Notes For October 9th, 2009

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Vote For Us Again!

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As you know, the Internet Writing Workshop - http://internetwritingworkshop.org/ - won last year's Writer's Digest award for being one of the 101 Best Websites For Writers. Now, we need your vote for this year's award!

Scroll down to the very bottom of this page, and you'll find our nomination box. Click on the link, and an e-mail window will pop up with the correct address and subject line. All you have to do is type in your letter of nomination and send it.

The deadline for sending in your nomination is January 1, 2010. We thank you very much for your support, without which, the Workshop would not have become the valuable writing resource that it is.

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Quote Of The Day

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"We live in a world ruled by fictions of every kind - mass merchandising, advertising, politics conducted as a branch of advertising, the instant translation of science and technology into popular imagery, the increasing blurring and intermingling of identities within the realm of consumer goods, the preempting of any free or original imaginative response to experience by the television screen. We live inside an enormous novel. For the writer in particular it is less and less necessary for him to invent the fictional content of his novel. The fiction is already there. The writer's task is to invent the reality." - J.G. Ballard

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Vanguard Video

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Today's video features a two-part presentation on setting up a properly formatted manuscript with your word processor. Though Word is used here, the advice in this presentation can be used with any word processing software. I use OpenOffice Writer myself. Enjoy the show!

A Testimonial: Why the IWW is One of the Best 101 Writer's Sites

Novel critique list member Bill Brier writes ...

I'm just finishing my first novel, Grayson's War. I spent over two years working entirely on my own. Struggled with the plot and the writing. Altered the plot, added, subtracted, shifted -- a million changes. It took ages just coming up with metaphors and similes, dialogue, research -- all that stuff. For me, it was a one person job. Many rewrites and lots and lots of thinking.

For my way of thinking, all that had to be done before subbing. (Of course I didn't even know subbing existed -- and am now happy for it.)

When I finished the complete story I began subbing and made many changes based on critiques. Hundreds of changes -- many hundreds. I even changed the first chapter three times. (So much for subbing that first chapter right away. By the time the last chapter is written the first chapter may have to be totally changed.) It turns
out, I believe, that I was fortunate in doing it that way, because no one else knew the story as well as me, and premature input would have had me flying in who knows how many directions. Besides, I'm the author.

After three months of running all fifty chapter through the subbing gauntlet, and making changes, I'm now completing a second run through doing fine-tuning and plot fixes that were still screwed up.

I can't rave enough about the quality of critiques I've been fortunate to have received. As our beloved Elma once said to me, writing is a collaborative effort. So true.

I have found this method to be beneficial and efficient, and intend on repeating the process with my next novel -- Grayson's War, the Sequel.

Next step -- where's that New York agent?

The IWW Is Honored Again as One of the Best

Writer's Digest Magazine annually names the "101 Best Sites" for writers. The IWW made the list last year, and as recently announced, was again honored in the current list.
Writer's Digest Best Websites of 2008

Whether you’re looking for quotes, advice, markets, critiques—or just a place to meet other writers online—we’ve got you covered. Our annual roundup of websites is here, so grab your computer and start surfing.

by Brian A. Klems

Type the word “writer” into the Google search engine and it’ll bring up an astonishing 243 million websites—and no, we’re not exaggerating. The idea of sifting through all of them can make your head spin like the child in The Exorcist—especially when all you need is a little copyright advice. Where to begin, where to begin, where to begin …

• Read the entire article here.

Finding the IWW

• I found your writing group through www.underdown.org.
• I found out about you through Google.com
• I learned about IWW viat the "Poets and Writers Speakeasy."
• I found you : http://www.writing-world.com/links/critique.shtml
• You were found in a nondescript yahoo search.
• I have a creative/writing blog listed below and I believe I originally found you through Blogger while looking for fellow writers on the Blogger network.
• I have been looking for an online writing group for some time now, but unsuccessfully until this last week's Willamette Writer's conference in Portland. I found you by checking out one of their forums on online writing groups; it was very outdated BUT someone had posted your link there. I'm cautiously optimistic!
• I found your site at http://www.writing-world.com/links/critique.shtml, which I found using StumbleUpon.
• After finally getting one to a point where I thought it was publishable, I searched Google for children's writers critique groups and found your site.
• He originally heard about IWW on an old Pony Express flyer he found many years ago, but has a link to IWW on his blog, so it was easier this time to find the site and sign up.
• I don't quite remember how I found IWW. It must have been from my many google searches, hunting for exactly this. So I really am happy to have found you.
• I found this group looking for a place that i could submit my work and get feed back so as to imporve a skill that I think I can be quite well at with some effort and help.
• I found the list via Google.
• This list was highly recommended to me by a writer-friend.
• I found you on the suggestion by Mary C. Nelson of Sharon, MA, who is a member of one my local writing groups. Mary is also a member of IWW.
• As to how I found you, I really don't recall as I've had you in my 'favourites' list for some time, although it was probably from a Google search.
• On the WD list of 101 websites for writers.
• I found you by Googling writing workshop.
• I found the IWW the old-fashioned way, through google.
• I found your site from the Writer's Digest 101 Best sites.
• maxbarry's website.
• I found your site while searching the internet for a YA writing group.

