Your qualifications as a writer

[AchtungNight]

Curious about what background people here have as writers. Please limit yourself to real world experience. I’ll start with mine.

- Long history of writing stories from a young age, especially fanfics. I’m 44 years old as of this post. I have written adult stories since 1999. My first story detailing graphic sex was published in 2006 and I’ve put out many more since then.

- Long history of writing on the web since the late 1990s. Forums include bulletin boards, email exchanges, chat rooms, fanfic archives, video game walkthrough archives, and other blogs.

- Bachelor’s degree in History, UT Austin. High school diploma. Salutatorian academic graduate of a private police academy. I’ve worked as a factory technician since 2006 and frequently email my colleagues about various concerns. Before that, I was in private security 6 years and regularly wrote incident reports. I tried to get into law enforcement, then changed my career plans. I don’t think I need to explain my reasoning for that.

 

[Sparky74]

Totally honest answer absolutely none, complete first timer
Just hope that somebody will like my first story when I finish it.

 

[AchtungNight]

Totally honest answer absolutely none, complete first timer
Just hope that somebody will like my first story when I finish it.

Give me a link and I’ll gladly do that. Conversation (private messaging) may be preferred. You can also find plenty of editors and beta readers here, separate forum for that. I’m such a volunteer editor too.

 

[alohadave]

I started writing Oct 2023 2022. Hadn't written anything longer than a forum post since English class in the 90s.

 

[Sparky74]

I started writing Oct 2023. Hadn't written anything longer than a forum post since English class in the 90s.

I think my biggest fear is what if no one reads it, when I eventually publish, don't care so much about the comments people will always be nasty.

 

[BarracudaSwordfish]

Wrote here to scratch an itch that had been building for years on long solo walks where my flights of fancy came to me unbidden. Totally self-taught, as is probably very evident.

 

[MrPixel]

Itz cuz eye right gud.

My writing goes back mostly to junior and high school, where I had great teachers in English, Lit and Composition who fostered my style, plus one absolutely terrible teacher who I figured out early was wrong about nearly everything she supposedly taught. "Mrs. Caulk, you wasted thousands of students' time." Memorably bad, in all honesty.

I ate sentence diagramming for lunch, a long-forgotten technique in understanding sentence structure. "5-paragraph" essay format was taught my freshman year, and went a long way towards organizing writing expression into exposition, development, and conclusion. Dr. McKinney my junior year was also a college professor, and brought the zeitgeist of mature creative writing into our high school, which I then followed with a class in composition, which polished things nicely.

College? Not so much. I received "HP" - high pass - in the required English and Lit classes, but that was with little effort on my part. My technique was evidently set in stone. Follow that with jobs in commercial typesetting where I became all too familiar with proofreading and the Chicago Manual of Style, and here we are.

 

[ronde]

Technical degree from a Big 10 university including two classes in formal rhetoric skills.

Long career in engineering for several companies mostly consisting of machine and control system design. This required writing technical reports, equipment specifications and justifications, operating instructions, etc.

Started writing erotica after reading stories here and deciding I could maybe write as well as some of the authors here at that time. Found out I enjoyed it and just kept writing.

 

[AchtungNight]

I think my biggest fear is what if no one reads it, when I eventually publish, don't care so much about the comments people will always be nasty.

All I can tell you regarding this is to remember what people say about leaps of faith.

 

[Djmac1031]

Total amateur.

Before creating stories here, my writing history consisted of some blogging I used to do on a Star Wars site (no, not fan fiction, just talking about collecting, mostly) and one fictional story based on the What If scenario that original Pink Floyd founding member Syd Barrett had never had his mental breakdown and left the band.

What inspired me to write erotic stories here? Boredom, mostly. I started when the pandemic was in full swing.

Read stories here all the time, decided to see if I could write my own.

Really not much more to it than that.

 

[BrightShinyGirl]

I write.

 

[Bamagan]

I started writing Oct 2023. Hadn't written anything longer than a forum post since English class in the 90s.

Welcome to the past, time traveler! Did you bring any lotto numbers with you? I don't even want all six, five will set me up nicely, please and thank you!

 

[SimonDoom]

Not much, in terms of creative writing. I wrote fictional stories for class assignments in high school, but between high school and my first published story at Literotica in December 2016 I wrote no fiction of any kind, and that was a span of over 30 years.

I have a solid background in English literature and grammar. Graduated with high honors from a US university with a degree that was half American literature. Spent a year as a high school English teacher. Have spent the last three-plus decades in a profession that requires writing and research on a daily basis and maintaining a solid command of grammar, spelling, and punctuation. In grad school I was the chief managing editor of a professional journal and my job was to oversee other editors to make sure the articles conformed to the appropriate grammar, citation, and style conventions. It's fair to say that since middle school I've been writing constantly, continually using and absorbing various grammar and style guides sitting on shelves within arms' reach. I've also been an avid reader of American and English literature of all types since I was a kid.

I felt good about my ability to write competently in English but always yearned to try fiction, so I finally overcame inertia and procrastination in 2016 to write stories here at Literotica, and it's been a pleasure ever since.

Although my background may suggest the opposite, I think the most important qualities of a good fiction writer are the gift and passion for telling a good story. I think it is a gift, although I think it's one that one can develop with effort. The ability to invent memorable characters and tell a compelling story is far more important than technical expertise. If you feel the passion, don't ever let doubts about your background get in your way. Just write.

 

[Bamagan]

In my other life, I do a bit of technical writing, and considerably more editing of such, mostly for science papers. Because it's technical writing, it's not necessarily great practice for writing erotica, or really anything that non-specialists would want to read. But this serves as a helpful counterbalance when I get tired of reminding researchers that they, too, need commas.

