Calling For BITTER HARVEST Beta Readers
While I don’t have all the editing feedback in yet, I decided to go ahead and get the ball rolling to find a set of beta readers for Bitter Harvest.
If you have no idea what a beta reader is (don’t feel bad, as that’s not something most readers ever hear about!), for me it’s someone who reads through a book before release to help me find any “gotchas” that I and the editors may have missed, things that detract from or disturb the reading experience.
In short, I want you to give the book a test drive and let me know what you think. Here are a few examples of things I want you to keep an eye out for:
Passages that for break your suspension of disbelief as you’re reading.
Continuity errors. Let’s say that on page one I say that a character is wearing a blue shirt, but on page two he’s wearing a red one, but he never changed it in the story.
Bloopers (e.g., typos or grammatical errors) are a bonus, but that’s not what I want the beta readers to concentrate on (lucky for you!).
As for “requirements” to be a beta reader, aside from liking to read, there are just a few:
A Facebook account. I’d like to have the beta readers pile into a virtual room and be able to discuss (and feel comfortable doing so) things about the book with one another and with me. I have a private, invitation only Facebook group set up for this purpose.
The willingness to read the book more carefully than you might otherwise. I’ve had some beta readers in the past zip through the book and say, “Hey, looks great!” and that was it. I’m happy they enjoyed the book, but that wasn’t quite what I had in mind. LOL!
While I want you to read the book a bit more carefully, I also need you to read it in a fairly limited amount of time. I’d like to get the books to the chosen beta readers on 5 September (tomorrow, as I write this) and be through the beta review process by 11 September (next Tuesday). That will leave me time to do final edits and prep the book files for release on the 14th.
That’s about it!
If you’re interested, please contact me or leave a comment on this post and tell me why you think you’d be a good beta reader for this book. I’m planning to make the selections by tomorrow morning (5 September) around 8AM EST. Good luck & enjoy!
