Being a Better Critique Partner / Beta Reader

 

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As an educator, I believe all of us are always learning. As a writer, I can be shy and anxious when sharing my work to a new person or group. I try to remember both  these attitudes when I'm a critique partner or a beta reader.

Writers are always learning

When I teach creative writing, I help students take risks and experiment. We know that publishers, readers, and agents are looking for fresh, unique voices. Yet young people today are caught by the expectations for instant success and living perfect lives. Failure is difficult, even though more seasoned writers know that is how we learn. 

Writing is messy. It's necessary to try and fail and try again. 

Young people are also hampered by social media's value of conformity, which can be the death knoll to the creative process. Much of my efforts as a teacher go into encouraging their unique perspectives: helping them find their voice. What are their individual style and interests? What genres do they like? Tone and narrative voices? What sets them apart from the other students in the class? When they can answer these questions--and not fear being vulnerable and authentic--they can lean in to who they are as a writer and their writing will improve. 

A common mistake beginning writers make is to think that their critique partners don't "get" what they're trying to do. That's not a helpful altitude--it infers that you cannot learn from your writing group and it ruins any chance for building trust. It stops you from listening to your first readers. Remember, if you are planning to publish your work, then you are writing for readers not yourself. You need to think about your readers and their experience reading your work, not your experience writing it. Listen and learn. You'll get something out of it, even if you don't agree with everything.

Sharing your work can be hard!

Many writers can have a thin skin or may feel uncertain about a piece of writing--though we can gain confidence as we gain experience, many of us are sensitive artist types who appreciate a positive, encouraging attitude. Some authors prefer tough criticism, while others like a gentler tone--it's worth asking your critique partner if they have preferences or certain needs. I've never forgotten a student who exclaimed, "I love praise!" when we were discussing her work. This was a key motivator for her, and it was so helpful for me to know this information.

Think about the goals of the critique session. Is this a first draft and they need advice on story structure and character development? Or is it a more polished piece and they are looking for more granular suggestions? Does their confidence need shoring up because they're stuck in the muddy middle? Could they use some brainstorming or a sounding board? Are they ready to be challenged and take their writing to the next level? Is it time to pull out the tough love?

Writing is like learning to walk. So many small pieces go together to make up the actions, and not everyone learns them in the same way or at the same pace. It can be overwhelming if we try to tackle everything all at once. Be conscious of where your critique partners are in the learning process.

Critique partners, alpha readers, and beta readers all make our work better, if we respect the process and use it as a learning experience for everyone. 

Mimi

Critique Ground Rules

In offering: One perfect white rose from the bush in the front garden:

Critique situations have the potential to be fraught with emotional mines. You can make it harder on yourself or you can make it easier.

Hard: just join a group of people you don't know and who don't read the genre you write.
Easier: It helps to at least be familiar with your proposed critique partners. Not everyone has to write the same genre and subgenre, but if you write scifi or erotica, it sure helps to dodge groups full of people allergic to those genres. You'll be happier if you're reading stories you generally like to read and you'll be far more confident of the critiques you'll receive if the people reading you understand the conventions of your genre.

Hard: Mixing beginning writers with very seasoned writers. Not saying this to be a snob. This is about offering critique at a level someone can fully comprehend and *action*. My example: my first few RWA conferences, I had the option to attend Margie Lawson workshops. Went to one and left halfway through because it was so far ahead of where I was as a writer, I couldn't understand what was being presented. Now, after a few books under my belt and a critical eye toward how I put emotion on the page, I can and do grasp the concepts I once couldn't. Further, I can apply the teaching and see the immediate change in my craft. Mixing wildly different skill levels makes life hard for everyone.
Easier: Finding a group of writers who are about at the same level as you are - some are farther along the road and they'll pull you along. A few will be a little way back on the road and you'll help pull them along. It creates synergy.

Once you've found your group, you have to learn how to both accept and offer critique with grace and with humor. These are some hard won ground rules I'm about to lay on you. We won't talk about how I worked them out other than to say it wasn't pretty.

• Leave your defensiveness at the door. Learn to listen with your mouth closed whether you agree or disagree with someone's critique (until it's your turn to talk.)
• Assume the best intentions./Come with the best intentions. If anyone in the group hasn't come to help make books better, you have a problem. Don't be that problem.
  
• Address the writing and only the writing. Zero personal attacks.
• The words 'that's dumb' or 'that's stupid' may never leave your mouth in reference to another person's writing.
• Ask questions. Rather than saying 'you have no point to this scene', ask 'what do you want the point of this scene to be'? This helps if the other writer is getting a little tense in the face of critique. It asks them to think which moves them out of emotion.
  
