Having spent quite a lot of time doing revisions now, I have come to a conclusion. Posting work to the workshop and just asking for comments, or what people think of it, doesn't work, or doesn't work as well as it could. People need different kinds of feedback, depending on what you feel your strengths and weaknesses are. So help critiquers to help you, by telling us what kind of feedback you are after. * SPAG. Are you worried about your spelling, punctuation or grammar? * Characterisations. Do your characters work? Are they believable? Are they well developed and deep enough? * Plot. Does your plot work, is it too full of coincidences, misunderstandings and tropes? Is the ending satisfactory? Do the beats stand out? Are there any plot holes? Is the payoff strong enough? * Themes. Does the story focus on what you intended? Does it make the reader think? Are there takeaways for the reader? * Prose. Are you worried that you've made poor word choices? Are your descriptions evocative enough? Does it paint a vivid picture, or is it overwritten? Do you want suggested rewrites? * Dialogue. Does it sound natural? Is it something someone would actually say? Are your characters' personalities properly displayed through their lines, or are your stylistic choices consistent? Is it period and setting accurate? * Worldbuilding. Is your world interesting enough? Does it support or overwhelm the story? * Pacing. Is your story, too fast or too slow in places? Do scenes move like they should? There's a lot more than this, but these are the ones I could think of for now. Setting out what kind of feedback you are looking for will help you get the right feedback to help you get better faster. Feel free to add your own and discuss, disagree - but let's not get into an argument about it, please. As always, this is my personal opinion.
I love this. It should be standard in the intro post! I would also say that a category of: I need encouragement It might be needed. Because sometimes, people just need to know someone enjoyed their work. But don't have anyone to share it with, like Erotica and stuff. So, sometimes, people post wanting critique, but are more interested in being appreciated for their work. I know that seems like it's counter to the Workshop, but I think it should be a category. Because sometimes, having just 1 person like your writing makes all the difference.
Some of that's more in the beta-reader realm, depending on piece length. I think if an aspect isn't brought up, e.g. you're worried about your dialogue sounding stilted and from three/three critiques no one mentions it, then you have an inkling it's working. The more an element is highlighted the more it's isolated, but evaluation matters mostly in the sense of cohesion, especially for the maiden voyage readthrough. "What do you think of this salad" versus "Does this salad's gummi bears meet your expectations?" Huh, I guess that's why I've never liked fiction analysis in school. Yeah, that's probably it at least some of the time. To me it seems more like new writers are more focused on the question of is it bad, am I bad? The context of it being a place where criticism is invited is what gives the anticipated validation meaningful authority. Otherwise they would just show it to their mother (okay... maybe not with the erotica), a sibling, a social worker, an LLM, or publish it on a fanfic forum or Wattpad or whatever.
Good shout. I might also add a further option: "Did you like it?" Just, from a purely readers' perspective, never mind the technicalities, did you enjoy it? But also: "Any". It night not be clear to the writer what needs work.
Good thread! I'm very particular about posting in a workshop and afraid of being overly strict with my wishes, that I usually don't bother. Things I always want to know though are What's missing? By that, I mean that I typically hate filler material so much so, that my stories likely feel rushed. Should I delve more into something/someone? Add more in a particular scene? Etc... I also want to know how the dialogue sounds, does it flow naturally? As well as obviously want a mistake spotted out. I truly do appreciate anyone who takes the time to read a story of mine, but it doesn't mean I will listen to it all. What I'm not interested in...ever, is changing my words to suit any reader. If something is off, sounds odd, let me know and I'll fix it my way. Eta: I'm also becoming wary of having my work copy and pasted into a place that saves it for any reason, word does this im told, so do many others. I don't want that, but feel like requesting people simply read as is, where it is, is asking to much. So I don't bother to share anymore. Is that an appropriate request this day and age? Idk.
This. I've had this several times on this forum and others. The worst is when someone says "I would write it like this..." and can't explain why, other than "It sounds better to me". What's worse is when someone suggests a plot change if I didn't ask for it. Someone once told me I should drop the "negative" aspect of a story because they prefer positive stories. With both of these, my response is - "This is my story, and these are my words, not yours. If that's the plot or sentence you want to read, you go away and write your own story". What a critiquer should be doing is helping a story to be the best version of itself, not to be a story how they think it should be.
To be honest, im never a 100 percent positive about anything. However, I've come across this, In the Microsoft privacy statement, it says "As part of our efforts to improve and develop our products, we may use your data to develop and train our AI models." That statement though, is similar to others I've seen. There are a few grammar checkers I won't use anymore because they say similar. I'm not sure about posting links here, but the information is out there and it frightens me.
