The Pros and Cons of Having an Alpha Reader

By Janice Hardy, @Janice_Hardy 
Do you really want feedback on those first draft pages? 

At this stage in my career, both my crit groups are "first draft, in-progress" groups. They read the pages right after I write them, and sometimes, those pages are a hot mess. 
These gals are my alpha readers, giving me thoughts on rough novels I dump right from my head onto the page. Bad pages. Messy pages. Pages that don’t always make sense. It's a tough job, but they're worth their weight in chocolate for the invaluable feedback they provide me.

The merits of beta readers (people who read and offer feedback on a writers’ manuscript) are widely known, but having alpha readers, folks you trust read brand new pages, can be equally valuable.
Continue ReadingWritten by Janice Hardy. Fiction-University.com