Evan Marshall's Novel-Writing Software

Gag me, Novelburger Helper plot cookie cutter. I think you could do better with dice. There are plenty of helpful FREE guides to plotting and character development on line.

Besides, you still have to write the bleemin' thing.

ETA: Just get the book. It has good recommendations. Nobody needs novel-writing software beyond a text editor

There is so much free stuff out there, I just can't justify paying for "novel writing" software. And to be honest, even screwing with the free stuff is a form of procrastination. When I wrote my last novel, I decided to finally give Ywriter a try, even though I knew it was sorely lacking for me in certain areas. It was a waste of time. I ended up tracking things on a spreadsheet. For a while I was tracking things in about three places. Just made it harder. Next book I'm going barefoot with a wordprocessor and a spreadsheet. Just simpler.

You need some way to keep track of the details when you write a novel. I use the Document View as my outline. I describe each scene (INT/EXT, location, Day, Date, time, anything else necessary). I keep track of all my characters and other details in MS OneNote. I slso keep all my research notes in OneNote. I create a new notebook for each WIP. So, I guess you could say I use software to write, but I just consider the software my tools.

And to think that once upon a time, writers had only paper and pencils.

I wouldn't spend that sort of money on writing software. No matter what, it still cannot write the book for you. You have to be able to do that, or novel writing software won't work. (Gee, how ironic =)

Use the software you have. Maybe read a couple books, but really, to write, put words to page. Save yourself the money and instead spend the time writing. =)

I would point you toward AW's own Fahim Farook's Plotcraft for tracking story details and ideas.

ETA: Plotcraft works. It allows you to keep your ideas organized and otherwise stays out of your way. (Unlike some mainstream office suites.) And it's "Care Ware".

Mr. Marshall is an interesting individual, and a professional, but at 150 bucks, maybe this project isn't about writers, first?

I like Zim for project organization and preliminary stuff, then I just use OpenOffice Writer for drafts. Keeping the tools simple works the best for me, and Zim is nice in this respect. It's freeform and requires very little getting used to. I also prefer organization progs that use text files; I can filter them pretty easily any way I want.

I use only Linux, but there's a Windows version of Zim (seems that you need full installs of Perl and GTK, which makes it a bit hefty, though).

ETA: Oops, I forgot to address the OP: that prog sounds too expensive, too questionable, and too fancy to even remotely interest me.

From the description on the webpage it looks like the main purpose of the software is to automate all the "you can do it this way or that way" and "make 15 photocopies of this page" parts of the marshall plan worksheet book. I would definitely check out the book, either from a library or by looking through it in a bookstore, before deciding whether to buy the software.

RJK said:

You need some way to keep track of the details when you write a novel. I use the Document View as my outline. I describe each scene (INT/EXT, location, Day, Date, time, anything else necessary). I keep track of all my characters and other details in MS OneNote. I slso keep all my research notes in OneNote. I create a new notebook for each WIP. So, I guess you could say I use software to write, but I just consider the software my tools.

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I heart OneNote.

I don't outline but I use OneNote to dump photos of people I want to use as characters, random lines of dialogue that tickle me and anything I write about characters which I'd need to remember such as eye colour, height, previous jobs, sexual history, etc.

ETA: Previously to getting MS Office 2007, though, I didn't use anything to 'keep track of details' apart from the actual novel itself. I don't believe it's something all writers need to do - but OneNote sure is purdy.

yWriter5 is FREE and much better than newnovelist and dramatica pro. It's a really nice interface with drag & drop features, character outlines (bio, pictures), locations, descriptions, notes, etc. You can actually drag Ch.22 up and drop it between Ch. 5-7 and then print the whole thing out. All the information is stored in .txt files, so it's easy to export a full manuscript, open it in MS word (or other word processor), and apply manuscript formatting.

If you're bored with a scene in Ch.9, you can jump to Ch.22 and work on a scene you've been looking forward to. I open all my new projects with 30 empty chapters and assign 3 scenes to each chapter (90 scenes). This makes outlining so much easier to manage. If you end up doing more or less, you can easily create or delete chapters and scenes.

It has a built in dictionary/thesaurus/spellchecker and button to read the text out loud so you can hear your passages and notice flow, pace, and rhythm. There's wordcount and autosave options.

The chapter descriptions can be printed out as a single document for an easy synopsis draft. yWriter can update on it's own too.

It comes with a new project wizard that walks you through the simple steps to create your project and a quick start e-book guide on how to use the program and all the cool features.

