many letters as she can on the page, but regrets that she cannot enter into individual correspondence. Publication of answers may take several months. Helpline cannot personally answer queries such as where to offer work, or comment on manuscripts, which you are asked not to send.
Q Is it worth paying extra to have a critique if you don’t win a short story competition? I had a critique from a local short story competition – I won’t mention the name – which shocked me by its lack of understanding of my story, which was a ‘black’ comedy. In fact I tore it up.
CONSTANCE LOVATT Glastonbury, Somerset
A I think that the bigger and more well known the competition, the more useful the critique would be. If the competition is very local and small, it’s possible that the judges won’t be national or international names – though sometimes they are. If the critique is free, that may suggest that the critique may be a little amateur – though I stress ‘may’. It could be highly professional. I’d put your cash on the big-name critiques. A critique from an agent is always worth having.
Q Just a little help on something please, or somewhere to direct me. I’ve had my book published and now I’m trying to find an agent.