Welcome to the Writing with Coach McCoach Podcast. A podcast for busy writers who want to cut through the fluff with exact strategies for launching their author career. I'm Katie McCoach, your book coach, guide, unqualified therapist, and cheerleader. Since 2012, I've helped hundreds of writers become authors, gain confidence, and grow their best stories yet. Let's do the same for you. This is the Writing with Coach McCoach Podcast.
Welcome to episode 19 of Writing with Coach McCoach. I am so excited to continue our What the F is constructive criticism series with today's podcast on 10 general rules for not losing your shit when you get feedback of any kind, such as book reviews, constructive criticism, edit letters, agent rejections, and more. We begin this series with episode 18, introducing the concept of constructive criticism, aka feedback, touching where this feedback is coming from, why it's important and completely unavoidable in your career, and the type of people you'll be getting it from, whether
you asked or not. Today I'm continuing this series with how the F do you even approach dealing with this feedback? How do you keep yourself from screaming or fighting back or curling into a ball and stopping writing altogether?
Receiving feedback, whether we have asked for it or not, is difficult to say the least, even when we've signed up for it and maybe even paid for it and we want to know what we can do to write a stronger story. Still being faced with any awareness of, I didn't do it perfect the first time, can hurt. I've been there many times, and even though I give feedback for a living, I still feel the ache of receiving any form of constructive criticism, even in its kindest ways, because I internalize feedback, that's who I am, and I hate the idea that I didn't do something right the first time, that I didn't make it worth it or perfect the first time. That's a bit of perfectionism, obviously, but I think there's levels of that where a
lot of people deal with this sort of thing.
And the reality is, we just cannot create perfection, right? Like it's just not possible. And if we want to grow, it's important we learn how we can, right? But we can't do that without some advice and insight that comes from someone besides ourself. Despite how much it sucks sometimes, we do need that external feedback when it comes to specifically our writing, or even in life on how to grow and be a better, stronger version of ourselves. If we want to move into the next level of our writing, of our skills, of our self, of our journey, we will at some point need to say to someone else, what can I do to get better? What can I do to my writing to make it stronger? What does the story need to be stronger? So since it is inevitable that you are going to deal with feedback of some form in your author journey, I want to give you 10 general rules that'll help you so you don't find yourself flung backwards or crying for weeks on end. You don't want feedback to be the thing that stops you from writing.
With these 10 rules, you'll be able to keep moving forward when the feedback hits you in the gut. And then what I want you to do is listen to next week's episode about how to apply and sort through the feedback so you know what to do next. So first, just to recap in the series, we've kind of talked about what constructive criticism is, who you'll hear it from. And then today we're going to talk about how to deal with it so you don't lose your shit. And then next time we're going to talk about how to apply it.
So obviously, what is the point, especially when you have actually reached out and you want the criticism, constructive criticism, I should say, when you actually say, I actually want the feedback, I am going to use it, I need to know what to do to get stronger. You need to know what to do, literally, right? So it's great to hear feedback. That is not the final, the end game, right? Hearing the feedback is useful, but if you don't know how to apply it and you don't know how to work through it and you're like, do I say yes to everything? Do I say no to everything? What do I ignore?
What don't I? That can be really overwhelming. So come back next week and you can get all the tips on how to apply and sort through the feedback and know what to listen to and whatnot.
But today, I think it's important that we start with just 10 general rules so that no matter the type of feedback or review or constructive criticism you receive and whether it's asked for or not, you do know how to look at it, hear it and be able to move forward. My biggest concern always for writers is I'm always finding ways to make sure they don't stop writing. I think that that is the most important thing. I want to make sure you keep moving forward in your career, in your journey to being an author, to being a multi-published author. So these 10 rules are going to really help you just come back to this when you're like, I'm really struggling. I want you to come back and remember these rules. You don't have to memorize them, but I think a lot of them will sit with you and you'll be able to think about them. And remember that there's a path forward. Don't let feedback stop you in your tracks.
So 10 rules for not losing your shit. Okay.
Number one, it's going to be pretty straightforward, but a lot of us are going to avoid this one at all costs. The first rule is embrace the emotions.
I know that this can be really hard. I have definitely been the person who has cried after feedback. I've received the really hard, brutally honest feedback and I've gone home and cried. I've received the written feedback where someone jots notes literally on printout of the story and even something small like wrong grammar, that'll make me unhappy or that'll sit with me for a while, even though I literally know that I don't know the correct grammar in that case. Why am I taking it so personally?
