The Reviewer's Guild Forum The value of review

I think that the value in review lies in two areas. First, and most important is the information it supplies. A fresh set of eyes can pick out new details, and errors that the tired eye will miss. This applies not only to grammar, but for style as well. I knew a guy named Joe in middle school. He storted before starting to speak. Nobody ever said anything, thinking it rude, and so Joe snorted for seventeen years of his life until one day a girl named Laura asked him why he did it. He looked puzzled and said he'd never noticed. Now he does and so he has stopped. That type of tough love improved Joe's social skills. If only someone had said something sooner.

The second way that review is beneficial, is that it affords something far more important to a writer.. validation. Writing is a lonely, and often secluded way to pass your time. The words on the page come to represent a great ammount of the writer's personal psyche. Many writers need the validation of another person saying that their thought was at least interesting. Any constructive criticism offered will afford the writer a new technique to add to their arsenal.

Those who cannot do teach.. Those who would just rather not do review.