I've probably done it myself once or twice, but I try simply to say "hey, this sentence is awkward, could use a rewrite in your own words." As for the not liking a negative, ugh, that would frustrate me. I can't understand why they simply didn't just move on. I had one once tell me they don't like fantasy, so didn't enjoy my story. But, that was the only thing they really said. What's the point of that? I don't ever want to sound ungrateful though. I realize that it takes time out of our days to read and critique, which is why I try to be very specific in what im asking for, but I sometimes feel afraid that it's too much. Maybe I should stick to smaller scenes, idk. The whole process, asking for, and giving critiques, is messy at times.
I don't usually do sentence-level critiques unless it's a recurring problem in the work, but if I do, I'll just do one or two as an example. The most important thing is to point out why the sentence is wrong, do things like "the pronoun is unclear, it could refer to either of the two people being talked about", or "the verb needs strengthening", that sort of thing. If they don't like fantasy, and you tagged it or put it in a fantasy subforum, why did they read it in the first place? Although I did once ask someone who specifically said they don't read fantasy to critique one of my stories because I wanted to know whether that particular story could keep them reading right through to the end.
There is also some dark stuff one can’t share with family, either. Like death, suicide, gore, torture, dark themes. So, it is not just erotica that one can’t easily share.
I've never seen any board really explain exactly what level of edits are wanted. Hmm . . . this might be different than the level of edits that are needed, but the point is that it would be a nice thing to include. You can google "5 levels of revisions" to see those. They are: developmental edits, structural edits, content edits, line edits, and proofreading edits. Those go from broad to narrow. It's a waste of time to line edit works that are in the developmental stage. It's counterproductive to do developmental edits on a work that only needs proofing. It would also be nice to know the purpose of the story too. Is it for a submission or for publication? The proofing on those should be severe. Not a single mistake should live, nothing. If it's just a casual, for-fun piece then that changes the revisions.. I have a habit of line editing. I don't tend to look at the early drafts. I guess that's because when I write a piece myself, the first thing I do is strengthen paragraphs. That's done by adjusting sentences. I just assume that that's what a poster here wants, and so there's always a lot of red/green edits as I fill out or trim the paragraph. Trying to get it in fighting shape, if you will.
One of the issues I have with pointing out minor SPAG errors in the Workshop is that these works are mostly drafts, often first drafts. These sorts of things should be caught in edit - I dunno, proofreading? It's worth mentioning SPAG if it's systemic, but not a missing comma or two, if everything else is correct - that's just an oversight, IMO. My first edit phase usually involves deepening themes and characterisation.
Yeah, I agree. It would be nice to know where they're at in the revision process. Correcting any lines in an early draft for them is not all that useful. Talking about the bigger picture is what's needed there.
I was just figuring these could be reasons why someone would post wanting encouragement. Because sometimes, it's hard for writers like myself who can't share stories with family.
The only way you're ever going to give good feedback 100% that the author will truly find actually helpful and not annoying is sitting down and having a chat with the author before you begin. This is irregardless of what instructions the author left for you. Seriously, just pop them a note: Hey, I want to read your book. I notice you want some feedback about your dialogue. I also wanted to ask you a few questions about your main character too. This will just help me tailor my feedback a little bit better. Why is that? 1. My job as a critiquer is to help you write the story you want to write. Not tell you how I would write the story. If you want a story about... idk, dinosaurs mounted with gatling guns while piloting F-16's, then so be it. We'll somehow get this figured out. 2. It builds trust. It's hard to tell when you receive feedback, whether or not the reader is actually sincear, or they're just writing very surface level things. When you take the time to show interest in the writer's work, they can trust you really are giving them feedback to the best of their interest. 3. Writers don't know what they don't know. I might say that I want someone to read a chapter for clarity, but that's just my best guess on what could be wrong with it. By sitting down and making the critique into more of a conversation and less about "Oh you did this wrong, and that wrong" understanding can be had. 4. Allows for greater access for writers with disabilities. This is one no one talks about. (Obviously, because no one cares.) I'm autistic. This makes 90% of the feedback I get, completely useless. Not because the Critiquer didn't mean well or didn't do a good job, but because I very literally cannot understand it! There's a particular way I want the book to be, and a lot of feedback feels very disrupting to that vision. So, I need a little extra help in seeing that "hey if I take this couple of sentences out, it's not going to break anything." But I've also gotten feedback that has completely wrecked the next five chapters. But the most important reason of all: 5. At the end of the day, most writers just want someone who is willing to care about what they wrote. It's not about the story itself. They just want to feel like the effort was worth it. And I think a lot of times we will point things out and point things out, but we forget to take three steps back and ask one fundmental question: Could you see yourself reading this story for the sake of enjoyment. In other words, if you weren't looking for flaws, would you even see them?