As a side note, now that I say this out loud, I realize, oh, part of something I learned as I have recently been diagnosed with ADHD is how we really deal with rejection. And there's a special phrase for it and I totally forget it right now. But if you are neurodivergent, the feedback might hit you a lot harder than it does other people. So just keep that in mind and don't let that be something that you're like, well, that's a me problem.
I'm going to be dealing with this forever and I should just give up. No, just know this is something that is common with people who are maybe neurodivergent and it's totally okay. You're going to get through it.
So to pull back, yes. So I've definitely cried. I've, I remember one person wrote the word cliche on something that literally was super cliche.
It was like one tear dropping from their eye. Like obviously it's so cliche. But you guys, this was, this is like 15 years ago and I still remember it. So I know what it's like when you get that feedback and there's so many different ways that you'll get it. And I'll talk about it in future episodes too, like the different types of feedback you can get and how they come, like the forms they come in, you know, real quickly, briefly,
I'll say, for example, if you're in like an MFA program or you study writing, one thing you'll get used to is having to sit silently while everyone else gives you feedback and you can't say anything and they're all going to say it out loud and they're going to make up all these things that they think about the story, everything they think the story is about. They're going to go off in totally different places and you cannot say a word. That's rough. It is so hard because you want to defend it. You want to explain it. It's a really good lesson in how to hear feedback, but I'm not saying that you have to go through that because it's painful and there are other ways to receive feedback and use it without having to go through the pain of that experience.
That is a way that, well, especially in creative writing degrees, when you're, you know, studying it academically, that is a very common way that people go through critiques. So there are so many ways that you will hear feedback or read it and it is a lot, right? So I want you to embrace the emotions of it. If you try to avoid it, let's be real. It's going to crop up in the middle of your revisions or the middle of writing and it might stop you in your tracks. It might make you be like, why am I bothering with this? I should just throw the whole thing out. Instead, move through the emotions, embrace them. Feel them. Let it suck. Like cry if you need to. Let yourself really fucking hate the words that people said about your stuff.
Let yourself be really freaking mad. Let yourself be just so, so upset because your emotions are not all of you. It's something we're feeling and experiencing and it's good to have them. And of course you're going to have them because you care about this so much. So that's, that's totally normal.
Don't like, don't make yourself feel like crap because you are feeling things about the stuff you wrote. Of course you feel things. This matters to you. Of course you feel things. So let yourself feel it. Embrace every emotion that comes with it. All right. It is hard. So whatever you need to do to embrace them, you know, I'm not going to go into strategies on that. There are different things you can do. I know in therapy they love to talk about the feelings wheel and when you can name it, you can tame it. And so there is like literally feelings wheel or chart you can find online and it helps to get the general feeling and then you start pinpointing what is the actual feeling I feel. And as you clarify that you can really tap into how to move forward. So if you find yourself stuck in the emotions, then that might be a good tool. I mean literally talk it out with people, use therapy if you need to write it down, process it, do what you need to do to feel it and accept the emotions that you have with it.
And then move on to step two. I want you to remember that it's not personal. After you felt all the feelings, I want you to chant this and this mantra of your, you're apt to forget it. It is not personal. This one's really hard for people because of course it's personal, right? Like you're saying something about my story. I wrote it. I put everything into it. How is it not personal? But it's not. When feedback comes to us and it feels like it's directed in a harsh light, I want you to remind yourself that this is the response someone is having to your story. This is not a response on how they feel about you. It's their interpretation of the work. It's the bias they come to with your work. It's what they are to your feeling before they read your story and what your story makes them feel. But it is not a response on how you are or that your story is bad or wrong. Just remind yourself this is their response to the story.
It's just like what we learn about growing up is like when someone is projecting their feelings onto you and they might throw things at you, it feels like that's on me. It feels personal. A lot of times that person's projecting, right? It's something they're going through. So your story might trigger something in their life day to day. If you write about a divorcee and they're going through a divorce, there might be a trigger there where they might suddenly be like, I hate this character. Maybe that character reminds them too much of themselves. So consider what stuff is going on in people's lives. Everyone comes to a book with a different set of experiences and biases. And so you might have a plot point or character that too closely resembles something in their life. And maybe it's just one line of dialogue. Maybe it's literally one word, like the vocab that your character uses makes the reader think of something. You could think of something terrible. They could think of something amazing. They could be like, oh my gosh, it made me think of my grandmother always uses that phrase. And now they're obsessed with your story. So that's fabulous, but that doesn't mean everyone's going to have that reaction. So they could be having a great day, a bad day. They have something that they're coming to when they read this. These things are not in your control.
