Writing can be a lonely profession. We often work on our own, toiling alone for hours at a time, sending our work into what can feel like a marketplace vacuum, and waiting for feedback that can be hurtful, even brutal. It’s hard, and our solitude makes it harder. Yes, we have loved ones on whom we can lean for support, but there’s no substitute for talking these things out with people who understand the process and the pain, the toil and the isolation.

Today’s Quick-Tip Tuesday post at Magical Words is about writing communities — conventions, retreats, crit groups — and the benefits they bring to writers of all levels. I’m recently back from ConCarolinas and the Roaring Writers 2016 Retreat, where I led critiques and taught, and I have a new writing group in my town, so this topic has been on my mind lately. I hope you enjoy the post, which you can find here.

Keep writing!