Writing Excuses Transcripts

Writing Excuses 5.33: Alpha Readers

From http://www.writingexcuses.com/2011/04/17/writing-excuses-5-33-alpha-readers/

Key Points: Don't look for a secret backdoor. Do look for and cultivate alpha readers. Alpha readers can read your book while still in draft, and encourage you to make it better. Beta readers, on the other hand, can read your completed work and help you polish it. Alphas should help you write YOUR book, not the book they would have written. Alpha readers need to give you the kind of feedback that is useful for you. Encouragement, ripping, whatever it takes. Beware the proofreader! Fine as beta or gamma, but alpha readers need to take a broader view. You find alpha readers through a process, not magic -- like good friends.
( Who's your friend? )
[Brandon] Okay. I'm going to do our writing prompt. If you didn't hear me coughing furiously after Jordo muted my mike, I have a cold still. So I'm going to give you the writing prompt of people who get possessed, catch colds. That's why we catch colds, is any time you have a cold, you're possessed. Go from there.
[Howard] Gesundheit.
[Jordo] [inaudible -- Means all new things?]
[Brandon] This has been Writing Excuses. You're out of excuses. Now go write.