Okay. Has novel writing software made the difference for anyone here?

I've been distracted by OneNote and one or two other pieces of software, but meh. Doesn't help the book get written one bit. The only thing that does that is BICHOK.

Bells and whistles are all very nice, but I've managed to write four - nearly five - books in the past eighteen months using nothing but MS Word, with all of its inherent bells and whistles switched off.

I downloaded YWriter5, it's free. I'm using it to organize an outline. It's designed to write the book in too, but my brain doesn't work that way. I'm a very visual person. Its handy for the outline though, for me anyway. You can add your characters, places, etc. Then when your writing the scene there is another spot where you drag and drop the characters in and the locations (plus other stuff). So you can see quickly (it has different reports) if you totally dropped a character along the way, or a secondary character is doing more then your MS. You can easily move scenes, or it will print out a synopsis. It's kind of neat.

You can look at the tutorial video to see what it does. I figured it was free so why not?

(No it hasn't made me famous) I don't know really what to think of all those programs either. To me to actually try and write an entire novel in one seems to disrupt the whole thought flow messing around with all the widgets and what-not.

I use Q10. Minimize distraction, allows me to write for superlong stretches of time.

YA author Justine Larbalestier had previously been published, but she's been vocal about having used Scrivener to write her most recent book, Liar. That book has an EXTREMELY unreliable narrator, and there are several versions of "the truth" to keep track of all through the book, so I can see where software like Scrivener would be extremely helpful (and that book has gotten more attention than any of her previous ones -- though in part because of the controversy over the cover.)

I don't think there's any software that can take you from unpublishable to publishable by itself, but if you need help keeping track of plot threads and structure, it's a very nice program.

Oh, right, I've tested out Scrivener before. Didn't have the money to buy it, but it's great for organization.

This isn't for novels, but I use Celtx for screenwriting, and it has this AMAZING function. You click, and a sticky note shows up on a specific point on a line, and you can make notes to yourself. Some people talk about highlighting stuff to go back to. It's sort of like that, except that you can make a note about what needs to be fixed, and then you can see all your notes lined up in a row. If you find novel writing software with that feature, you should check it out!

I use MS Works and good old fashioned notepad.exe. What else do you need?

Word 2010. You can hide just about everything, which I like.

All this various novel-writing software is helpful to plot and keep track of things, but actually use it to write? No way. Too cluttered, unstable, incompatible/proprietary. I don't want to have to dig down and make sure all the formatting is correct and such. Word or (insert widely-embraced word processor here) works fine.

I use Hop! Writing, which was just this little thing my mother picked up for me one day. It's got bright colours and helps me keep track of characters, settings, important objects and stuff like that. I don't use it all the time, but it can be pretty handy. I remember getting really excited about writing with it, just because of the colours. It's a shame my school decided to block all .exe files on USBs, which means I can't use it at school.

I have New Novelist on my PC. It's quite good for organising research.

But, yes, they don't actually do anything for the writing.

On the submitting side, I've used Query Tracker and XMind. QueryTracker is an online tool, though it doesn't really meet my needs. It's missing one agent that I'm submitting to (he asked to be removed), so if I want to track him, I have to record him elsewhere. It's also missing one category entirely that I've already submitted to, so I would have to leave that off, too (Contests). But it does provide lists of agents, along with links to things like interviews. Considering that it seems like I have to look at three or four different resources to track down information on agents, it's very handy.

XMind is a free mindmapping tool. Mindmapping seems to work better for me than making lists on spreadsheets. I put down whatever I need and am not limited by what fields I have listed like I would in another program or spreadsheet. The only flaw with it is that it gets pretty big pretty fast.

For word processing, I use Word 2007. I use the features to help with some parts of the writing process. For example, I tend to rearrange chapters a lot when I write, so I use the Chapter autonumbering style. That way, if I move a chapter, I don't have to hunt down all the chapter numbers and change them. Search and replace tracks down words that I might use too much, like look. I just replace it with a highlighted version and do a fast scan. Document Map and Go to hop around. Sometimes I'll put an unusual character (usually an at sign) in at my last place and do a find to locate it.

Mozy for online automatic backup. It's free under 2 GIG.

