I was chatting with a a group of writers the other day when Sunyi Dean, asked a question about beta readers, and if people used fewer beta readers now than they did earlier in their career. I do use fewer, and it got me thinking about why–and I’ll talk about that. But it, along with other conversations with other people, got me thinking about the bigger subject of who we listen to and why. (Please note that this was a semi-private conversation, so I got Sunyi’s permission to share this here.)

I think that’s a skill we don’t really talk about much. But who and what we listen to is really important, and it’s a very hard skill to develop.

One school of thought would suggest that we listen to everything and then accept the parts we want and reject the parts we don’t. Which is a nice thought, in theory. But it presupposes that we have the ability to filter all of that and to accurately determine which parts are valid and which aren’t. In practice, it’s likely overwhelming.

On the other end of the spectrum, there are people would suggest that you’re the artist, so you should listen to nobody but yourself. A famous football coach once said “If you listen to the fans, you’ll be sitting up there with them.”*

Either of those theories are fine if they work for you, but in reality, most of us exist somewhere along that spectrum. And I think one of the most important things you can do as a writer is to figure out where along it you fit. It’s a constantly moving target, and one you might reevaluate and change as you grow in your career (even if you’re doing that subconsciously.)

I want to emphasize that. There’s no right and wrong answer here. Your writing process is yours, and the only thing that matters is what works for you. What I’m going to do here is try to give you some things to think about that might help you figure that out.

To try to make this usable, I’m going to talk about different types of feedback separately.

1. Beta Readers. I’m starting here because that was Sunyi’s initial question that got me thinking about it. Sunyi talked about using fewer readers as she got further along in her career, and I think that’s pretty normal for a few reasons. For me, I’ve become better at self-editing, and I can do more with less feedback. Second, earlier in my career I was ingesting a lot of craft advice from beta readers, and I do that a lot less now. Not that I’m not constantly trying to improve my craft–I definitely am–it’s just that I do it in different ways and don’t rely on beta readers to provide that learning.
   
   Additionally, over time I think you learn what beta readers are good at what things, and you start to file them accordingly. These days, I’m mostly looking for big picture things or specific technical things. For example, JC Nelson reads for me every time, and while he gives me feedback on the story, he specifically helps me with my tech stuff.
   
   So what should you look for in a beta reader? First, I think it’s important to acknowledge that you won’t always know what a reader is going to do for you if it’s the first time they’re reading. Some won’t finish the book. Some won’t have the insight you hope that they would. And some will provide way more than you ever thought. So it’s a process, figuring this stuff out.
   
   But at the end of the day, I think you’re looking for people who can provide things you can’t provide for yourself. That might be writing craft advice, it might be technical information, or it might just be perspective that you don’t have (in that you’re very close to your story, and they’re seeing it with fresh eyes.)
   
   A few things I do as I select and use information from beta readers:
   
   Generally speaking, I look for people who know more than I do. Often this might be in a specific area, whether it’s technical or craft. And I’ve done this for others, as well. I have no ability to write a romance novel, but I’ve read scenes for romance authors involving military things or action scenes involving guns. While the authors are way more qualified than I am to write those novels, in those types of scenes, I might know more than they do.
   
   I give guidance to my beta readers to focus them. Obviously I can’t control how they follow that. But I ask for what I want. For example, I don’t want a lot of craft advice on an early draft. I’m going to fix that stuff on my own in the next pass. So I usually try to focus my beta readers on the big picture — things that work and things that don’t. Things that feel too slow or things that feel rushed. Places where they’re confused. Beta readers who can give you an honest reader reaction are great beta readers.
   
   I weigh the advice once I get it. This is, I think, where experience comes in and where I’ve evolved the most over time. Early on, I think I tended to overreact to notes. Someone said something, so I needed to address it. You can find a lot of advice about this online, with one of the most common things I see being that if one reader says it, you can ignore it, but if multiple readers mention it then you really need to address it. I think that’s flawed. For example if I have three readers and one says a scene is slow but two don’t mention it, does that mean it’s not slow? Maybe. What it means to me is that I need to take another look at it and decide. Something is making it feel slow to that one person, so even if others didn’t feel strongly enough about it to mention it, I’m going to look at it. But it might be a matter of degrees. If all three readers mentioned it, I might consider a major revision. But with one, maybe I can find some smaller ways to to make it better. Maybe I can up the tension with some better stakes, or maybe there are places I can cut filler. But also, it depends on the reader.
   
