Getting Feedback from Different Genre-ist

I'd give her a try, but tell her it was up to you in the end whether you keep the changes or not. I have a friend online who writes differently than me and she says I write good and I tell her the same, but my criticism is sometimes questioned. I don't feel bad she disliked my comments, or gave me some feedback on the subject, I figure it's her ms and its up to her.

You can try giving her a partial and see how it turns out and if it's all cool then give her the rest.

I think a good story is going to stand out as a good story, regardless of the genre. For instance, I don't read SF/F, but someone I know writes it fantasy. When I've read his stuff, I can tell where the story works and where it doesn't. Doesn't really matter if I can't pronounce the name of his MC or not.

I also think if someone is trying to change your voice in the story, that's not someone who you should be taking advice from.

I'm getting my first-ever 'beta' reading of any of my work. In the past I've just had friends read for fun. I'm just glad to have someone advise me. I don't think there's any attempt to change my voice but instead am getting some good points on what works and what doesn't. The one area where I feel kinda bad has to do with some of the violence/sexual aspects of the story. I'm afraid I may have been a little too explicit for my beta; but then I also received some good advice concerning a scene I was questioning in my own mind and my beta confirmed my opinion on deleting or revising it. I think we write in the same general genre though mine is a mixture of genre's, mainly romance, and my beta does not write romance.

I guess what my rambling reply is trying to say is, even though I'm new to the whole concept of beta readers, I find that while my beta has a little in common with my genre (at least one aspect of it), I've still gotten sound advice. I think it's whether you can trust the person you're having as your beta that's more important than genre.

I second the suggestion that you give her no more than a sample--say, chapter one?--and see what sort of feedback you get and whether you will find it useful when you rewrite. If you're not on the same wavelength, it's unfair to her to let her beta-read the whole thing when her input will not be used.

Maryn, who generally prefers betas who at least read in the work's genre

When I was in a fiction workshop in college, many of the students were of different genres from my own work. A few of the comments were helpful but I found that those who just didn't read in my genre their comments were next to worthless because they were questioning elements of the story that, if you had ever read anything in that genre, you'd know were simply an accepted part of that genre.

Even the professor wasn't much help within the genre, but tried to provide grammar and other writing fundamental help.

I write fantasy. Some of the best critiquing I ever received came from a long-time writer of mysteries. She didn't always "get" what I was writing about, but she was careful to keep her reading preferences from interfering in her critiques.

So I suppose my answer is a question - do you trust this person to give you honest feedback that's not colored by her own personal reading preferences? If she can do that, let her read.

But I agree with SouthernWriter1978 - any changes are still, ultimately, up to you.

Personally I think freindship and critiquing can be a bad mix, even when you don;t already know she dislikes your style of writing. If you don;t need her critique and forsee trouble, don't do it.

The point of getting feedback from readers is to find out if the story in your mind made it to the paper or not.

If your friend gives you feedback that indicates something in your mind didn't make it to paper, or something got mutilated in translation, then use that part of their feedback.

if your friend critiques some genre-specific thing in your work, and your friend doesn't like it, but its a standard genre-specific trope, then ignore the feedback, because its the story you wanted.

It should be an basic, understood rule that any writer retains the right to ignore any feedback they get. The worst that should happen is you give your friend a copy, they critique it, and you ignore everything they said. And they should be fine with that. If there is some implied sense that you should implement their suggestions, then something needs to be renegotiated in the relationship between author/reader.

You might give it to her and ask her to focus on one particular area that you think she might be best at. I had a reader who I KNEW would not get the jist of my plot or characters, but she's a grammarian through and through. I gave her my MS with the plea, "I'm really hoping you'll give me a lot of good grammar pointers." She did, and she had some other tips too, many of which I didn't use. I found her reading very helpful.

veinglory said:

Personally I think freindship and critiquing can be a bad mix, even when you don;t already know she dislikes your style of writing. If you don;t need her critique and forsee trouble, don't do it.

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I'm with veinglory on this one. While I'm sure that if I wrote a western, my beta would critique it for me, she doesn't read or write westerns. I'd be better off finding a different beta suitable to the genre.

If anything, give her the manuscript as a reader, not a critter. "I know you said you wanted to read this, so here it is. I hope you enjoy."

The good thing about getting feedback/critiques is that you are free to ignore what everyone says.

I've been lucky and 99% of the feedback I get is useful; however, a friend of mine submitted a fantasy chapter to a group and was critiqued by a poet in scathing terms. The woman had never read fantasy or any other genre fiction but it didn't stop her from blasting the author. The author was too stricken to reply as her chapter was torn apart from every angle. Not so me (no surprise there, huh?). I told the critic she should never try to comment on something she never read and didn't understand.

Each genre has quirks which sometimes carry it outside normal rules, only grammar and basic writing rules are consistent. Let your friend have a go at it. If her comments are not apt, say thank you and move on. Don't be tempted to educate her or argue about it.