Beta Readers Meets Lord of the Rings and Makes a Duff plug!!!!

I've noticed that "betas" seem to be a hot topic lately in the blogasphere. Actually, it's not beta fish people are talking about. Although I did have one when I was in middle school. His name was Mr. Dude....but that's a story for another day.

Critique Partners are an invaluable part of your writing career. I'm forever in debt to the people who have bravely gone where no man has gone before and read my manuscripts.

One of the first beta readers I ever had on my YAUF is someone you may have heard of. She has a book officially coming out in September, although it has been spotted in the wild! (subliminal message: Go buy the Duff!) Yep, Kody Keplinger was one of my original betas. And guess what? I got to do the same for her on The Duff. She was gracious and awesome enough to include me and some of the other beta readers in the acknowledgements!! :)

Anyway, I digress. Writing is often an isolating hobby. We hunker down in strange locations, clutching our laptops or notebooks as we escape into the uncharted realms of our imagination. In a way, we become Gollum from Lord of the Rings with our own “preshus”. If you've ever had a word count deadline or been in revision hell, you know how feasible it is to actually begin to resemble Gollum physically. And when this happens, you should seriously step away from the computer for a period of time.

So, stay with me here as I continue to use the Lord of the Rings analogy for critique partners. After you've taken that first brave step and had someone, or several people, read your work, it's only natural that you become comfortable with a select few. The bond you form with these people is very much like that of the Fellowship of the Ring. You're out for a common good: making that manuscript the best it can be either for querying, for an agent, or for an editor. The best critique partners are the ones who give a mixture of tough, constructive criticism as well as comments that can talk you down from the ledge or stop you from torching your laptop in rage.

But the greatest gift I've found with my critique partners is the friendship. These are people who will pick me up when the publishing game has left me bloodied and battered on the floor. They are the wind beneath my wings, and the reason I get up, brush myself off, and try to fly once again. Some people say it takes a village to raise a child. I think this is true in the publishing world as well. I know I couldn't have made it this far without my critique partners....my manuscripts most CERTAINLY could not have made this far!

So, if you've got your own group of Sam's, Merry's and Pippin's, then hold tight to them. They're what make the journey--the quest up to Mt. Doom feasible.

Be a Better Beta

I think most seasoned writers agree: our betas are one of our most valuable assets. We count on them to polish our early drafts into something shiny and fit to be seen by the rest of the human population. But for newbies considering beta-ing for the first time, the idea of critiquing someone else’s work can be kind of scary. Are there any rules, you might ask? Well, in my opinion, yes. Yes there are. Read on below for Debra’s Rules for Being a Better Beta.

1. Ask the writer what he or she expects BEFORE you start. Because, OMG, there’s a huge difference between general feedback and line editing. I think there’s some conventional wisdom that says you should read every novel you crit at least twice, once for big picture stuff, and the second time for line edits. I’m convinced whoever said that had 500 hours in a day, all of them allocated to reading. The truth is, if you’re like me, you have beta reads lined up til kingdom come, and hai there, a WIP that needs to be written, revisions to do, etc, etc, etc. Plus there are those little hassles of daily life—work, kids, hubbies, eating—that tend to get in the way. So unless you just really have boatloads of time, I’d suggest doing one or the other, general or line, and working it out with the writer up front. Some writers don’t like line edits in the first place—as in, you touch that prose, you lose a finger.

2. Which brings us to rule number two: if the writer doesn’t want line edits, do not, I repeat, DO NOT, touch even one syllable of that sparkly prose. Wear socks on your hands while reading if you must, or duct tape them, cover your laptop keys with thumb tacks dipped in rattlesnake venom, whatever you need to do. JUST. DON’T. TWEAK.

(okay, so this is a bit extreme, but it's also one of the most creative uses of duct tape I've ever seen. Hmmm, wonder if it's legal....????)

3. Do a trial run. No, seriously. Ask to beta just the first 3 chapters to start. That way you can both a) make sure your commenting style actually helps the writer and b) have a way out if what you thought was contemporary turns into a Martians-taking-over-the-world-by-inhabiting-the-intestines-of-Golden-Retrievers plotline.

4. Make a sandwich. No, not the eating kind, silly—though, you can do that too, because beta work does take a well-fed brain—the comment kind. Personally, I’ve always found the criticism easier to take when it’s surrounded on both sides by the good stuff. Sort of like an Oreo. Only with brussel sprouts instead of cream filling.

5. Use your relationship skillz to approach the negative. You know how therapists always suggest avoiding “you” and “your” statements when addressing problems with your spouse/mother-in-law/crazy neighbor who dresses her Yorkie up as RPatz, complete with glitter and tousled fur?

