Weird Crits

I haven't had a weird read between the lines experience yet, but I did participate in a "forgot what the heck was actually written" moment. I was discussing one of my stories with my husband that had been accepted for publication, talking about some of the events in it, and kept going on about how it was important that the MC had not killed some children. My husband scrunched his brow and said he was positive the children had been killed. There was no way he was right, so I went upstairs to pull out the excerpt and prove it...and it turned out he was right. I had forgotten what I wrote in my own danged story.

*sigh*




-Michelle, official participator in Jaycinth's thread derailment

Jaycinth said:

Has anyone had the experience of someone reading an entirely different (and non-existant) story 'between the lines'

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*Looks around* *raises hand*

I do. All the time, sometimes it takes a while for me to understand him.

Jaycinth said:

Oops...I didn't mean to derail Spookey...I just didn't want to start a whole new thread when this subject seemed so very, very close. And it weirded me out. I read through my stuff, like you did...and those incidents I mentioned did not occur.

Dang....now I have to cook Spookey's food.

Maybe I should have Spookey read it?
Maybe I should ask Spookey to talk to this beta?

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Yes, I think the proper punishment is indeed to have Spooky-poo read your work, critique it, and see how many false between the lines assumptions he can add into his critique. For every false assumption he creates, you must spend a day cooking his meals (you are a good cook, right?).




-Michelle

Oh, look! We're in a pretty new thread now! (back to your regular programming...)




-Michelle

On some level, I suppose it is easy for readers to fall into reading between the lines, and possibly a good thing. I mean, as writers, we try to minimize the specified details and let the reader fill in the blanks, so I am not sure we should be completely surprised when a reader fills in a few more blanks than intended. Sort of like mental fan fiction while the story is in progress. I know at times I have determined entire character personalities based on a few lines of dialogue and then based my reading experience off of those early assumptions. In fact, we practice this skill a lot when critiquing, I think, as we rarely have the entire picture and are busy trying to find out who the characters really are so we can better critique where we think they should go.

Just rambling at this point, but thought I would bring these thoughts in for discussion.




-Michelle

me? I took this class last year, and I turned in the final project. I was really looking forward to the instructor's in-depth critique.

my blood pressure is soaring, even as I type this...

so, she finally gives it back. I flipped. It was wrong, and I shouldn't have, but I asked her if she'd even read my story. I mean, I'd PAID for this class.

I wrote a line about a lock of black hair, tied with a plastic twistie. (don't ask.)

she wrote back. no, you need to use more description about the hair. gives us the color. tell us how much hair. ponytail size, a few strands.

um, I did. I said a lock. I said black.

then I'd written a line about a simple wooden box.

she wrote-again, I needed more description. what kind of box was I talking about.

hmm. wood?

I wrote a line about the benefits of being invisible. (don't ask.)

she wrote "whoa, when did the character become invisible."

Um, in the first line of the story.

and this went on and on and on. I was floored. Just floored. To this day it remains the single worst crit I've ever received.

And I never got a refund.

The strangest I had was after finding a website review site. Some came up for my URL. One thanking me for the great travel information, one saying I was the worst restaurant they'd ever been to and another complimenting my fine selection of plants for sale.

Considering my site is about dragons, I was a tad confused. I've never owned a restaurant, sold plants or run a travel guide.

Turns out the site thought all sites hosted by my ISP were the same site. Sometimes you do get cases of mistaken identity. People think one book is another similar book, or they just don't remember what they read.

drachin8 said:

Oh, look! We're in a pretty new thread now! (back to your regular programming...)




-Michelle

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Amazing how that happens, isn't it?

drachin8 said:

On some level, I suppose it is easy for readers to fall into reading between the lines, and possibly a good thing. I mean, as writers, we try to minimize the specified details and let the reader fill in the blanks, so I am not sure we should be completely surprised when a reader fills in a few more blanks than intended.

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I find I do this when reading poetry that has vivid imagery. I am often transported to a scene from my own memory and associate the emotion/mood that that scene recalls with the poem..which is often not where the poet meant to take me.

Wondering how dragons taste when Polenth cooks them badly :}

There's right and wrong ways to beta too. You can read the whole book, go back and do a ch. by ch./line by line nitpick, or just do the latter without reading the whole first. If you read the whole, close the book and try to reconstruct what the writer put down, you're bound to miss alot because of that nasty 'fill in between the lines' invisible gland that travels willynilly through our brains.

It's like looking at a room, leaving it, and then writing down everything that was in there. You'll add things that weren't leave things out, and change the size, shape, and color. (Which is why 'eye-witnesses' usually are are not too reliable.)

HeronW said:

There's right and wrong ways to beta too. You can read the whole book, go back and do a ch. by ch./line by line nitpick, or just do the latter without reading the whole first. If you read the whole, close the book and try to reconstruct what the writer put down, you're bound to miss alot because of that nasty 'fill in between the lines' invisible gland that travels willynilly through our brains.

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The opposite can be true, too. If you try to do a line-by-line as you read, you may not understand the significance of some details that are important later.

