Don't Shoot the Messenger! (Adventures of a Critic)

Why I Hate the Term "Honest Critique"

Got an amazing cover from burning_ (of whom this chapter is dedicated to). Thank you so much, I love it. 

Anyways, now let's go on to the message I have for you all. 

"Come around, kids, Samantha's going to tell you about the story of two critics and an author. It sounds absolutely riveting, doesn't it? I promise you, it's more interesting than you think!"

Maybe, we'll see. 

Pretty much, today is a lesson. Here's something that both critics and authors should know-that is what comes today. 

So here's the scenario. You've got a book, it's horrid. Absolutely wretched. You've promised this author you are going to critique their work-and somehow, you must pull yourself through it. Even though the title has a spelling error, even though their first sentence is so garbled you already find yourself confused, even though each sentence seems like one you just read but using different words, and lastly the POV changes every second. EVEN THOUGH there are all these issues, you go on to critique the book. 

Critics, sometimes (especially on wattpad) you have to critique a book that you hate with every fiber of your being. Whether the plot is a horribly written cliche about one-direction, twilight, or whatever; or it's so horribly written that you WISH it was a cliche plot about one-direction, twilight, or whatever; you're going to have to do this. You've promised them, it's your job. 

This is where I hate the term "honest critique". Even moreso, "brutally honest critique". Want to know why "honesty" is the WORST word to use to describe how you critique someone? 

It makes you feel you have the right to say this:

"Your story sucks. It makes no sense whatsoever. Did you know that you've misspelled the title-no one is going to want to read your book if there is a misspelling in the title. Also, have you ever heard of a period? No, not the thing that a teenage girl has when they've hit puberty (which you clearly haven't by the contents of this book), it's a full stop of a sentence. Clearly you don't know what it is because you don't have any! Also, there's a thing called capital letters that you use for names and the starts of sentences, yeah, those are real, use them. God and your grammar is horrendous..." 

That's not okay. I don't care how bad the book is, being honest in this way is NOT okay. You know how you get upset when authors blow off your work or get angry about your critique? This is worse. You're blatantly insulting them as an author. This is no longer an "honest" critique, this is bullying, whether you think it's for the greater good or not.

Critiques like this I always analogize to when people used to "bleed" people to cure them of illnesses. It didn't work and it made things worse, but the doctors swore up and down that it was necessary if they are to get better.

If you don't know what bleeding people is: in history before any sort of good medicine, doctors used to take lancets (like a knife) and cut open people who were sick. This was to rid them of the "bad blood" that was supposedly where the illness came from. This would almost always (if not always) kill the patient faster-but they didn't believe that for years.

Back to the point, critics, you have no right to an opinion. You can tell the author what's going wrong, what's going right, why something's working, why something doesn't work, and say overall what needs to change, but YOU HAVE NO RIGHT TO GIVE YOUR OPINION. Contrary to popular belief, that's not a critics job. The only time that your opinion will matter to the author is if you say that you liked their piece-but in general, they don't care if you didn't like it. They care if it makes the story flow-they want to know if their characters are dynamic, not if you like their characters. 

There are sneaky ways to give your opinion through a critique, this is true, but in general, you do not blatantly say "I like", or "I dislike" something. No one cares. 

Want to know a way to get out your critique? Say "OFFERING CRITIQUES" or if you must add an adjective "GREAT/GOOD CRITIQUES". Don't say "honest", for God's sake don't say "brutally honest", just offer up your services. 

Here's a good critique when the worst novel happens to fall into a good critic's hands. 

"Hello. I hope you don't mind, but I may take a few bubbles to critique your work. Just a note, the title of your story is misspelled, which is a quick fix.

In sentence "...." you have a grammar issue and are missing a comma. This is also reoccuring throughout your story. 

You need to use full stops to end sentences and then use capital letters to punctuate the beginning of the next line. A good rule of thumb: sentences should be able to be said in one breath.

If you have Microsoft Word, you may want to put your document on it so that it can catch a lot of the errors. Your grammar is rather rough and it's hard to understand what you're saying. Wattpad also offers a sort of spell-check too. 

Your characters are rather two-dimensional. The only thing I see about (person) is that she is very rude. The things she does doesn't seem funny, it seems cruel, and in a normal situation someone would call her out on it. 

The time table of your story doesn't make sense. Unless you have a legitimate reason, most schools do not have two chemistry classes in one day.

The romantic interest shows up, and she's never met him, yet all of a sudden "romantic interest" becomes "romantic partner". This happened way too fast, and it doesn't make sense how it happened. Perhaps if you gave it more time before this happened..." 

You get the point. A good critic dances around the "honest" things they may want to say-they get rid of the insults that some people have a craving to tell and get to the actual point. Instead of "your story sucks and the title is misspelled" just ax off "your story sucks". Good critics go straight to the point and explain why something is. 

"Honest Critiques" are stupid. "Good Critiques" are fantastic. Honesty gives the false impression (whether you realize it or not) that you can be a complete asshole. "Good Critiques" tell you that the critic knows what they are doing and that they're offering their critiques. 

"Good" does not mean "sugar-coat", which some people claim the authors will think. I have never had an authro tell me that "good critiques" sounds like lighthearted critiques.

Personally, I don't like adding adjectives to my offers-I provide examples of other stories I've critiqued (I have a library that shows some of the books I've critiqued-definitely not all). I may give out the title to this book (haven't made a thread since I started this) so they can make the decision themselves. 

Authors, I'm not saying every person who uses the term "Honest Critique" or adds an adjective to their offerings is a bad critic. I'm explaining why it's probably not the right word to use-but that doesn't mean that it isn't the right critic to pick. This is what I've observed and my own personal opinion. 

Also authors, if you get a critique like critic A-report them or tell them to get their act together. They have no right to insult you. 

Which critique do you prefer? Hopefully, the answer is obvious.