Hello all,
I am looking for a beta reader and am happy to offer a critique of your ms in return. If interested please PM me or reply to this post and let me know your genre, length, and maybe a blurb of what it's about ... My manuscript is a historical fantasy around 85,000 words - I am not looking for line editing, as I've had a handful of writer friends go through it already to help get it polished up. What I'm hoping to gain is a short, high-level critique of the storyline, focused on an overall assessment of the pacing - I am worried that the book is too boring and isn't grabbing readers, so I'd like to get a sense of where it drags and where it might need more conflict and tension, or whether perhaps the flawed characters are too off-putting and therefore don't draw the reader's sympathy enough. I think my friends who've beta-read might be being too nice, so I need a gloves-off, super-honest critique from a stranger who isn't trying too hard to spare my feelings. As far as content goes, there is a bi character, several storylines involving infidelity, a few sexually explicit scenes, and some mild kink - this is definitely not a work of erotica, but if you're offended by such content this book might not be for you.
The setting of the book is the French Alps in the mid-1700s, and the storyline is a retelling of the Greek myth of Cupid and Psyche, weaving in a number of European folktales about ogres and fairies as well. The style is more magical realism than high fantasy. It's intended as upmarket gothic fairy tale for thinking people that explores some of the ideas and personalities of the French Enlightenment. In terms of comparable titles, it's kind of Dangerous Liaisons meets Katherine ArdenÂ’s The Bear and the Nightingale.
Thanks! (P.S. If it helps make a swap more attractive - I am an experienced beta reader and have traded beta reads through this site in the past on a previous manuscript and got some great critique that way and met some really nice writers!)
I am looking for a beta reader and am happy to offer a critique of your ms in return. If interested please PM me or reply to this post and let me know your genre, length, and maybe a blurb of what it's about ... My manuscript is a historical fantasy around 85,000 words - I am not looking for line editing, as I've had a handful of writer friends go through it already to help get it polished up. What I'm hoping to gain is a short, high-level critique of the storyline, focused on an overall assessment of the pacing - I am worried that the book is too boring and isn't grabbing readers, so I'd like to get a sense of where it drags and where it might need more conflict and tension, or whether perhaps the flawed characters are too off-putting and therefore don't draw the reader's sympathy enough. I think my friends who've beta-read might be being too nice, so I need a gloves-off, super-honest critique from a stranger who isn't trying too hard to spare my feelings. As far as content goes, there is a bi character, several storylines involving infidelity, a few sexually explicit scenes, and some mild kink - this is definitely not a work of erotica, but if you're offended by such content this book might not be for you.
The setting of the book is the French Alps in the mid-1700s, and the storyline is a retelling of the Greek myth of Cupid and Psyche, weaving in a number of European folktales about ogres and fairies as well. The style is more magical realism than high fantasy. It's intended as upmarket gothic fairy tale for thinking people that explores some of the ideas and personalities of the French Enlightenment. In terms of comparable titles, it's kind of Dangerous Liaisons meets Katherine ArdenÂ’s The Bear and the Nightingale.
Thanks! (P.S. If it helps make a swap more attractive - I am an experienced beta reader and have traded beta reads through this site in the past on a previous manuscript and got some great critique that way and met some really nice writers!)
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