Resource Du Jour

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Betty W01

RDJ: Elite.com Story Starter

www.elitelit.com/pages/inspiration.html

Need some inspiration for your next story? A new direction or character for the one you're hung up in now? Just want to flex your writerly muscles on a prompt assigned at random? Go to the Story Starter, click on Elite.com's story starter, and you're off!
 

Betty W01

RDJ: Fantasy Name Generator

Tired of trying to come up with new names for your fantasy series? Need a different name for the next round of your favorite role-playing game? Go to rinkworks.com/namegen/ and spend a few minutes. You'll end up with enough names for a whole new novel!
 

Betty W01

RDJ: Health Writing

www.healthwriting.com/links.htm

Kathy Summers has put together a nice set of links that will be a big help to anyone who does (or would like to do) health writing, including a long list of writer's guidelines and magazine web sites, another one of medical searches, and an amazing one of writer's resources (including a list of libraries - click on the "writing sites" link and then scroll down to "libraries"). Even if you don't do health writing, you might want to spend a few minutes seeing what this site has to offer.
 

Betty W01

RDJ: Filers and Pilers & Get Organized Now

members.aol.com/SBakerMan2/piles.html

Having trouble getting organized? Here's a good article about taking control of some of it.

See also Maria Garcia's Get Organized Now web site, with loads of tips and tricks for getting on top of your desk mess. (Careful, don't fall off...)

www.getorganizednow.com/index.html

[Updated 6-05: Sadly, Garcia's site has become pretty much a commercial for her books instead of a great source for organizing ideas. However, you can still get a monthly checklist, weekly e-mail, regularly-changed recipes, reader's tips, and quick tips, forums, and a few other odds and ends that are worthwhile.]
 
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Betty W01

RDJ: Television Without Pity

www.televisionwithoutpity.com/

Need a new way to waste time while you're on the Internet procrastinating? Too bad, I'm going to give you one anyway. Practice your self-control. Go on, I dare you!

OK, if you have none, go to Television Without Pity and read how they've disssed your favorite show. Join in dissing that one you hate (you know the one I mean...). Laugh until you snort Coke out of your nose. (I hope you covered your keyboard with a plastic bag first. No? Ouch... maybe next time...)
 

Betty W01

RDJ: Crosswalk.com

www.biblestudytools.net/

If you write for Christian publications or want to do some research on your own, this site has everything you will need: commentaries, dictionaries, interlinear and parallel Bibles, concordances, lexicons, maps, and so on.
 

Betty W01

RDJ: Midwest Book Review

Looking for a place to get your book reviewed, or a market for reviews you're already written? Jim Cox, of Midwest Book Review, has a list of interesting links at www.midwestbookreview.com/links/othr_rev.htm

(If you want to see some sample reviews, there are lots on here. And you can check out my column, Betty's Bookshelf, at this site. Click on Reviewer's Bookshelf, March 2004 and April 2004 - none posted for May, and I don't know why... maybe they didn't arrive.) :bang

[update on column screw-up: or it could be that somehow I missed the information that the 25th is the deadline for the next month.... <sigh>. Well, go check out June's, when it's up.]
 

Betty W01

RDJ: Baen Free Library

www.baen.com/library/defaultTitles.htm

You know how they always say "read what you want to write"? Well, if sci fi & fnatasy are your things, go to Baen's Free Library link, where you can download absolutely free a number of their titles by well-known authors such as Mercedes Lackey, Larry Niven, Andre Norton, and Rosemary Edghill. OK, reading them on-screen may give you a headache, but the price is right. Why are they doing this, you ask? Read their reasoning here: www.baen.com/library/


Not only will this site offer you a lot of good reading, it will give you a lot to think about re free downloading of books, music, and so on.
 

Betty W01

RDJ: Ergonomics for Writers and Editors

Tired of the back pain you end with after a long day at the computer? Afraid that tingling in your hands may be carpel tunnel syndrome? Learn more about how to take care of your body, so your writing career doesn't suffer.

www.sfwa.org/ergonomics/links.htm
 

Betty W01

RDJ: Gareth Long's Encyclopedia of Monsters...

Gareth Long's Encyclopedia of Monsters,
Mythical Creatures and Fabulous Beasts

webhome.idirect.com/~donlong/monsters/monsters.htm

If you write (or read) fantasy, fables, folk lore, or horror, this site will explain a lot of common terms and may give you a lot of new ideas to play with.
 

Betty W01

RDJ: How Stuff Works

computer.howstuffworks.com/

How Stuff Works can explain all kinds of things to you that you didn't understand before, including computer stuff like cookies, electronic stuff like digital cameras, and home stuff like lock picking. A writer needs to understand something to be able to write convincingly about it and this site will help.
 

Betty W01

RDJ: eHow

Need to know how to do something, like how to make dreadlocks, how to french braid hair, how to set cookie preferences on your computer, or how to play poker baseball? It's all here, and more... the eHow site has over 15,000 "how to" solutions, some for things you may not have expected to find. How to choose a foreign film worth seeing? Wow. Is that even possible??