So keep that in mind. It is not personal. And I also want you to consider that there's the personal preference of your readers. If your reader comes to it and they're maybe unable to be objective, just keep that in mind. You know, I've been in many critique groups where someone hates romance novels, but they're in the critique group. So they have to hear the romance novels and then their feedback always shows how much they hate romance.
And that's like, okay, this is not, this isn't helpful. Again, I will dive into next week on how we work through that. But keep in mind that if you always have readers of a genre that you don't write in or vice versa, it's your feedback is going to, it's going to come out a certain way. So remember it is not personal.
Okay. On that note, but sometimes number three, I'm going to say, but sometimes it is personal. Okay. So I know that I just said that, right? I'm like, it's not personal, but you know what? Sometimes it is. And you hopefully can tell. So next week, I'm going to help you sort through those times when you're like, this is just like, this person's just shitting on me. Or, or it's great. Like I said, like they could have something where they, you know, Oh my grandma, this grandma, this character reminds me of my grandma. I love her so much. So I love your story so much. And it could make them blind to the things that they were supposed to be trying to see in the first place. Because readers are just fricking assholes. Let's be real.
Readers are human beings and human beings can be jerks. And there are times, especially in reader reviews, like when your book is on Amazon as opposed to online, especially in the past few years, there have been these waves of readers who there's something that the author did or the publisher did, and they will go and attack the book. They will go to Goodreads and put terrible reviews for the book. They'll do things to make a point, to make something heard. And whether that is a valid thing that they're struggling with or not, it is personal. That is actually a personal attack. They're not judging it based on the story in the book. They're judging the person, the author behind it, or something that is written in the book. And I know that's happened where there have been people who will, they've heard there are certain topics in the book and without reading the book, they will go and post a review about it to say something about it. That's really tricky in this day and age, right? There's a lot of reasons this happens. I'm not going to get into that at this time, although I will give you a way to try to avoid that.
I'm going to talk about sensitivity readers in a future episode soon in this series because it's very much on topic. So we'll talk about that. So you kind of do your best to avoid offending people. But there are times where it is going to be personal. You know, what if you have someone in your critique group you just freaking hate or they hate you, like you guys just don't get along. You might get feedback sometimes from them. You're like, they're just trying to be jerks. You know, it happens. It's not great, but it happens. So there are times when things are personal and when that's the case, I'm going to tell you, you can usually ignore the shit out of it, right? Like when it's super personal, it's not judging the book on its own merit. It's judging more about it. It's judging you and that's not feedback that's helping. So even if you did something super offensive and someone was giving you flack for that, I mean, yes, be called out for writing something offensive, but the best feedback in that situation is going to be about the thing you did and not about you as a person for doing it. Unless of course you're really not responding well to that. So anyway, you want to remember it's not personal and then what sometimes it is. Okay.
And what I'm going to just say, most often you can probably ignore the times that it is. And I want you to remember when it is personal, you have to try to step away from that, right? Like you have to try to pull yourself away from that and say, okay, well, this isn't really helpful or this isn't feedback that I can use. So in the case of feedback, this isn't what's going to move you forward to write the best book ever. And like I mentioned, you know, um, how it's not personal, um, and that there's personal preference of readers. I mean, on the same case, like that's another reason why it can be personal because a reader can just be like, I'm just going to always hate any character who reminds me of X, Y, Z. And so no matter what, you'll just, you'll always disappoint them. They're always going to say crap about your character because of that. So keep in mind there are those personal preferences do come in to play when they do. You can usually tell it's usually fairly obvious. People are not great at holding back their opinions and their emotions related to something. So you will be pretty obvious when you get that stuff.