Seems like novel writing software is great for those who prefer to plot and outline and plan. That leaves me out.

The furthest I go in planning is leaving notes for myself in the manuscript marked with XXX, so that when I get to revisioning, I can do a search for XXX and find the places I wanted to fix.

But if I did a lot of plotting and organizing, I might want some software more capable of keeping track of my thoughts.

Exir said:

I use Q10. Minimize distraction, allows me to write for superlong stretches of time.

Click to expand...

That's a text editor, not really novel writing software.

I love to complicate my life with highly intricate theories, so I got me Dramatica Pro. I haven't published anything using it yet, but I do hope to cut down on the rewrites (which I hate).

I've tried a few 'sample' versions of software, and spent most of my time trying to keep from tossing the pc out the window because something was one place when I thought it was another. I use Atlantis Nova and that works just fine, even when I've outlined. A glorified typewriter, a pen and notebook - the rest is between the ears.

Word '07 does me fine, word. *gang sign*

I'm going to put out there that sometimes novel writing software can make the difference. I wrote my first complete novel a little less than two years ago. Prior to that, I'd never finished a novel, though I'd started at least a dozen.

I used Scrivener to finish that first novel. I used the corkboard feature to outline (one board for each chapter) and then wrote my first draft in six days (roughly 46k words). Sure, the novel itself turned out crap (cliches out the wazoo), but the point is that I FINISHED it.

Since then, I've written five other complete drafts, and am turning back to Scrivener for one of the novels I'm currently working on. When I write fantasy, I have to outline or I end up off on tangents that make no sense. Scrivener is great for the way I outline (I tried using actual index cards, but I don't have space to leave them laid out and I tend to lose them).

When I'm not using Scrivener, I use OpenOffice or Bean (a free, bare-bones Mac word processor). I also use OpenOffice for revisions. I don't always use Scrivener for my first drafts, but if I'm writing with a detailed outline, I've found it's helpful.

Greeble said:

That's a text editor, not really novel writing software.

I love to complicate my life with highly intricate theories, so I got me Dramatica Pro. I haven't published anything using it yet, but I do hope to cut down on the rewrites (which I hate).

Click to expand...

Any software you use to write a novel is novel writing software. I use Q10, as well.

I think this is the whole point. There is no such thing as "novel writing software." There's only software used to write novels, no matter what it's called.

Most of it should probably be called "transfer software", not "novel writing software. Its main purpose seems to be to transfer money from the pocket of the writer to the pocket of whoever owns the software.

At this, it does a remarkably good job.

Simon Haynes created yWriter to write his Hal Spacejock novels.

I believe the Authors of Ophelia's Ghost use Writeitnow.

Word 2007 to write, OneNote to keep notes, and Autocrit to assist with the editing. everything else comes from between my ears.

I'm a Scrivener devotee. It keeps me & my complicated manuscript far more organized than anything else I've ever used.

Could I write without it? Of course. I wrote parts of my last revision in fountain pen. But Scrivener makes it much easier to organize and manipulate, saving me time and headaches.

Jamesaritchie said:

Most of it should probably be called "transfer software", not "novel writing software. Its main purpose seems to be to transfer money from the pocket of the writer to the pocket of whoever owns the software.

Click to expand...

Isn't that purpose of all commercial software? I don't see the problem here.

Novel writing software helps the writer with novel-specific issues, such as building characters, plotting, planning and ordering scenes. Dramatica is somewhat more general in that it is also usable for screenplays and that it's more of a manipulation program for a database of "storypoints". It's also aimed at the outlining phase and lacks proper tools for editing itself, which is a shame.

And for what it's worth: I do the writing itself in Q10 as well, ut I still don't consider it to be a novel writing program.

I love Scrivener. I love Scrivener so much I'd marry it and have its babies. But lately, I don't know, I've been drifting back to plain old OpenOffice. And I've even thought of taking it a notch lower and just using a text editor.

Maybe I just feel like simplifying things. Maybe my plots are less complex at the moment. Or maybe I've gotten better at holding the threads together in my head.

But I still love Scrivener and I haven't found anything to beat it in terms of organization.