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I don't mean writers' circles, or "auditioning sites", although some of these have forums tacked on as a by the by. Usually places to talk about the beardy philosophy of writing are moribund places as many writers are just not joiners.

Does anyone know of a healthy writers' community that talks about the imponderables of writing and does polls etc.? I am particularly interested in one for writers of genre fiction and ones with a particular bent towards storytelling and experimentation in that field but I'm sure that Writing SE's lit fic authors and technical writers could benefit from knowing if there are communities for them too.

(Incidentally I know also about Nanowrimo. I find many of the healthy discussion among Nano participants is all about getting that 50k done, not my issue I can get stuff done, I mean something like experimental role playing forum "The Forge" but for storytellers.)

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  • Related: Are there any places to have community story development?
    – Goodbye Stack Exchange
    Commented Jan 4, 2011 at 14:41
  • @neilfein: Nice. But that kind of is experimental writing as opposed to being about experimental writing. But interesting stuff!
    – One Monkey
    Commented Jan 4, 2011 at 16:15
  • Have you thought about an in-person local writers' group?
    – justkt
    Commented Jan 4, 2011 at 20:41
  • @justkt: I've joined many writers' groups over the years and they are always critique circles. I'm talking about an online place like this that deals with polls, discussions, broad subjectivity etc.
    – One Monkey
    Commented Jan 5, 2011 at 10:16

5 Answers 5

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NaNoWriMo forums are pretty good. They're generally fairly slow during the off-season though. Their IRC chatroom, however, is always busy year round. I hang out there quite often an it's a great place to chat with other writers.

There are tons of good groups for writers on Goodreads. There are groups for every genre and a lot of them have specific areas for writers to talk with each other and interact with readers.

The Young Writer's Society is also a pretty good place for 21 and under. There are places to chat and discuss with other writers and there are also places to post poetry/shorts/novels for critique and feedback.

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  • I wish I was 21 and under... but I shall check out the others.
    – One Monkey
    Commented Jan 4, 2011 at 16:15
  • 1
    excellent post Ralph, I took the liberty of adding links to these forums!
    – Jeff Atwood
    Commented Jan 4, 2011 at 20:52
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AbsoluteWrite is another forum that looks interesting. There are sub-forums for different interest areas, publishing, genres, etc.

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  • 1
    AbsoluteWrite is an excellent resource.
    – JSBձոգչ
    Commented Jan 5, 2011 at 0:00
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Forward Motion is a community with lots of forums for discussions about business and craft (and other things), writing challenges/exercises/marathons, posting goals or submissions and rejections to cheer on other writers, chat rooms, critiques, articles... You can participate in any or all.

It's free and is open to any genre of fiction, though my impression is that most people there are genre writers (SF, fantasy, romance, mystery). It was founded in 1998 and is still going strong.

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I have found genre forums very rewarding.

For example, I write Science Fiction and I am a member in two SF Forums. I have found that SciFi Fans are enthusiastic and quite capable when I need help with writing SF. Plus, they don't have any reservations (as this site has) with brainstorming ideas and other "off topic" topics.

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  • Just to have it said: There is nothing really wrong with brainstorming online. It's just a poor fit for a question and answers model. Rather than try to shoe-horn something into a format that is a poor fit for it to begin with, Stack Exchange's model is to just not try, and to rather be as good as possible at Q&A. Both have their place, and not everyone likes the Q&A format better, and that's fine. People are different. (I for one happen to like the stricter Q&A format, but that doesn't mean I dislike open-ended conversation.)
    – user
    Commented Feb 7, 2018 at 12:58
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For a British slant you could try the community at Writers & Artists.

From their overview

  1. Ability to share thoughts and ideas with other writers

Also there is a thriving literature community at DeviantArt. Visit the Literature Forum or join one, two or ten of the Literature Groups.

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