Writer Support Groups?

The writing process, writing advice, and updates on your work in progress
francoag
Posts: 3
Joined: December 7th, 2009, 9:15 pm
Contact:

Re: Writer Support Groups?

Post by francoag » December 8th, 2009, 9:05 pm

P.S. To answer your question Renalb, I am writing a fictional novel that begins with a prophecy in the 16th century Mayan jungle and ends in the 21rst century White House.

If any of you are interested in starting a critique or writing group, please let me know. In the meantime, I'm going to checkout some of writing sites suggested above.

casnow
Posts: 159
Joined: December 7th, 2009, 1:51 pm
Location: Cairo, Egypt
Contact:

Re: Writer Support Groups?

Post by casnow » December 9th, 2009, 12:14 am

Thank you all for the suggestions... I had been searching for a few months, but just couldn't seem to find anything. This will definitely help.

Gordon - I appreciate the offer for a beta read, and I'll contact you. However, I want to give this thing one final scrubbing on my own before I send it to anyone else.

Thanks to all!

Cam

onefinemess
Posts: 8
Joined: December 7th, 2009, 11:57 am
Contact:

Re: Writer Support Groups?

Post by onefinemess » December 9th, 2009, 2:14 pm

Thanks for all the awesome info for a question I would have asked eventually!
*goes and checks out the various links*

I'm working through the thirdish draft of an epic (urban) fantasy and have got good feedback from a few beta/friend readers, but it's really hard to find people who are willing to invest the time and interest in something like this.

User avatar
ElisabethMoore
Posts: 36
Joined: December 6th, 2009, 2:25 pm
Location: Bellevue, WA
Contact:

Re: Writer Support Groups?

Post by ElisabethMoore » December 9th, 2009, 8:47 pm

onefinemess wrote: I'm working through the thirdish draft of an epic (urban) fantasy and have got good feedback from a few beta/friend readers, but it's really hard to find people who are willing to invest the time and interest in something like this.
From my experiences as a beta reader, one reason people become reluctant to invest the time and interest in beta reading for strangers is the uneven quality of the things you are sent. In spite of specifying a willingness to read only projects that are complete and revised to the best of the author's ability, I received one project with such atrocious spelling and grammar that I had to stop helping with it, since I am incapable of reading Word documents and not line editing. Providing free, extensive line editing is not what I signed up to do. I don't mind the occasional typo, word choice error, or grammatical mistake, but if I am correcting something on virtually every line, that is far too much. I dislike the process of delicately telling someone that their project is not ready for beta reading and only close and friends or family can be asked to line edit extensively for free.

Also, I have developed a mutual relationship with the authors of other projects I have read, and so have less time to take on new projects from people I don't know. This plays into the growing fear about what the quality of an unknown project might be.

User avatar
Sandra Jensen
Posts: 3
Joined: December 10th, 2009, 7:20 am
Location: Ireland
Contact:

Re: Writer Support Groups?

Post by Sandra Jensen » December 10th, 2009, 7:34 am

I cultivate/moderate an online writer's workshop at the social networking group Gaia.com. It's based on my 'real life' workshops and is called "Diving Deeper: A Writing Workshop" -http://groups.gaia.com/creativewriting/. It's not really suited to working on novel length writing, it's more designed to give ongoing support, encouragement and ideas - writing assignments and so on. But you can post sections of work to get feedback on - you will be expected to do the same for others in the group. How we give feedback is fairly rigorously monitored, no nastiness or unhelpful criticism.

Nearly a dozen of us just completed NaNoWriMo, with daily support threads in the group to keep us going. Although there are over 300 members, active members are far fewer, so the group has a nice cosy feel. I have several other moderators, one is a professional editor, and two are teachers of writing.

It is free, but to join you do have to be part of Gaia.com (Facebook with a mission, a bit new agey for some but there are some very good people there and not much bitching). There is a light screening process to get into Diving Deeper itself, basically you will be asked to read (and say 'yes' to) our commenting guidelines and one or two other pieces about the approach the group takes.

User avatar
John Ross Harvey
Posts: 10
Joined: December 10th, 2009, 12:25 pm
Location: Canada
Contact:

Re: Writer Support Groups?

Post by John Ross Harvey » December 11th, 2009, 12:22 pm

Thanks ronalb signed up for critiquecircle now
Author: Three Forces Of Evil - Comedy Shorts, Snowball's Chance In Hell, Acronymville - Your One Stop Destination In The World Of Acronyms, World Peace - A Novel, Harvey The Happy Helmet's Illustrated How To Drive Handbook - A Drive By Education

onefinemess
Posts: 8
Joined: December 7th, 2009, 11:57 am
Contact:

Re: Writer Support Groups?

Post by onefinemess » December 15th, 2009, 12:06 pm

ElisabethMoore wrote:
onefinemess wrote: I'm working through the thirdish draft of an epic (urban) fantasy and have got good feedback from a few beta/friend readers, but it's really hard to find people who are willing to invest the time and interest in something like this.
From my experiences as a beta reader, one reason people become reluctant to invest the time and interest in beta reading for strangers is the uneven quality of the things you are sent. In spite of specifying a willingness to read only projects that are complete and revised to the best of the author's ability, I received one project with such atrocious spelling and grammar that I had to stop helping with it, since I am incapable of reading Word documents and not line editing. Providing free, extensive line editing is not what I signed up to do. I don't mind the occasional typo, word choice error, or grammatical mistake, but if I am correcting something on virtually every line, that is far too much. I dislike the process of delicately telling someone that their project is not ready for beta reading and only close and friends or family can be asked to line edit extensively for free.

Also, I have developed a mutual relationship with the authors of other projects I have read, and so have less time to take on new projects from people I don't know. This plays into the growing fear about what the quality of an unknown project might be.
Oh I understand that. I'm well past the point of spelling/grammar fixes, and I wouldn't expect someone to spend their time on something at that level. I was more referring to a kind of emotional investment I put out when I help someone with their work. I probably do this because I understand what I want as a writer, but it's too much for most people who don't write as serious hobby or (someday) career goal. The one person who does provide support like this is, yep, another aspiring writer. So, we are good for something ;) !

Post Reply

Who is online

Users browsing this forum: Bing [Bot] and 18 guests