Well, you're entitled to your opinion, of course. But I don't agree with you at all. I am a long-time avid reader AND ex-teacher as well as a writer, who is in the final editing stages of my first novel. And yes, I've read Jack Blinking Bickham, Sol Stein, Ben Bova, Nancy Kress, Orson Scott Card, Robert Kernan, Matt Braun, David Michael Kaplan, Margret Gerhaghty, Renni Brown, Dave King, William Noble, Sue Grafton, Michael Orlofsky ...yadda yadda yadda. These writer's guidebooks and articles are all on my bookshelf just now, along with many others. I'm not published yet, but that's because I'm still finishing my final edit. I want it to be at the highest possible standard and ready for publication before I put it out there. I can certainly recognise helpful feedback (and POV errors!) I can also recognise readers' genuine engagement with my story and how it's been written. And no, I haven't 'liked' everything they've said about it—and it's quite insulting of you to suggest that the only thing I want from beta readers are pats on the back. Indeed, the most helpful responses have been from people who pointed out problems. And yes, I'm smart enough to have worked out how to correct them. I have taken all feedback on board (from around 30 beta readers to date) and made most of the changes the readers suggested. Why? Because they were right. You never know how a reader is going to receive what you've written, until you let them read it. I would never have got to this stage without my helpful beta readers, to whom I'm incredibly grateful. Some of them have been friends and family. Some not. I take your points about being cautious about family/friend feedback, but to say it's useless? Nah - ah. That's just daft. Are you trying to tell us that published authors with big names don't show their manuscripts to spouses and friends before proceeding further? That's not what many of them say in their thank-you sections...
@JayG : That's all nice and fine, and a lot of the time friends and family will be lousy beta readers. But why would you suppose to know everyone's situation well enough to generalise in this way? Quite a few bestselling writers I know use their spouses and perhaps others to read/comment/edit/react to their work in progress. And they are obviously good enough since they fulfil their purpose, which isn't final edit but help along the way. Your way and your convictions aren't the only way, even if they might have worked really well for you in the past.
Who isn't? We're all avid readers. I assume you watch TV too. Did that ready you for a career in screenwriting? To be a director? We don't learn to do by viewing the product. We need to learn the process. If you worked in the public school system as teacher it was your job to teach the general skill called writing, and practice your students in the compositional forms most adults require, which are author-centric and fact based. Their purpose is to dispassionately inform. The reader is told what's happening, but they are not made to live the writing on an emotional level. This is what you were trained in and what you taught. It's a bitch to break such ingrained habits as that. When you try, all your training, practiced till it seems intuitive, is going to scream in outrage. I assume the novel you refer to is the one you have a chapter posted, but this is not the place to point out what I mean, so I did a critique there for what it may be worth. And no I'm not saying that authors don't show their work to family and friends, just that you can't get a cold read reaction from them because there'a an emotional connection between writer and family that will bias their reaction.
Well, as it happens, you 'assumed' wrongly. That is a snippet from a just-started novel, my second, for which I've only written the first three chapters—and these are only at the first-draft stage. This piece I put up for feedback on that other thread is a snippet from the middle of the story. I often sketch in crucial scenes early on, so I've got something to work towards, as I fill in the gaps between. This particular scene will be a crucial one, and I wanted to pitch it right. I had a hunch it was over-written, so I asked for feedback. That snippet is FAR from what the final version of that chapter will be. It's just what I was working on that day, and wanted some help with the frustration I was feeling about how it sounded. By the time the readers reach that part of the story, they will know the character well, and will understand his situation, and why he feels so closed-off and distant from others around him. I deliberately chose that distanced effect for that part of the story, as contrast to the way my main POV character presents her side of the story. This guy is not my main POV character. My main POV character (whose 'voice' is not distant at all) is very worried about him, and the fact that he is becoming withdrawn and nearly unreachable. The readers, by this stage of the story, will know why. I would say your penchant for 'assuming' is one of the things you ought to work on yourself. You assume everybody starts from the same position you do/did, and know what? You're wrong. Your advice is often very helpful—as is that of others on this forum—but you're not the only game in town. Nor is your story everybody's story.
One thing I'd like to add, just a general note on friends/family vs. strangers… It’s not all that black ‘n white either. You might want to know the person you give your MS at least a lil bit. If you give your work to a complete stranger, they might misuse it, so in that sense it might be a good idea to gauge the people you’ll be collaborating with beforehand. But: just 'cause you've followed someone on the boards, deemed the stuff they post kosher, and they are in the know of your genre doesn't make them your friends, you still have to win them over with the quality of your manuscript, and I think that’s where @JayG has a point, the beginning has to hook the betas too, as it should the publishers. As for published betas vs. non-published. In my meager experience, there hasn’t been a significant difference. Our current WIP has been beta-read by a published author and while she picked up on a lot of stuff, she didn’t spot POV problems, even though there are those “distancing” bits too. I’m more sensitive to such technical errors now that I was a year ago, which, I hope, is an improvement. The MS has also been read by a non-writer, who picked up on the factual stuff, but was fine with the quality of writing – which is SO not there yet, it can be so much better – but my point being, the feedback combined with your own judgment and what you’ve learned from writing mentors and books will probably do more good to your MS than keeping it all to yourself and becoming blind to your work.
