The Joy of Beta

I’m currently in the strangest and most uncertain period of writing a novel: the beta.

Ten friends - some writers, all readers - have a copy of a novel I finished about a month ago, and I’ve asked them to be entirely honest about their feelings.

The beta - something I now do for all my completed long-form works - is a curious thing. You’re sending out a draft version which will be read in the same way as if it’s a published work.

Some readers may not finish it. Some will give a few lines of feedback. Others will go at it like line-editors, picking up every flaw and nuance. Writers will typically focus on the writerly things, the things they want to know about regarding their own work - structure, characterisation, narrative arcs - while the non-writers are all about the ‘feels’.

Every response is useful. If a reader doesn’t finish it, I’m always curious to know when they stopped and why they stopped. It may be highly personal. It may be simply because it didn’t resonate or left them cold.

But it can be depressing. If there are major structural issues, or - the worst - a huge plot-hole - it’s often quite difficult to summon the enthusiasm for a major rework. That was certainly the issue with ‘Typhon’, the novel I completed in lockdown, which after the beta just felt like too much work to rewrite.

Happily, I don’t think that will be the case for my latest novel - title currently under wraps but known to a few of my friends. In fact I received the following message just this morning from the first of my betas to finish it (I sent it out on Sunday, he finished on Wednesday morning). Today, he wrote:

“Your characters and their stories are really staying with me. I find myself thinking about them the same way I might think about a friend going through tough times, worrying about them, being concerned for their wellbeing.”

It’s honestly quite difficult to think of a better compliment.