web stuff 4 writers

It seems to have been a good week for a website launch - and not only the one I wrote about on Tuesday evening.

Following the release of her debut novel, Cover the Mirrors, Faye L. Booth has moved her website, www.fayelbooth.co.uk, to a new server, updated her About page, and added page about 19th Century Spiritualism. At the end of the latter page, there’s a link to a password protected page with information for book groups, with the intriguing sentence ‘The password should be pretty easy to guess if you’ve read the book’ (though perhaps, as she suggests, once I read the book - I’m still waiting on the copy I ordered from Amazon - things will become clear).

Rebecca Laffar-Smith has also updated the look of her website, and moved it to it’s new domain name, www.writersroundabout.com. This week, Rebecca’s also posted her first blog review, alerting me to another great site, Writing for Writers, by Melissa A. Donovan.

Finally, I received a message through Facebook today, letting me know that the new Legend Press website is now live. Again, the site is based on a blog format - which will accomodate their regular updates. It also incorporates an online shop where, at the moment, they’re offering special package deals to celebrate the launch.

Your thoughts

Launched a new site recently? Started a new writing-related series? Written a great post? Please let me know by leaving a comment on this entry.

Tags: Web links by Natasha
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A few more writing resources from across the world wide web.

• Overwhelmed by emails? Not getting any writing done because your mind’s on those blog entries you need to respond to, those websites you have always meant to revisit? You might want to read Digitally Bankrupt, which is about starting over in the online world.
• The Daily Blog Tips blog also has 10 Tips for Managing Email Effectively.
• Alternatively, you could save time on your research and other novel-writing activities, by checking out Mashable’s 30+ Tools for the Amateur Writer.
• Meanwhile, over on Information Today, Roberta Roberti has written a piece about Blogs to Book deals, focusing on The Julie/Julia Project blog which went on to become the book, Julie and Julia: 365 Days, 524 Recipes, 1 Tiny Apartment Kitchen.

Your thoughts

Found a new website for writers this week? Started a new series or posted an interesting article on your own writing-related blog? Please leave a link in the comment box below.

Tags: Web links by Natasha
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Writing resources and websites I’ve discovered over the last 10 days.

• Many writers have their pet spelling and grammar hates.  Perhaps you can’t stand seeing an apostrophe before the ’s’ of plurals.  Perhaps you get frustrated by people who write ‘you’re’ when they mean ‘your’.  The creator of this website obviously just needed a place to express his/her anger about incorrect spellings of ‘definitely’.
• Earlier this week, Caitlin emailed me a link to a Positivity Blog post where Stephen King’s Seven Tips for Becoming a Better Writer are applied to practice of blogging.
• If 50,000 words during NaNoWriMo or a blog post a day during NaBloPoMo seem a bit too scary, perhaps you could try telling a true story in a single sentence at onesentence.org.
• And if you’ve been putting off starting any form of writing this week, you might want to take a look at this 52 projects article called Simple things you can do right now to jumpstart your writing efforts.

Your thoughts

Found a new website for writers this week?  Started a new series or posted an interesting article on your own writing-related blog? Please leave a link in the comment box below.

Note: Spam links will, as always, be deleted.

Tags: Web links by Natasha
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Writing resources and websites I’ve discovered over the past seven days:

• For some, November is all about NaNoWriMo.  But for those who don’t have a novel project in the planning (or those who want to be totally absorbed in writing projects for the 30 days), it’s also NaBloPoMo.  That’s right, National Blog Posting Month, and to win all you need to do is post a blog entry every day.
• Stuck for short story ideas?  Over at the Writer’s Window, all you need to do is choose the number of characters you want (as long as it’s between one and five), and their story builder will provide you with a setting, character types and the central conflict or problem.
• Stuck for a descriptive phrase?  Try the Wonderful World of English’s simile generator, which combines 141 abstract nouns and 236 concrete nouns to create all sorts of weird phrases.  I just got ‘boredom is like a laser.’  Yep.  That could work.
• And finally, for those of us who are frustrated with our current projects, with ‘writer’s block’, with deadlines, there might be a laugh or two in the Yankee Pot Roast’s satirical How to Write a Book.

Your thoughts

Found a new website for writers this week?  Started a new series or posted an interesting article on your own writing-related blog? Please leave a link in the comment box below.

Note: Spam links will, as always, be deleted.

Tags: Web links by Natasha
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Writing resources and websites I’ve discovered over the past seven days:

• I received an email at the end of last week from Eric of Eric’s Directory. Even though Eric’s first language is Flemish, he has put together a great list of international writing and web links. This looks like a resource that will only improve with time, so I’ll be back to check it out later on.
• Meanwhile, over on The Writer’s Round-about, Rebecca Laffer-Smith is midway through a six-part series on planning your novel. Whether you’re a planner or a seat-of-the-pantser, somewhere in between, or even undecided, Rebecca’s series offers some very useful tips on how to move your writing forward.
• Yesterday I mentioned that sign-ups have begun for this year’s NaNoWriMo. To complete a NaNoWriMo project, you need to write approximately 1666 words per day during November. If writing 100 words (exactly) per day for a month is more your style, you might want to check out 100 words. The guidelines for this challenge can be found here.

Tags: Web links by Natasha
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There are some great writing-related resources and reads on the internet.  The difficult thing is finding them! 

Here’s a couple that I’ve come across while surfing the web this week. 

• On the BBC website, they’re reporting on the demise of the hyphen.  In the latest Shorter Oxford Dictionary, hyphens have been removed from words such as pigeon-hole and ice-cream.  The story suggests that blame should be assigned to the slap-dash (thought perhaps without the dash) nature of electronic communication.
• Linda of MidLifeWriter.com has Five Ways to Break Through Your Writer’s Block and Get Your Book Started Now!  Her fifth point about starting a book as a blog hit home to me.  A lot of people (and I’m usually one of them) find it easier to write 500 word blog posts, rather than opening up MS Word and writing 500 words of fiction.  Of course, if you’re writing a book that you then intend to submit for publication, it’s probably worth making all your posts password protected.

Tags: Blogging, Web links by Natasha
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