Yes, absolutely. You might take a friend's criticism in a different light from that of a stranger's. Would you remain friends with somebody who hated your writing for whatever reason, and thought it was silly, or offensive or dull and boring? If you can honestly say yes to that, then fair enough, let them read your work. Make it very VERY clear to them that you won't take offense or get hurt, no matter what they say—and then don't. The opposite might also happen. Because they know you, and maybe know the extreme effort you've put into the writing and how much it means to you, they might be reluctant to be honest in their criticism. There's nothing wrong with friends reading your work, if you really DO want honest and constructive feedback. However, it's a good idea to get other readers on board as well. I think the biggest mistake is to be in too much of a rush, and to limit feedback to only a couple of people. Get as wide a range of criticism as you can. The diversity of opinion is likely to surprise you. Not everybody is going to love your work. No author has that distinction.
I agree, my friends know how much I appreciate honesty so, I rather you hurt my feeling by being honest than sugar coating it worried you're gonna lose a friend. On that note, I won't stop being friends with them
Alpha readers are people who read the work while its in progress and give crit on storyline, plot etc, they don't usually worry about spag unless you specifically ask them too. Sometimes but not always people pair off to alpha read for each other .... you need to find the right person though, so it wise to trial it with a chapter first. As opposed to Beta readers who read and critique the manuscript when its at draft complete
In theory here - but you arent eligible for the workshop and collaboration areas yet. I'm alpharing for a couple of people already (and betaring for Zoup) so I wouldnt want to make it a regular thing but if you want to send me what you've got so far I'd by happy to give you a one off alpha read
Am I right in thinking that your friend mentioned a lot of SPaG issues, but overlooked the plot issues that was what you really wanted feedback on, and which you picked up yourself later? If that is the case, it's probably the reason why you should ALWAYS submit work of the highest possible SPaG. Because to some people (me, and probably your friend, included) won't be able to get past the SPaG to see the story/characterization underneath. Because bad grammar frequently leaves the words open to several interpretations, so the reader has to translate the text into a language they can understand before they can read it, and that translation may be different to what the author intended, and may make the story/characterization unimaginably bad.
Yeah... She said something similar. although she did understood the plot and the situations. She asked me to please finish it so she can know how it ends. lol
