Top 4 tips for Beta Readers!
Hello Dear Readers!
Writing my first novel has been a huge learning experience for me. As it should be. I finished my second draft back at the end of July. Now I’m just waiting on feedback from some of my beta readers. The first non-writing-mentor people to read my book. This is a whole different part of the learning process. Before we dive into that, let’s just make sure we’re on the same page. What exactly is a beta reader?
Beta Reader - someone who reads your novel while it is a work in progress, who offers feedback and suggestions to help guide your editing process. They are typically not a formal editor. (Or at least not in my case.) They can be friends, family, teachers, strangers on the internet, etc. I’ve been told it can be less than optimal to have friends and family read the book because they may be hesitant to give you honest or hard feedback, but ultimately that decision is up to you.
Phil wrote a really great article a few weeks back about how to give feedback. You can read it here. I’m going to put my own spin on this topic, but specifically in regards to what feedback is most helpful when it is coming from beta readers.
I want to say that I fully understand that reading someone’s unrefined novel (especially one that is on the longer side, like mine is) is a huge undertaking and it is not something I take for granted. I highly value my reader’s time and input. Fortunately for me, I’ve had great beta readers who have all gone above and beyond, and they are not the inspiration for this list. This is more of a “how do I help other beta readers be as awesome as my readers?” Being on this side of it has also helped me learn a lot about what to do in the future when I read other people’s work as a beta reader, so I am by no means saying I am perfect. We’re all on this journey together.
On to my list of humble requests for beta readers:
Please let me know your thoughts throughout the book, both good and bad.
Why? It’s really helpful for me to see how you’re experiencing the book as you’re going through for it the first time. There will be typos, spelling errors or inconsistencies, sentence structure and the like. While commenting on them is helpful, I actually have no idea if my reader enjoying the book if this is all they comment on. Further, this can be extremely demoralizing for a reader to only point out the flaws in someone’s work. To date, (It’s Sept 2nd as I’m writing this) I’ve easily poured over 1000 hours into this work. Scrolling through dozens of comments that only point out the negative parts and the flaws and the typos, while necessary, is absolutely crushing. Please be a kind beta reader and let your author know what IS working well and what you ARE enjoying so that we can do more of that. It doesn’t have to be much either. I have one beta reader who is leaving me a simple :) in parts that they liked. That’s perfect! That’s enough to let me know this at least made you smile or I did a good thing. If you can provide even more feedback, better, but I will take a smiley face over silence any day.
Please be specific and provide a reasoning with your feedback other than “I did/didn’t like it.”
Why? It’s fine to say you didn’t like something. That’s fair, you’re entitled to your own opinion. But if you can dig a little deeper and help identify the why, that’s best. What is it specifically about something you don’t like. “I don’t like your main character.” Ok, thank you, but why? “I don’t know, I just don’t like him.” is pretty useless in terms of helping me fix the problem. “I don’t like your main character, it really irritates me the way he talks down to everyone around him. He comes across like a jerk.” While it may not be the most tactful, it’s honest and it helps identify the problem. Perfect! Now I at least have some idea of what direction to go in terms of making him more likable. As I mentioned above, letting your author know if something worked particularly well and what made you like the scene so much is also helpful. “I loved this section, it had strong energy and you did a lot of showing instead of telling, which makes me want to read more.” Boom. Super helpful.
Please be honest, but tactful.
Why? As mentioned above, writing takes a long time, and it is hard work. I’m not even done and I’m a year and a half and over a thousand hours in. In my particular case, it feels very vulnerable to be sharing my work. (I’ve talked about that here.) I understand that diamonds are forged under extreme pressure and heat, and so I need to get the hard feedback to make my work better. If something isn’t working, I need to know. I genuinely want my book to be the best that it can be, and the only way to get there is to refine it by getting sometimes painful and difficult feedback. But keep in mind, there is a living, breathing, feeling human being on the other side of the page who will be reading your comments. Don’t be a dick just for the sake of being a dick. Being objective and specific like I’ve listed above goes a long way towards that. When I was in art school, I learned to take criticism on my work. I have no problem going back to the drawing board and starting over to make something better. Sometimes though, critiques get emotional or heated. One of my favorite teachers had a very specific way he would have us critique each other’s work. He would have us say “If this was my piece, I would have done xyz.” or “If this was my piece, I would have tried abc.” And so on. Obviously there are things you have to be objective about. We can’t be subjective about a typo. Something is either spelled correctly or it isn’t. But as a reader, it’s fine to have stylistic choices and even your own ideas about how scenes or the story should play out, and its fine to share those with the author! But don’t go at it from the approach of “I hate the way you did this, you should have done abc.” or even “Do it this way.” Not only does that turn me off from hearing your feedback, it puts me the defensive, and I’m less likely to listen to much of anything else you have to say, no matter how helpful it is.
Finally, Please be timely.
Why? I’m literally at a standstill waiting for you to provide your feedback before I can move forward. In some cases there are other things that can be done while waiting for feedback, but sometimes everything is at a halt until the author hears back from you. If they’ve given you a timeline, and you’re not sure you can meet their deadline, the best thing to do is to let them know upfront. “I know you said you want this back by such and such date, but I have a lot going on this month, and I’m not sure I can finish by then. Perhaps I could read a later draft of your book when I’m more available to provide feedback?” would work perfectly. Otherwise, you might be delaying the publication of the book. There may not be a strict deadline and/or the author may not provide you with one, but not only can I not move forward until I hear back from you, I’m literally on the edge of my seat waiting to know if you even liked the work or not. So if you can, be prompt. It’s professional and courteous.
All that being said, what can the AUTHOR do to help Beta Readers know what they need? Well, if you’re an author and this resonated with you, you can send them this blog post, of course. I think a lot of these suggestions in terms of giving feedback are applicable in many situations, not just writing. But beyond that, you can provide them with simple instructions and a deadline. Set clear expectations! They’re not mind readers and they won’t know what you want/need unless you tell them!
When I sent out my second draft to a few people at the beginning of August, I sent along specific instructions on what I was looking for in terms of feedback and a deadline. I’ll summarize, but essentially it was along the lines of
“Please let me know what you like, what you don’t like, what works, what doesn’t work, if parts are slow and boring, if parts are confusing, etc. I’m looking for a good overall view. Does the story flow well, is the pacing appropriate, is it enjoyable to read, are there plot holes or glaring story problems that need to be fixed, do you like the characters? I’m not as concerned with typos at this time as this is only a second draft, so please spend the bulk of your time on story and content if you can. Please have this back to me by the end of the month, and if you don’t think that’s feasible for you, let me know.”
Keep in mind, even with clear instructions, deadlines, and expectations people have lives and jobs and families and nothing in this world truly happens in a bubble. They may have all the best intentions in the world and still not be able meet those expectations. Even if my readers were to run past my deadline or if they provided me with only negative feedback, or even vague feedback, I will still grateful for the time they took to read my book before it reached its final and most impressive form. It’s all about that attitude of gratitude friends.
Well, this has certainly gone on long enough and it’s time for me to get back to editing. Thanks for stopping by and hopefully you found something useful in today’s article. Till next time dear readers, go give some extraordinary feedback. <3 Tiff
