Eager for November and the beginning of Nanowrimo? Thinking of planning your novel in advance? Check out Storybook an open source and free novel “writing” software.
I’ve only been playing with this for a couple of days and probably won’t do much more with it, so if someone has more experience, let me know. But the software looks very well designed for novel planning and outlining. The problem here is that I don’t outline in advance but plow through a very rough first draft that works as an outline. And as far as I can figure out, Storybook is a novel “writing” software without a feature to actually write the novel in. But it does have some great features for planning scenes and characters, managing timelines and other tracking that you might do in conjunction with writing the novel. And it is free.
But one advantage this one might have for those planning Nanowrimo is that since you don’t actually write the novel in it, anything you do before November should fall within the Nanowrimo guidelines for planning. You’ll still be able to start writing the actual novel in November.
September 5, 2010
Storybook Novel Planning Software
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You can write the novel directly in the first text box for the scene. You’re supposed to write it scene by scene. Use description and note tabs to take notes on the scene you are writing on the main page. That is why it has import and export buttons on the front dialog.
I use Storybook frequently.
I often use it to keep track of story lines and characters that appear as I am drafting. You can reverse engineer it to use it as something to keep track of the plot OR as something to draft in. I draft in other programs, so I am just using storybook to keep track of the minor and major characters. I like the preview pane on the right so I can see at a glance character hair / eye colors, builds, talents, abilities, preferences, etc. It really helps keep the story true to itself.
It is one of the best writing programs I have encountered. It gives you the flexibility to do as little or as much of it as you want. It will not replace a word processor for typing your story in, but it will help you keep things organized when you write.
You do not necessarily have to plot ahead to make good use of this software… you can use it to track as you go. Both are exceptionally valuable things to do.
Comment by R.J. Blain — September 6, 2010 @ 12:09 am |
What do you do after you write it? According to their features list –
Included export reports are: Book Summary, Character List and Location List.
From the info they present that text box is to write a scene summary, not the scene. I couldn’t find any character limit to it or any info on how to export a novel. I still find Writer’s Cafe Storylines more useful for what I do. But Storybook is free and looks promising. Perhaps it’s just falling short in explaining how to write and export an actual 90,000 word novel in the software.
Comment by nanorlando — September 6, 2010 @ 1:16 am |