When it comes to all the elements that go into a successful novel—good pacing, character development, plot progression, and the story itself, for example—there’s a lot that can go wrong. As the writer, you don’t have the perspective. Things might work in your head but don’t translate to the story. And while you can always hire a professional book editor to help strengthen your story, it’s always a good idea to enlist beta readers (one of my 3 crucial tips for self-editing your book) before reaching out to a book editor.
Since beta readers are crucial to your book’s well-being and development, it’s important that as an author, you’re taking advantage of this free help as much as you can, right? Let’s talk about how to work with beta readers.
I’m a woman of my word, and in order to back up my claims I usually like to bring in others’ input. For this post I talked with my client Christine Meram, author of the forthcoming An Unlikely Tale, who commented on how helpful beta readers are. Christine shared that she gets coffee or trinkets for them as a way to say thank you. What a great idea! I reached out to Christine to ask her about beta readers, and am sharing some of her experiences with beta readers here.
First things first: Are beta readers even helpful?
You betcha! At this stage in your writing process, it’s super important to get as much feedback on your story as possible. Whether this is something minor (such as “I was bored in the middle”) to specific, high-level feedback (like “Your main character’s motivations needed more development during that scene on page 24), you’re sure to get something good out of recruiting beta readers.
Beta readers often give authors valuable feedback that drastically improves the story. According to Christine, “My beta readers provide wonderful input and comments during my rewrite/revision process. A while back, I was working on a scene between my main character and antagonist. My beta reader suggested that I should throw one more or two more jabs between the characters to really get the tension across and how badly the relationship has crumbled. I tried it out, and it worked.”
How to find beta readers
When you’re searching for beta readers for your book, try to recruit people from your book’s target audience. They’re likely to have read a lot of material in your book’s genre, and will provide you the best feedback to what your book is missing compared to others on the market.
How do you find these beta readers? They’re everywhere! If you’re a part of a local writer’s group or even an online writing community, that’s a great place to start your search. Check out AbsoluteWrite, Beta Readers and Critique Partners, Beta Reader Group, CP Matchmaking, 10 Minute Novelists, and My Writers Circle.
If nothing else, you can look elsewhere for beta readers. Paid services like The Spun Yarn offer 3 beta readers for $499.
While you can recruit friends or family members to read your work and give feedback, be careful with this. Beta readers need to tell you the truth about your book, so…sometimes it’s best NOT to recruit your close friends and family members to beta read your work, especially if they’re afraid of hurting your feelings. A beta reader’s feedback is worth nothing if they’re not honest.(Ironically, that’s why a lot of authors come to me for a manuscript critique: they fear that the feedback from their friends and family isn’t 100% truthful.)
How many beta readers to have
Ideally, you should have a range of beta readers—at least 10 to 20. This way, you’ll have a better idea of the general consensus on your book. Your beta readers should not be able to talk to each other about your book—remember, you just want everyone’s individual opinion.
Still, a handful of beta readers is better than none at all. Christine has three beta readers: “Two from work and one is a college friend,” she says. These three beta readers have given her great ideas and feedback for improvement.
Who you choose as your beta readers is important, too. The main thing is to make sure you’re finding beta readers who are interested in your book’s genre—beta readers who frequently read books in your genre will be better equipped to give you constructive, helpful feedback than readers who only read some different genre. Online writing communities like Absolute Write or even Facebook groups (check out Beta Readers and Critique Partners and The Write Life Community) are good places to find beta readers in your target audience.
How to send your manuscript to beta readers
This is up to you! Because at this point your book is not published, most beta readers will read your manuscript as an electronic file. So, sending your manuscript to readers as an email attachment ususally works fine. You can also print out paper copies of your manuscript, but this is usually considered as less secure (see my article on book plagiarism and copyright infringement).
Most authors prefer to send their entire manuscript to beta readers to allow them to get the full effect, whereas other authors like Christine opt to send their beta readers a few chapters at a time. “I’ve learned giving too much of the manuscript at once is overwhelming. So a few chapters at a time works really well. Plus it gives my beta readers something to salivate for later.”
A lot of authors end up writing a series of questions for their beta readers to answer: things like “What was the most exciting part of the book? Least exciting/boring? Who is your favorite character and why? Least favorite? Do any characters’ actions don’t make sense?” And so on. You can ask these questions through email or invite your readers to give feedback via Google Forms. You can even encourage readers to leave comments on your manuscript for more specific/pointed feedback.
How to thank beta readers
While reading a new book is a pleasure, for beta readers, it can also be a bit of work—so if you are recruiting beta readers, a little thank you goes a long way.
Some ideas? From Christine: “I usually treat my beta readers with coffee, candy, Arabic tea and/or little trinkets as a little thank you for taking the time to read the manuscript. It’s their reward for helping me out a lot. I always tell them they give me the reader’s perspective on the manuscript and that is priceless.”
Final steps: What’s next?
After you get feedback from your beta readers, take some time to carefully consider their recommendations. If several of your beta readers are pointing out similar issues (i.e., “Chapter five went on too long,” “I didn’t like Troy’s reaction to Aqua after she revealed her secret to him,” or “I don’t feel like the story really started until page 30″ ), this is a good indication that you should change something. But no matter what, it’s up to you on what you want to change and how much of beta readers’ feedback to take.
As always, keep in mind that you won’t be able to please every reader—but as an author, it’s your goal to write for the majority. If several of your beta readers are pointing out areas in your manuscript that need work, that’s a good indication that those areas need some work.
Your next step after the post-beta readers revision? Work with a book editor!
Book editor Kristen Hamilton is the owner and sole employee of Kristen Corrects, Inc., where she provides manuscript editing services for traditionally and self-publishing authors. Several authors whose books she has edited have won awards and have topped Amazon’s best sellers lists.
Reading is Kristen’s passion, so when the workday is over, she can usually be found curled up with a good book alongside her four cats. She loves watching cat videos and scary movies, eating pizza, teaching herself French, and traveling, and she is likely planning her next vacation. She lives outside of Boise, ID.