So rule number four is I want you to step away. Yeah. I mean, there's not much more to say about that. Step away from the feedback. It depends on how you get it right. Sometimes if you get a critique and you read the critique, definitely read through it and then literally just like put it aside and don't look at it again for a few days, a week because that's a lot at once. Um, when I used to give critique reports, they would be like 10 to 15 pages and no matter how much I worked so hard to be encouraging and to include all the strengths and to do, you know, compliment sandwiches and really make sure that it was professional. I still can imagine getting 10 to 15 pages of notes that tell you things that could be different or could be done better. It quote unquote better is really overwhelming. And like I said, you're going to feel emotions. So embrace emotions and step away and really take yourself away from it because you do need distance sometimes, especially if you have to go back and revisit feedback or if you've gotten feedback. So now I don't do those critique reports anymore because they are just so much. And I know that I would not want to be on that receiving end. So instead I actually deliver my feedback through a 90 minute zoom in which we get to go back and forth and collaborate. And so I can give my feedback in a very personal way. You get to see the person who's giving it. You get to hear the inflection of my voice. There's a lot more nuance to that. And it also makes a lot more approachable. And the way that a writer feels at the end of that is much more like, oh, I can do this versus holy shit, Katie could not believe you just grilled into me for 90 minutes. So because that's not what it's like, right? That's what it's like when you get a critique for some people.
So even if like after those calls, I will usually want the writer to step away and just distance yourself, go do something totally different. Let it flow into your mind when it when it needs to. Okay. Like don't try to push it out of your mind, like let it flow in and soak on it and stuff, which I'm getting ahead of myself next step, next rule. But get some space, get some distance. It's impossible, I think, to be objective with our own writing. A lot of editors will obviously work so hard to provide objective feedback, right? Like we can't help that sometimes our own personal preferences or identity or something will leak into it. But we work really hard as editors to make sure that we use a very objective viewpoint. I know that one of the things I do is constantly think about the reader, like, okay, this is what the reader would experience. So even if that's not what you intended, because usually I can say I can see what you meant to do. But based on what you have here, this is what might happen for the reader. So that'll happen a lot of times.
But if you are working with a friend or family, or you're getting anonymous feedback from judges, or you're working with critique partners or beta readers, a lot of times that feedback is not being presented in as objective as a light because it's not really their job. So they're kind of giving like, this is how I feel about it. This is what I think. And you want to hear that. I think it's important to hear that advice. Just keep that in mind, right?
So step five, pretty much very similar to step four, but I want you to sit on it and listen. Okay, these are kind of two things. But they go together.
So when you are in a position where you're getting feedback, and whether you're reading it or you're hearing it, I want you to really, really listen. This is so hard. Sometimes, especially when you're sitting there and you're literally, you're literally listening to people grill into your story. And you're just like, No, I don't. I don't agree with that. I hate that. Like, I just want to fight back. I just want to defend it. No, they don't understand. This is what I was trying to do. Like all these things go through our head. It is really hard to pull back and just listen and not do anything else.
I don't want you to try to make sense of the feedback at this time. I don't want you to try to explain it or anything. I want you to literally just sit and listen, or just read depending on how you're getting it. And let yourself hear all of it. Because there's always something in there that is worthy of being heard. Sometimes there will be writers who ask for feedback. I want to know if the story works. And then when they get anything beyond validation, they don't want to hear it. But how fair is that to the person who's delivering the feedback? And how fair is that to your story? Right? Or your readers? So I really want you to just don't dismiss anything. Don't defend anything. Don't try to explain it away. Just listen to all of it and then sit on it.
After listening, before defending, do not make rash decisions. I see authors who are so eager to get notes that they'll change anything someone mentions without considering if it's helping the story they want to tell. Also see many writers unwilling to listen to anything they don't immediately agree with, and so they'll just dismiss something right away. I completely empathize with the urge to ignore things that don't work for you at first glance. I understand why you would want to do this, but this can be detrimental to your work. I'm going to be really honest and you're going to hate this. It's usually the most painful of constructive criticism. And I'm saying constructive criticism, not personal, vitriol feedback, but constructive criticism, the most painful ones usually end up being the most valuable. That time that someone made me cry, I mean, I've had many, but there was a time I got some feedback and someone called me a newbie writer. I was crushed. I had studied writing in college. I'd been writing for years. How could they see me as so new? And I cried for sure. And I really struggled with the feedback.
And after I sat on their notes for a while and I went back, I realized they were right. My work was full of adverbs and cardboard characters, unrealistic dialogue and telling out the wazoo. It was really hard to hear, but that was probably the most helpful critique I've ever received. Now, side note, don't call someone a newbie writer unless you know for sure they literally are brand new, because that just, that just hurts. We don't want to hear that we seem new. No one wants to hear they seem new.
Anyway, it's really important you sit and listen. You listen and then you sit on it and really soak it in and let yourself ponder everything. I want you to soak it all in and be like, what are all the things people said? Now I'll go into next week on how you're going to apply those things. Right now, just sit on it, listen, step away, do one or the other. I mean, you can, you can swap those, you know, you can sit and listen first and then step away after or vice versa. But anyway, you need to give it all the space to exist. Give the feedback room.
