"Matty Groves" is, realistically, a few weeks away from being finished. It's at nearly 55,000 words, and I'm charging down the straightaway to the big finish and epilogue, which are the easy parts for me to write.

Yay, you! I checked for the first time last night, and Nihilist Chic is currently at 35,000 words or so. It's longer than I thought it was. Which is odd. The end's all plotted, except that I just made a major change that means I have to rework everything, and I've scrapped working linearly for awhile, to go back and write some secondary character stuff.

Fly-by post.

When I'm in California next month, in addition to the big reading Thessaly and I are doing in Orange, I'll also be reading a poem or two at a benefit-reading for Midnight Special Bookstore at Beyond Baroque in venice.

Other readers include Viggo Mortinson, Patricia Smith, Regie Gibson and many, many others.

Details to come.

Mild writing group vent below. Thing is, I'm sure I do the exact same I'm about to complain about, the whole "my work is an exception to the rule you're citing because blah blah blah exceptioncakes."

Hero of romantic fantasy spends at least two full pages confessing his love to heroine in a long, emotional speech. Didn't feel like real dialogue at all. I gently suggested that perhaps the speech needed to be broken up a little, just so it would flow better, and that I found it hard to imagine as real dialogue. I made a crack about my own hero, that James couldn't make a speech that long if you paid him. Other writer replies, "James is English--my guy is Greek."

I shrugged and made the palms-upraised "your story, your call" gesture. But the thought bubble above my head read, "Are you kidding? Have you paid attention to my book? James is talky meat. Nothing stiff and upper about his lips. He's just not speechy meat, because speeches are annoying and don't sound like real conversation!"

Susan, I already think your writers group aint my writers group, bebe. I mean, if the purpose of the thing isn't to hear feedback and evaluate it properly, why bother?

I also (having been to Greece a time or three) tend to doubt that this particular speechwriter has hung out with too many Greek men. They're, er, more about immediate action than loud talk, in my experience.

Basically, two pages of eternal love declaration, my arse. He'd be more likely to have her knickers around her knees after half a paragraph.

What Deb said.

Yeah, I'm still going to this group because they were there for me all along, y'know, and I wouldn't feel right about ditching them abruptly. But I'm going to discreetly look around for a new one, maybe one where there's more obvious commonalities with my work--all romance writers, or all historical writers of one genre or another--in hopes of making a tactful and graceful exit. Because I really do value the friendships I've built, and feel I've gotten at least some useful feedback--just not from this particular writer.

And I thought the same thing about Greek men, and also that I'd much rather be on the receiving end of my hero's love talk than hers. I happen to find it real sexy when the guy lets you get a word in edgewise from time to time.

I'm all about the hero throwing her on her back, but if there's going to be talk, it shouldn't be blahblahblah for two pages.

That's insane and surreal.

Writers groups are very helpful, but sometimes you grow out of any particular one. I've done so myself.

Different needs dictate different strategies. And a more genre specific group seems like a perfectly reasonable approach.

I doubt they'll take offense unless you phrase your departure with that intent. (Well, okay, les artistes are touchy, so no guarantees, but really, that has to be on them.)

I'm all about the hero throwing her on her back, but if there's going to be talk, it shouldn't be blahblahblah for two pages.

Oh, totally. And this particular story is maddening to critique, because there's the germ of a really interesting idea there, but she really doesn't have the grasp of the craft yet to make it shine. The dialogue is awkward, she tells when she should show, and the story is too episodic--the characters keep getting thrown back in time, but there's no obvious connection to the incidents, and I have no more clue about what's going on on page 250 than I did on page 50. I think she's beginning to improve, but it's a slowwww process.

And yeah, I think I've outgrown this group. And I've thought all along they're a little too easy on me.

Susan, are they all fairly new at the craft? Or are there some seasoned writers in there?