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Does anyone have codes to spare? I know of someone who might like this comm, tried joining before but couldn't find a workable code.

A very good writer, by the way. I have their permission to share their novel, King of Cats (A Life In 5 Novellas), but I much rather they have access to do it.

Thanks!

intothewood

So what's become of this comm with so much potential? Abandoned? Any chance of revival? And if so, what would it take?

Let's bare our bloody carcasses, shall we?

I'm all messed up with a bad case of crapola, which is commonly interpreted as writer's block, but it's not that fucking simple. Writer's block indicates a lack of direction/inspiration - not my problem. My problem is less easily defined and all the more maddening for it. Ever had something playing at the edge of so fucking good you can't deal? Yeah. Tell me about that.

No, really - tell me about that.

noctuary

Hey guys! I noticed this place had been a bit quiet and I was starting to feel isolated so I thought I'd post a topic. ;_;

So! A newspaper in my country is having a short story competition. I've never entered a writing competition before and I'm quite excited. Apparently we're allowed to submit a number of stories, and the length maximum is 3000 words. (They didn't give us a minimum, which was interesting to me.) The prize is $5000 and some book vouchers, although as quite a shy person in "real life" I'm not quite as keen on the awards ceremony or my picture in the paper. Lord.

Anyway, I wanted to ask whether anyone had ever entered a short story competition, and if so, did you win? How did the competition work, and how did you pick the story/ies you wanted to enter?

intothewood

Sharing. When do you determine who, when and how?

I'm very wary of sharing any of my writing beyond silly little things I care nothing about. It's like a native fear of picture taking - if they see it, they will steal my soul!

But there are precautions in sharing, especially things you're currently working on - or at least I think so, anyway. Maybe I'm just paranoid, but I can't imagine I'm the only one who feels this way. Of course, I am a little extreme - I can't seem to let go of even one sentence. I was going to ask people to share a sentence from what they're currently writing, something that may sum up the gist of the story, but I don't know if I could reciprocate. Yes, yes, that is paranoid, isn't it. But I don't know you, you don't know me... we could all be soul stealers, who can say?

So how do you know when to share, with whom, and at what stage?

niniane

(x-posted to: Critique_Circle )

Anyway, recently I had someone recommend that I check out a character template. I did, and it got me to thinking about writing tools and which are useful. (Incidentally, I found the template to be pretty useless.)

I'll be honest in that I haven't found any writing tools to be useful enough to be worth working with. This may be in part due to methodology (I tend to start with a plot, then flesh out the story with the world and characters I need for that plot, considering the whole time what sorts of people they'd need to be to respond in the way they have to in order to make the plot progress. Of course, sometimes they surprise me, but...all the same...I build them in response to the plot, rather than the other way around, and half the time don't care about details like their hair color or ethnic background, which can sometimes be completely irrelevant.), and may be in part due to arrogance/apathy/sloth.

That said, I do think that certain checklists can be super helpful - I just haven't seen any that I'm all that excited about. So I wondered if any of you knew of any awesome tools for world building/character building/plot development, etc.

analect

( Bom-chicka-wah-wah! As promised, an old blog post of mine on peculiar market classifications regarding gay and m/m fiction, and the problems of genre sub-division. )

breezeshadow

Hello all.

I'm not really sure what to write for this, because I'm horribly shy and thus my ability to write introduction posts has been slowly deteriorating. *cough*

But anyway.

My name is Breeze, I'm a twenty-something-year-old to-be grad student. I have been writing basically since I was in sixth grade or so. My first piece of writing was a screwy thing about some girl being visited by an angel. My first novel is here if you're ever bored and want to read something so awful it's absolutely hysterical.

I specialize in what I call either weird or semi-realistic fantasy. Basically instead of writing about people going on epic quests to slay dragons, I write about a therapist trying to treat her patient who is basically a human-animal hybrid, and also an illegal immigrant. I dabble in other genres occasionally but fantasy is my focus.

I've wanted good advice for writing for ages but after being basically ignored on sites like Fictionpress, I've become really shy about it and so barely show my work to anyone anymore. I'm hoping maybe talking about writing on this community, or just reading what people post, will give me both the muse to write more regularly, and maybe the courage to post my stuff online more often.

So yeah I think that's about it. *waves*

Current Mood: nervous

intothewood

Thanks for all of your replies to my questions about reading within your genre and word counts. Seems like most of you keep track of counts on a professional level, to help you gage progress, story type and whether something should be reexamined for content - all good reasons.

I don't take a very professional approach with my own material, and I suppose that's a bit out of rebellion and a bit out of denial. I've written professionally for years under deadlines and word counts and slogging through content that I'd rather poke out my eyes than deal with, so I tend to go to the other extreme and ignore rules with my own stuff. That's something I'm trying to resolve.

