In Praise of Scrivener

I’ve been trying Scrivener, a program for writers, and I love it. It’s software for writers, particularly for novelists working on long projects, but with additions for poets, screenwriters, etc.

Here’s their blurb: “Scrivener is a powerful content-generation tool for writers that allows you to concentrate on composing and structuring long and difficult documents. While it gives you complete control of the formatting, its focus is on helping you get to the end of that awkward first draft.”

What it offers that Word doesn’t is a way to organize all the research debris – text, photos, links – whatever – related to the project, and access it as needed while working on the project. I’m hoping, if I learn to use it well, to replace some of the incoherent piles stacked around the office.

Yes, I know that’s the wrong use of incoherent – but it’s oddly accurate. When the piles get deep enough, they can’t talk to me any more, and I lose whatever gems they might be hiding.

Scrivener has reams of other functions, which I’ll discover slowly. It was created by a novelist for his own use, and then adapted for other writers – screenwriters, poets. I suspect it would be useful for university research projects, too.

I’m gradually converting my stories, and slowly learning the program. And enjoying it immensely.

There’s a video introduction I found really useful, and a chance to try it for 30 days for free. Not for one month, but for 30 days of use. Only the days you use it count. I’m still in my trial phase, but I’ll be buying.

http://www.literatureandlatte.com/scrivener.php

Maureen

Post-It Notes On the Wall

I’m in the mushy middle of my story, floundering in plotlessness. Well, it feels that way. I considered using my new software gem Scrivener to help (more on Scrivener in another post), but decided I needed to be totally visual and kinesthetic about it. I mean, I needed to move paper bits around. As my office is a shared space, papers on the floor are always in danger, so I pulled down a satellite image of the earth, and decorated the wall with post-it notes.

I don’t have an ideal collection of various colours and sizes (and decided a shopping trip was a distraction, not a necessity). I dug out what I have, and started cutting and labeling and rearranging in a horrific mess. I have the beginning and the end – I just need to settle out the middle.

Half-an-hour after I started, a writer friend posted a link on Facebook to a blog on mushy middles, which got me thinking… and rearranging… and searching for new colours…

And here I sit, facing the wall, bedecked with notes, hoping I have good enough notes that they won’t all be on the ground by morning.

Maureen

Where Clouds Come From

There’s something about wild places that inspire me. I’m not sure why, not being a wild person. But when I’m in really wild, remote places, I feel more connected to story.

This was taken on Whistler’s Mountain, near Jasper, on a cold and windy day.

Maureen