There’s nothing quite as satisfying as printing out your stories. A pile of bound papers that holds your blood, sweat, and tears. Or clicking that final save on your word document. Pages of your creativity and imagination, complete at last.
But where do they go? Are they left in the drawer to collect dust? Are they kept in your hard drive to be buried? After all the time and effort you had spent, you know your stories are more than checkboxes ticked and later forgotten.
Now you ask: where can your stories go?
The internet gives you limitless possibilities. Publishing your stories online can help you improve your writing and even help in jumpstarting your career! It’s so convenient that you can do it from the comforts of your bed. You’ve already put your ideas into words and typed your imagination into reality.
What’s one more digital click? Really, there are many benefits.
Online Writing Sites
So, you know all of the great things that can come out of writing stories online. You’re curious; you’re excited. You’re ready to ask, where can your stories go?
Don’t worry, we got you covered! Here is a list of only a few of the many writing sites that are waiting for your story!
1. Wattpad
“Where stories live” describes the home that Wattpad offers you. It’s an online community of writers and readers where you can share your stories and discover others. The site encourages not only a mass audience but also media producers as readers to explore their continuously varied and exciting content in the hopes of expanding to different platforms.
2. Commaful
Commaful promises to create a “bite-sized, on-the-go experience” with the stories you share and enjoy. With a picture book reading format and pleasing story trailers, they deliver! The site is the largest multimedia fiction site where you can stretch your creativity to newer and greater lengths. You can take the challenge of writing for their format and grow your style.
3. Archive of our Own
If you’re a fan, you definitely know of Archive of our Own. Shortened to A03, the site welcomes and hosts millions of “transformative and legitimate” fan works to preserve the ever-growing fan culture. AO3 lets you share your love for your fandoms and grow them with other fans, readers, and writers!
Write about anything
Your imagination can bring you anywhere.
As writers, it’s your job and passion to maximize that potential. But, let’s face it, sometimes there are barriers to the reach of your creativity. That can be your professor or boss that’s looking for something different to your story. That can be the friend you asked to peer review, who found a section that’s too sensitive for him. Maybe it’s your own writing insecurity, that little devil on your shoulder asking: is it okay to write about this?
Going online means you have the freedom to write about what you want. Here you can stretch your creative muscles and flex your imagination. You believe you’re in the right position to discuss certain topics. You have done all the appropriate research. Or you just really want to write this crazy crossover between an alien dictator and a unicorn nurse in the fourth dimension. By going online, you can go for it!
Anyone can write
“I was telling the truest story I could,” states Leigh Bardugo, a New York Times Bestselling Author, in an interview about her new adult book where she tackles trigger-warning themes for a larger truth. Writing online provides you an opportunity to do the same because it lacks the marketed curating that mainstream publishing does.
In response to the racial disparity exposed by #PublishingPaidMe, children’s author Malorie Blackman declares, “Your voice, your work, your stories matter.” There is a place for your story and for you, the writer.
Write more than once
But who says you only have one story to tell?
Online writing lets and even encourages you to write more. You don’t have to settle, and you shouldn’t. Novelist Toni Morrison says, “If there is a book that you want to read, but it hasn’t been written yet, you must be the one to write it.” This is your chance to explore themes you haven’t and genres you’re unfamiliar with.
Diversify your stories because we need more of those. Challenge your writing by trying different voices. Aside from that, you’re not the only one. Inspire yourself by reading other online stories where you can test your own limits. By going online, you can grow as a writer!
Full house of readers
Now you know the vast expanse of online writing where millions of stories are shared. And with a great number of stories, comes an even broader audience.
It can be difficult to move your friends to read your manuscript, especially when they’re busy with their own things. It can be challenging to fight that writing insecurity that wonders whether anybody will check out the story you worked hard on.
Writing stories online offers you an audience. They’re waiting for you, quite literally.
Most platforms welcome user accounts. This means readers have an already developed interest for stories and the access to discover them. Best of all, this lets them interact with writers, with you. There are text boxes for comments and buttons to spread likes and kudos. Archive of our Own shares that their rise in page views traffic has reached millions. These are people that read on the daily!