The sixth rule for not losing your shit, you get feedback. Don't discount anything yet. This is going to be really hard for some people and I recognize it. But if you are really quick to say, nope, I am not listening to that. There's a chance you're missing something really valuable. I will give you tools for how to do this. But one thing that I find is even the feedback, you're like, I don't agree with that. It doesn't make sense. There's usually some nugget in there of awareness that you need. You might get feedback that's super contradictory. Like one person might be like, I freaking love this character. Another person be like, I hate this character. And what I encourage you to do is to look at if you can ask more questions, but look at where these things intersect and see what story you've created. I guess story is confusing to say here, but what story have you created with this point in time or this character or this plot or this moment or these words or this line and say, is there something here that both are pulling from, but what I meant to do is different in the first place. And I think there is that nugget there. Even if for something where you're like, I absolutely hate this feedback. I cannot imagine agreeing with it. There might be something under the surface of why that person said it in the first place.
And I think that is what's more important. It's not, do you agree with the feedback or not? It's what is that feedback alerting you to? So that's why I don't want you to discount anything yet. I want you to sit on it and then just don't discount anything. Right? Like I'm going to give you more advice, but one thing I'm going to, you know, next week, but one thing I'm going to tell you right now is I also don't want you to yes at all. Do not say yes to everything. Do not be like, hell yeah, I'm going to do all of these things that everyone says that will no longer be your story.
So that's just a little brief heads up. Don't discount anything yet, but also don't say yes to everything. Number seven, I want you to create questions. You have now embraced your emotions. You recognize that it's not personal, but sometimes it might be you've stepped away. You've listened and soaked it in. You sat on it and you haven't discounted anything. And now you're going to create questions.
Now you're going to say, what is anything that literally pops in my head right now? I cannot believe this person said this. If you need to write stream of consciousness, you know, that might be a great way to get started with your questions. But I want you to create questions that even if you cannot ask the person who gave you that feedback, writing down what you're trying to understand about what they said is going to be really important. And potentially you'll be able to have someone you can talk to with. So a lot of times I actually have my writers come to me with what their beta readers have said and we go through it together so we can be like, okay, is this valid? Is this something we can ignore? Is this something we totally missed? Is this something that, oh, I can see why they said that. Here's a little tweak in case that comes up again. Or you know what? I see what they mean, but we can definitely disagree with that. Like we can, we can cut that out or that is a super valid point.
So even if you can't ask that person questions, you might have something you can ask questions with. So a writer could come to me and say, these are the questions I had about what someone else said. Can you work through it with me? Yes, 100%. I want you to create questions on everything. Like why would they think this? Where did this come from? What was the point of this? What made them think this? Like ask all the questions you can. And especially if you are in a situation where you have the opportunity to talk to the person who had this feedback for you, then this is amazing. Like take advantage of asking questions, gaining clarity, because that's going to help you so much as you begin to decide what to do with the feedback, how to use it, and then how to begin revisions.
Let's move on to number eight. So eighth rule is I want you to remember to do what's best for your story, not for your ego. This one's tricky.
This goes back to like our need to defend what we write. It can be hard when we are like, but this is what I wanted to do, or this is what the story is supposed to be. And everyone's saying, yeah, but that's not what we're getting. I've seen it happen many times where someone then when they get the opportunity to defend and fight back, they'll say, well, here's what I'm, this is one I've heard many times. Back will be, it just doesn't feel real, or it just felt inauthentic, or I just can't believe this would happen. And the writer will say, but it happened in real life, but it has happened. So of course it can happen because it's happened before. What that person is ignoring is that based on how you've told the story, you haven't set it up to be believable. You haven't given us enough to work with to make it believable.
I will tell you on a situation specifically like that, usually it kind of goes back to the character. So go back to the, you know, other character arcs episode, because that might give you some insight on what I'm talking about there. But this has happened, and you know, the saying truth is stranger than fiction. A lot of times that will happen where someone will write fiction and they'll say, well, it happened in real life and we're like, yeah, but it's not believable in the story that you created.