• Suggest possible fixes for any issues you identify. I'm a stickler for this one - if I can't make a suggestion for something that bothers me, I'll mark the section in text and talk through why I'm bothered and then ask for input from the rest of the group for ideas on how to fix because I care enough about my crit partners that I don't want anyone left hanging.
  
• Offer ideas and suggestions without ego. You're offering up ideas and suggestions, yes, but release any attachment to having someone use them. Your goal is to spark the other person's imagination, not get your way. If you feel really strongly about an idea, use it yourself. Let everyone else decide what's right for their stories.
  
• What happens in critique, stays in critique. Your critique group needs to be a safe space to try new things, make mistakes, learn new technique, and air intellectual property that isn't ready for public consumption. Trust matters for and from all members.
• Share the wealth of knowledge. Recommend classes that helped you. Share notes where it's ethically legit to do so. Remember a rising tide lifts all boats.
  

Critique is hard. There's a lot of emotion involved. Learning to navigate your own and everyone else's is no small task. Give yourself and one another grace. I've learned to couch suggestions in terms of opportunity. Ask anyone who's ever been critiqued by me about my favorite phrase: "I feel like you have an opportunity here to <insert plot point, emotional hit, etc>". It's served me well because it offers a writer choice without intimating that they've done something wrong in their book. I may feel that they *have* done something wrong, but I'm sure not going to say that. Maybe that's the last rule: Care about other people's feelings and remember that WIPs are fragile little birds. Gentle, honest handling strengthens them so that when they are released into the world, they're ready to fly.

Who Do You Trust?

 

The story of critique partners, and alpha and beta readers starts with a couple of questions. Who do you trust? When is it safe to trust, and what problem are you trying to solve?

Critique partners tend to be other writers, people in the trenches doing the same work. In healthy groups, everyone works toward the common goal of making the books, stories, and writing better. A healthy critique group can foster life-long friendships, sure, but they can also make better writers. They're inspiring. If you like the group, you want to write just to have something to take to the meetings. Bad groups drain you. They leave you feeling diminished and exhausted even if everyone was pleasant. They zap your writing energy. If you find yourself in one, get out. A critique group needs to be a circle of people you can trust with tender, newly born ideas.

Critique groups, when they work, solve the biggest writer problems. They can help take a raw, nascent idea and brainstorm with you to flesh out the world, conflict, plot, and characters. A healthy group will not only identify your weak points as a writer, they'll actively help you strengthen them - while you help someone else strengthen theirs.

Alpha readers

These are the individuals you can trust with a crappy first draft. They're usually either authors themselves or very knowledgeable readers who can speak to things like motivation and goal mismatches. Or characters not following through on a piece of foreshadowing you dropped in chapter two. These brave readers search out plot holes and point out spots where the story map loses the reader. Usually, alpha readers already know the story. If only because most of us rely on our critique groups to be alpha readers. I can trust these readers to take a novel that's 2/3 written and tell me where I went wrong. Or right.

Beta readers

Beta readers read for sense, flow, and enjoyment. By the time a writer's idea gets to these readers, most of the issues have been ironed out. The story is generally complete and approaching polish. It might still be rough around the edges, but this group of readers - and they usually are readers rather than fellow authors - are the fine grit phase of running your story through the rock tumbler. You'll get grammar notes and maybe a few 'didn't understand this' beside some paragraphs or scenes. But by this point, no one should be pointing out plot holes you can drive trains through. 

As for when to trust - that's trial and error. When I first started writing, I needed a critique group while I was drafting. Now, I want a complete rough draft before I expose the work to other eyes. Receiving feedback while I'm drafting has become too disruptive. Finding all that out was pure process of trial and error. So was finding a critique group that didn't suck the joy out of writing in the first place. It took a few tries. 

Moral of the story: Writer know thyself. And if you don't, experiment until you do. Feedback fuels some writers and crushes others. Neither one is wrong.

Critique, Alpha Read or Beta - Which Is What?

Here's a little tease for you of the cover of UNDER A WINTER SKY - the midwinter holiday anthology I'm doing with, well, as you can see! Kelley Armstrong, Melissa Marr and L. Penelope. An amazing lineup and a seriously gorgeous cover. Look for the reveal on Tuesday, September 22 on Frolic! Preorder links are here. 