Readers respond to you
With a broad audience, comes sources of feedback. Constructive criticism is important, even required, for every writer. When you share your story online, your readers can become your peer reviewers and your critics. Wattpad even has an inclusive feature called Writer Analytics that breaks down your views, engagements, and demographics.
That can be scary; it’s understandable! From the beginning, your story is yours. It is personal that some writers even call it their baby. But Hank Green, an author and content creator, reminds us that criticism is inevitable and responding to it is something that can be learned!
Receiving feedback about your stories online from unbiased strangers can help you improve. Online writing offers an opportunity for your works to be seen and having new sets of eyes can provide you an angle you didn’t notice or a fresher perspective to you story. It builds your courage towards criticism and your skills in writing.
After all, at the end of the day, we would rather have our stories read and of course, appreciated. Writer Samuel Johnson, adds, “For the worst thing you can do to an author is to be silent as to his works.” Your community of online readers await!
Accessible to everyone
Yes, online writing platforms build a community! We all know just how much the internet connects everybody. It allows you, the writer, to try out the many stories available and be a reader yourself. At the same time, the audience that’s interested in your work can be more than just the average traffic — they can also be your friends.
By writing online, sharing your truest stories is your self-introduction. The friends you can make or the mentor you can discover become part of your writing journey.
It’s a famous idea that writing is done alone but with online writing, you don’t have to anymore! All other writers experience the same frustrations and difficulties as you! What happens after this scene? What is the point of this character? Should the unicorn nurse deny the alien dictator?
There are open forums you can tap into or start engaging through private messages. Going online gives you the writing buddies to share these with so you can work through it together.
You are your own boss
Online writing is easy enough to commit to because it follows your own terms as a writer. No need to impress big agents or countlessly query your manuscript, where rejection can be discouraging especially as a new writer. Online writing allows you to try again and again without question and it’s as simple as uploading document files.
It removes the pressure out of writing because you can write casually and still feel successful. Plus, often the best ideas come when you’re enjoying what you do.
It’s also okay to make mistakes you can learn from! Going online is a practice range where what’s important is to aim again, even when you missed the target the first time around.
Your own deadlines
Deadlines become writer friendly.
With your community or group of writing buddies, you can set up word counts and writing dates to encourage one another reach a completion goal. You can look into Nanowrimo, a writing website and a supportive community that provides real-time tracking and hosts frequent writing events. It’s a helping hand for writers everywhere!
Online writing twists deadlines the other way around too! Maybe writing is more a leisurely pastime for you and assigning numbers to your creativity only makes matters worse. By going online, you can take your time and explore your story at your own pace. You can post whenever and wherever. All of this without the dread of having no readers.
After all, fiction writer, Richard Bach says, “A professional writer is an amateur who didn’t quit.” By going online, you can glow in the way you want to! You no longer need to perfect your writing once or stress over your story alone.
Go online
Writing stories online is a great alternative for writers everywhere. That includes you! With everybody attached to their different devices, writing sites are only growing and expanding their audience. This is a lot of advantage for you venturing into going online.
There’s freedom in what themes and topics you want to write about because of the very few barriers against literature gatekeeping online. As a writer, there’s a place for you without bias; only opportunities to improve your stories and your style. Writing sites let you switch up the genres and pursue a limitless word count. Online writing is trying out different flavors to determine which one works best for you!
Plus, readers are ready to help you with that. Various writing sites hold thousands to millions of readers from all over the world. You can sort through which feedback is effective for revisions or future works, or simply smile over the kind words and thoughtful comments.
Most of the time, these readers are writers too. You share the same passions and interests, struggles and hardships. What’s stopping you from starting a friendship? These writing sites feature community tabs and public threads that act as meeting places to meet these fellow writers and strike up conversation. You can take the extra step of messaging them directly to say hello! Ernest Hemingway says, “The hard part about writing a novel is finishing it.” And that goes with any story, so you deserve people to write with!
These writing sites are here for you, to release your works to a bigger audience! All it takes is a quick search and quicker clicks to be the writer that you dream of being.
Don’t worry. We know it’s a scary change. But with all the benefits we talked about, maybe it’s scarier to say no because that means your manuscript can be left to dust and forgotten in your files. Be today’s writer.
Go online and tell your truest story!
