Recently I wrote a guide about how to give feedback on someone else’s manuscript. Feedback is a topic writers always want to understand better, but I had no idea just how much my Snow White Writes readers were dying to discuss this. Let’s face it: feedback is hard to navigate whether you’re on the giving end OR the receiving end. So in light of all the enthusiasm, I feel compelled to write about the more difficult side of this coin: receiving feedback on your own writing.
The Burning Question: When Does Feedback Get Easy?
I’ve heard many writers express just how devastating it is to hear bad feedback. And they all ask me, does receiving feedback ever get easy? Will I eventually become completely bulletproof and not care what other people think about my work?
Honestly . . . no. No, you will probably always care. So no, this never truly gets easy. Writing is a super emotional endeavor, and it’s perfectly natural for writers to be sensitive to a fault about their abilities and their projects. I’ve been getting feedback for over a decade now, and even I still cringe over lackluster or brutally honest comments. Receiving feedback is just inherently uncomfortable.
However! I firmly believe that writers can train themselves to stay calm in the face of tough critique. In fact, learning this skill is crucial for building a long-term writing career, honing our craft, and choosing which feedback to incorporate so that our books don’t suck.
With all that in mind, here are seven rules of receiving feedback that I’ve found immeasurably helpful over the course of my career:
Rule #1: When It Comes to Feedback, Give It 48 Hours
If you only read one rule on this list, let it be this one: sometimes feedback needs a couple days to sit. When someone reads your first book and gives you absolutely scathing feedback, you might feel like crying, eating a whole bag of chips in the darkness of your closet, and never writing again. When these intense emotions strike, take a deep, deep breath. Let it out. And give it two days.
In that moment when you’re reading harsh feedback or someone says something about your book that you don’t want to hear, your first instinct will be to battle to the death to defend your literary baby. Instead, try your very best to breathe and listen. Then give yourself a 48-hour grace period to process your disappointment. Bad feedback can cause a writer to go through actual grief, but I swear to you that the 48-hour rule is SO real. Those feelings of sadness, betrayal, and despair will lift.
Better yet, you’ll have the clarity of mind to ask questions about the feedback or simply move on. Just because one person disliked your book, that doesn’t mean that your writing is trash.
Rule #2: Ask for What You Need
In my advice for giving feedback, the very first tip I mentioned was to ask the person you’re critiquing what kind of feedback they want. If you are the person getting critiqued, you can offer up this information right from the beginning.
Lately I’ve been asking my beta readers to tell me what they loved about my book, what they hated about my book, and how they felt as they read along. If you’re feeling vulnerable about sharing your writing, maybe you’ll want an overabundance of positive comments and praise. Maybe you have a tough character or writing weakness you want your friend to watch for. Or perhaps you want to know where the pacing lags or what scenes could be cut.
Whatever it is you need, let your reader know so you can set them up to delight you and motivate you. If you need over-the-top encouragement, don’t be too proud to ask for it. People who critique books really want to help you out, and sometimes they focus too much on what needs to improve in an effort to feel useful. Ask for good comments and you will get them!
Rule #3: Receiving Feedback Well is All About Perspective
If hearing feedback is so stressful for you that you second guess showing your writing to anyone, I have good news. You are normal. I’ve written an entire blog post about how scary it is to share your writing AND how beneficial it is too. Feedback is hard—but it’s also worth it!
The most basic perspective change that’s helped me welcome feedback rather than hiding from it is this: feedback is a tool, NOT a source of validation. There’s a big difference there. Don’t get me wrong, writers need validation and support. But we also need to know which parts of our books to change, and real feedback is pretty much the only way to find out.
Here are some other useful perspectives:
- The uncomfortable feedback is what helps you actually improve and get published.
- Positive validation + real feedback is the best combination of all. Ask for both.
- Even if you hear something you don’t like, every piece of feedback is a building block that’s making you more aware as a writer.
- All feedback is information to be examined, but most feedback won’t end up in your manuscript.
