Writer Wednesday: Writing Forward

Writing Forward provides tons of useful information and resources for the new and experienced writer.

At this site you can find writing exercises, ideas, resources, and a section on publishing as well as grammar tips.

Some posts:

Introduction to Getting Published

Tips for Critiquing Others

Proofreading and Editing Tips for Writers

Don’t forget to bookmark it!

Technorati Tags: writer wednesday,authors,tips,resources,published,proofreading,editing,novels,fictions,plot,grammar

 

Wednesday Writer: Write On

Writing Forward provides tons of information for writers of all sorts of genre. You can find pages for creative writing, poetry, news, ideas, prompts, resources, and tips.

Be careful, however, you will find yourself spending hours looking up the articles here.

About Writing Forward

Writing Forward is a creative writing blog packed with tips for better writing. You’ll find articles on grammar, editing, and proofreading, plus tons of writing prompts and exercises to sharpen your skills and help you stay inspired.

Technorati Tags: writing forward,author,poetry,tips,writing rules,publishing,resources,grammar,marketing

Friday Fun Tip: Evernote and note taking

I discovered the wonder of Evernote, and tend to enjoy any note-taking service that helps to make writing easier. As a blogger, I find ideas for topics tend to pop up while I cruise through the Web, or almost anytime I’m doing something. When I realized Evernote has an Iphone app, I was ecstatic.

Now whenever those ideas pop into my head, I can easily jot them down into Evernote. Its free, and pretty easy to understand the concept of notebook and notes. I sort by notebooks, adding notes and links as I need to. You can also add web pages, pictures, and files too.

Another handy note-taking service is Google Notebook. It works much the same way, but I have yet to see an IPhone/Ipad app, or the add-on program that Evernote offers.

Google Notebook is also free, and easy to use. I keep an icon on my web site toolbar.

For writers-

• Keep track of word counts
• Add writer’s prompts and challenges
• Keep track of titles, characters, or even summarize your book by chapters within a notebook.
• Jot down notes as you need to.

For bloggers-

• Keep track of ideas, prompts, and topics to write about.
• Add links to other blogs you want to mention. (I file these under ‘bloggable’)
• Create a blog schedule

Technorati Tags: tips,blog,writer,author,story,fiction,organization,note-taking,evernote,google notebook,online services,links,resources

Blog Mention: Juiced on Writing

I happened upon Juicedonwriting.com while Stumbling the other day, and found it was quite impressive.

Not only can you find a number of useful tips, its easy to navigate and offers articles on subjects such as reviews, publishing, general writing topics, and the author’s personal take on the writer’s life.

I also enjoy the friendly language the blogger uses to speak to me, as if I’m a friend.

She has a wonderful section based on writing productivity I visit again and again. Don’t forget to subscribe to her RSS feed, of which she offers more than one, depending on your preference.

Technorati Tags: juiced,writing,blogger,tips,resources,publishing,author

Related articles

• StumbleUpon traffic doubles in 6 months (venturebeat.com)
• How to Use StumbleUpon: A Step by Step Guide (blogs.sitepoint.com)

Writing Tip- Meeting word counts

Trying to meet word counts, especially for the National Novel Writing Month, you might find yourself falling behind for a number of reasons. A tip I find most helpful is to use writing bursts. Sit with a timer for 10-15 minutes and write as much as you can in that given time. You can always edit later.

Dr. Wicked’s Write or Die online service offers a perfect timer for writers, adding consequences should you not meet a word count goal. You can opt to not have word count goals as well, if you can’t stand the pressure.

Other online timers:

Online Stopwatch- counts up as a stop watch or counts down with an alarm. This can be added to your IGoogle start page.

Meditation Timer works a bit more softly, using a knocking sound to indicate the start, and a soft bell sound to end.

Technorati Tags: tools,tip,productivity,resources,writing,nanowrimo,writer,timer

My favorite writer’s tools

What I use to help me along with writing and ideas;

A regular, purse-sized notebook- The pen and paper method works best for me during moments where I’m waiting in a doctor’s office, or those other moments of pause in one’s life.

Voice recorder- You’d be surprised you may already have this on hand. I discovered my phone, for instance, has a voice recorder, which works wonderfully to say my ideas and things I need to do while I drive, wait, or take the dog for a walk. My MP3 player also has this same feature, enabling me to simply talk out loud the creative process.

StayFocused for Google Chrome- Many browsers include add-on tools which offers timers and even blockers to sites. StayFocused is set for a block of time during the day, cutting me off from distractions such as Facebook, YouTube, and other productivity killers.

You can also find Leechblock for Firefox which does the same thing. In fact, it allow you to pick and choose blocks of time from day to day.

Wordweb is an add-on program for Windows that is both a dictionary as well as Thesaurus.  All I need do is highlight a word, click on the Wordweb icon on the taskbar and I get info on the word and choices for synonyms.

LiveWriter is my blog writing program of choice. I find it simply gives me more flexibility to writing and formatting blog entries, as well as adding pictures into the posts.

Flesch Reading Ease Readability can be found in a free web service or a feature in MS Word. (click link to make this an option) This allows you to view the grade level at which you write. It also shows you the readability of your work.

Chapter-by-Chapter is one my favorite programs to use to organize novels. Master documents in MS Word are known to get corrupted from time to time, so I use this small (free) program that works with word processing to organize each chapter into separate documents. I can find/replace ALL documents, and the program can assemble all my chapters into a single document for submission later. This also works with a program called SuperNoteCard.

Feedburner allows the author of blogs to setup RSS feeds on their web sites and online journals. I can then keep track of statistics of who visits, for how long, and what entries they tend to read most. It neatly packages the necessary HTML for me to cut/paste into my blog as well.

“Press It” and other share button services such as Google Share or Addthis or StumbleUpon allow me to easily click a button on the browser and it automatically sets up a blog entry about that site. I then add my own words and viola’! its posted.

My Flash Drive- On my flash drive (also called a thumb drive) I back up my writing, but also add some programs that enables me to write FROM THE FLASH DRIVE. This way I don’t need to worry what program a computer has or where my bookmarks are. They’re on the portable hard drive. Check out PortableApps.com for the free software that includes word processing, browser, and more.

Technorati Tags: tools,writer,web blocking,stay focused,productivity,resources,wordweb,Flesch,readability,feedburner,chapter by chapter