Hone your internal reader, not your internal literary critic

So, I have five books coming out in 2014 (two Ever After High books, Dangerous, Spirit Animals book 4, and the first Princess in Black). And I'm busy. Writing. Most of those are already written, but it's still busy! (I'm also working on the third Princess Academy, which should be out in 2015.) I usually try to blog here at least each Monday but I've been failing lately. Am recommitting now! And in the meantime, here's a three-year-old post that generated some discussion at the time:

From Sara Zarr's blog:"Richard Rodriguez says that the reader re-creates the book when hereads it." I completely agree, and you long time readers of my blog knowmy opinions about How to Be a Reader.No story is static. A book has no meaning on its own. Meaning iscreated for each reader as they read. I've been thinking about thislately as I've been hearing people's responses to the last book in acertain trilogy.

I think that whether you are a reader, writer, or both (if you're awriter you'd better be both), reading books is far more useful when weshed the need to be a literary critic and focus instead on the internal.It's been interesting to hear over and over again what readers imaginedthe author failed to do. And I keep thinking, that's such a uselessresponse. Unless you're getting a phd in literacy criticism and doingyour thesis on that author, that's not helpful to you. Speculation aboutwhat the author was trying to do, or whether or not she was "tired" ofwriting, etc., is pointless. We don't know. Instead, it's so much morebeneficial to focus on understanding our own internal reader, andtherefore ourselves. Where did the story fail you? Where did it work foryou? So, what does that say about you? What were you hoping for? Whatdid you need from the story? If you're a writer, what does that tell youabout what kind of a story you want to write? For me, this kind ofresponding is just about how I think about the book. Instead ofthinking, "The author really dropped the ball on the ending," I trythinking, "What did I want out of the ending instead of what I got? Whydid I want that?"

I've become more and more conscious of this wayof reading over the past several years. It stems from hearing reallyweird responses to my own books and hearing readers speculate aboutludicrous reasons I did this or that and assert false motivations for mystory choices. Realizing how often readers do that about my works mademe realize how often I thought that way about other people's books.Sometimes the speculation is right, most of the time it's not, butregardless, I realized I was throwing away my reading experience. I'venow become a much more selfish reader, perhaps. When a story bugs me,I'm not thinking about the author but myself. Why am I bugged? What do Iwant? I think I come away from books now with a better understanding ofmyself as well as a better awareness of story that I can utilize in myown writing.

Reading as a writer changed me completely as a reader. I find I canstill appreciate books I dislike because I am learning through them howto write stories I do like. I don't mean everything I've said here to bea blueprint for reading and the only proper way to read a book. THereare lots of ways to read a book. But I hope to call into question thesometimes assumed idea that we read books to label them as either goodor bad. To me that's as silly as getting to know people just so we cancategorize them as either good or bad. It's not for me to judge andlabel people. And if my only experience with books is a judgement call, arating of stars, then I would soon tire of reading. For me, reading isan exploration, a partnership, me and the author via her words off on anadventure. For my personal reading experience, some authors are bettercompanions than others, but it's always an adventure.