   The reader matters. The better they are, the more I’m going to listen. I tend to use mostly pro writers as betas these days, so there’s a level of skill inherent in their notes. Does that mean I’m always going to do what they say? Of course not. I’m privileged where every day I talk to writers who are better than me. I know that’s going to come off as me being self-deprecating, but I mean it. This isn’t debatable. I’m not going to name drop–just trust me on this. But that doesn’t mean I’m going to apply everything they say. Because while they’re better writers than me, it doesn’t mean they’re better at writing my book. I listen. I learn. I certainly think about anything they share and give it the appropriate weight. And then I do what’s right for me.
   
   And again, I think that’s an evolving process, and one of the things we talk about when we talk about ‘leveling up’ as a writer. It takes practice.
   
   2. Reviewers. Obviously for this one to apply, you’ve reached a certain point in your writing career. There’s some pretty ubiquitous advice out there about not reading reviews. Personally I read all my reviews. The catch is, I read them when it’s right for me. I read them when my head is in the right place to deal with such things, and I absolutely *never* read them on days where I still need to get writing done. Whether you should read them or not is up to you. It’s important to be honest with yourself about how you’re able to handle them. If they mess with your head, avoid them. If they don’t bother you at all? Go for it. Or, if you’re like me, go somewhere in the middle.
   
   But the question is how much do I listen to them. Not at all. Okay. That’s an exaggeration. I do listen. I just don’t change anything based on them. Reviews as we have come to know them today aren’t really reviews. They’re personal takes. There’s a difference. Most current “reviews” boil down to whether the person liked the book or not (Not all reviews. Obviously some are more objective than others.) What I use them for is to see whether I hit certain marks or not. Did a reviewer get something that I was trying to do? That’s a good piece of feedback. Doesn’t change anything, but I like to know. I also look at reviewers over time. For example, if someone liked one of my books but likes another one less, I find that interesting and I might, in broad terms, think about why. I paid a lot of attention to this with reviews for THE MISFIT SOLDIER. It was my first book after the Planetside series and I was interested to see if fans of my first series enjoyed the next book. But again, that was interest only, and not really something that would change how I do things. But more on that when we talk about sales later in the post. <Pro tip: That’s called foreshadowing. It’s a cool writer thing that I learned from reading Richard Swan’s book. I’m joking. Mostly. It’s definitely something I loved about that book.>
   
   3. Agent. This is one that’s going to be different for everybody. Personally, I love to get my agent’s feedback because she’s super insightful and makes my work better. I know other people whose agents don’t read their books until they’re published if they’re already sold (which, at some point in your career, hopefully they already are.) There’s no right or wrong with this and is really up to the writer and the agent. Though I would suggest that early on in the relationship it’s more the decision of the agent and later it’s more the decision of the writer. That’s just how things kind of go. But bottom line, I think you can go either way on this and I’m only including it here in order to say exactly that.
   
   4. Editor. This is probably a whole post by itself, but I’m going to keep it fairly short here. There are some legal and business aspects to this, as you’ve got a contract and your editor has a lot of influence over your career. So on one hand, you’ve got some obligation to listen to your editor. At the same time, you’re the writer, and your editor wouldn’t be working with you if they didn’t appreciate that. Do you have to do what your editor says? No. But up above I mentioned weighting the advice that you get based on the person, and your editor is almost certainly deserving of the most weight. They’re very, very likely to provide the best feedback you’re going to get. I know that’s the case with my editor. But at the same time, they’re probably really good at giving that feedback in a way that empowers you rather than restricting you. That’s what makes them good at their job. They’re trying to bring out the best in your writing, not tell you how to do it.
   
   My editor almost never gives me specific advice on how to fix things. He tells me what’s working and what’s not. Where I need more and where I might need less. Things that aren’t clear or not resolved. And then he might throw out ideas on how to do that–usually a list of possibilities. And then he leaves me alone to do it, waits for me to send it back, and evaluates what I’ve done. Did I do what he said? Probably not specifically. Did I address his concerns? I definitely tried to (and historically, I’ve done a pretty good job of it, even if it wasn’t exactly what he was expecting.)
   
   5. Fans. This kind of correlates to reviews, but I’m making it its own category because I think the approach is different. Fans want things. The bigger you get as a writer, the more fans you have, and the louder those wants can get. Don’t believe me? Spend a day reading fan opinions on Ren and Kylo (Seriously — don’t do that to yourself.) Fans have opinions. Those opinions and desires are valid–for them. Should you listen to them? Probably not.
   