And so if you are really trying to get a certain message across, you're trying to tell a certain story, you need to do what's best for your story and not your ego, not what feels best for you, not your need to prove something. Remember, the story is the point and the best feedback givers are there to help you with your story. They're not trying to crap on you and cut you down, especially when you pay for feedback. You know, there are people who are going to do this and it sucks, of course, but mostly people are in your corner and they want to see you succeed. And they want to see this book be all it can be, especially like as a book coach, all I want is I see your vision and I'm like, let's do everything to get it there. And let's make sure you feel good about it. So people naturally, when they're giving you feedback, they're trying to help you write the best version you can. Please keep that in mind as you want to fight on something. And especially if many people are saying the same thing, be like, you know what, what is my story need right now? What is it that my story is asking or demanding? What are my readers getting that I did not intend? How can I make sure that I amplify what I was intending versus just trying to make myself feel better? Do what's best for your story, not your ego.
Number nine, this is a great one, especially when you maybe don't agree with stuff, but this is actually like my favorite part of feedback. It's when you can use it as inspiration. When you give feedback, a lot of times you might say, no, that won't work, but it might open you up, gets you to think outside the box and be like, oh, but I could do this. That is actually probably one of my favorite things about being a book coach. And when I used to do developmental edits and I would write the critiques and I'd write all these edits and the margins of the, like all these comments in the book. And then I would see, because I wouldn't necessarily have the conversations at those times, then what would happen is I would see the book a month or two later and see the changes they made. And I would be like, oh my God, yes, that is what I was saying. But they went a route that was 10 times better. I gave them maybe like, this is what needs to be done. And sometimes I'll even say here a couple ideas, like here's a couple ways you could do it. It's magical when the author says, okay, that made me think of this epic way I could do it. I'm like, yes, you're the author. You're the one with these amazing ideas and you, you know, these characters better than anyone. So use the feedback as inspiration, because what you might create is something you didn't ever consider, but getting that feedback, hearing things from others might open you up to being like, whoa, I didn't even realize this is something I set up or this is something I could do. So use it as inspiration.
And then we've reached number 10, your 10th rule for not losing your shit. And this is big one because I want to make sure you don't let it stop your journey. The 10th rule, remember that this is your story. I don't even feel like I need to go into this much, but I will. I want you to remember this is no one else's story, but yours. The best forms of constructive criticism are from people who want to see you write the best story you can. But a lot of times, especially when it's from other writers, it's difficult for them to separate what they would do if it was their story versus what you want to do. You are the only one who knows what you want to do for your story, what story you are trying to write. And so do not let anyone else dictate where your story goes. Don't let their feedback stop you. Remember this is the story you want to tell. You have your reasons. And if you let feedback stop you, then you're letting others win. You're letting people get in your head. I mean, that's going to happen, but kick them out, get them out of your head and say, this is my story. If you want to tell that version, go for it. But this is the story I'm writing. And so always come back to what is my story asking of me? What story am I trying to write? And will this path because of this feedback get me there? Does this feedback aid me in creating the story of my vision or is it hurting me?
So that's what I'm going to leave you with today. Next week, we're going to talk about how the fuck to apply the feedback in the first place. How do you sort through it? And so we're going to really talk about to really getting clear on your vision of your story so you can keep that in mind. This is my story. No one else's. This is the story I want to write. This is my vision. So do what's best for your story.
Okay, let's just go through it real quick. All right, so our 10 rules for not losing my 10 rules, I guess, for not losing your shit when you get feedback is I want you to embrace the emotions. Remember it is not personal, but sometimes it can be. I want you to step away. I want you to listen and sit on it. I want you to not discount anything at this time. Then create questions. Remember do what's best for your story, not for your ego. I want you to use it as inspiration. And then finally, remember, this is your story. Don't let anyone dictate your journey. Don't let anyone stop you.
Okay, so this was super fun. I'm really excited to be in this series. Like basically overall, like what the fuck is constructive criticism? How do we move through? How do we work with it? So I'm really excited to go forward in the series. There are so many more things to talk about. Like what the F is the difference between a beta reader and a critique partner or sensitivity reader? What the fuck is the difference between a book coach and a development editor and a copy editor, line editor and proofreader? Do agents give feedback? What about acquisitions editors? What in the world are we supposed to do about reader reviews? There's so much to talk about here, right? So I'm super excited to continue through a series. I'm hopeful that I'm also going to have some authors who are going to come on and talk about their experience with feedback, because I think that's also very important. And also the different types of critiques and feedback you can get, you know, so we'll talk about the people you can work with, and then the literal forms of feedback that you might receive. I am so excited to be on this journey with you.
So until next time, writer, keep growing.
