Take a story by a writer you really, really admire - preferably a short short story that won't take for ever to reproduce. Analyze it in minute detail: from word choice to sentence length. Now, choose a different setting and different characters with different dreams from that of the originals, and write a copycat story, following the exact structure and tone of the original.
I've belonged to this for more than ten years. It is a huge community of people who write, at all levels of experience. Mostly Americans, but many from all around the English-speaking world. There is a free course you can do to see if you like it, before paying to join. If you join, there are many interest groups, self-moderated. I belong to one focusing on literary short story writing, invitation only, full at the moment and not taking members. There are groups writing every kind of genre you can think of. The standard varies hugely from group to group, and from course to course.
I spent ages one day checking the dates on my spices and tossing out the ones that were old. At the end of that time I had no writing and lots of empty spice bottles - in alphabetical order. I loved this article. I'm sticking to short stories. Novels sound even more horrifying to try to produce.
Great software for drafting - much easier to use than MS Word for longer pieces of writing. It's worth downloading the trial and setting aside some time to play with the tutorial.
This is the home site for AWM. Each Wednesday night they invite people to write for an hour together, via Facebook. I think you don't need to be a member to join in.
I use dropbox.com. I think it's a similar concept to box so I would be interested if anyone has any insight into the pros and cons of each. I've found using the cloud for storage particularly handy as I work on different computers at home and work - the cloud is a lot harder to lose than a usb.
They are similar, but as I understand it the differences are:
Box is great for sharing and collaboration - perhaps better at it than Dropbox, with more collaborative functions. But you need web access to use it properly. If you just use it for regular back-up that's fine.
Dropbox synchs files between your computer and the cloud so you always have access even when not online. That's critical for me. I work in my files on my machine/device and Dropbox backs it up for me immediately, so I don't have to think about it.
Google Drive/docs is another option.
Depends on your needs.
I use Dropbox for pictures and Google Drive for text, in essence. The benefit of Google Drivein my opinion is that it ties in (almost) seamlessly with Google's online word processing tools.
Agreed. Simple to use and really terrific for online collaboration. Slightly different concept as the files aren't natively in Word or Excel or whatever, but still very handy.
Site listing huge number of writing opportunities. Used to be free but recently became necessary to pay to join. Weighted towards the US, but does list Australian opportunities, such as anthologies. Basically world wide publishing opportunities.
Interesting....... 'All writers are vain, selfish, and lazy, and at the very bottom of their motives there lies a mystery. Writing a book is a horrible, exhausting struggle, like a long bout of some painful illness.' George Orwell, with his breezy advocacy of a very British 'common sense', often seems as much crackpot as savant.