You have to register, but it's quick and worth the effort.

www.ehow.com/http://www.ehow.com/
 

Betty W01

RDJ: Slanguage -

The hick-to-hip translation guide. OK, it's hard to explain this one; go see it for yourself. Very entertaining!! For example: do you know what "Kiss Me Neck" is slang for, in Jamaica? Or what time it is in Honolulu when they say, 'Pau Hana Time"?

www.slanguage.com/
 

Betty W01

RDJ: Word Spy

www.wordspy.com/

Welcome to Word Spy! This Web site is devoted to lexpionage, the sleuthing of new words and phrases. These aren't "stunt words" or "sniglets," but new terms that have appeared multiple times in newspapers, magazines, books, Web sites, and other recorded sources.

Here aresome examples: thumb board, retail leakage, trail angel, geekerati.
 

Betty W01

RDJ:Anna Grossnickle Hines

www.aghines.com/

This picture book author/illustrator has a lot of good material on her web site, but I especially like the article that is entitled:

Seventeen Minds Trying to Catch Up With One -
A Checklist to Help Us Critique Our Own Manuscripts

Compiled by Jane Yolen's Centrum '81 Students
Edited by Anna Grossnickle Hines
SCBWI Bulletin 1981

Don't get me wrong, either; I mean this is a good article for ALL of us to read, no matter what we write.

Here's the path to get there -
Articles and Talks
then the above title.

She says to feel free to print out a copy for your own use. I say, print it out and tape the danged thing next to your monitor and memorize it!

After you've done that, be sure to check out the other articles. They're all pretty interesting.
 

Betty W01

RDJ: Regards free e-greeting cards

Today's site is frivolous, in honor of my friend Vikki's birthday. Send someone you care about an e-card today.

Happy Birthday, girlfriend! I miss you... :PartySmil

www.regards.com/
 
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Betty W01

RDJ:Game Developer Magazine

Interested in finding out more about how computer/video games are developed? Maybe even do some writing about the subject? Check out Game Developer Magazine.


www.gdmag.com/homepage.htm
 

Betty W01

RDJ: Health A to Z

If you write about health-related issues or would like to, here's another helpful site. They offer calculators (target heart rate, healthy weight and so on), a list of "ask the _______" FAQs, information on fitness and nutrition, safety tips, and sections on all sorts of diseases, health issues, and lifestyle topics.

healthatoz.com/healthatoz/Atoz/default.html
 

Betty W01

RDJ: Holly Lisle's Mugging the Muse - free download

fmwriters.com/community/downloads.html#Mugging

Sci Fi author Holly Lisle has a lot to say about writing. Find out how to create a series character you can live with, among other things, by downloading her e-book and reading it cover to cover - errr, screen to screen. Good stuff!
 

Betty W01

RDJ: AT&T's "Anywho" directory

www.anywho.com/

Need to find the address or phone number of an expert mentioned in an article you just read, so you can contact her yourself for fresh quotes? Found a phone number in the bottom of your purse and have NO CLUE who it belongs to? Trying to track down your ex (assuming he hasn't changed his name and his number isn't unlisted...)? Want to call an out-of-state business and do it on their dime, toll-free?

This site has it all: phone directories for white and yellow pages and toll-free numbers, reverse look-up (for that unknown number), area code list, maps... it's probably here somewhere.

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Betty W01

RDJ: Urban Legends

urbanlegends.miningco.com/

So, about that kid who has cancer and is collecting cards for a world's record; and that expensive chocolate chip cookie recipe that Neiman-Marcus overcharges for; and those organ harvesters who want to kidnap you and steal your kidney...:Wha:

If you get an e-mail that "everyone needs to know about", it's probably a hoax and it's probably explained in Mining Co.'s Urban Legends web site. And if you need yet another place in which to procrastinate, there's loads of funny stuff here. My newest hoax favorite? Cicadas for Cash... Nope, if you want to know more about this gem, go look it up! :roll:
 
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Betty W01

RDJ: Vistaprint (business cards and stationary)

If you're serious about being a writer, you need to have business cards. I mean, what happens when you run into the perfect agent on the subway and he begs you to send him your book and asks for your card? What, are you going to scribble your contact information on the back of a laundry receipt? (You weren't, were you?) If you're not convinced, read Dr. Lynella Grant's book, The Business Card Book*, to find out why you need business cards and what they should include.

*My review of it is here:
www.absolutewrite.com/novels/business_card.htm


Then go to Vistaprint.com and order yourself some. Their prices can't be beat for your first foray into becoming a card owner and it's easy to do. There's even an offer for an order of 250 cards free; you only pay S/H. (The ones I use are the pink ones with mutli-colored bubbles down the side...) They also offer stationary, postcards, brochures, and address labels to match.

www.vistaprint.com/
 

Betty W01

RDJ:Christianbook.com [free copies of successful bk prop.]

Author Randall Ingermanson has a Ph.D. in physics and is a self-proclaimed computer geek. He has several books in print: five novels (Premonition, Retribution, Transgression, Oxygen, and The Fifth Man) and one non-fiction book (Who Wrote the Bible Code? A Physicist Probes the Current Controversy)

Christianbook.com has an interesting article by him about book proposals, and they also are offering free downloads of two of his successful book proposals for interested wanna-be authors to examine. Wanna see what kind of proposal sold a publisher on Oxygen (a sci fi book) or Who Wrote the Bible Code? (a non-fiction book)? Now you can...

www.christianbook.com/html/cms/general/proposals.html/127161522?event=1001SBF
 
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