Is it ever okay to tell someone their story is unsalvagably bad?

Be cruel. Walk away. Let them explode.

What else are you suppose to do? Baby them?

Ask them if they want you honest opinion. You sit them down, tell them that you like them in many different ways. And then drop, "But..." and go from there.
And then you try to be factual. You bring up points, reference published writing, reflect on their writing so they can see what's wrong.

They'll either plug their ears and sing, or scream and yell at you. But in time, they'll thank you in one way or another.

Anyone in his/her right mind likely would have used the tag "bad and unsalvageable" for my very first story. Now, they would just call it Something Bad (including the people who awarded it a silver medal in the 2008 IPPY competition, Horror category).

Crits on the present quality of a work have nothing to do with the ability of the author to learn enough to rescue even the largest pile of literary scat. I agree on calling out bad. But to judge any future value of the story is taking the crit beyond the present work. Keep crits focused on that present work and don't let them extend to the author or the author's ability to learn and re-write.

Note added in edit: I'm not suggesting that any crit or review be soft-pedaled. I don't think that will help a new or developing writer improve. I was an angry a$$hole after my first crit, but if I'd been mollycoddled, or even given a false softness in that review, I would not have put my knuckles into learning good, solid writing and storytelling. That learning continues, and will as long as I write. And that first experience continues to be a prime motivator for that lifelong learning.

Writing is never a waste. It's all about learning. I would suggest erring on the side of compassion. Many people's first attempt is lacking, that doesn't mean you get to curb-stomp their dream. Give a couple pointers, if you have some to offer, or point them in the direction of someone in the know, and wish them well.

As for what to do if it's been published, I'm not sure I understand. Do you mean someone's asked you your opinion of something they've self-published and you purchased the book without knowing it was self published?

I've never done that before, but only because I thought Twilight was painfully bad. If I'd come across it as an unpubbed MS, I would've thought, "Oh god, this will never make it."

And I'd be dead wrong.

I think plenty of best-sellers are unsalvageably bad. I'll give you a list if you want...

So now I just keep such strong thoughts to myself. I may tell someone who asks for crits where I think their MS needs improving, but I wouldn't say, "It's not salvageable" because the truth is something I think is trash may be a great book to others, and vice versa.

A story isn't a story until it's written.

Before that it's just an idea.

Everything comes down to execution. I would never tell someone their idea isn't worth pursuing, because I have no idea what their execution of this idea will look like.

I have read outlines/pitches that just didn't interest me at all, but usually the reason I wasn't interested wasn't because the idea was bad, necessarily, but rather because 1) I lacked interest in the subject matter or 2) the way the outline/pitch was written did not inspire in me any great faith in the writer's abilities. But even if 2 is the case, the only way to improve is to write, so, I think the answer is not to discourage someone, but rather, to tell them to go for it. Who knows? Maybe they'll surprise you.

Putputt said:

I've never done that before, but only because I thought Twilight was painfully bad. If I'd come across it as an unpubbed MS, I would've thought, "Oh god, this will never make it."

And I'd be dead wrong.

I think plenty of best-sellers are unsalvageably bad. I'll give you a list if you want...

So now I just keep such strong thoughts to myself. I may tell someone who asks for crits where I think their MS needs improving, but I wouldn't say, "It's not salvageable" because the truth is something I think is trash may be a great book to others, and vice versa.

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Your comment about Twilight


I keep reading naysayers of Twilight saying, "But this is horrible! How this could ever be published I will never understand!"

and my favorite...


"Did anyone read this book before it went to print?"


But what people fail to understand is that Twilight wasn't published because it was good, but because it was wish fulfillment for teenagers in it's maximum form. It gave young girls the opportunity to experience everything they've ever wanted in a book.


1. To be loved and accepted by anyone in school. The only person in the entire school that doesn't like you is not that important anyway.

2. To be the boss at home. Bella doesn't have to tell Charlie when she goes out or where she goes. She just lets him know she's going somewhere and doesn't even give him the details. "Um, Dad, I wanted to let you know that I am going to (I forgot where) for the weekend." And then in her narrative she goes on to say that 'asking for permission set a bad precedent, but she didn't want to be rude, so she added in, 'if that's okay'.

3. For the hottest guy in the entire universe to be hopelessly in love with you although you're a, and I quote, because that's not what Bella really is, a 'Plain Jane'. Please, after describing her physical features with such self-praise she's a Plain Jane? I'm a Plain Jane.

