Young Writers Society

So — let's talk feedback.

You post a story. What kind of response do you want?

Do you want people to analyze your characters? Do you want grammatical errors fixed? Problems with plot and flow and structure to be critiqued?

Unconditional praise?

Discuss!

To be honest, unconditional praise is always nice It makes me smile, so if you're saying what I want and I'm being honest, praise is good - but if we're talking what I actually need from a critique and hence probably on some level want as well - then let's see ...

Grammatical errors and spelling mistakes are okay, but to be honest not that helpful. I'll find spelling mistakes eventually and don't need an internet forum to help me with that - I didn't join YWS to help people fix my typos. Grammar can sometimes be helpful, but only if I keep making the same mistake over and over again and need someone to tell me why it's wrong, how it should be and how I can change - using an example. That's great. But I'm pretty sorted on grammar so that doesn't happen really. When someone comments on my story, I want an analysis of the plot/story and the characters, and how both these things are conveyed by me, the writer. So, for example, fishr looked out my Port story and went through my characters presented and did an indepth analysis of how the characters felt to him and how he understood him. This eventually brought up some interesting facts that I had to consider that will strengthen the backbone of my story. In regards to plot, I'd like people to comment on what they think about what is happening and the scene structures and what they like or don't - should there be more dialogue? less description in that certain place? extended part here? there? etc. This will help me to understand how readers have looked at it.

And I always love it when people ask me questions or comment about certain things that I can think about and which might help me develop my story more. That's always cool.

Firestarter wrote:To be honest, unconditional praise is always nice It makes me smile, so if you're saying what I want and I'm being honest, praise is good - but if we're talking what I actually need from a critique and hence probably on some level want as well - then let's see ...

Grammatical errors and spelling mistakes are okay, but to be honest not that helpful. I'll find spelling mistakes eventually and don't need an internet forum to help me with that - I didn't join YWS to help people fix my typos. Grammar can sometimes be helpful, but only if I keep making the same mistake over and over again and need someone to tell me why it's wrong, how it should be and how I can change - using an example. That's great. But I'm pretty sorted on grammar so that doesn't happen really. When someone comments on my story, I want an analysis of the plot/story and the characters, and how both these things are conveyed by me, the writer. So, for example, fishr looked out my Port story and went through my characters presented and did an indepth analysis of how the characters felt to him and how he understood him. This eventually brought up some interesting facts that I had to consider that will strengthen the backbone of my story. In regards to plot, I'd like people to comment on what they think about what is happening and the scene structures and what they like or don't - should there be more dialogue? less description in that certain place? extended part here? there? etc. This will help me to understand how readers have looked at it.

And I always love it when people ask me questions or comment about certain things that I can think about and which might help me develop my story more. That's always cool.

More or less, same as Jack. Being critiqued mercilessly for small typos or other such mistakes is likely one of the most idiotic mistakes a critique can fall into.

But I love to hear people's thoughts as to plot, structure...character. Just someone's honest thoughts (beyond any editing or critically inclined notes) are invaluable.

Well, the most usless thing is non-specific praise, because all you can do with it is think "Uh ... great ... that was ... helpful". Even non-specific hate is better for me because it'll usually give me a little motivation.

Grammar ... not really useful unless I don't know something. Like the first time I posted here I had never ever heard of a run-on sentence. I went and learnt all about them and practiced correcting them and so forth as soon as someone told me, and then that was fixed. So that was usful. Stuff you do know, but just stuffed up that one little time isn't all that usful, because you can sort it out yourself as soon as you spot it. Other handy things are reserch tips. When you write something that is incorrect. These are mega embaressing, to have pointed out to you, but you need to know.

Sometimes I have sentences that I ... just ... can't ... make ... sound ... right. It's good if someone can help me with these, because although I can fix them myself I'd have to spend hours staring at the words and trying to fit them into my head in a better way. Sometimes they still sound awkward, no matter how much time I devote to them. So it's nice when someone can just solve the problem in an instant. That would rate in the "good" catagory of things to be commented on. Other things like that would be things that are only really going to help the presentation of that one piece, and not do much to improve over all writing skill.

The best thing to get comments on is things like plot, characters, flow, structure, worldbuilding ... etc. This is the sort of stuff that's going to stick with you and teach you a lot, so it's pretty handy. Questions and enthusiasm are really helpful. It's always nice to have someone get really interested in what you wrote, and does help you take things to heart. It's also one of the sensitive areas, because there are excuses for making other mistakes, but mistakes with plot or characters are hard to blame on outside forces. Plus, it's the heart of a story and usually pretty much original stuff, so it's never fun to have this stuff mucked with. I've never exploded over a critique, and don't plan to, but this is the area that would get me the most worked up if a critiquer came in and just ripped it all to shreads.

Opinions are wonderful, especially from many different people becaue then you can build a picture of how possible future readers are reacting to things you've done and what they think of characters and so forth.

I love it when people go through my numerous sentence structure mistakes... it's just awesome. My sister is my harshest critic (or second harshest, actually) and goose pimples run down my spine whenever she critiques my work.

And then I love character analyzations, especially since I write character stories. Make senes? Yeah. Anyways, I try to make my characters act a certain way and want to see how the reader reacts to that particular way. For instance, I made this mom in my story sound extremely (in my opinion) annoying and I wanted to see whether anyone else thought that.

Plot... well... I usually don't care about that, unless you see a gaping error or if you want to praise me. The plot doesn't matter. The style does.

The main problem I have that I like people to help me with is if I've made what's happening clear. My English teacher last year was the best help I ever got for this and he showed me how to avoid it, but he's gone now and I still confuse people (and myself) occasionally. So basically what I want people to tell me is if I've written something that isn't quite clear, unless I want it to be like that.

However, I do like it when people praise me for what I happen to have done right.

EDIT: Another thing that was great about my English teacher's critiques is that he would make my sentence structures that much better. He knew how to make writing seem like every word was utilized to the best of it's ability. No words were wasted. Not many people critique like that.

I like balance in critics. I want to know all of the bad things I do wrong but I also like to hear a few good things.

As Inertia said:

The main problem I have that I like people to help me with is if I've made what's happening clear.

I like to know if people understand my writing. If no one knows whats going on its obviously not good.[/quote]

What do I want in a critique?

That's a broad question, at least for me.

If anything, I want honesty. Sugar coating is a no-no. I agree with Jack though. Spelling errors are usually simple to catch but grammar for me is a little harder to spot, so I appreciate someone pointing grammatical errors out.

However, I'm more interested what the readers think of the characters especially. I mean I could have the stupidest plot or the most cliched conflict ever but if the characters aren't developed, I'd like the reader to tell me straight up - dig deeper into their profiles because I'm (the reader) not connecting with them.

I also enjoy when people help me with sentence structures. *ack* So many times I over-describe something, and reminding me that I should slow down and slip in smaller details later. Also, it's extremely helpful to have someone point out unnecessary words or ways to either shorten or improve sentences from lack of details.

And of course, analyzing characters is just awesome! I mean, it is so fun reading someone else's opinion of your characters and knowing if you succeeded in portraying their personalities or failed.

Last but not least, though for me it's not crucial, praises are always nice. That goes the same for negativity. Whichever; praise or not, it's helpful to understand why the reader liked or disliked the story. If a reader enjoyed it; great but why? If the reader disapproved; why and what should be changed to possibly satisfy them?