More questions:
Do you write to meet the standards of the market, or do you just go with your heart and hope someone gives your work a chance?

How do you think the book industry fares in terms of accepting original material, and are changes to the market and how consumers are choosing their titles affecting that? Is it better or worse than the music and film industries, or on par?

analect

We're one month old, people. Yay. Thank you to those who've taken the time to introduce yourselves and start making the place feel cosy, and thank you to those who've joined up, even if you haven't posted. I see you. Oh, yes. I shall put down a saucer of milk and just wait...

So, two things. Invite codes: I have some. If you would like to join, or have friends you want to herd over here, but you/they need an invite code for dreamwidth, let me know.

Secondly, while I'm paying attention, if anyone has requests, suggestions, anything like that - tags the comm needs, things you think need changing, a monthly prompt thing you want to run, whatever - add a comment here and wave the idea around. Don't be shy.

Thanks!

Current Mood: tired
Current Music: Cactus: Cactus Music

intothewood

I'm wondering....

Do you all read within your genre?
I won't do it because I don't want to be influenced in any way, but I will watch films within my genre, and I listen to a lot of music for inspiration.

I believe

duskpeterson mentioned tracking word counts - do you do this?
I can't do word counts, because it would drive me mad. People ask me how many words I've written on a specific piece - I don't know, and I don't want to know. I guess it makes me feel like I'm assigning worth to what I've written by a quantity, and I don't want to do that. When I reach the end I'll look to see what I have purely as a gage within common classifications in the book industry, but I hate doing even that much.

I think of books like Notes From Underground or Death in Venice that have relatively small word counts and would be classified as novellas, but what does that mean? That they're less valuable in some way? As profit margins, yes. As stories, they're massive. It bothers me.

intothewood

Okay, well, my profession and obsession has always been writing. I was an editor/story writer for an organization up until about a year ago, when I was laid off. I always did need a kick in the pants, so I took that as a big old flashing neon sign stating I best quit whining about a lack of time and energy to devote to my own stuff, and get to writing.

I picked up and old piece I had begun many years ago, something I had always intended to be a novel, but was forgotten in the shuffle of life. I read what I had, which was about 1/3 complete. To my surprise, I liked it and I was inspired. A series was born of that first effort. Two books later, I’ve begun work on the third. I am in my glory.

To keep my hand in and keep up my interviewing skills, I also do volunteer writing of profile pieces for an organization. I have yet to seriously pursue getting my own stuff published, partially because I’m not ready and partially for a lack of reputable resources and support for what I’m doing. I don’t want to get pigeonholed, but everyone dearly loves a label.

A switch to novels was eye opening, as I’d previously mainly written one-offs of boysmut to entertain my friends. I often wrote based on storyline requests from friends, and I loved the challenge to create something beautiful and thought provoking with lots of hot sex driving the plot. So to speak. I still center around gay characters, with less smut and more philosophical leanings.

I came to Dreamwidth to build relationships that are focused primarily on writing. I have other communities elsewhere that serve other purposes, but this piece was lacking. I have always shied away from writer’s communities because of preconceived notions and a lack of focus. I hope that will change as things progress.

analect

I wasn't going to post this, but then I decided a) there's actually a relevant point about self-publishing here, and b) if I go first, it stops anyone else feeling awkward about shameless self-promotion. So... yes. Ahem. *shuffle*

( Plug behind the cut. )

Current Mood: tired
Current Music: Mighty Baby - Blanket in my Muesli

scarylady

Hiya all.

I have a question for you, if you'll indulge me. I'm planning my next, long, chaptered fanfic, and as I'm making my initial forays into writing it I'm strongly feeling that, to get the style and feel right, I want a third-person, present-tense Prologue, and a third-person past-tense Rest of Fic.

Is this allowable? Or is it sloppy? I would prefer not to write the entire thing in present tense, but the Prologue is resisting all my efforts to re-write it into past tense.

analect

All right, I figured it was time for a discussion thread. Thought we might throw one of these around every week or so and see where it gets us. Please feel free to make more, and better ones.

In the meantime, your opinions: show me them!

( Do main characters have to be sympathetic, or even likable, to serve their purpose in a story? )

Current Mood: ditzy
Current Location: Behind the coffee vat.
Current Music: Humble Pie - I Don't Need No Doctor

jocieness

*Waves* I'm Jocie and I'm glad I just happened upon this community. Through a friend, I found DW and just a few days ago. Just now I decided to explore the site a bit so I did: Explore: Random Journal, which led me to find Analect's journal. While skimming it I found writerslounge as it was mentioned in her post.

I' m very glad for where the randomness led me! I truly love writing. I want to make it a serious part of my life and I think it's great finding people, places, communities and so forth that have the same love of writing and encourage one another.

