Hello, everyone. I've stalked this forum for a bit now and finally signed up because I learned so much about writing just by viewing threads from afar and figured I could learn more by actually participating here and there. A bit more about me: I'm from sunny South Africa, happily married and a new mom. I never thought I could write anything until I wrote a fanfiction years ago and got great feedback from some internet friends. I know they were just being sweet but the act of writing was quite fun so I figured I could keep going at it. Sadly, I know nothing about writing and once upon a time thought I could just take a character, throw them into a situation and see what they do. I've learned by now that, while it's great to watch them react as if they are alive, stories tend not to go anywhere specific without proper planning. At least, mine don't. And that's where it all falls flat because I can't plan my way out of a wet paperbag. So, I'm here to absorb wisdom from other writers who successfully broke through their wet paperbags while beating on their chests, much like the Hulk would. That is if the Hulk habitually finds himself in paperbags, I don't know the character all that well to know for sure. I consider myself a humourist. Humour me. I'm horrible at self-deprecation and I will write something and spend twice as long editing all the words right out of it. Also, I have this tendency to sprinkle my forum posts with smilies. You can probably tell that I am fighting the urge to place a huge grin here right now because there's not a smilie in sight. But I mention it in case the old illness starts plaguing me in the posts to come, can't say I didn't warn anyone. That seems to be all I can say for now.
Welcome to Writing Forums, Lunatia! I hope you find what you're looking for here, whatever your interests in writing. This forum aims to provide the best workshopping resources on the internet, and to that end we have a few rules which you should familiarise yourself with before you get stuck in. The main section of the site is the Writing Workshop, where members can post their writing in order to receive critique of their work. However, before we allow members to post their work, they must have met some basic requirements. Firstly, you must have been a member for fourteen days, and have made twenty posts on the forum overall (please note, posts in Word Games do not count towards this). This is so that members, when they post their work, have familiarised themselves with the forums and contributed to them (as well as hopefully learned something for themselves). Secondly, members must provide two constructive reviews of other people's work for each piece of their own that they wish to post. This is because we believe that the focus of workshopping should be equally upon giving reviews as receiving them, as they allow a writer to practice and improve their editing skills, which they can then apply to their own writing. Beyond the Writing Workshop, you will find that we have extensive forums for discussion of aspects of writing, as well as a community area for general discussion. We also run periodic short story and poetry contests, which are good for challenging yourself and expanding your skills. The requirements of the Writing Workshop don't apply to the contests, so new members are allowed (nay, encouraged!) to get stuck in and enter! If you have any questions or problems, then the moderators (myself, Lemex and Dante Dases) should be your first port of call. Any technical problems with the site itself should be directed to Daniel, the site administrator and owner. I would recommend you have a look over the rules so that you know what to expect, and what is expected. But aside from that, I hope you enjoy your time here. Banzai