Well, the same applies to critiquing. Avoid sentences starting with “you” or “your” if at all possible. For example, do NOT say:

“Your prose makes me want to gouge out my eyeballs with a dull spork.”

OR:

“You really should delete this entire manuscript and start over. On a new topic. And use a ghostwriter.”

Just like in relationships, “I” statements are often more palatable. As in:

* “In my opinion, this characterization could be stronger."

OR

“I feel like the pacing dropped off a bit here”

Also, note the use of “could” above? Could is your beta-ready friend. Could implies that it’s something the writer might think about—not that they MUST do as you say. I don’t know about you, but I’m pretty darn stubborn. I am much more likely to pull a mule if someone tells me I MUST do something to my novel, rather than suggesting I think about it.

*Okay, so I cheated a little, because really, “In my opinion, your prose makes me want to gouge my eyeballs out with a dull spork” still sounds pretty crappy. But you get my point (bad pun intended).

6. Always, always be both respectful AND honest.* In my opinion (see what I did there?) these traits are both key in a good beta. If you’re not respectful, you run the risk of having the writer discard your input, no matter how spot-on it might be. And if you’re not honest? Well, you’re not doing your job. The writer counts on YOU to tell her what’s working and what’s not. If you’re not able to do that, then you shouldn’t be beta-ing. Period.

*If you ARE honest, be prepared for the person you’re critting to hate you for at least ten full minutes, regardless of how kindly you’ve worded your comments. This is normal. If you must crit in person, ignore any tears, ranting and hand waving, or other disturbing behavior that occurs during this time frame.

7. Finally, have fun, and enjoy the experience. Beta-ing can be a great way to improve your own craft by analyzing the highs and lows in your peers’ work--and make you feel good for helping someone else out. Really, it's a win-win situation.

Let me say it again, kill redundancy.

On a line-edit, few things bug me more than misused homophones. Redundant words are one of them.

Let me put it out there that I like repetition - when used right, the emphasis is fantastic. In dialog, it reveals a lot about a character, depending on context.

I love arguments where one person stubbornly repeats their position. Or conversation where Bob reiterates a point that Andrew just made thus revealing that he wasn't listening to Andrew in the first place.

"The line's going to be long, so we should go early."
"I don't really know what time we should show up, but the last time I went, there was a long line."

Doesn't that make you want to smack Bob and bless poor, patient Andrew for putting up with Bob?

Redundancy is different.

"He opened the hand painted door he was so proud of, and I walked into the apartment, sidling past the painted naked lady on the door, mentally promising myself to be quick, and hoping that he left the door open behind me."

Grrrrr. Sure, there are details, important details...because really? Never enter the apartment of someone who's painted a naked lady on their front door. But there's got to be a better way to say that.

I'm as guilty as the next person. It's actually pretty embarrassing. My two favorite tools for combating this are:
1) Find/Replace - I do searches on "thought that" and tell it to replace it with "thought" - It's faster than searching all the thats and looking at them one by one. "said that" "told me that" "assumed that" "grateful that" It's still a long list.
2) Beta Readers. - Some of the words I repeat are specific to one scene, betas can catch this - especially if I've done #1 already before they read it.

Lastly, if it's an action you keep repeating, say, rolling eyes, or cracking knuckles, you may want to head over to The Bookshelf Muse's Emotion Thesaurus. They have emotions listed followed by the many different ways people express them.

- Holen

P.S. Congrats to Mel who won our awesome auction package and helped a great cause at the same time!


So tell us, what actions do you overuse?

Networking: Not Just For Used Car Salesmen*

First off, a huge congrats to Veronica for her book deal! (See yesterday's post.)We're super excited to have her with us, and that feeling was there BEFORE said book deal.



This news ties nicely into my topic today, because until a few months ago, I didn't "get" networking. In fact, I still hold an Ayn Randian view of people who rely on who they know rather than what they can do.

My old interpretation of people who network:
"Hi, Vee. Nice book deal you have there. We should be friends." = I now need you to beta everything I've ever written and then refer me to your agent.
Doesn't that just feel dirty?

My enlightened understanding of networking: "Hi SusieQCoolness. Nice concept. Have you entered Agent So-and-So's annual contest yet?"
See the difference?

Not just the taking vs. giving, but the idea of glomping onto success vs. spreading opportunity. Networking is actually about sharing needs when you run across them. It's also about sharing some of what you learned from your greenhorn mistakes. "No! Don't have your MC look into a mirror and critique her looks!" "No! Don't test email yourself a query to check format and then forward that query that worked to the agent. Forwarding an email messes w/ format too and they'll see little arrows or whatever."

