from Laura Drake's files...
You have found Laura's treasure map to her favorite, most useful, fun online locations for references, writer's resources, and just plain fun.
Warning: This blog could be hazardous to your time schedule. You're going to want to spend a lot of time mining for the gold buried in these links!
Language, Grammar, etc.
Names, Quotes, and other stuff:
http://www.bartleby.com/100
www.quoteland.com
www.brainyquote.com
Research - General
www.ehow.com
www.answers.com
Writer's Resources
Plotting – Structure
Just Plain Fun
- Are you looking to create a character through psychology or just interested in what qualities make up a particular personality? The Similar Minds website has a nearly every personality test developed by man.
- OneWord.com offers one of the simplest (and rewarding) writing exercises I've ever seen. One word is listed at the top of the page. You
have sixty seconds to write about it. Go!
- At the Your Amazing Brain website you can explore your brain, take part in real-life experiments and test yourself with games, illusions and
brain-benders.
- You might be surprised what you find at the Cliché Finder website
- The Truth About Deception.com website (advice about lying, infidelity, love and romance)
- Epiguide.com has one of the most extensive and detailed character charts I've ever seen. If you're into getting to know your characters before you start writing the story this site is for you.
- Archetype Writing.com (the fiction writer's guide to psychology) has
a host of fact sheets on psychology for use by writers, articles, a Q & A
section, and a muse section containing idea generators and visual prompts.
Having trouble getting organized? Life Organized.com has a wide
array of articles, checklists, blogs, book reviews and other tools to help
you!
If you've got must-have sites, please share them with us. Between all of us here at Writers in the Storm, we pretty much have an interest in everything on the planet! So give us your killer sites!
Wow! A ton of great links. I love the snowflake plotting method, too. Thanks for sharing.
Stacy,
Feel free to pass on any good ones you have!
thanks,
Thanks for giving us these resources.
Cool.
Patti
Thanks for stopping, Patti - good to 'see' you here!
Thanks to WITS and Laura. YOu have provided an amazing list of valuable links. I do not nec. have something "different" ... however I use Google Live Earth to research actual locations (mostly New York) and I've traveled from Brooklyn to San Fran. to islands off the coast of southern Italy. If anyone uses foreign phrases, I have found several language sites by for instance, google: Common Gaelic phrases; Everyday Greek and so on. I use foreign sites for the meaning of names, if I want a foreign name to have symbolic meaning.
But with great historical romance writers I am sure you already knew ... not as spectacular as what you provided. I will copy these and refer to them often 🙂
Oh, nice - thanks Florence!
My favorite: http://www.gutenberg.org/wiki/Main_Page
Thanks Les! I'll go check it out!
Laura,
I'm soooo glad you gave us the latest and greatest toolbox! I love it and can't wait to be all over these links. 🙂
Hey, it only took you prodding me about 25,386 times!
OMG, I think my head just exploded! At this particular moment, I'm struggling with comma placement so I'll be using some of the links in your grammar section. Thanks so much for all of the great links, Laura. 🙂
Sheila,
I don't have a specific link on comma usage, though, god knows, I should! Just ask the other WITS bloggers about my 'comma drama issue."
Well, that and my improper semicolon usage, and my complete inability to understand the rules for 'lay' and 'lie.'
Wow Laura, this is fantastic.
Happy dancing in Texas, Laura! This goes in my blog "keepers" folder.
I think you have a visual of Wordle.net up there (names illustration) but didn't notice it in your list.
After I get past the "shiny bauble" phase with fonts, colors, layouts, I use wordle as an editing tool. The first time I used it, the largest word in the display was "back." Huh? Back? Now, THERE'S a power word-worthy of repetition. Turns out my characters couldn't sit, turn, sit, set, step, look, or lie without a back attached. I also use it to count "power words" (showing my Margie here) in each chapter.
Very Cool, Gloria, that sounds like a keeper! I'm going to check that out right now!
Don't you love this stuff? New bell or whistle=good!
Ooooh! Lots of treasure!!! Thanks for sharing it with us.
Thanks for stopping by, Sonia!
This is great, Laura! I LOVE you guys. 🙂
Thanks Darcy - great to 'see' you! How's that book coming?
Thanks for all the amazing links. Appreciate you putting it together. 🙂
[...] Laura Drake of Writers In The Storm brings us a fantastic list of resources for writers in New & Improved Writer’s Toolbox. [...]
[...] New & Improved Writer’s Toolbox by Laura Drake [...]
Wow, Laura! Glad you added the schedule warning at the beginning - not that it helped. 🙂
Hello, just wanted to tell you, I loved this article. It was practical.
Keep on posting!