So I hope I can be of help if anyone needs it and I know I sure will need it a lot.

Looking forward to new friends.

Current Mood: sick
Current Location: Sister's Room
Current Music: Silence

scarylady

Hiya, I'm Karen and I've been writing for less than year. Everything I've ever read or watched, every game I've ever played has triggered ideas in my mind, but I tried writing about 25 years ago and gave up in disgust after one page because my dialogue was so goddawful. Somewhere in the last 25 years of not practicing, I improved; so when the game Dragon Age got so far into my imagination that I couldn't resist any longer, I found that, actually, my writing's no longer so bad that it made me want to ritually sacrifice it at midnight and bury the remains on unhallowed ground.

One year and 300k words of fanfic later, I cautiously stuck my toe into the waters of original fiction and wrote an erotic short story. Much to my astonishment it sold instantly to an online anthology. Hopefully more to come soon!

I'm 46, married and I live in England. No kids; I cheerfully had myself removed from the genepool at the earliest opportunity. I've been a live-role-player for a good 15 years or more (hence the icon, that's me at an event), so character immersion comes quite naturally now.

I like to write complicated politics, character growth and smut. Preferably non-het, non-vanilla smut.

So, that's me in a very small nutshell. Nice to meetcha! *waves to everyone*

analect

A list of useful, interesting, or otherwise noteworthy books for writers, with an emphasis on the craft and practice of writing. Got your own to add? Leap in!

( Things to make your wallet groan behind the cut )

Current Mood: awake
Current Music: Take the Cash (K.A.S.H.) - Wreckless Eric & Amy Rigby

noctuary

I actually joined Dreamwidth to have a place to keep a writing record. That is to say, a place to procrastinate a little and to nag myself to write. I'm actually very new here, so please do bear with me. I am very glad to find this group, (and also quite glad that it's a new one... because I'd feel a bit shy coming into a long-established group, I think). This is exactly what I am looking for. So, thank you for making it.

I scribble the odd short story (some of which might appear on my dw) and the odd poem, and I'm working on finishing a novel. Most of the first draft has been finished, and I'm going through and editing right now, although the entire end of it needs to be rewritten and another 20k or so words tacked onto the end. So there's a lot of work yet to do. I hadn't anticipated editing would be quite so difficult. On paper, it's just reading and correcting as you go. For some reason it takes a lot of mental effort. Explaining that it's more difficult than it seems does not go down well with family.
( More me under cut. )

So, there it is! I am pleased to be here and shall be pleased to get to know you all. Do stop by my journal for more info on me.

analect

Right. Intro post.

*wave*

( Wurbling about myself restrained behind the cut )

The idea for this community came about because I believe there are too many divisions among writers. We share so much of our world-view (hey, we consider it normal that there are little people in our heads, dictating things and making demands…), yet it’s hard to actually find writers’ groups that promote free, frank discussion that’s genuinely helpful.

Let’s try to redress that. Treat this comm as somewhere to share as much or as little as you like, and talk about the trials, tribulations and other things starting with 't' that you face as a writer. Got a tip or resource to share? Great! Want some help or advice? Throw it open for discussion. Once we're settled in, I'm hoping some of us will even feel brave enough to offer up some work for critique or workshopping. Hey, it might end up being fun.

Obviously, it's still early days. The plastic wrap is still on the furniture, but hopefully we can make something out of the place. Any suggestions, requests, etc. re: layout, tags, anything else, gimme a shout. Also, if anyone fancies taking on modship, please wave. I live behind my keyboard, except for the times I fall off the end of the world and have bad CFS spells (aka M.E., or 'yuppie flu'), when I'm not around for a few days, at which point it would be useful to have someone else to make sure nothing explodes in a big fiery ball visible from space.

Okay... your turn!

Current Mood: cheerful

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The Writers' Lounge

About

The Writers' Lounge is a friendly, informal chat, crit, discussion and resources group.

Have questions or want to discuss something? Fire away! Want some feedback on a piece of writing you're working on? Post it! Stuck with research, or found a fabulously useful resource others might benefit from? Step up and share!

We expect a level of maturity in our members, but we're open to all genres and levels of experience. Read full details on the comm profile or, if you need help, contact your friendly mods,

intothewood and

analect.

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The Writers' Lounge

A chat, crit, workshop, and support group for writers of original fiction.

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Writing Tools - Which Do you Use/Not Use?

Dixploitation: thoughts on gay fiction. m/m & yaoi

Greetings...

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One month old! Woo!

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Dead in Time paperback ships to Amazon

A question on tenses: what is acceptable, and what makes people point accusingly.

Discussion: Sympathetic Characters

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February 2013

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