What does everyone say in regards to getting accurate feedback for books? I have friends that read them, but I feel some opinions may not be accurate for a plethora of reasons. It never hurts to have more anyway. Do you read your stories yourself and then see how "smooth" they are in regards to others? Do you submit them somewhere? I ask this mainly because I've written two books, with the first being on it's eight cycle of being rewritten (I feel it's total garbage but I'm told otherwise) and the second book simply doing an impeccable job of making me surprised (And I'm the damn guy who wrote it!) I genuinely can't tell if I'm being too harsh, or too bias on my work, among other things.
"Accurate" is non relevant when it comes to a feedback. From my perspective this works like this: I am not content + my reader(s) is not content = It's no good. Maybe good premise, but that's just not good enough. Rewrite from start or completely abolish. Keep the thought for later if I flirt with it. I am not content + my reader(s) is content = Hm... What's wrong with me? Furthermore, what's wrong with my reader? Nope. I don't trust them. It sucks to me. What was I thinking writing this? How reliable is my reader? I am content + my reader(s) is not content = Hm... What's wrong with the reader? Furthermore, what's wrong with me? Nope. I don't trust me. It sucks for them. What did they perceive reading this? How can I rewrite this in order to make it persuasive? I am content + my reader(s) is content = It's good. All check. Moving on. Nowadays, I prefer writing a great big bunch of the story and later getting critiqued on it, rather than getting critiqued from chapter to chapter. I've changed the method in which I write and so far, I find it works better for me. I get the most out of the big picture when I write further into the story and this helps me revisit something before I send it out for critique. This saves time and effort for me as well for my readers.