4. For the other hottest guy in the universe to be hopelessly in love with you and fight for your love to the death.

5. To treat your best friends like trash and get away with it because they keep kissing your feet and including you in their activities.


So many other total wish-fulfillment aspects, but it would take me forever to write up this post, so I will move on to my opinion on the OP's question.

Just tell them the truth, but don't stop there. Tell them why you think their story is 'unsalvagably bad'. Chrome is marking that word as misspelled and it's not someone's uncommon name in the dictionary so I'm not sure if that word even exists, but tell her what you think is wrong with their story. Don't be rude about it either. Perhaps that will drive her to rewrite it because the thing is that if you give her destructive criticism and are not tactful about it, she'll dismiss your advice and continue to believe she's the best writer that's ever existed.



Good luck and please let us know how it turned out.

Christina.

There have been times when I've told someone I don't think they can fix a story. It's always been in cases of a prejudiced central concept. There isn't really a way to fix a story where black people turn out to be literal sub-human demons, who reveal their true nature and take over the world. But such stories often do sell, so though the story may not be fixable, it might be saleable (even if I wish the author would reconsider).

Something like poor writing or a premise that doesn't appeal to me... I'm not going to tell someone it has no hope. They might rewrite it someday to be better. It might appeal to someone else. All I know is I don't like it, and that's what I'd say if they asked.

I have told people that, in my opinion, their work is not yet to publishable standard. They have 1) Self-published or 2) Been published by a small epublisher or 3) Been published by a large NY publisher. So it just goes to show there's no accounting for taste. The last query I read that I thought was a completely bad idea is now a bestseller and is being made into a movie. Lately, I've taken to just being polite and noting the typos.

I don't think a "bad" concept is a waste of someone's time. The only time when writing is wasted is when you aren't getting anything positive out of the process.

Instead of outright telling someone their idea sucks, I think sometimes it can be more effective to ask questions to try to get them to think about how their idea is (or rather isn't) working, or point out specific things that annoy you.

For example, I think saying something like, "The whole story hinges on a premise that's unbelievable and ridiculous" will put some people off with its bluntness, because chances are, the writer doesn't see why the premise is unbelievable. And it may not give them a whole lot to think about.

But saying, "Why are the ghosts corporeal most of the time, but incorporeal other times? And how is it it possible to kill them with guns when they're already dead? Also, I really don't understand why ghosts would want to rob a bank. Surely they don't need money?" gives some specific examples, and hopefully forces the writer to consider how much sense the story makes.

They might still dismiss it and defend their choices. But in my experience, having people point out inconsistencies and stuff that didn't make sense was a good learning experience for me over time. Eventually, I figured out that if I had to explain or justify stuff that was happening in my stories, there was probably a problem.

Yep, I agree with this. TWILIGHT succeeds because it found its core audience and gave them what they want.

But because these aspects of the story are not something I look for as a reader, I fail to see its attraction. So if I were to see it as an unpubbed MS, I'd think, "No. I would not put my money on this." And like I said, I'd be dead wrong.

What TWILIGHT has taught me is that the market is too diverse for me to know for sure and be confident enough to actually tell someone their MS is unsalvageable.

ChristinaLayton said:

Your comment about Twilight


I keep reading naysayers of Twilight saying, "But this is horrible! How this could ever be published I will never understand!"

and my favorite...


"Did anyone read this book before it went to print?"


But what people fail to understand is that Twilight wasn't published because it was good, but because it was wish fulfillment for teenagers in it's maximum form. It gave young girls the opportunity to experience everything they've ever wanted in a book.


1. To be loved and accepted by anyone in school. The only person in the entire school that doesn't like you is not that important anyway.

2. To be the boss at home. Bella doesn't have to tell Charlie when she goes out or where she goes. She just lets him know she's going somewhere and doesn't even give him the details. "Um, Dad, I wanted to let you know that I am going to (I forgot where) for the weekend." And then in her narrative she goes on to say that 'asking for permission set a bad precedent, but she didn't want to be rude, so she added in, 'if that's okay'.

3. For the hottest guy in the entire universe to be hopelessly in love with you although you're a, and I quote, because that's not what Bella really is, a 'Plain Jane'. Please, after describing her physical features with such self-praise she's a Plain Jane? I'm a Plain Jane.

4. For the other hottest guy in the universe to be hopelessly in love with you and fight for your love to the death.

5. To treat your best friends like trash and get away with it because they keep kissing your feet and including you in their activities.


