I was Asked to Be a Beta Reader, But I Hate the Book. Now, What Do I Do?!
As a beta reader, you could be asked by a friend, colleague, or get paid to beta read a book.
You might find that you love this process and can’t wait to get started, but for most of us, the prospect of telling someone their work is not enjoyable is rather uncomfortable.
Especially if we know the person.
Hopefully, this post will help you let them down easy and help them through the process.
For every bad thing you find, try to find three good things to say.
This is a great rule for trying to give anyone positive criticism. When your goal is to help the writer and you want them to do their best but you are doing like what they did you can get away with saying some uncomfortable negative things if you tell them three positive things first.
You might try it like this:
“I loved the opening scene, it really hooked me. I really like your character here. They often make me laugh. Your grammar is really tight. I couldn’t find any glaring errors that brought me out of the story. Your main character seems to be a little overly sexist. Did you mean to do that?”
Now, we aren’t just trying to flatter them. In order to truly help the writer, we want to give them both affirmation and positive critique.
This will let them know where things are going well and they don’t have to change as much and where things could be thought over and looked over again.
As a beta reader, we would Do them a disservice if we didn’t tell them what could be better and what could make more sense.
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Ask good questions.
Positive Criticism doesn’t have to be all pointing fingers and saying this spot is bad and that spot is bad.
Sometimes a good question does wonders and doesn’t make the person feel attacked.
You might be thinking, “this part is awful. I’m so confused. What’s even going on here?”
But you don’t have to say it that way.
You can say, “I don’t know why, but this part is confusing for me. I’m not sure what is going on here or what the point of this scene is. Is this part meant to be confusing?”
Then they can know that they need to rewrite that part so that it’s not so confusing that it brings the reader out of the story.
Be an in-line commenter.
This can be extremely helpful for you and the writer you are beta reading for.
This lets them know very specific places that could use a rework and that is SO much more helpful than, “the book was good, but I didn’t love the main character…”
As a writer you’d be wondering, “what’s wrong with the main character and where do I fix it?!
Instead, leave comments as you go:
“When he said this I literally rolled my eyes.”
“I laughed out loud so hard here. Great job!”
“I got bored here. Wanted to stop reading.”
“This character has so many lines that make me not like them. Did you mean to do that?”
If you can point out specific things this will be really helpful to the writer and they should have no reason to be offended.
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I really have to stop reading this book.
Don’t feel bad. This happens. And when it does, you should tell the writer where and why you had to stop reading the book.
This can help them realize that their writing thus far is not ready but general audiences. If they were aiming for more of a niche market they can choose to do so, but at least they’ll have real feedback telling them it’s not ready.
In the book you can leave certain comments:
“I got bored here.”
“This part offended me for this reason.”
“This character continues to be sexist unrealistically and I don’t think I would continue it I wasn’t a beta reader.”
And then the final straw.
“Okay, at this point if I was just a reader I would have quit the book a chapter ago, but even as a beta I can continue to read this character’s story, here’s why…”
And then with those notes, the author can actually follow your journey from enjoyment to not enjoyment which is very helpful.
You can also write them a note explaining what happened and tell them all the good parts you found and liked sincerely but that ultimately, for this reason, I just couldn’t finish the book.
If you are willing you can tell them you’d be happy to give it a look through again if they decide to make any changes towards your concerns but that ultimately you think it has potential towards some readers, just not ones like you.
Just do your best to find some genuine compliments and to be honest about why you quit the book without being mean or attacking them as a person.
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Final Thoughts
Ultimately your feedback even though to you it may seem harsh, is really helpful to a smart writer who is looking for actual feedback.
They want to know where they’ve done well and what needs to be fixed for general audiences.
If they are actually with their salt they want to know if you hated it and where you decided to stop and why. This is so much more valuable than a polite, “it was great. Good luck!”
A biblical saying from Proverbs that could apply slightly here: “Better is the wound of a friend than the kisses of an enemy” and the point is even if you comment stings a little, it’s more valuable, honest, and friendly than someone that says to your face, “it was great!” And then turns to someone else and says, “it was trash. I couldn’t even finish it.”
Hope this helps!
Happy reading!
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