Writing Groups, Tools, & Software

Follow these guidelines to clarify your expectations for your manuscript editing and they will save your editor a lot of time, frustration, and confusion.

Creating a writing group with trusted friends and authors is one way to provide accountability, moral support, and feedback – and can be a great asset as you advance your writing career.

Whether taking the NaNoWriMo challenge or not, we can all use pointers and reminders when it comes to increasing productivity at the keyboard. These seven writing tips can set on your way to make a plan, and stick to it!

Jacket copy is never going to be “perfect.” It’ll never capture everything you want readers to know about your book or your achievements as an author. So give up on trying to pack it all in and just accept the fact that this is supposed to be, much like the descriptions on a menu, a teaser. First throw your hands in the air, and then use them to karate chop all the extraneous elements into submission. What’s left over will be in fighting trim.

Like any craft, the beauty of writing lies in the creative process combined with the workmanship and joinery that lie beneath the surface. So writers, don’t panic! You’re not out of a job. Apple’s next major innovation is not going to be the iTolstoy. Please carry on writing wonderful stories for us to read. But, while a computer program can’t generate a compelling narrative or sympathetic characters, it might help make a good story even better. It's where technology can make a difference.

And what writing tools do you use?

Curious how J.K. Rowling, Neil Gaiman, Stephen King, and many others get the writing done? Picture your favorite author writing a new book. Where is she sitting? What is she using to write? A computer, a typewriter, pen and pad, taking notes on an iPhone? The famous authors in the infographic below (from NinjaEssays.com) are all pretty lo-tech when it comes to the composition process — which, of course, isn't a stunner when you're talking about Agatha Christie or Mark Twain. But a few of the other examples did surprise me.