Postscript to 'Cold, is Wisdom'

I've mentioned writer forums a few times as I've gone along, and I did so again in a recent post. Seriously, these days an unpublished writer must expose their work to opinion, and writer forums are the best medium for doing this. It's pretty hair-raising having a bunch of guys you hardly know kicking seven bells out of your masterpiece, I can tell you. But you must do it, and you must give your opinion on the work of others. It helps enormously, and you won't regret it, I promise you.
In time, though, the novelty and hard work wears off and it wears you down. And no matter how good a writer you become, and no matter how good you are at critiquing the work of others, there is a limit. A shelf life applies - and it applies to everyone. You have to watch for this, be aware of this. Never let it go on too long. Your own writing must never suffer, which it will if you stay a part of forums for too long. All forums must recycle their writers and critiquers. If they don't, something is going wrong.
My time in forums was largely productive and happy, and I did get some lovely emails from people who believed they got published after taking on my advice. This was for short story work at Critters, as Critters is/was primarily a short story forum. I don't get emails any more from Bedtime-Story; it's a dead site, and I can't change my email address on the reader contact option. Jeez, I had some marvellous feedback over time, and one Italian guy thought my Christmas story was the 'bees kneeze' as he put it when his grandson had just been born and he was going to save it for when he was old enough to understand it - it still makes me smile to think of it. But it was all practice, and that is what you have to remember: it is all practice, real practice. At some point, you have to stop. I will never exchange my experiences for anything, and I've had some really rocky moments for sure. Forums will never hold the same attraction as they used to, but I'd advise any unpublished writer to find one and put themselves out. There are two such forums on my 'links' list - Critters and Litopia. Join them both. You won't regret it.