Also, I’m super excited to be doing this online event “at” Love’s Sweet Arrow bookstore with my brilliant author friends Maria Vale, Amanda Bouchet, and Kait Ballenger. Danielle Dresser, Editorial Manager for Fresh Fiction will moderate. Join us on Saturday, September 26, at 3pm ET for fun conversation! You can register here. 

Our topic at the SFF Seven this week is: How do you define Critique Partners, Alpha Readers, and Beta Readers?

I think this was my topic suggestion because I was sincerely interested in everyone's definitions. Seriously, I feel like writers use these terms very differently depending on the person. For me, I don't use "Alpha Reader" at all. I don't even know what that is except maybe a response to "Beta Reader." 

Can we divert a moment and discuss that simply adding the next Greek letter in either direction doesn't necessarily make the term meaningful? I mean, Beta Reader makes sense because it's like beta testing. The term "beta testing" comes from software development, where "the end-user (intended real user) validates the product for functionality, usability, reliability, and compatibility." Thus a Beta Reader is an end user - in this case, a reader - who takes the story out for a test drive by reading the completed work. Alpha testing, in its original sense, "is carried out in a much-controlled manner and it is not accessible by the end-users/market. Testing is carried out to simulate real-time behavior to match the usage of the product by the end-users in the market." To my mind, if alpha testing occurs entirely in-house, then Alpha Reading would be by the author. I am my own Alpha Reader, I suppose, which is just writing and revising. An "Alpha Reader" is not one step earlier in the process than a Beta Reader just because alpha is to the left of beta in the Greek alphabet. I won't die on this hill, but I did have to mini-rant about it.

Moving on!

What I think writers mean when they use the term "Alpha Reader" is actually a critique partner or group. Critique is the first pass by outside eyes. It's the thorough examination of the work by someone who isn't the writer. But, people don't seem to like the word "critique." It implies criticism and - let's face it - no writer loves criticism.

I think what's going on here reflects a level of author proficiency, too. It has certainly worked that way for me.

When I started out as a baby writer, lo these couple of decades ago, I took writing classes where we "workshopped" each other's writing. (Workshopping could be considered a deeper dig than critique, where other authors may actually help create and shape the story.) Some writers I met in those classes invited me to join their critique group. (Big milestone for baby writer me!) That first critique group really taught me a lot about writing and absolutely helped to launch my career.

After a few years, the group burned out - as these groups do, for particular reasons, though that's a whole 'nother topic - and I moved into using critique partners. These were writers I swapped work with. They've changed over the years, though some have been working with me for over ten years. (Hi Marcella!) We tend to hit each other up for specific projects/problems/questions these days, rather than regularly exchanging everything we write.

Fast forward to a few years ago and I was invited to join another crit group - this one specifically SFF. It ultimately didn't work for me. A writer friend suggested that the reason was that the group was trying to dig into my writing at a level I  no longer needed - and that I, in fact, found was harmful to my process. 

So guess what we've done? Formed a beta reading group! 

It's a group of writers all well-established in our careers, and we read each other's completed works. (Or completed chunks intended for submission on spec.) It's definitely a different level of analysis with thoughts on clarifications or missed opportunities. So far it's working great!

What's key is to figure out what will most help our process at that time. Not always easy, but like everything - a work in progress!

Need a CP you can trust, but don't know where to start?

There is nothing more frightful than handing off what you’ve written to someone else for critique. 

*insert cringing, nail-biting, hiding under a blanket*

As a writer, critique is absolutely what you need. Why? Well, there’s only so much you can do for your manuscript, only so many typos you’ll be able to catch, and only so many errors/plot holes you’ll be able to see.

Trust me, I know it’s tempting as soon as you type The End to send that book baby off to agents/publishers/format it for Amazon. But don’t. You need another set, or sets, of eyes on it.

*side note* Another set of eyes, not your mother (sorry Mom, and all moms out there, but you’re biased because you love us and will always believe what we do is amazing, therefore you’re not a good sounding board).

My fellow SFF Seven have shared insight on how they decide who to trust. Personally, I believe it all comes down to following your gut. But what if you don’t know where to start to find a critique partner? Or maybe the thought of handing your words over to someone you know, and have have to see IRL, terrifies you. If that’s you, then I have some options for you:

Absolute Write Water Cooler. This is a very active community for all types of writing. You’ll find a lot of articles about publishing and their online writer community forum is loaded with discussion a variety of discussion topics and writing prompts. 