Here's what made it click for me. A very nice person had read my last MS and told me to query Agent Fabulous, who'd read a full of hers before and given really helpful comments. She thought that my writing style matched up with what Agent Fabulous liked, based on her interaction with that agent. This wasn't a referral. I didn't used Nice Person's name. But I took her advice, and it got me a request of my own.

Things like that. Pretty awesome, and everyone gets a much clearer picture of opportunity when we share our 20/20 hindsight.

-Holen

*My apologies to used car salesmen everywhere. I've never actually bought a brand-new car, so please don't doubt that I'm glad you exist.

The Ins and Outs of Beta Readers

I had an epiphany the other day. I realized that some of the best YA books I’ve read lately aren’t even published. Yes, that’s right, and I’m not even talking about ARCS here. I’m talking about unpublished, unagented gems of literary genius: the books I’m beta reading.

If you’re part of the writing community, you are acquainted with the term “beta reader”. However, if you’re not, you may be wondering what in the world a “beta reader” is. I’ll be honest when I was first introduced to the term, the first thought that flashed in my mind was the fish.

A Beta reader is someone who reads and critiques your novel. Sure, you might have read it a hundred times with red pen in hand, but a beta reader will read it objectively. They will be subjective where you cannot. After all, our WIPS are like children. We love them, and we don’t want to think badly of them. We may not see how this character isn’t necessary or how this scene drags. So, what do you do? You call in a beta reader…or two…or maybe even ten! They’ll make your wip nice and pretty for perspective agents and editors.

Beta readers are great for fact checking, too. They’re like script supervisors on movies. Maybe you have Character A drinking a coke in a scene and then five paragraphs later they’re hopping in the car. Wait, where did the drink go? Or maybe Character A was talking to Character B, but you call them Character C’s name by accident. Hey, it happens. Ever seen the “goofs” section on the Internet Movie Database? It happens in big budget blockbusters, and it happens to writers too.

I mean what would Harry Potter have been like if someone let this mistake happen in makeup!

There are two types of beta reading. One is just a content read. Maybe you have a pivotal scene that you’re not sure works, or maybe you want to know if a character is believable or not. Beta readers will be able to answer these questions for you. They might also find little things you weren’t even expecting.

Another type is line-by-line edits where you edit not only for content, but for grammar as well. Yep, I used the “g” word—the word that exercises fear in the hearts of many. When you have line-by-line edits, beta readers can correct spelling, punctuation, and proofreading errors, and awkward wording or sentence structure. Even if you’re a “grammar god” with eagle eyes, you’re going to miss things—you’re only human. So, go ahead and bring another set of eyes in to check for mistakes.

Here’s what a couple of our OPWFT writers and OPWFT thread contributors feel about beta readers:

“They are like a lifeline to reality. You’re thinking you’ve got either crap or something totally amazing, but your eyes are the only pair that have seen your WIP. You need more than just your opinion to confirm or deny your own.”

“They also catch a lot that you don’t. In your mind, it’s all clear. You know the relationships and the events that occur b/c they’re all in your head playing like a movie. Others may not get it. You might need to clarify some things that they can identify.”—Jamie

“Having beta readers is like having editors before getting the real thing.”—Becca

“For me, beta reading involves treating the novel I’m reading the same as a book I’ve purchased from Barnes and Noble. Regardless of whether or not the writer is my friend, I’m going to give them an honest critique even if I have to suggest several revisions.”—Stephanie

“Beta reading opens my eyes to all the mistakes I make on my manuscript, and it’s always helpful to have another set of eyes, or twenty, on your work.”—Annie

Me as a Beta Reader:
“Pretty much, I look for things that the writer has asked me to look for. If they just want general comments on flow, characterization, plot, etc., then I only comment unless I find a blaring grammar error. If they ask for me to pay attention to grammar, then I basically copy edit. Usually, it’s a mix of the two, and I find that works well. (I’ve only beta-read parts of two so far, though)”

Me as the Writer:
“I’d probably look for a combo of what I just said above. Basically, I’d want someone to be brutally honest about if it’s any good, where there are slow places, if things are written well, show/tell issues, etc. I don’t have any experience with fiction, so in a beta, I’d be looking for someone who could add kind of an expertise, I guess. PLUS, I’d want to know if it’s relevant to the YA market (if YA, of course).

So let the beta reading begin!

Originally published on Old People Writing for teens by former OPWFT contributor Laura. To view the original post and reader comments, please click here.