Hi everyone! I found this website through a literary agent who told me this was a great site for getting critiques, critiquing others, meeting other writers, etc. I've just finished my first novel, The Stolen Prophecy, and have been querying lit agents for about a month now. It's been such an exciting process so far! I'd love to chat to any other fresh writers, and if anybody is looking for a crit partner feel free to reach out to me!
Hello from Fairbanks Alaska
- Thread starter Isabelrhodes17
- Start date
Congratulations on finishing your novel - so many people never get that far!
There's lots of valuable info around here - I hope you find all the good stuff, but sing out if you get stuck - there's always someone around, and the mods a very helpful.
Enjoy the journey
Hi Isabelrhodes17 & welcome to AW!
That literary agent gave you very good advice! AW is, in my opinion, the premier writing place on the nets. There's more information here regarding all things writing and publishing than you can shake a stick at, and an excellent community to hang out with.
Please carefully read the Newbies Guide you were linked to when you registered, plus the stickied/pinned threads at the top of each forum page. This is highly important. Not only will doing so help you understand the rules of the forum, but you will also learn the etiquette and culture of the various spaces within. Too, you will be helped to avoid potentially embarrassing newbie mistakes.
AW is all about community. You'll notice we have a 50-post requirement before you can start threads in certain places (Share Your Work being one example). The requirement is there to encourage meaningful engagement. Also, if people know you and see you giving to the community they are more likely to then give of their time and energy to critique your work or your queries. Enthusiasm is great (I remember how excited I was when I found AW) but please, please don't rush to fifty posts. Take your time getting to know the place and browsing the resources available. You will likely even find that your writing and other aspects of the craft will jump forward just by doing that.
One great way to engage is to offer critique of your own. If you're querying, for example, then you'll probably discover offering thoughts on the query letters of others will help you strengthen your own. The objectivity of distance, and all that. You can find our Query Letter Hell here. Please peruse the stickies there and in the Intro to Share Your Work room before posting in the critique area.
Take your time exploring, engage with the community, make friends, have fun!
See you around the boards
Izz
That literary agent gave you very good advice! AW is, in my opinion, the premier writing place on the nets. There's more information here regarding all things writing and publishing than you can shake a stick at, and an excellent community to hang out with.
Please carefully read the Newbies Guide you were linked to when you registered, plus the stickied/pinned threads at the top of each forum page. This is highly important. Not only will doing so help you understand the rules of the forum, but you will also learn the etiquette and culture of the various spaces within. Too, you will be helped to avoid potentially embarrassing newbie mistakes.
AW is all about community. You'll notice we have a 50-post requirement before you can start threads in certain places (Share Your Work being one example). The requirement is there to encourage meaningful engagement. Also, if people know you and see you giving to the community they are more likely to then give of their time and energy to critique your work or your queries. Enthusiasm is great (I remember how excited I was when I found AW) but please, please don't rush to fifty posts. Take your time getting to know the place and browsing the resources available. You will likely even find that your writing and other aspects of the craft will jump forward just by doing that.
One great way to engage is to offer critique of your own. If you're querying, for example, then you'll probably discover offering thoughts on the query letters of others will help you strengthen your own. The objectivity of distance, and all that. You can find our Query Letter Hell here. Please peruse the stickies there and in the Intro to Share Your Work room before posting in the critique area.
Take your time exploring, engage with the community, make friends, have fun!
See you around the boards
Izz
Welcome to AW
Take some time and read the Newbie Guide and the Stickies found
at the top of Forum pages. They are your best guide to learning about
Absolute Write.
Stop by the Weekend Progress Report each week to brag about your weekly writing accomplishments. Awesome smilies and awards are given out.
Please read the FAQ about posting photos.
In fact we have lots of brilliant FAQs check them out.
Members who want to start a thread in Share Your Work to have work critiqued need
50 posts. Don’t make a mad dash to reach your 50 posts. That is frowned upon and can lead to your posts being deleted.
Take some time to greet fellow newbies, critique other members’ works, or join a discussion.
Announcements, Events and Self Promotion is for active members only. All obvious spam will be deleted on sight! Here’s how to Promote With Aplomb.
Take some time and read the Newbie Guide and the Stickies found
at the top of Forum pages. They are your best guide to learning about
Absolute Write.
Stop by the Weekend Progress Report each week to brag about your weekly writing accomplishments. Awesome smilies and awards are given out.
Please read the FAQ about posting photos.
In fact we have lots of brilliant FAQs check them out.
Members who want to start a thread in Share Your Work to have work critiqued need
50 posts. Don’t make a mad dash to reach your 50 posts. That is frowned upon and can lead to your posts being deleted.
Take some time to greet fellow newbies, critique other members’ works, or join a discussion.
Announcements, Events and Self Promotion is for active members only. All obvious spam will be deleted on sight! Here’s how to Promote With Aplomb.
Welcome.
Nice of them to do that, even if it's just in the boilerplate "we got your query" notification.
You should probably hold off on querying until you get the critiques and beta readers out of the way, unless you're finishing the first draft of a novel every two weeks or so, and just constantly have stuff going out.
For now, I'd say hang out on AW, get to know the place, get your 50 posts out of the way (which probably won't even take a week), and then you'll be able to use the Share Your Work forum to find beta swaps or critiques.
What's your book's genre, by the way? I'm guessing fantasy or scifi from the title.
Nice of them to do that, even if it's just in the boilerplate "we got your query" notification.
You should probably hold off on querying until you get the critiques and beta readers out of the way, unless you're finishing the first draft of a novel every two weeks or so, and just constantly have stuff going out.
For now, I'd say hang out on AW, get to know the place, get your 50 posts out of the way (which probably won't even take a week), and then you'll be able to use the Share Your Work forum to find beta swaps or critiques.
What's your book's genre, by the way? I'm guessing fantasy or scifi from the title.
It's fantasy! Magical realism more so, if you want to be specific. I've actually had a ton of people read it, critique it, and help edit it. Otherwise I wouldn't have been confident in sending out my query letters. However, I'm excited to check out other writers, and read their work. It'll be cool being apart of a community of fellow word nerds.
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It's great to have a final draft of a novel based on heaps of feedback from knowledgeable readers. But I reckon that a successful query letter requires the same degree of editing, feedback, and polishing.
AW folks can surely help with that, and we look forward to you sharing your expertise in turn.