Beta Readers: You Need Them, Especially When You Think Otherwise

So there I was a couple of weeks ago: I had just done my first read through of my fae story after letting it rest for over a month and it wasn’t that bad. I mean, I was satisfied with it and it didn’t seem like a washy pile of BS. Thinking that the deadline was Oct. 30 and my calendar saying mid-October, I felt pretty good about myself. LOTS of time to fine-tune, I thought.

However, I had a step to go: one of my rules is to always run a piece by a beta reader. I chose Kate because she initiated the fae story challenge and because when I bat my eye lashes she doesn’t quite know how to tell me to f#@k off. I cheered, because something was nagging at me about the story and I just couldn’t figure out what. And Kate’s good at figuring that kind of thing out.

She tore it to shreds. Not literally, but the red ink everywhere might as well be shredded edges. If I didn’t need the edits she wrote down I think she would have stomped on the whole document in frustration. With a quivering lip –ok, my lip wasn’t really quivering but I was like WTF– I asked what was wrong. A lot of things. So many things I can’t believe I didn’t see myself. *cry*

But after our lengthy conversation she assured me that it was salvageable. My story needed to be overhauled to the extreme, but there was something there.

THIS IS WHY A WRITER NEEDS (GOOD) BETA READERS: First, they give your story zero quarter and kick it when it’s down. They beat the ever living snot out of it. Second, when the tear-down is over they pick it up, dust it off, and tell it where it needs improvement. Third, they reassure you it doesn’t suck and motivate you to fix it instead of tossing it.

Then you get to start all over again! Yay! *cry*

Drafting is a bittersweet process but you can’t rely only on your set of eyes. When you come at your story for the 5th time and know it inside and out it’s really hard to see where the problems are, even after a long period of time. Beta readers are invaluable, and I urge every writer out there to assemble a team of people who won’t sugar coat their words and only give positive feedback. Good is nice, but negative lets you know where stuff is and isn’t working. I’ve learned to revel in the negative –I used to be one of those that would get all wide-eyed in the face of constructive criticism and wonder, in my Di Nero voice, “you talkin’ to me?” You have to grow and learn to take it, it’s part of being a writer.

As always though, any feedback given can and should be taken with a grain of salt. They’re suggestions, but take them seriously. Constantly ask why? Why did they say that, hate that, love that, etc. At the end of the day if you really don’t want to change something –don’t. But if all of your readers are pointing out the same thing and you just love it to pieces, you might have to kill it. It’s tough but writing involves killing your babies, no matter how good you think they are.

I’ve killed my baby and redrafted it. Now I need to edit my Fae story like mad before Nov. 30th, which is the actual due date. Ciao.