   In the end, what fans want is a great story. And that’s what you should give them. But you’re the writer, and the reason they are fans in the first place is because you’ve already done that. Their wants are really hopes. They have hope for your characters, and that certain things will happen to them, because they’ve invested in them. But they’ve invested in them because you wrote them.
   
   There are two extremes when it comes to this, and I think both are pretty bad. There’s the 100% fan service extreme, where we’re going to ignore story to give people what they think they want, and there’s the opposite, where we’re going to specifically not do what fans want just to be a dick. I’ve seen both. I’m a fan of neither. Write a great story. Fans will appreciate it.
   
   6. Sales. Wait…sales aren’t feedback, you might say. Aren’t they? Aren’t they a very objective referendum on your work? Do note that I didn’t say the *quality* of your work. Sales and quality do have some correlation, but not nearly as much as you’d expect (Note, I’m not taking a shot at any popular books. I’m more saying that there are some really, really good midlist books that never found their way in the market.) But sales matter. At least if you want to write more books. Should you change creatively to change sales? I don’t know…probably not. But at the same time, if you can ignore it, you’re definitely wired differently than I am.
   
   And a lot of it comes down to your goals. You can absolutely ignore sales and write whatever you want. Some people do. But I find that people who say they do are often people who already sell well. It’s easy to do what you want creatively when the commercial side of things is already working out. And of course we can argue causality on that all day long. Did the person get sales because they followed their own creative vision, or are they able to follow their own creative vision because they got sales? As with all things, the truth is probably somewhere between the two and varies person by person.
   
   Bottom line, if you’re trying to make a living writing, sales are a pretty integral part of that. If you’re someone who doesn’t have to think about that, I’m happy for you, because either you have a ton of sales and thus a lot of options or you have no sales and can absolutely write whatever you want, which is fun. For those of us between the extremes, there are considerations — so let’s talk about how much we have to pay attention to them.
   
   In some cases, we have no choice but to listen. For example, my book, THE MISFIT SOLDIER, has underperformed. I don’t know by how much yet, as I won’t get my first royalty statement on it until next week. But we know it hasn’t sold as well as my other books, and since my publisher paid me like it would perform like my other books…well…that’s a problem. Mostly it’s their problem, as I’ve already spent my advance and they’re not getting it back. But their problem becomes my problem in the future, as it affects what they’re willing to do with me going forward. For example, one thing we know for sure is this: There ain’t going to be a MISFIT SOLDIER 2.
   
   Now…here’s where it gets complicated. The publisher (and really the market) has said we don’t want MISFIT 2. Does that mean I can’t write it? Of course not. I could write it and self publish it, and it would sell some number of copies and there are dozens of fans who would probably love to see it (I’m joking. It’s more than dozens. Probably.) But nobody is going to pay me to write it up front. So it’s a balance between the creative and the commercial. If my choices are between writing MISFIT 2 for $0 and something else for $25,000 (and for the record, this is exactly what my choice was) then I’d have to *really* want to write MISFIT 2 in order to do it. And while I’d love to write Gas Gastovsky again, I wouldn’t love it *that* much.
   
   Does this mean we’ll never hear from Gas and Putty and the team again? I’d never say never. But at this point, it would probably take some outside interference to make that happen. Specifically, it would have to find an audience that hasn’t manifested yet (extremely unlikely) or find Hollywood interest (Also quite unlikely, but slightly more likely than the former.)
   
   Shifting this to writers who are either working on their first novel or are writing their next project without having sold it, I think there’s still a natural question about how much to write to the market. I think the industry consensus is not to do it, because today’s trend is tomorrow’s done to death. Personally, I think some balance is probably a good idea. I absolutely wouldn’t write to a current trend. But I probably also probably wouldn’t chase my most niche idea either. But then, I know people who have done both and been successful. So I don’t know. There’s some fun in just writing what you want, and I think when you’re enjoying yourself it comes out in your writing. But also, if nothing else, at least you had fun.

So I’m not sure I hit the mark with this post. It’s kind of all over the place. Hopefully, if nothing else, it helps you think about feedback and your relationship to it. I do believe that’s an important aspect of being a writer that you’ve got to learn to manage. And I think it’s hard. Good luck!

*When I heard this, it was Bill Belichick speaking and he attributed the quote to Buddy Ryan, but there’s some evidence to suggest that Ryan himself was quoting an older Eagle’s coach.

Tags: Author advice, beta readers, critique partners, Writing advice, Writing Feedback