I have mentioned in several previous posts how important it is to get others to look at your work before submitting or publishing. Today, I’d just like to underline that fact, and discuss once more why it is so critical to achieve a superior product.
First and foremost, where do you get feedback? There are many places, actually, as I’ve mentioned before. You can get family and friends to review your work (if you’re comfortable sharing with them and you trust them to be unbiased), join writers’ groups with critique circles, or even hire professional editors to take an objective look. There are also classes you can take on creative writing or the like in which you can get not only feedback from your instructor and sometimes peers, but also learn ways to improve your writing in general.
The reasons you want feedback are many. When you are first writing your book, you want to write the best book you can, so that when you are finally ready to submit or publish, you can put out the best product available. Having other pairs of eyes looking over your manuscript and giving you their thoughts, opinions, and suggestions is vitally important to this process, lest you come off as trapped in your own echo chamber and your blind spots quickly show to the public. Thus, you need to find sources of critique that are supportive, but honest.
However, it is also important to find sources of feedback after the fact. After you’ve become a successfully published author, you’ll naturally want to hear what people think. This most often comes in the form of reviews, which are important for two main reasons. First, publicly visible reviews, especially by customers who have bought your book, can help other potential customers determine whether they want to take the chance on your book, or even to help them find it in the first place. Second, while it is always nice to hear praise for our efforts, the most helpful reviews will go into detail about what they liked most and what they would have liked to see. This can be extremely helpful when it comes to writing your next book, so that you can make it an even bigger success than the first!
So, as I have said many times, feedback is important, whether it comes before or after publication. It can be hard to find at first–especially in the case of the latter–but it is well worth it. And once you’ve established a wide enough reader base, you should hopefully not have to go scrounging around for it. Once you pass that magic threshold, the reviewers will come to you!