Hey everyone! Here I am for another weeks post. I can’t wait to share this one with everyone. This week’s post is the second half of the website post from several weeks ago. It’s not late and I hope it’s not confusing. I hope that everyone who is doing Nanowrimo is enjoying themselves and keeping up with their word count! Can’t wait to hear from everyone again. Don’t forget to like and subscribe as a member of the webpage or follow me on social media. Without further ado:
Writer Resources and Tools: Websites Part Two
So, as I mentioned in the Websites Part One post, the other two categories of websites that are good resources for writers is Builder Websites and Software Websites. So the reason this one was in the second half was because this one took me a bit more research than the other ones. I’m not a super big user of builder or software websites. I usually do all my writing by hand and on the rare occasion that I don’t its all done in Microsoft Word. So, it’s whatever for me. But there are a few that I have used and a few more that I’ve tried out before and found to be pretty helpful. I also am going to mention a few that I have never personally used but have heard really great things about. I’m also going to mention what kind of site they are in those general categories and if they’re free or not.
1. Builder Websites
So the basic of the basics of builder websites aren’t sites dedicated to building anything related to writing. The ones that I tend to use a lot are other writer blogs. A lot of other writer blogs will have a page or posts about character building or world building sheets. These sheets are usually downloadable as pdfs or Microsoft word documents are printable and easy to write on. I have used several different world building and character building worksheets from writers and blogs. Some of them I didn’t like or I changed to better match what I was trying to write. It really depended on the type of sheet I really wanted. Often times these can be helpful because you can take things from some worksheets that you liked and add it to other worksheets that didn’t have all the things you wanted.
The next one I’m going to suggest is World Anvil. World Anvil is a world building/character building website that I started using about a month ago. It’s pretty okay and free. World Anvil was originally made as a website to help set up RPG games with friends. So it’s not really designed for writers. Plus, it’s a little hard to figure out how to navigate it originally. It took me a while to get used to and it’s a pretty okay website. I think the main reason that I joined World Anvil was because it stated that it had a map feature. I was so excited. As far as I can tell it does not help you create maps. Because this is an RPG website you upload a map of someplace, like the inside of the castle, and you and anyone else you invite and interact with it. It really is a website designed for RPG.
Something that I’ve been told is really good for world and character building is Microsoft Excel. I’ve never personally used this for any sort of building but I’ve known people who have used it to make Story Bible’s for their books. (I’ll get to Story Bible’s in a later post). Microsoft Excel is free if you’re a student of any sort but it costs money if you aren’t. I’ve always gotten mine for free one way or another so I’m not sure about the exact price. I’ve been told is fluctuates. I have seen many people use this as a world/character/object builder. They use it almost like World Anvil where they have different tabs like characters, world, laws, religion, objects, and other important areas and they fill it in, in whatever way they would like. I’ve always wanted to try this form of building but I don’t have the computer patience for it. I tend to write by hand because I’m less easily distracted and I am easy to distract. Haha.
The last one I’m going to suggest is Plot Factory which is a free to use website with paid upgrades. This website is really similar to World Anvil (minus the RPG features) and I started using them about the same time and if I had to choose I like Plot Factory a lot better. The thing about it that I think made it stand out to me is that you can create several different ‘Universes’ as it calls it. Meaning you can build multiple worlds for multiple different books all on the same account. I found that nice and convenient. It breaks up your Universe into many different sections like characters, places, objects, and other generalized categories and you can even plot different books in that universe. The only problem I did find with the site is that when you go to create something like, for example, a character, it only gives you a couple starting prompts like name, physical description, personality, and relationships. If you want to add anything else, you might want to actually start with a character sheet that you are working from. But it’s a good place to store all my information in one place instead of several different sheets in a folder on my computer. The only thing I don’t like is that, like most sites, it doesn’t have map features.
2. Software Websites
As I said earlier when it comes to software such as word processors I mostly use Microsoft word so most of these are things I have not tried out myself.
The first software website I’m going to talk about is Scrivener. Scrivener is a paid word processing software. I have never used this one personally so I don’t really have a full review of it or anything. This website has been suggested by a lot of published authors and was actually suggested to me several years ago during a writer’s conference by several of the published authors there. Sadly I do be broke and so I’ve never had the money to pay for Scrivener. The one thing that I do know from all the things I researched about it then and now is that Scrivener is really good for authors who have large novels or universes of novels that need to all connect. It’s really good for connecting diverging plot points.
Another software that I have not used but I’ve heard it amazing is Grammarly. Grammarly is a free editing software. Most of the writers I’ve heard from about Grammarly said the same thing. If you don’t like editing as you write, this software if your worst nightmare and will drive you insane. If you’re one of those writers who edits as they write, this software will be your number one best friend.
This next software I have actually used and absolutely love although mine needs an update and I need to buy the latest version. Zenwriter is a great software that I have enjoyed using. If you are one of the writers I mentioned that Grammarly would annoy, if you are a writer that is easily distracted (like moi), or if you are a writer who loves to just write and write and write when the urge hits you, then you will love Zenwriter. Zenwriter is a software like Microsoft word. You can writer from the space, it helps you keep word counts and you can have different documents open at the same time. What makes it unique and nice for me is that once it’s open the only way to leave the app it to close it and stop writing. No way to access the distracting internet. But have no fear for writers who listen to music while writing like me. You can upload music into Zenwriter and have it play from a writing playlist as you write. It also allows you change the setting from a night to day lighting and you can change the calming faded out background behind your writing. I highly recommend Zenwriter. It’s less then $20 and I enjoy it a lot.
The last software is yWriter. This word processor is free but I have never used this. This software actually came recommended to me based on my style of writing. It lets you write your novel by scene rather than by chapter. This is how I write my novels. I don’t write them in order and so this processor would be perfect for me. I have not tried it yet because I haven’t had the time but as soon as Nanowrimo is over I’m planning to give it a quick test run to decide if I like it or not.
So that’s it. The second half of our website posts. I can’t wait to move onto to next weeks posts about Reading Groups in which I will discuss the Pros and Cons of writing groups. I can’t wait to hear from any of you. Don’t forget to like the episode, become a site member or follow me on social media for any updates. Hope to hear from you all again!
Get Up, Get Writing, and Get Published. See you next week!
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