A Big Post on Writing, Collaborating, Getting Published, etc.

Prompted by a question in the shoutbox, I thought I'd talk a bit about creative writing and places to get your writing seen and maybe one step closer to being published.

A disclaimer: I'm not a published author, I only write creatively for fun.

Writing programs

When it comes to actually writing, you're going to find you prefer one word processor over another. If you don't have one, you can download Open Office for free, which does many of the things Microsoft Word does.

If you're going to be collaborating, consider signing up for a google account and using Google Docs. Google Docs allows more than one person to work on a single document - at the same time! You can see what the other person has been writing and vice versa. Even if you're not collaborating, if you're looking for someone to edit your work, GDocs is a nice way of e-mailing a document to multiple people.

A lot of writers I know use Write or Die as a persuasive tool to get them writing. Basically if you haven't typed a character in a while it blares out awful music until you start writing again. The theory is it will get the creative juices flowing (or something!)

Writing sites:


So you've written something and you think it's okay. What's next? You probably want people to read it.

Ink Pop is a creative writing forum for teens run by HarperCollins (a publisher). The top five projects on the site actually get read by editors so it might be a good way to get your writing seen. That being said, I've never used the site so have no idea if it's easy to upload your work, comment, etc.

Fiction Press.com is another place to upload your work and read other people's. It's fairly huge (over a million users) so you might find an audience there.

There are LOTS of other places to post writing (livejournal.com has a fairly large writers community, for instance). Poke around the internet and see what niche you can find. Comment on other people's stories and become part of a writing community. It's also helpful to find someone who will edit your writing - at first it's going to be a bit painful getting all that criticism but it's going to make you way better.

Getting published:


There are a lot of levels of getting published. For instance, What If magazine is a literary magazine for Canadian teens that you can submit things to.

If you win the Power of the Pen contest here at HPL, we will also publish your writing in our magazine and on our website.

If you're looking to publish something like a novel, Kiersten White (author of Paranormalcy) has published a guide to getting published here.

There are also lots of books like The Essential Guide to Getting Published at the library.

But really, the most important thing is to actually write. No one is going to publish the novel that you don't write. (Right?)

P.S. If you have favourite sites, tips, etc. Please feel free to leave them in the comments box!