The free download is here.
http://www.spacejock.com/yWriter5_Download.html

Here are a few screenshots:
yWriter5 Main Screen


Scene Editor Window


It's good to backup often and even keep a weekly backup on a thumbdrive just in case something happens to your computer or if you want to go from using your desktop to a laptop. This program works from a usb thumbdrive.

Some yWriter users have started a Google group to report problems and make suggestions for future updates.
http://groups.google.com/group/ywriter

This is from a customer review on Marshall's book:

...it seems to me (although I think it's never explicitly said) that Mr. Marshall follows Jack Bickham ("Writing and Selling your Novel", "Scene and Structure"), who follows Dwight Swain ("Techniques for the Selling Writer").

Marshall doesn't offer anything new to add on how to write. I have both his book and workbook. All of the information you can get for free on the net. Neither has helped me put my butt in a chair and put words on a page.

I know it's tempting to buy something that might offer you the magic formula to get words on a page. It doesn't exist. I personally own about 75 books on writing. The only thing they've managed to do is paralyze my creativity. I recently told a friend of mine that if I had to do it all over again, I wouldn't go near any craft books.

1. Looks like utter crap to me. Over priced and what's the point of having a program write your novel?!

2. For organization, I use StorYbook and/or YWriter 5 (all depends on my mood). I know that YWriter was mentioned before, so here's the link to StorYBook (it is free as well) http://storybook.intertec.ch/joomla/

3. For drafts, I just type it into OpenOffice and use either one of the programs mentioned prior to organize the chapters and make them nice. All depends on my mood.

4. I also recommend PlotCraft, so take it for what it's worth.

Good luck and don't be sucked into paying money for someone else to write YOUR idea.

mollyluna said:

Has anyone tried this? It's $149, no disc, no manual, just a download for one machine. It looks like a good organization tool, but the price tag is high and the only recommendation comes from an erotica author whose books are only available on Kindle. So...I'm skeptical.

Please feel free to rant and give me your honest opinion.

http://writeanovelfast.com/software/

P.S. There's a twelve-minute video to watch that gives the lowdown. To me, it basically looks like a good outlining tool with the bonus of providing a synopsis. Am I wrong?

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Just get the book, or you know, see if your local library has it and make copies of the relevant worksheets.

This package and NewNovelist are the only ones in the market that ask to pay first and get refunded if you don't like it. It's a ridiculous proposition. Writing process is soooo personal. Everybody else have free demos you can try out and see if they fit your needs before buying the full package.

My suggestion is to start with the freebies (demos and full) and see what you like and what you don't.

And spend some time reading this thread to get an idea of what's out there: http://www.absolutewrite.com/forums/showthread.php?t=43803

Hope this helps.

-cb

I have never used this software but i heard that Marshall Plan for writing novels guides you to develop a powerful novel idea based on a specific system for developing characters and plot. The plot is driven by an initial crisis that motivates the Lead character to focus on achieving an important specific goal throughout your novel. Marshall emphasizes that this must be a compelling and formidable problem that will keep the reader engaged throughout the story.

And how many novels have been written without a software crutch? A lot more than with.

I think Evan Marshall's book, The Marshall Plan, is really useful, and he's great guy. I met him at the International Thriller Writer's Conference a few years ago. Also, I interviewed him a while back for AW--it's posted on the AW home page in the sidebar. Evan is a longtime agent that has also written and published a number of novels himself, so it isn't like he doesn't know what he's talking about. He sent me the software a while ago, but I have a Mac and there wasn't a Mac version at the time.

Try one of the free tools first. Do this to see if this kind of tool is helpful for you in practice -- it may not be useful at all, depending on your personal work style.

Most of them do all or most of what this will do and they are free.

None of these tools will write your novel and even if they did, it would no longer be your novel.

Good Word said:

I think Evan Marshall's book, The Marshall Plan, is really useful, and he's great guy. I met him at the International Thriller Writer's Conference a few years ago. Also, I interviewed him a while back for AW--it's posted on the AW home page in the sidebar. Evan is a longtime agent that has also written and published a number of novels himself, so it isn't like he doesn't know what he's talking about. He sent me the software a while ago, but I have a Mac and there wasn't a Mac version at the time.

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He is a great guy, but there's no way this software is worth the price. And how many of his own novel did he write using it? Going by the date of his novels, and when this software was developed, it couldn't have been many.

In my opinion, if you need this kind of thing, just use Uncle Jim's 3x5 card method or any of about a bajillion 3x5 card programs that are available free. I use iCard Sort for the iPad and have even put together a little template that I can use to start stuff off with.

Aleksandra Sokoloff has a variation on Uncle Jim's methodology as well on her blog site.