Writing Groups: David Farland's Writer's Groups

It's funny how I come across resources some days. The other day I was perusing Deana Barnhart's blog. I love reading her "Firsts Fridays" interviews. She recently interviewed Robin Weeks, and in that interview I learned about David Farland.

David Farland is a bestselling science fiction and fantasy author, and a writing instructor, who counts authors like Stephanie Meyer (of Twilight fame) among his students. He founded a forum, David Farland's Writer's Groups, where writers could join together for feedback and encouragement.

Writers who join the group get to specify the type of group they'd like, depending on size, genre and sub-genre, the audience they write for, how frequently they'd like critique, experience, length of submissions, and content. This helps to fashion a group that specifically meets that writer's needs. Members can ask to join an existing group, or recruit for a new one. Beyond critique groups, there are many other topics: compare your first page to others, discuss writing software, daily writing prompts, and many more.

But that's not all. Connected to the forum is another website (not requiring a sign-in), called Farland's Author Advisory Conference Calls. On this site, once or twice a month, an author is interviewed via conference call. Readers can dial in and listen live, asking questions if they want. If you've missed a call, the highlights are posted on the site, along with a recording of the entire call. 

I spent a wonderful hour the other day, listening to an interview with author Aprilyyne Pike. I had some papers to organize, so I played the interview while I worked (interviews can also be downloaded to your computer for playing on an iPod). You might be interested in this particular interview, as Pike explained in detail how she learned to plot and outline her books from a master author. Highly recommended.

I can't wait to listen to more of the interviews. The right side of the site lists the upcoming interviews through December. Several of them are going on my calendar.

So thank you Deana Barnhart and Robin Weeks! It would have taken me a lot longer to find these sites without you!

Are you a member of an online writing group? If so, which one?