Jaycinth said:

But when you read a paragraph where the hero rescues a lamb from the burning barn, do you then turn around and comment:

"Why did the hero burn down the barn? That wasn't nice"

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I don't have to go far for this kind of stuff...

In one book of mine, there is a scene where hero and sorta sidekick are in a tavern. Sorta sidekick is clutching a valuable parcel. There are rough sorts in there, all eyeing sorta sidekick, who is a ruler's son. Hero makes some comments about how sorta sidekick is being obvious, hero has to make a stand, etc.

My husband read this, and made the comment that it showed how powerful sorta sidekick's family is (not THAT powerful, per me, the author) in that they had all these secret agents in the tavern, guarding sorta sidekick.

I shared that this was not so. These were ruffians and thieves. Husband insisted, no, they were secret agents sent to protect sorta sidekick. I stressed again that, since I was the author, this was not so. He argued for secret agents.

Our daughter's best friend was over for dinner when this discussion was taking place. Earning herself the title of "Best One-Liner, EVER", she said, "Yes. The agents are so secret, even the author doesn't know about them."

We have yet to let the husband live this one down...

ROFL
I've had some odd ones, like someone reading over my synopsis and asking "Who's this ------ character?" - picking up on a normal word that wasn't a name at all. Or the guy who said he was expecting monosyllabic names because it was prehistoric (eeeww).

I like to know what people can read in between the lines. The more weird sh*t they pick up on a careless once-over, the more I know I have to clarify. The slob-eyed ones will still not make complete sense out of it every time, but I like to think I've done my best to put it there.

I always find that my readers see way more than I intentionally place in my work. They go into detail about a theme that runs through the story, and I think, "Wow. Really? I didn't know that?" I find it extremely bizarre, because when I give it to them to critique I think it's a lot shallower than it is when it comes back. I just write...I don't plan or think of theme, etc. I'm glad it somehow mistakenly and accidentally gets in there...but I'm always shocked to find out it's there.

I intentionally try to MAKE my readers see things that aren't there by giving them little lead offs. Is this cruel?

Jaycinth said:

Has anyone had the experience of someone reading an entirely different (and non-existant) story 'between the lines'

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Not exactly, but we do have one person in our group who isn't very organized and I suspect that they sometimes rush their critiques a little bit.

It's usually not that bad, but one time she critiqued one of my stories without noticing that she had replaced the first page of my story with the first page of someone else's essay. She critiqued it that way and had all sorts of questions as to why some things didn't make sense.

Sometimes people do misunderstand things, though. My general rule is that if it's just one person who doesn't get it, it's just them. If it's more than one, then it's probably me, and I try to rework the scenes accordingly.

I've gotten some readers that say weird things, but it's always due to overthinking or just not paying attention.
For example:

"It took me ages to realize Taylor was a GIRL!"
That's why her mother spends lots of time worrying about her DAUGHTER and why her best friend pressures her to get a boyfriend. It also explains why Taylor's school uniform is...you know...a blue pleated skirt.

Unless there's something she's not telling me.

I also had someone analyze a random snowstorm at the end of chapter two:
"I get it! It's symbolic of her abandoning her past life, cause the snow covers stuff up, right? While at the same time she's going into a new, unknown, and potentially dangerous situation--like a snowstorm!"
"...sure."
I got rid of the snow eventually. Symbolism just isn't worth it.

I also have a scene where a nosy journalist gets poisoned. One of my readers thought that this journalist was the same as some OTHER journalist who played a minor role in the story. Now, as Minor Journalist was a fully fleshed-out character with a pretty unmistakable attitude, I fail to see how flat, unnamed, unimportant journalist was mistaken for him. Especially when Minor Journalist reappeared in the next scene, alive and well.

It may well be possible that the Amazon reviewer is trying to give the writer bad reviews so they'll lose. I would just report it to Amazon. As for your regular reviewer. Perhaps he also reviews for other people and accidentally sent you part of another crit.

I would just be honest and ask them about it.

Never had a weird fiction critique, but I have had several weird essay critiques.

My teacher was too sure of herself to see what was right in front of her face.

Lool. Has anyone had those crits where it's so unclear, you had to ask the critter questions? But the criiter won't explain or elaborate any further, he made it vague on purpose.

I think it's because he wants the writer to think about his own writing. Heh, it works for some people.

BlueLucario said:

Lool. Has anyone had those crits where it's so unclear, you had to ask the critter questions? But the criiter won't explain or elaborate any further, he made it vague on purpose.

I think it's because he wants the writer to think about his own writing. Heh, it works for some people.

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I've received some vague crits before, but I never really felt they were on purpose. It always seemed more that the critter wasn't quite sure what was bugging them, so they got stuck making a more general remark. I then viewed it as a challenge to figure out what might actually have been bothering them so I could determine if I felt it was truly a problem.



I must say, you guys have all received some pretty odd crits, crits that seem to go beyond reading a bit too much between the lines. But, our brains are strange little machines skewered by ever-changing perceptions. I guess it goes along the same lines of how so many people can witness a crime and have such drastically different memories of what happened. Only we expect a bit more attention with crits because there is no rush of the moment to blur the edges of memory and the crit request inherently expects a certain attention to written detail.




-Michelle