Building community of readers and writers

After having a Facebook account for 3+ years and connecting to family, friends and former coworkers, I wondered what I really could accomplish with the thing. I knew it would come in handy when the day came I actually had a book published, but I didn't want to use my own site for that. I plan on having a separate site for anything that has to do with writing and publishing.

But something happened as I delved deeper into social media and waded through the many sites that offer all types of advice on going legacy, going indie, becoming a brand, building a following -- jeez. All I wanted to do was try to get a handle on this stuff.

And Facebook. One of the things that intimidated me when it came to 'friending' on Facebook was, heck, I don't know these people. Why would I want to friend them? And they friend me?

And then Twitter came along, and I realized that becoming a citizen of the Web meant introductions were in order. So how was I going to introduce myself? As a journalist? An editor? A traveler? A veteran? No: I got into all this because the time had come to get my fiction published. It was time to introduce myself as a writer.

And then it all clicked: I was following writers on Twitter, making friends on Goodreads, so when I see that those people have a Facebook account, how about 'friending' them on FB, and .... what?  They don't know me. I don't know them.  But there's one thing we have in common: a love of reading and a love of writing.

Bingo.

So I started the process of finding friends, and the really cool people who accepted, found out the reason why I was contacting them when I was 'invited' to write on their 'wall.' This is what I write: Thank you for helping me build a community of readers and writers.

And now I am friends with novelists, poets, writing instructors, all kinds of people who care about words and reading and books, and it's not for the purpose of selling, for getting a review, for reminding folks of a buy-it-now sale. Now I feel like I'm friends people from across the country and around the world who love writing and ideas and are helping me build a community of readers and writers. To share stuff. To get turned on to new stuff. To remind folks of good stuff already out there.

And I think that's pretty cool.

If you like this idea, just find me at https://www.facebook.com/joe.brewer1
and if you like, follow me on Twitter https://twitter.com/JoeBrewer1

Hope to see ya soon.