So many other total wish-fulfillment aspects, but it would take me forever to write up this post, so I will move on to my opinion on the OP's question.

Just tell them the truth, but don't stop there. Tell them why you think their story is 'unsalvagably bad'. Chrome is marking that word as misspelled and it's not someone's uncommon name in the dictionary so I'm not sure if that word even exists, but tell her what you think is wrong with their story. Don't be rude about it either. Perhaps that will drive her to rewrite it because the thing is that if you give her destructive criticism and are not tactful about it, she'll dismiss your advice and continue to believe she's the best writer that's ever existed.



Good luck and please let us know how it turned out.

Christina.

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I don't think I could ever say that to anybody because it is such a subjective thing. Many people here claim Twilight would qualify as such a story, but look at its success. The same could be said for Fifty Shades of Grey. I don't think you can truly say a story is that bad unless you've actually read the story. What seems like the most cliched story on the surface could work in the way it's told.

I've read traditionally published books that I thought were horrible.

So, is this book truly horrible or is it just not for you?

Putputt said:

Yep, I agree with this. TWILIGHT succeeds because it found its core audience and gave them what they want.

But because these aspects of the story are not something I look for as a reader, I fail to see its attraction. So if I were to see it as an unpubbed MS, I'd think, "No. I would not put my money on this." And like I said, I'd be dead wrong.

What TWILIGHT has taught me is that the market is too diverse for me to know for sure and be confident enough to actually tell someone their MS is unsalvageable.

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I have many manuscripts that are unsalvageable, but I don't delete them from my hard drive. Some are 92,000 words, some are 100,000 words, 80,000...you know, and I am not going to delete all that hard work I did. I have like three monsters that are over 220,000 words each. What do I do? I leave them there as something I wrote and rewrite them, completely. I change everything, characters' names, plots, where the stories took place, etc, and then I show my 2nd version to a beta. I have a beta that tells me one of the stories she's reading is amazing. We're working on a story together right now.

Twilight is bad. I'm not just talking about bad writing. There are a lot of books out there that were commercially published that were badly written. The only one I could think of is Twilight and another book by Shannon Drake named When We Touch. Twilight is bad because it presents horrible things as if they were good.

1. Stalking. It's OK to watch someone sleeping without their consent! Oh, yeah, when Bella found out Eddikins was doing this to her, she was like "Oh, how romantic!" Let me tell you something, as much as I adore Adam Lambert, if I caught him watching me sleeping, I would chase after him. Not with my arms extended and my lips puckered, but with an ax.

2. It's OK for your boyfriend to tell you what to do.

3. It's OK for your boyfriend to read your every thought.

4. It's OK for your boyfriend to force you to do things you don't want to.

5. When your boyfriend dumps you, you just sit there staring out your window for a whole year. You don't shower. You don't sleep. You don't eat. And you still survive!! When he comes back, you can live again!

6. It's OK to drag another guy along knowing you don't love him and you're in love with your boyfriend. "Ah, Jake, but I'm going to use you for my amusement! Yes! Kiss my feet! Adore me! Why aren't you praising me?"

7. Sex is horrible, but you crave it anyway. You implore your husband for torturous sex! : Painful sex is the bomb, man! I want me some!

8. It's OK to give birth to your child even when you know it's killing you.

9. It's OK to fall in love with a child.

10. It's OK to bribe someone to get what you want.

The list is interminable, so I'm going to stop there.

rwm4768 said:

I don't think I could ever say that to anybody because it is such a subjective thing. Many people here claim Twilight would qualify as such a story, but look at its success. The same could be said for Fifty Shades of Grey. I don't think you can truly say a story is that bad unless you've actually read the story. What seems like the most cliched story on the surface could work in the way it's told.

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I want to rewrite Twilight, and make my MC as a controlling, abusive and invasive freak. I won't, but I want to. Oh, man, if they knew this was Twilight fanfiction, and I got published, they'd hate me for shattering their perfect Edward Cullen into 1 million pieces.

Susan Littlefield said:

I've read traditionally published books that I thought were horrible.

So, is this book truly horrible or is it just not for you?

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My interpretation is that she doesn't agree with the plot and it's something that should've never been written. She said, "My problem is not bad writing, but that I think this plot should've even been written." I'd have to read the book to know to be honest.