That last thought takes me to my next point:
Rule #4: All Feedback Is NOT Created Equal
We’ve all heard the saying to “take it with a grain of salt,” and this definitely applies to receiving feedback. You’re going to encounter a wide range of quality when it comes to critique. It can be difficult for a writer to judge whether something they’re hearing is legitimate or bogus, but here are some general pointers to keep in mind:
- Experience matters. Feedback from an amateur writer is far less reliable than feedback from a writer with years of experience producing books and receiving feedback themselves.
- Trust expertise. Feedback from history buffs, hobbyists, academics, world travelers, adrenaline junkies, and generally wise human beings is priceless. These groups may not understand storytelling, but they can spot embarrassingly wrong details in a book with laser precision.
- Voracious readers have an edge. Well-read people can identify clichés from a mile away. And they’re often more skilled than writers at identifying overcomplicated or confusing stories.
- Sensitivity readers also matter. Seek out feedback from readers with different life experiences than you. Someone who’s grown up in a particular culture, experienced poverty firsthand, or is part of a marginalized community can give you real-world perspective on your characters.
- And for dating advice . . . Everyone has unique opinions on characters in love, but your friend who’s been happily married for years will know what makes a relationship healthy. Your sister who dates a ton but has never had a boyfriend longer than two weeks? Not so much.
Rule #5: Patterns Reveal the Truth
Contradictory, random, or plain weird feedback can be really frustrating, especially if you’ve been editing a manuscript for a long time. How does a writer know which suggestions are super necessary and which ones are probably not a good idea?
One word, my friends: patterns. The more people read your book, the more data points you will have to identify patterns in their feedback. If five people read your story and only one of them comments that the main character is annoying, that opinion probably doesn’t hold a lot of weight. But if three or four reviewers say that your climax was slow and confusing, that is a pattern that needs to change.
I’d say that 80–90% of the feedback you get isn’t going to make its way into your final novel. But it’s that precious sampling of insightful advice and strong patterns that will steer you in the right direction. All readers have their own biases, preferences, and pet peeves. But if your friends are saying the same thing over and over as they read your book, that’s worth your attention.
Rule #6: Sort Your Feedback for Now & Later
Once you’ve gotten some feedback, sifted through it, and identified patterns, it’s time to integrate these ideas into your book. Of course, if you’re a normal writer, this task might paralyze you. Where do you even start?
I’ve found it extremely helpful to sort my feedback into two categories: quick fixes to do now and big fixes to do later. Rewriting a book is a huge process. You might not be ready to dive into all that right now, but you can start with the small feedback that’s easy to implement. Changing the typos. Tweaking individual scenes. The find-and-replace fixes that can be done in thirty seconds. Making these changes right away will boost your confidence because you’re already doing something to improve your project. And that’s not a small thing.
When it comes to bigger feedback like reworking a character, cutting plotlines, or rewriting swatches of the book, I usually collect all these insights into one document and let it sit. How long it sits depends on your writing goals for that particular book, but I’d encourage you to let big fixes sit for at least two months.
After that much time has passed, most writers are far less attached to their stories and better able to look at them with fresh, critical eyes. That’s when you’re ready to dive in.
Rule #7: More Feedback = Faster Improvement
Truly. The more feedback you seek out, the faster your skills will improve. And I can personally vouch for this fact.
I recently went back and reread parts of my first novel, which is a horror retelling of Beauty and the Beast. To be frank, it was punishingly bad. There were paragraphs here and there that shined, but overall it was long, dense, sluggishly slow, and poorly written. Too much all around. But when I compare that novel with my second novel, the improvement is literally STAGGERING. How on earth did I improve that much in only a year a half?
Three words, gang: my writing group.
I had written for a decade before I started getting weekly feedback on my work. And that was the secret to improving my writing so quickly. If you’re wondering whether the vulnerability of receiving feedback is worth it, I promise that it is. And the more you get of it, the faster you’ll achieve that dream of becoming a published author. ❧