IWW Named One of the 101 Best Websites

The administrators noticed an uptick in membership applications recently, and we discovered that the Internet Writing Workshop had been named one of the "101 Best Websites for Writers 2008." The official email arrived recently.

Congratulations! You have been selected as one of the "101 Best Websites for Writers 2008" by Writer's Digest. Along with being featured in the June issue of Writer's Digest, your site is also linked on our website. Let your users know about your success by posting the attached award image to your site.* We are now accepting nominations for next year's list. Ask your users to nominate your site for 2009 by sending their nomination to this link with "101 Websites" as the subject line. January 1, 2009 is the deadline. Congrats on the nomination and thanks for providing such great services to the writing community.

• *The logo is displayed in the right-hand information column.

I found you guys through Writer's Digest 101 Best Websites.

• I found you guys through Writer's Digest 101 Best Websites.
• I did an Open University Creative Writing course, and I got a lot out of it - especially the writing group and critique side of things. But I've let things slide since then. So I came across your group and thought that I could contribute.
• I learned about you through the Internet Review of Books.
• I recently joined a YahooGroup IAG (Independent Authors Guild) and a post had a link to you.
• I was referred by a most precious friend.
• I have reviewed your website and am very interested in joining your group.
• I found this website by doing a yahoo.com search for online writing critque websites.
• I found the IWW site while poking around on the internet in search of just such a place.
• I found you by following a few links off of other links, but I do not know the direct connection.
• A search engine led me to your site.
• I found you through a general search.
• This list was recommended by a friend.
• Internet search.
• There I was skipping around the Internet, looking for information on investigative poetry as a flash fiction technique, clicking one link after another, bouncing into cyber stars and I tripped over a group called the IWW.
• I found your site from a website called Children's Writing Resources.
• I found this list via WWW search.
• I was introduced to your site by a member of my local writer's group who makes a living as a freelancer with local and state publications.
• I cannot remember exactly how I found your website but I believe I Googled "young adult writing workshops" and your site was listed on the first page.
• In answer to your query, I recently read on Max Barry's (the Australian writer) website how your workshop had really helped him.
• I completed on On-line writing course with Wendee Holtcamp in May. She recommended that class members join IWW nfiction.
• I read about how valuable the writer Max Barry found your site and am therefore interested in getting involved.
• I stumbled upon the Internet Writing Workshop blog when googling for a website on literary agents, I don't remember exactly what I typed in since I bookmarked it months ago.
• I found this website in the Writer's Digest list of 101 Websites.

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• Send nominations to include The Internet Writing Workshop for next year’s list to Writer's Digest with “101 Best Websites” as the subject (deadline is January 1, 2009).

We Love WRITER'S DIGEST as Much as We Love GOOGLE!

"I found you in writers' digest list of top wrters' websites."

• I found this site by simply punching in Writing Critique Groups in my search engine.
• I just researched online writing groups and found your website.
• I feel I could get much better if someone would critique some of my work, so I looked up this page on an Internet list of critiquing sites.
• I found this list by searching the internet.
• I found this writers group while I was Googling for support, since I am in the middle of a draft and needed moral support.
• I discovered IWW while reading Writer's Digest.
• I found the IWW at http://www.writing-world.com/links/critique.shtml
• I found you in the Writer's Digest.
• I came to your site through IWW Writer's Links.
• I found you by doing a search on google.
• I found this site from a link from a link from critique circle.
• I found your website through Google.com.
• Susie Carlson sang IWW praises and I listened.
• I found out about the workshop through the forwriters internet site.
• I discovered the IWW on Dogpile a few years ago.