ChristinaLayton said:

Twilight is bad. I'm not just talking about bad writing. There are a lot of books out there that were commercially published that were badly written. The only one I could think of is Twilight and another book by Shannon Drake named When We Touch. Twilight is bad because it presents horrible things as if they were good.

.

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May I gently tell you how sad I find it that every time bad writing is mentioned someone jumps up and down and start stomping their feet about Twilight and the moral horrors it's unleashed upon our poor helpless youth? You need to give kids a bit more credit. Perhaps you need to give SM a bit more credit too.

You didn’t like it, cool, we get it. I wasn't really a fan of the series myself (for entirely different reasons than you pointed out). But guess what? A great many people did like it. A great many people who know what they're talking about, who work in the industry, liked it.

If you think you could do better, as you have said you believe you could, go ahead. Do better.

To the op: I think there is such thing as bad writing. If your friend has made some bad writing choices, help her by suggesting some good books. If you don't like her story, it doesn't mean somone else won't, right? Or is there something inherrently flawed in the storytelling?

I've only read one thing I'd consider unsalvageable, and that was when one of the members of my crit group brought in what read as thinly-veiled hate speech. With members of the group targeted present.

The author didn't come back to the group after that.

sunandshadow said:

Not even self-published, but I've seen some small presses publish a book which is packaged to sell with little relevance to the contents. They don't care if it satisfies readers because there won't be a sequel. Or, it's possible an otherwise decent press has one bad manuscript pushed through due to nepotism, or a purchasing editor having a weakness for one type of story even though they otherwise make pretty good choices about what to publish.

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Just because there's no planned sequel does not mean a publisher buys and sells anything it doesn't think will please a lot of readers. That's just nonsense. No publisher intentionally buys a bad book, not through nepotism, or any other way.

And there is no such thing as an idea that can't be turned into a wonderful novel. Horribly bad execution is what stands between an idea and publication, never the idea itself.

ChristinaLayton said:

Twilight is bad because it presents horrible things as if they were good.


7. Sex is horrible, but you crave it anyway. You implore your husband for torturous sex! : Painful sex is the bomb, man! I want me some!

8. It's OK to give birth to your child even when you know it's killing you.


The list is interminable, so I'm going to stop there.

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Look, I don't like Twilight and I don't disagree with most of your list but at least these two items could very well be something that absolutely normal head-screwed-on-right people have to face head on and deal with. Ever known a woman who's had to make the decision between her baby and chemo treatments? Probably not but they do exist and the ones who choose the baby have made a perfectly valid decision.

Twilight raises a lot of disturbing questions. You and I might not always agree with the answer but the fact that it's done so well suggests the questions themselves just might resonate with a lot of people out there.

Is it ever okay to tell someone their story is unsalvagably bad?

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Probably not. I might, however, say "Maybe it's time to start working on something new."

Some great variety in the responses to this questions and I think that both sides have some merit.

I tend to regard critiquing as an honor and responsibility, no matter who is asking it of me. When asked to critique, I like to read through something once as a reader, before I start to examine it more critically, so I only take on a critique when I know I'm going to make the time to give it the attention it merits.

This is partially due to an awareness that one person's "unsalvagably bad" may be another's favorite novel of all time. Given that, my critiques always focus on constructive criticism with concrete examples.

How did "unsalvagably bad" break down? Were there significant holes in the plot, or was the pacing off? Was characterization not flushed out, or was the grammar poor? Rather than focus on a purely subjective, response to a piece I would focus on those types of specifics. If you want to express your own emotional response I do think that's fine too, but when I do that myself I always frame it as only my opinion, which they should feel free to use or disregard at their discretion.

If it's 'unsalvageably bad', it's not going to be much fun critting and I doubt any honest critique is going to mask the amount of corrective surgery needed. The recipient will probably either go nuts on you, or fit the blinkers and latch on to whatever small crumbs of praise can be scratched up.

In my humble opinion, I don't think so.

When I first starting offering critiques I was pretty blunt. But I had a chance to talk to a writer who told me something that's lingered with me. He said that I shouldn't give a critique *until* I saw something good in the story. It took me a while to accept the wisdom in that. I now believe it, fully. If I can't see what's good about what I'm critiquing, then I'm not ready to critique it.

The writer of the story thinks the idea is good. There are bound to be others who think so too, at least conceptually. As a critic, it's better to speak on issues that didn't work for you, and--as DancingMaenid put it--express your concerns about logical inconsistencies.