NaNoWriMo. National Novel Writing Month takes place in November, but their community is active year round. #NaNoWriMo makes it easy to find people who are participating, and NaNo’s website allows you to search for people and ‘buddy’ up. I know many authors that’ve found writing buddies to cheer for them and critique for them this way. 

Discord is a way to interact with a large group and chat with like-minded individuals. Yes, there’s a ton of groups for gaming, minecraft, manga, etc. on Discord, but they also have BetaMe for writers who want to give and receive feedback on their work!

writing.com. This online community is a great place to post your writing for member feedback. Once your words are up all members can read and leave comments, so if that’s too broad for you…

Inked Voices may be a good option. This space is set up for writing groups, usually 5-15 members. They do have lectures and can connect you with professional editors if that’s intriguing to you. 

Since this is the SFF Seven blog, you may be interested in: SFFChronicles.com. This sci-fi fantasy community has a lot of forums, feel free to join and geek out, and they have a robust writing forum with a Critiques section. Note, you must have done 30 posts before you can post your own for critique. 

Reddit is huge, but did you know how many subreddits there are? I don’t, sorry if you were getting excited over getting an actual number. But they have some very popular writing subreddits if you’re looking for a particular niche!

r/writing

r/fantasywriters

r/writerchat

r/selfpublish

And last, not that this list is even the least for writing communities by far, but I’ve got to wrap this up before I lose your attention, are the social medias.

Twitter has become home to one of the largest #writingcommunity groups. Search by the hashtags, a few are #amwriting, #writerslife, #writersnetwork and #5amwritersclub. Twitter can turn into a negative cess pool at times, so if that gets to you…

Instagram uses the same hashtags and has a more positive vibe to it. Facebook, is Facebook, and can also be searched. 

It’s petrifying to share your work. But you can do it! Prepare yourself for feedback, buy some wine or bourbon, and settle in. The more you do/participate, the quicker you’re gut will learn to spot the hatters and those who aren’t a good critique-partner fit. Plus, your writing will get stronger and you’ll likely end up making some great friends! 

Have you tried any of these communities? Do you have a writing community that I didn't mention? 

Who Do You Trust with Your Work?

This week at the SFF Seven, we're asking: how do you know who to trust with your writing, especially early drafts and idea bouncing.

This is similar to a question I get all the time, which is how to pick critique partners and how many I use, including beta readers, etc.

The short answer is that this has changed quite a bit over the course of my career. I've been a member of two different critique groups that met IRL, and I've been part of various clusters of critique partners and beta readers online.

Another short answer is that who I discuss my ideas with or share work with at various stages changes all the time, and varies depending on the type of story and what I need help with. I'm blessed with a number of writer friends at this point who can read for me, and give me what I need, usually blazingly fast, too.

I can also say that I've grown extraordinarily picky about who I bounce ideas with and who I ask to look at early drafts. This is because - and I've used this analogy before - stories in their earliest stages are like infants. Their skulls are still soft and they are fragile beings that must be carefully tended. Just as you'd never hand your newborn child to just any person on the street, you don't want just anyone giving your fragile new idea a good, hard shake.

There is a time and necessary function to the good, hard shake - but that's akin to the college years, when you figure they've got to get drunk and pass out on the couch at the fraternity house at least once and learn some lessons from it.

But not the baby story. The baby story needs love and nurturing. It needs someone who can see the potential and not that dreadfully bulging forehead. I even left one IRL critique group because I felt they were having a negative impact on my work, instead of a positive one.

That's not the topic question, though, right? The question is how do you know who to trust?

There are no easy or short answers to that one, though I'm very much looking forward to hearing what advice my fellow SFFers have to offer. It took me a long time to decide to leave the crit group that wasn't working for me. It can be difficult to separate the very real reaction most humans have to criticism from the intuition that something is having a very real negative impact.

None of us like to have our work criticized, even if we are privately pissed that they passed out on the fraternity house couch. Learning to receive criticism and use it effectively is a huge part of learning to be a professional author.

But not all criticism is useful, and it's not always kindly meant.

So, that's how I decide: I consider the source and their intentions. If feedback from someone feels negative or unkindly meant, I pay attention to where they are with their own work. Are they feeling good about the work they're doing? How do they critique other people's work? Are they otherwise supportive of me and seem genuinely pleased for my successes?

That last question is key, and helped me to decide to leave that group. When I mentioned a success, these same people were sour and unsupportive. I knew then that their criticism of my writing felt negative because it was.

When you figure that out, walk away. Don't trust them with anything fragile again.