Writing Tip of the Day: March 29, 2007: Critics

When you receive critical advice or feedback about your writing, learn to evaluate it then follow your instincts.

Get feedback, any and all feedback, about your story. Feedback is important, it well tell you more about yourself and your writing style than you really want to know, but it’s a lesson worth learning.

Listen to those who praise your work, but listen with an open mind. Think about this: ask yourself who is giving the good feedback and what’s in it for them?

Is your family? Your best friends? Do they really know good writing when they read it, or are they just glowing with pride because they know you? Feedback from your friends and family is rarely worth listening too, because unless your mom is an editor from Harlequin or Doubleday, chances are good that she is just fanning your vainity. Harsh? Yes, but true.

What about the bad feedback you are getting from friends and family, should you believe it? No. Chances are good that they are jealous and spiteful, and want to put you down and make you feel bad, and really have nothing good to say about anything in your life anyways.

So what does that all mean? Well, what it means is, never have someone who knows you personally give you feedback on your stories, cause it well not be objective. Yes, get their feedback, but no, don’t rely on it to determ if yours is the next best seller.

You want feedback from editors, agents, book reviewers, talk show hosts, and newspaper critics. They get paid to give writers feedback. Impossible? No. All it takes is sumbitting your manuscript to as many places as you can think of. Here’s one to get you started: Harlequin Romance Novel Critique Service, finding others is as easy as saying Google.

So, where has all this taking us?

• #1 get feedback from everyone: family, friends, online groups, & profesionals

• #2 consider who is giving the feedback and what their motive is

• #3 do you see a pattern in feedback given, regardless of who gave it? if you get the same feedback over and over again from everyone, than they may be right and you might want to look at that point harder

• #4 when all is said and done, it’s your work, your story, your characters, your book, not theirs… you only need to change what you think really needs changing

Think about every feedback you get from every possible angle and than act accordingly, based on what YOU feel is best for YOU and YOUR book

I know what my characters are doing and why, and where that well lead them… you tell me to change them and you’ll get a roaring lion on your hands, but you want to tell me about my grammer/style/spelling mistakes, (and I do make them, I admit it) I’ll take note and try to improve with willing ears.

I get most of my attacks, not on my style, but on one of my reoccuring characters who is a drag queen, and those attacks come not from my readers, but from close friends and family who think I am “ruining their good name”… ??? … whatever,

Everyone has a bone to chew, and you can be sure that the more famous you get the more “hate mail” you’ll get too, it comes with the job

to all you writers out there: good luck on your story, and be sure you got a hard shell… we writers need it if we want to stay in the game

~~EK