For Those Who Do This In Person...

[Matt12191982]

Even non-erotica, how were you able to meet, or start a group? I used to be in a Writer's Circle, but the guy who started it passed away.

I once found a woman on Craigslist to talk about men and women, and it was great, but she told me she couldn't match my enthusiasm, and I joked to her a year ago that I'm still waiting for a reply

 

[oggbashan]

I joined Creative Writing classes.

The first one was a disaster. The tutor asked us whether we had had any work published - fiction or non-fiction. Three of the others had published articles in specialist magazines about their hobbies. But I had published academic articles, technical manuals and text books.

I wanted to learn Creative Writing which I saw as a different skill set. My list of publications upset the tutor who kept saying 'This is what you should do - unless [oggbashan] knows better'.

By the end of the first term I felt I couldn't continue. I had made things worse because before I started the course I had entered a local short fiction contest. That contest had been the trigger for wanting to learn to write fiction.

The tutor had also entered, as she did every year. Embarrassingly, my first effort won third prize, and she was unplaced, as usual. I decided not to continue that class.

It was another five years before I tried to join a Creative Writing class again, after checking that it wasn't the same tutor. But many of the students had real difficulty with sentence construction and grammar. It was too basic for me. I spend most of the sessions helping the weaker students or explaining how to use Word.

But I am still in contact with some of the past students from both classes because I used to have a secondhand bookshop in our town and they would drop in for a coffee, chat, and even perhaps buy some books.

 

[KeithD]

I haven't joined any writing groups since the university, because, better or worse, I don't write by committee. I'm sure they help some, but it's best to join one where the others are more advanced then you are and are prepared to look their pronouncements up in recognized authorities to assure you you are being grounded.

 

[AfterDusk]

I haven't been in a writing group since college either (and all those twats moved away and actually did stuff with their lives). It would be interesting if you could find a small group of writers on the AH who wanted to do a virtual writing group, then get together in a chat room or skype or whatever the kids are using to communicate these days and talk shit out.

 

[vanmyers86]

Not long after I relocated, I found a local writers' group through my public library. It is true that the tone and norms of an established group will likely be set in stone before you ever arrive, but mine turned out to be a good group of folks.

There is, of course, nothing stopping you from forming your own writers' group or workshop. The advantage there is you get to set the rules!

Here on Literotica, you can always reach out to writers whose work you admire and see if they are open to talking. Some will be quite open, some will talk within certain parameters, others will not. As long as you are respectful of others' wishes, you should be fine.

Good luck!

 

[Hypoxia]

My writing group worked in COBOL and JCL and, while creative, wasn't exactly entrancing.

 

[ChloeTzang]

I found a local guy who runs creative writing workshops - they're not free, you pay, but the guy is an ex-editor, he also teaches creative writing and he still does editing. He's also very good with contacts in the publishing industry and he runs some great workshops with guest speakers. I went to them weekly for about three years and got a lot out of them. The format was about half the evening where he talked about one aspect of writing, usually with handouts and notes, and the other half were group critiques of each other's writing assignments - and he also reviewed and commented on every piece that came thru, which was probably the most valuable part of it.

I stopped going a year or so ago because I felt I'd got everything I could from the workshops but I still meet regularly for coffee with a couple of the others that go, mainly just to talk about what we're doing. I do go to the occasional one-off workshop he runs where it's a topic that interests me and he also organizes cafe readings and "retreats" a couple of times a year (which I don't go to - I just "retreat" to my desk and put my head down.

The good thing is, he runs different types of workshop sessions, including a series for established writers who are writing novels for publication - those are a bit more intense and demanding and I'm thinking I may give those ones a try later this year. I tried a couple of informal writing groups I found through Meetup (https://www.meetup.com/find/writing/) but they weren't great - mostly old women and hipster-type wannabe literary writers, and it all came across as a bit pretentious. My action-thriller-with-some-hot-sex wasn't quite the style.

But if you do want to find local writing groups, meetup is a good way to find them.

All of that said, I'm thinking of signing up for some online college creative-writing degree course and doing an entry level one to see if it's worth it. On the other hand, I may just get more out of heads-down writing and coffee with my one or two writing buddies.

 

[oggbashan]

One that hasn't been mentioned so far: NaNoWriMo local writing groups.

They get together to encourage each other but can be a diversion from actually completing the NaNoWriMo challenge.