Before I get into the promised discussion of this new writing software I've been talking about, I'm going to take a moment to make you aware of an intriguing new series coming from another friend from Scribblers' Den. If it seems like a lot of my activity is originating there lately, well, that's because it is. It's the most open, friendly, and involved group I have ever encountered. Anyway, my fellow member, Kurt Roberts, has offered for our enjoyment the first in what promises to be a series titled The Gray Ghosts. The first installment carries the title, The Curse of Atlantis, and here is the blurb from the website:
In 1866, a group of citizens have banded together to form a strategy against Adam Thorne, the man who is trying to take over their small mining town of Prosperity, California. Anna Penvennon, the wife of their leader, Jud Penvennon, tries to warn them that they are, "not facing an enemy of flesh and blood," but she is ignored The next morning they are found butchered by the Pevennons' daughter Laurie and her beau, Jack Trevellyn. At Fort Belvoir, Virginia, Colonel John Kenyon, a one time Confederate cavalry raider, is whisked out of a death cell by a woman named Vivian Lake and taken to Seelie Court, a high end house of "entertainment" where he is recruited into the "Ithacan Foundation," a mysterious organization that battles the "Brotherhood of the Left Hand Path," an occult fraternity dedicated to world domination. He is also introduced to his new partner, Angelique "Frenchy" Le Clerc a sexy Creole gambler from New Orleans, and former Confedrate spy. They are sent to Prosperity where Jack Trevellyn has formed an outlaw band that is raiding Thorne's business operations, unaware that their is foe is really a 12, 000 year old Atlantean vampire named Krato, and he has designs on Laurie (believing her to be the reincarnation of the princess he loved back on Atlantis), and is harassing her in her dreams. John and Frenchy join up with Trevellyn, eventually leading to a confrontation at Thorne's Victorian mansion.
The links are provided above, and now I will attach the proviso that this is presented in the form of a screenplay. I've never read a screenplay as if it was a book before, but I have to tell you, I plan to read this one unless someone beats me to it, and provides a very compelling reason why I shouldn't. This is a classic example of how to sell a book with the blurb. Mr. Roberts has seized my curiosity by the throat, and it isn't likely to rest until it has satisfied itself as to the merits of this book.
Now, to tell the writers among the following about a product I stumbled across over the weekend that has me uber-excited. The name of the product is yWriter5, and what it is, is a PC-based software program that replaces the function of those notebooks we all carry around to scribble in furiously, then try to work out of when it comes time to write. Writers, you know the frustration: When you're 75 scenes into your novel, and you find that you need to know in what scene your assistant to the sidekick last appeared, or the name of that bartender who was asked directions 200 pages back, you are faced with losing this writing session as you flip through notebook after notebook, peel Post-It notes from your whiteboard, and all that kazoo. This program renders that a thing of the past!
Once you have downloaded the free software, it installs a shortcut on your desktop, and with one click, you find yourself on the home screen:
Now, to tell the writers among the following about a product I stumbled across over the weekend that has me uber-excited. The name of the product is yWriter5, and what it is, is a PC-based software program that replaces the function of those notebooks we all carry around to scribble in furiously, then try to work out of when it comes time to write. Writers, you know the frustration: When you're 75 scenes into your novel, and you find that you need to know in what scene your assistant to the sidekick last appeared, or the name of that bartender who was asked directions 200 pages back, you are faced with losing this writing session as you flip through notebook after notebook, peel Post-It notes from your whiteboard, and all that kazoo. This program renders that a thing of the past!
Once you have downloaded the free software, it installs a shortcut on your desktop, and with one click, you find yourself on the home screen:
Click on File, then Start New Project, and you are taken to the blank screen that you will eventually build into what you see here. You start a chapter by adding a scene. Several scenes complete a chapter, and you start another. This is all your choice, you don't have to fill a pre-loaded template. For each scene, you can create as many or as few digital "index cards" as you like. As each character is created, fill in their quirks, habits, strengths and weaknesses, even add a picture if you have one that looks like you imagine the character. Make the same kind of notes for Locations, or settings, Items, like the McGuffin, or the features of a custom car, and those tabs across the bottom appear on every scene you bring up or create fresh to work on. Never again will you be flipping through notebooks trying to find a note you may not have even made four months ago. Have you ever forgotten a secondary henchman's nervous tic? Never again! Just type in any note you even think you may find useful, and it's there for the duration. As you build your scenes, you change that Status tab in the upper block from Outline, to Draft, to 1st Edit, 2nd Edit, to Done.
It has other things you can add, like a scale on which you can plug in numerical values for each scene in such things as Tension, Humor, Importance, and the like. Once you have done this, you can click into the Tools tab at the top, hit Graph, and it will show you a line graph of each scene, with those items tracked. Another thing it will show you is a storyboard of every scene you have completed thus far, who is in it, and what happens:
It has other things you can add, like a scale on which you can plug in numerical values for each scene in such things as Tension, Humor, Importance, and the like. Once you have done this, you can click into the Tools tab at the top, hit Graph, and it will show you a line graph of each scene, with those items tracked. Another thing it will show you is a storyboard of every scene you have completed thus far, who is in it, and what happens:
Editing tools abound, and they pop up when you call for them in separate windows, overlying the project, and interfering with it not a jot:
Every tiny feature you expect from both a handwritten notebook, and MSWord is present, but you don't have to use any of them. I need the discipline of a highly detailed outline, and am already finding myself using almost every feature, but the beauty of this is that you use what you need and move on. There is no mandate that you have to fill every field before you can move to another section, or anything like that. This means that if you're a pantser, and you just want to use the Character cards or the Storyboard feature, you're welcome to do so. And since you have to type your finished product somewhere, why not do it here? Its constant cross-referencing will help you keep track of everything, and the .rtf files it saves in are compatible with almost everything.
I have seen author assistance programs similar in nature to this one with black screens and day-glow charts and various other graphics that put these screens to shame; I have also seen them for $100 and up. This does it all, albeit without the fancy graphics, and it's free. If you're looking to impress someone with your flashy graphics, by all means, it's your money. If you want to put this powerful program to work for you at absolutely no cost, here is the link: http://www.spacejock.com/yWriter5.html. The choice is yours.
I have seen author assistance programs similar in nature to this one with black screens and day-glow charts and various other graphics that put these screens to shame; I have also seen them for $100 and up. This does it all, albeit without the fancy graphics, and it's free. If you're looking to impress someone with your flashy graphics, by all means, it's your money. If you want to put this powerful program to work for you at absolutely no cost, here is the link: http://www.spacejock.com/yWriter5.html. The choice is yours.
Now, get out there and live life like you mean it!