New Writer? Never Scored higher than an HM? I'll crit you!

Hi all,

I am bored. And, in an effort to avoid writing my work-in-progress, I am willing to critique up to 3000 words of your work-in-progress! (Or a completed story, if you'd rather.)

This is a limited offer because even if I am bored and procrastinating I still--alas--have a life and a job, so I am only opening this up to relatively inexperienced writers. Likewise, I will turn it off below if I am busy.

This offer is currently closed but I will probably re-open it after I finish the current queue.

Here are the rules:

* Your highest score in the contest must be an HM
* You must not have published more than one story professionally
* You must not have taken me up on this offer before
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If this defines you, comment below and I will send you a PM with my e-mail address. While I say above I am only going to critique up to the first 3000 words of your story, please do send the entire story (if it's completed) so I can read the whole thing.

The rest of this is TL;DR.

Disclaimers:
While I no longer believe that "brutally honest" is a good thing in a critique, I generally will not pull any punches about what I perceive to be flaws in your story. If you have a thin skin and that worries you, please let me know in your e-mail and I will put my filters on.

I reserve the right to decline to critique a story upon receiving it. I may or may not tell you why, and I may or may not ask you to send another instead. (Generally, this will be due to stories I consider to be quintessentially racist, misogynistic, or some other kind of objectionable in intent.)

I welcome follow-up questions if you have any, but please do not write me angry e-mails telling me I'm an idiot because XYZ. My critiques are just my considered, professional opinion, and I am only one reader. If what I suggest is not helpful to you or you have a reason to strongly disagree with it (e.g. Neil Gaiman said that line was awesome), ignore what I've said and move on. (If you do not have a reason and are just upset, I suggest setting the critique and the story aside for a month and then reading both again.)

And who the hell are you anyway, you pompous ass-hat?
I am an academic librarian, haikuist, and speculative fiction writer. My fiction has appeared most recently in The Sockdolager, Fantastic Stories of the Imagination, and Galaxy's Edge, and is forthcoming in a little anthology you might maybe have heard of, Writers of the Future (Volume 32, 1st place, Q2), among other venues.

This doesn't mean I necessarily have any idea what I'm doing, but it does mean I've been somewhat successful in tricking other people into thinking I do.




Stewart C Baker - 1st place, Q2 V32
My contest history: Semi-finalist, R, HM, R, R, HM, HM, R, R, R, R, HM, R, R, R, R, Winner
My published fiction, poetry, &c.