Since starting this writing journey I’ve heard time and time again about the benefits of joining writing communities.
I’ve taken the step once before to research them but there is just SO many that it made my head spin. Plus there’s always that feeling of,
“Would I even really fit into this group?”
or
“Do they want a new group member? Will I be a “party crasher”?”
After half a year of going back and forth about it I’ve decided to squash the fear and the doubt and jump right in. Of course I got a little push from a friend who helped me see how much I was missing out, career wise, by not joining at least one group.
I haven’t narrowed down which group I want to join yet but as you might have guessed I’ve made a list and I want to share it with you 🙂
Below I’ve listed general writing groups and genre specific Romance groups. I hope that if you have experience with any of these groups you will let me know what you think of them and if you haven’t found the perfect group to join yet maybe this will help steer you in the right direction.
General Writing Groups/Communities:
An online social networking community for the publishing Industry and the writing world. It is free to join and currently has  10,143 Members and 223,509 posts. The website discussion section is in a forum format. The following threads look promising:
- The Guppie Pond
- Genre Angst
- Ask the Experts
- Query Critiques
- Hook Critique Group
- Query Questions & Conversations
- Examples of Successful Queries
- The Synopsis Critique
- Agent Updates
- Agent Submission Process
- Ins and Outs of Literary Rep
- Conference & Contests
- Wanted Ads
- Pr, Marketing, Ads & Promos
- Blogs & Social Media Du Jour
- Title Tester
- The Think Tank
- Romance Writers
A website where members find and talk about books to read, blog about books they’ve read or written, and learn how to write and market books. Membership is free and the site currently has 23,858 Members with 625 Groups. The following groups looks promising:
- Network Your Books
- Book Blog Giveaways
- Blogging Tips
- Authors-Needing-Reviews-and-Interviews
- Reading Romance
- Any Kind of Romance
- Contemporary Romance Readers
- About The Author-Author Interviews
- Bloggers Who Write Books
- Contemporary Romance
- Erotic Writer’s Group
- Time Travel Romances
- Highland Romances
- The-Paranormal-Romance-Writers
- Historical Romances
- Romance Authors
- Chick Lit Lovers
- Request-Reviews-For-Your-Romance
The official website is for everyone who wants to participate in the National Novel Writing Month every November. However, it’s not just about those crazy word filled 30 Days.In the Forum section of their website you can find groups to join for general writing support and take part in Camp NanoWriMo which, this year, runs in April and July. The website currently has over 37,114 members and can be used to find people to meet up with locally to help you obtain your writing goals.
I can’t say much about this website because you need to sign up with them first before they will let you see what their site has to offer. According to their homepage they offer Critiques, writing tips and advice, and workshops and it’s all somehow based on a point system. The Scribophile Basic is Free but if you want full access and perks you need Scribophile Premium and that is $9/mo or $65/yr. Their home page also shows the following numbers 303,533 critiques served for 50,557 works and 1,116,678 posts in 45,797 threads.
This a website that where you can write and post your book/story and have others vote for it or you can read and vote for other peoples works. They also have a forum that helps in all areas of writing. They currently have 138,960 members. Some forums that looks promising are:
- Grammar, Syntax and other Nuts and Bolts
- Brainstorming and Plot Doctoring
- Illustrators and Artists
A free online writing community where writers can post their work, get reviews, befriend other writers and much more. I don’t know their total number of members but here is a list of groups that sound promising:
- Book Trailers Creating
- 100% Review
- Novels & Short Stories
- Publishing Central
- Romantics
- Erotic Warriors
- Romance Writers Unite
- Hopeless Romantics
- All Sides of Romance
This is one of the biggest online writing resources around and their forum section is just as big. They currently have around 134,145 members with 26,627 topics being discussed. The following topics peak my interest:
- Recommended Resources
- Literary Hot Spots
- Writing Prompts and Challanges
- Critique Central – Romance
- Query Letter Clinic
- Synopsis Clinic
Find and meet other local writers that share your passion and craft. Just type in your country and your zip and it will show you the groups that already exists near you. Don’t see one? Make one. It’s Free. They currently have 246,432 members and 1,604 groups.
Just for Romance
Join Harlequin Forum section to discuss books and writing tips. There are currently 6,470 members with 1,761 threads and 120,242 posts. Some of the topics that looks interesting to me are:
- On Writing Romance
- Books and Authors
- Cafe Social
This is a yahoo group with 144 members. It is a restricted group that you will have to request to join. It’s been around since 1999 and is still active.
RWA- Romance Writers of America
The end all be all place for Romance Writers (it seems). Here you can join a very large community of romance writers, authors, literary agents, editors, and publishers. You will also have access to classes, workshops, insider news and information, contests, and resources. I can’t tell you what to expect exactly because I just filled out my application and am waiting to hear back but I can tell you that General Membership is $95 with a $25 New Applicant processing fee.
This is a restricted yahoo group that you will need to request to join. It has 2,360 members and was started in 2001 and is still active.
These are just a few writing community websites! I know I’m joining the RWA but other then that I’m not sure which one to try first.
Do you have any advice or opinions to share?
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