Authors, Writers, Publishers, and Book Readers

Writing Groups for Support and Critique

Hi All

I run a free internet writing group called writerscave (www.writerscave.co.uk). It's a small but friendly international group which exists simply to critique and improve writers and poets skills. I set it up out of the ashes of a paysite that annoyingly disappeared and run it for free because I get out a lot personal value from it and so do my members. It's also free and I don't ask for donations because I don't want to beholden to any members if they chose to leave or I one day decide that I don't want to run the group anymore.

Given that Authors.com is largely around promotion and ideas for publishing I wondered if anyone uses similar critique sites such as my writerscave. Do you find them useful or a distraction to the main task of writing books

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Replies to This Discussion

Permalink Reply by Catherine Green on September 16, 2011 at 2:44pm

Hi Steve,

I am a member of Write and Share which sounds like a similar resource. Although I haven't had much time recently to interact with other people about their work, I have found it insightful for my own contributions. It is always helpful to get a fresh opinion on something, especially if you are unsure about the direction of a piece of work. I do have to separate myself to make sure I actually do my work though!

Catherine

Permalink Reply by Steve Norris on September 16, 2011 at 3:07pm

Hi Catherine

I use Write and Share as well, which is a fabulous site but has a different focus I think. It's more based on writing support and general articles. They do a great job in publicising materials I dont have the time to research. writerscave is purely about writing itself and we run many different challenges on a daily, weekly and monthly basis plus publicise the best stuff in a monthly printed magazine.

I do find it quite intensive as the competitions always draw me in and I end up writing a lot more for the site than on my own work.

Permalink Reply by Catherine Green on September 16, 2011 at 3:39pm

I can see that being the problem, you don't realise how time-consuming these sites are. That's why I tend to dip in and out, so I can still get my work done but can find people to interact with when I need to.

Permalink Reply by Borislava Borissova on September 16, 2011 at 6:51pm

Hi Catherine!

Time-consuming is something I didn't expect at all but since I have a published book I have devoted much time to blogs and forums for promotion. I even cannot start my next story because I must concentrate on the marketing and promotion of this one. I wonder whether with all authors the case is the same or I do something wrong on my road of writing and publishing. The situation is starting to bother me because I love writing but now I am mostly PR of my work.

Catherine Green said:

I can see that being the problem, you don't realise how time-consuming these sites are. That's why I tend to dip in and out, so I can still get my work done but can find people to interact with when I need to.

Permalink Reply by Steve Norris on September 16, 2011 at 7:44pm

Borislava

I can't help but agree with you. Trying to do promotion and marketing, work on general writing skills, work on new books all at the same time is pretty intense. Oh and I forget about the day job which is generally 45-50 hours of the week taken up. Guess I know why the wife complains now

Permalink Reply by Buster LaFrance on September 17, 2011 at 2:58am

I'll be giving your site a look. I published my book earlier this year, and though I've received great reviews from those who have read it, including a nice review on Amazon, I have found that getting exposure for my work is slow-going, to say the least. The hard part is getting the book into the right hands, those that can take it to the next level. As I currently work on my next novel, which is a sequel to the first, I am anxious to one day make writing my full-time job. Some in my family believe that writers don't work. They have no idea how wrong they are!

Permalink Reply by Robert L. Allen on September 17, 2011 at 7:35am

Catherine please don't dip out too long, I look forward to hearing from you...

Catherine Green said:

I can see that being the problem, you don't realise how time-consuming these sites are. That's why I tend to dip in and out, so I can still get my work done but can find people to interact with when I need to.

Permalink Reply by Robert L. Allen on September 17, 2011 at 7:43am

A lot of the family read all the time. They ask why is it taking me so long to get published. I reply, write a book and do the research and then reseach the agents and publishers. It takes me about an hour plus to send one MS out. First I have to find the agent/publisher and then read the guidelines to the submissions and then record the info into word and , well you guys know what it takes...

Buster LaFrance said:

I'll be giving your site a look. I published my book earlier this year, and though I've received great reviews from those who have read it, including a nice review on Amazon, I have found that getting exposure for my work is slow-going, to say the least. The hard part is getting the book into the right hands, those that can take it to the next level. As I currently work on my next novel, which is a sequel to the first, I am anxious to one day make writing my full-time job. Some in my family believe that writers don't work. They have no idea how wrong they are!

Permalink Reply by Robert L. Allen on September 17, 2011 at 7:45am

Steve, your website sounds interesting. I'll give it a try.

Permalink Reply by Catherine Green on September 17, 2011 at 7:11pm

I'm here! Actually it's a relief to know I'm not alone.

Borislava, I too struggle to get my writing/PR balance even. My time is taken up in blogging and chasing for reviews and web coverage.

Buster, yes, people do have a misguided concept of what writers actually do!

Robert L. Allen said:

Catherine please don't dip out too long, I look forward to hearing from you...

Catherine Green said:
I can see that being the problem, you don't realise how time-consuming these sites are. That's why I tend to dip in and out, so I can still get my work done but can find people to interact with when I need to.

Permalink Reply by Borislava Borissova on September 20, 2011 at 10:28am

I would like to ask you what your experience say about sells of a book? I am not sure participation at amazon forums is helpful for more sells, FB and Twitter are of very little use. Blogsites are not what they were in the past. Now the sites with big number of followers changes their surface in too short time so many people could not see your promotion or review if they don't open the blog at the right day and the small blog sites have not enough followers, yet. What to be the next channel for gaining possible readers?

Permalink Reply by Steve Norris on September 20, 2011 at 11:37am

Hi Borislava - I've just updated my blog on the site with a similar question. It seems easy to influence a small amount of sales with this route but not a major amount

Borislava Borissova said:

I would like to ask you what your experience say about sells of a book? I am not sure participation at amazon forums is helpful for more sells, FB and Twitter are of very little use. Blogsites are not what they were in the past. Now the sites with big number of followers changes their surface in too short time so many people could not see your promotion or review if they don't open the blog at the right day and the small blog sites have not enough followers, yet. What to be the next channel for gaining possible readers?