Writing Tip #235

Researching for WIPs : A Collection

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Historical Fiction

Resources For Writing (Global) Period Pieces : High Middle Ages & Renaissance

Resources For Writing (Global) Period Pieces : 1600s

Resources For Writing (Global) Period Pieces : 1700s

Resources For Writing (Global) Period Pieces : 1800s

Resources For Writing (Global) Period Pieces : 1900-1939

Resources For Writing (Global) Period Pieces : 1940-1969

Resources For Writing (Global) Period Pieces : 1970-1999

Resources For Writing Royalty

Procedural/Scientific

Resources For Crime/Mystery/Thriller Writers

Resources For Writing Dystopian/Post-Apocalyptic Stories

Resources For Writing Sketchy Topics

Resources For Writing The Mafia

Resources For Writing Injuries

By Genre

Resources For Fantasy/Mythology Writers

Resources For Writing Science Fiction

Resources For Romance Writers

Other

Resources For Plot Development

Resources For Describing Physical Things

Resources For Describing Characters

Resources For Creating Characters

Resources For Worldbuilding

Resources For Describing Emotion

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It drives me crazy when I think that almost all of Mark Twain's quotes are valid in the present. He was so ahead of his time!

Here we are, in 2020, in quarantine, when we're obviously wishing to be somewhere else and suddenly this post appears, which encourages us to read.

““Books are for people who wish they were somewhere else.””

— Mark Twain (via teandcats)

New Editing Features in Writing Analytics

A few days ago, I posted a preview of a feature I was working on. I’m happy to announce that highlights are now live and ready to use 🎉.

Just choose which words or phrases you’d like to be highlighted, and Writing Analytics will do that as you type. This has a number of use cases, particularly when you’re editing something and want to target specific issues in your draft. 

Stuff like weeding out adverbs, cleaning out unnecessary words, passive voice etc. You can also use these to highlight the names of your characters and their pronouns to visualise better how much space they’re getting in the narrative. 

You can do anything you want — that’s the best part!

How it Works

1. Click on Highlights in the main menu.

2. Add some highlights. You can also click on them to choose a different colour.

That’s it. You can close the widget and go back to writing.

One cool thing is that star works as a wildcard. It will match any word or part of word. So if you want to highlight problematic adverbs use *ly like so:

Colour-coding and visualising what you’re looking for in the text makes revisions so much easier —instead of having to read the whole thing over and over again, you can focus on specific areas and issues.

The highlights show up as you type so you can also use this to break down bad writing habits. Just set up highlights for words or phrases that you’d like to stop using, and you’ll be alerted when it happens.

It took me a while to build this, and I’m very excited to finally see it in the wild — one of my favourite features for sure.

Wanna give it a go? Sign up for a free, no-commitment 14-day trial.

The best advice really is to just write. Write badly - purple prose, stilted conversations, rambling descriptions. Don’t delete it, pass go, take your $200, save all your garbage in a big folder. Look at how much you’ve made - it doesn’t matter if it isn’t perfect, isn’t polished, it was practice. Every time you write you learn a little more, and find another piece of your voice.

“It takes an awful lot of time to not write a book.”

— Douglas Adams

“Progress is made by lazy men looking for easier ways to do things.”

— Robert A. Heinlein 

I think its amazing that no one knows who you are but you. No one else knows the stories you create, the feelings you have at 3am, the song stuck in your head, your favourite childhood book. So stop allowing people to tell you what you should be or what you are because they don't know.

“Your intuition knows what to write, so get out of the way.”

— Ray Bradbury