As previously announced, Bound was sent out for beta reading. Feedback was received, and I am glad to have gotten it. Here is some of the feedback received:
- Rabin, is that the guy’s name? (I didn't mention it was Lt. Rabin until later)
- If they put tape over her mouth, how was she begging for her life?
- This ended too abruptly. That pisses me off. If I bought this, that would probably keep me from buying the next one, unless maybe it was already available.
- You should not release these separately. You need to finish the whole story and release it all together.
- I didn’t like the way you jumped forward and back in time.
Wow. How is that for valuable advice? Obviously, the first couple of bullets were things that I should have caught in editing and proofreading, and having beta readers are good for catching those things that you miss. But how about the third? You never want to lose readers, so any advice that keeps you from doing that is gold. The fourth was some good advice that I’m going to heed. Finally, it’s never good to confuse readers, so I’m restructuring and reordering.
What all this means is that Bound will not be released as a standalone book. Boundless is already out there, so I’ll leave it be for the time being, but at some point, it’s going to get pulled back. I’m going to pull them into Parts, and turn that into a complete whole instead of what was almost a serialized novel. Once that’s ready, then I’ll pull back Boundless and release the entire story.
What this means for you, if you’re a fellow scribe, is that you need to find your beta reader or readers. They can not only make your book stronger but possibly keep you from making costly mistakes. I certainly appreciate mine.
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