Authonomy and Backspace are online writing communities for authors, readers, agents and publishers. Authonomy — developed by book editors at HarperCollins — invites aspiring writers to submit their works and build their online profiles. Readers, agents and publishers are also invited to join the community and support the best new writings.
In similar fashion, Backspace’s mission is based on writers helping writers. This is accomplished through forums, guest speaking engagement from agents and editors and best-selling authors, and how-to articles from publishing experts.
Both sites have forums, but you have to pay for access to Backspace’s forums.
Anyone a member of either of these two? If so, what have your experiences been like?
I’ve heard about Authonomy before. I would definitely be wary of using it however, as it seems to have been created as a marketing exercise for a vanity publisher wing of Collins – see http://howpublishingreallyworks.blogspot.com/2009/04/authonomy-blurb-and-book-army.html and other posts under this blogger’s Authonomy label.
Mark, thanks for the info. I read the article you suggested. I would definitely not use it to self-publish anything I’ve written. I think if I did use Authonomy, I would use it to have readers critique my work. Right now, I’ve only browsed the Authonomy site for a few mins.