 

[SimonDoom]

Welcome to the past, time traveler! Did you bring any lotto numbers with you? I don't even want all six, five will set me up nicely, please and thank you!

All I can say is that if AlohaDave says "I'll be back," I'm running like hell.

 

[alohadave]

Welcome to the past, time traveler! Did you bring any lotto numbers with you? I don't even want all six, five will set me up nicely, please and thank you!

Hehe. I'm just waiting for the MegaMillions to peak.

 

[SeraphNocturne]

Like so many writers here, I've been writing since I was young--around thirteen or so. Not erotica, largely fantasy. Erotica and romance as a focus came along later. I think at this point I've been writing too long and have received enough compensation as an author, so I can't claim 'amateur' as a title, but I feel I can always learn something new about the craft. Writing as a hobby in my teens was largely done on roleplaying websites using fictional characters and creating stories with other collaborators, everything from world-building unique environments to dabbling in fanfiction.

I source my avid reading habit in my younger years as my primary influence, that and some very attentive English and Literature teachers, who aided in cultivating my ability to string a sentence together. I've had more than a few of them point me in the direction of writing through my youth, but only recently have I begun to get more serious about it and actually look toward a future as a proper, published author.

In the meantime, I'm here on Literotica (my second or third stint I think, since I was eighteen) for little more than fun pastime and mingling among other authors. I'm active on a handful of other writing websites beside Literotica, though sometimes it's hard to make sure I'm distributing my attention fairly.

 

[TxRad]

I did some assignment writing back in high school but that was on stone tablets that have sat out in the rain so they are hard to read. Flights of fancy thoughts made me into a storyteller. My first real try at real writing had to wait until computers came along. I couldn't type worth a shit and my handwriting was unreadable after a half hour. My first story started out as a memory from my past. 287 pages later it was a novel.

 

[AchtungNight]

Thx to everyone so far. I’m a lifelong avid reader too.

 

[mirafrida]

Qualifications seems like a funny way to think about it. Most writers aren't 'qualified,' right? I mean, you can get MFAs and stuff. But my impression is that most fiction writers just like writing, and then actually sit down and do it, and then find some outlet and audience for it, and it ends up providing enough reward (of whatever kind) that they continue doing it.

I never expected to be a writer. I'm not dumb, and read a lot, and have been good at school/professional writing, but my imagination and creative spark is... workmanlike at best. So I never expected to write any kind of fiction.

Then I hit a point where I was frustrated that relatively little stuff on Lit hit my particular weird kinks, and was also in search of some erotic catharsis, so I tried it. And I found I enjoyed it, and people sometimes liked my stories and posted comments I enjoyed reading, so I've kept doing it.

But I don't remotely think of myself as 'qualified.' I think I'd enjoy writing fiction more generally, but don't kid myself that I have something important or artistic or compelling to say that would merit people reading what I produced...

 

[KeithD]

university professional certificates in editing and publishing, former managing editor of a news agency, a senior foreign policy analyst for the U.S. government, owned an editorial and publishing consulting business for twenty years, some 230 published titles in the marketplace, over 1,600 stories across accounts here on Literotica.

 

[Euphony]

Qualifications seems like a funny way to think about it.

"Qualifications" seemed like poor word choice. Doubtful it was actual gatekeeping but, as it's often a tool of those types, it carries certain connotations even if contradictory to the intent.

Existence, and the need to navigate that torture chamber, is more than enough justification to be a "writer." That's not to say there aren't levels of technical proficiency and if communicating your ideas/thoughts/perspectives on a concept ranks high on your needs list, nailing down the fundamentals will pay dividends far greater than your time investment.

But ultimately, everyone is a writer. Some only to page. Some all the way to publish. Some only within the confines of their head.

Writing is storytelling with a tangibility twist for garnish. Human beings are inherently storytellers. Writers found an efficiency to carry storytelling further.

Stories deserve to be told.

 

[BobbyLaker]

None really, other than a somewhat vivid imagination.

 

[dmallord]

My impetus to write began during Covid and lockdown. Long retired and living a life of solitude became even more so at that point. Bored to tears, I sat down and wrote about some life experiences, and it grew from there. I have no background in writing anything other than some required college work and thesis - just an avid reader until I found this site and wrote a couple of things. People seemed to be nice in their comments, so I wrote a few more; about 48 now. I was pleasantly surprised quite a few readers enjoyed them. [Edit] I still get comments about grammar and 'get an editor,' so I contacted a Lit editor and work with a nice guy who fixes my homographs, etc - Kenjisato.]

 

[Comshaw]

Writing qualifications? I are smart! I are a author! Okay, I'll behave myself, which is a chore for me.

In high school, I wrote a few stories for Lit class and did well. I was a 4.0 student up until the time life kicked me in the ass. Fast forward many years and I took a creative writing class at our local community college. The first story I ever wrote for that class I entered into a local writing contest a won first place. Funny but since then I haven't been able to even place with any of my later (3) entries. I was promoted at my job from Lead Mechanic to Fleet Manager. In that position I wrote a lot of extensive memos and equipment specifications for contracts as well as lots and lots of emails to other Division/Department heads. I've been writing erotic tales for 25 years or so.

There are a lot of authors here who submit free stories to Lit but also write for a business, for profit. I envy that but not enough to try it. I am an unabashed hobby writer. I write a story because I want to when I want to write it. Most of my work has been accepted rather well by the readers, which I believe is the best qualification for any author.

Comshaw