You know that feeling you get when you hand over a piece of your art and hope people like it, but you expect them to tell you the exact opposite? It makes reviews much easier to deal with. Also knowing what my cup of tea is might not be someone else’s makes listening to what other have to say much easier.
On top of that, since I had a more of a script writing background, I’d done edits on the fly (aka, rewritten dialogue so it wasn’t a tongue twister for the actors or just dropped entire sections of well-crafted dialogue to make everything flow better). I was willing to make changes or start from scratch if it seemed necessary.
I had chosen people close to me as well others who I knew and respected their reviews. I also tried to choose people who weren’t necessarily into the genre that this story fits into. As an added bonus, I also got reviews from people that I didn’t know.
So it was with quite a bit of surprise that I got mostly favorable responses.
I listened to what they each had to tell me and made revisions where I saw fit. I gave it out to other people and let them have a go at it and I made a few more. Every single person involved in this step helped me become a better writer. It made me wonder if I should try this whole thing again.
Funnily enough, the biggest response I got was, “When can I read the next one?”
Jon Gray Lang.com 