We've all seen the blog posts and Tweets by agents of the horrible responses some queriers send them a rejection. It can be fun to rubberneck such responses, watching the car wreck that is that person's nonsexistent career and wonder What were you thinking?
That's a no brainer, though. I assume none of you would think such a reply appropriate, but there's a more subtle trapping that more authors (well-intentioned authors) fall into. Having recently received beta comments for JEHOVAH'S HITLIST, I had to mentaly prepare myself for criticism. It's like running a marathon. You gotta be in shape!. You have to be ready for someone to criticize your work and then thank them for it.
Here is a general rule of thumb: YOU WILL NOT BE PRESENT TO EXPLAIN THINGS TO THE READER. Occasionally a detail might be missed, but for the most part, if your beta reader points out something that didn't make sense, this is not the time to explain it. You missed that chance. Now is the time to fix YOUR mistake.
If your writing cannot communicate what you want it to without further input from you, then it's wrong.
Now, that's easy to accept when reading a blog, but just as easy to forget when receiving criticism. When someone offers constructive feedback, your first response is THANK YOU. They may not be right. They may be. But yours is not to defend your novel but to revise it to be the best that it can be.
So to train for feedback, go through mental exercises. Remind yourself that the goal is to get good feedback not for the beta reader to love your book. You want the world to love your book and an important step toward that is fully accepting and implementing feedback.
I DO NOT NEED YOU TO LOVE MY BOOK. I NEED YOU TO HELP ME MAKE IT BETTER. THANK YOU FOR YOUR COMENTS, QUESTIONS, AND CRITICISMS.
That's a no brainer, though. I assume none of you would think such a reply appropriate, but there's a more subtle trapping that more authors (well-intentioned authors) fall into. Having recently received beta comments for JEHOVAH'S HITLIST, I had to mentaly prepare myself for criticism. It's like running a marathon. You gotta be in shape!. You have to be ready for someone to criticize your work and then thank them for it.
Here is a general rule of thumb: YOU WILL NOT BE PRESENT TO EXPLAIN THINGS TO THE READER. Occasionally a detail might be missed, but for the most part, if your beta reader points out something that didn't make sense, this is not the time to explain it. You missed that chance. Now is the time to fix YOUR mistake.
If your writing cannot communicate what you want it to without further input from you, then it's wrong.
Now, that's easy to accept when reading a blog, but just as easy to forget when receiving criticism. When someone offers constructive feedback, your first response is THANK YOU. They may not be right. They may be. But yours is not to defend your novel but to revise it to be the best that it can be.
So to train for feedback, go through mental exercises. Remind yourself that the goal is to get good feedback not for the beta reader to love your book. You want the world to love your book and an important step toward that is fully accepting and implementing feedback.
I DO NOT NEED YOU TO LOVE MY BOOK. I NEED YOU TO HELP ME MAKE IT BETTER. THANK YOU FOR YOUR COMENTS, QUESTIONS, AND CRITICISMS.