While I sit and wait for the publisher's edits of The Knocking Below, my mind wanders towards my personal editing team. I know I've touched on how I edit my own work, but I can't forget my Betas.
For anonymity, let's call them A, B, and C. Only one of those is not their initial, but it's a mystery! Also, I wanted this to look uniform...All three of these Betas are close friends, whose opinions I highly trust and value. I know they won't be too hard with my fragile ego, but they are also honest. So first, I want to thank them for all their help over the years. You guys are the best!
Then how exactly does one find a Beta reader? Years ago, I signed up for authonomy.com to gather interest and opinions on my work. I've had a lot of great experiences there, but it wasn't as personal as I would have liked. Still, I highly recommend it to other authors. The next step was the obvious post on Facebook asking for help. A, B, and C all chimed in and I happily swamped them with my writing.
It's always good to find someone who will be honest with you, but you also want to find a Beta who will actually be interested in the story. If someone hates science fiction, you don't want to bog them down with aliens and lasers. Being my friends, I already knew we had similar tastes. While only one of them is a writer, they all have experience in creative work, along with an interest in history. For me, it also helps to have the opinions from people looking at the story instead of nitpicking all the grammar. Am I not detailed enough on the setting? Does the dialog make sense? Is it exciting enough? These three always help answer those questions.
So for anyone out there looking to get published, make sure you have a great team of Betas. They are invaluable. I really lucked out with mine.
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