Creative writers: What's a good format to use?

[Dogzilla]

@njtt

In my experience, grammar checkers are wrong far more often than they are right. Especially, they flag a lot of perfectly cromulent constructions as errors, and often, even when they find real errors, their suggestions for changes are not good.

Spelling checkers need to be used with care too. They are good at finding errors, but often the first spelling they suggest will not actually be the word you intended (which may or may not be further down the list). Using a real but inappropriate word usually makes you look far more stupid than a mere misspelling of the correct word would.

I have to agree with you on both counts, but again, for someone’s personal use, it’ll be correct enough. It’s very true that spell checkers cannot account for homophones and usage issues.

I always find myself wondering, wtf style guide is the grammar checker in Word based on? The thing about grammar being “correct” is, it depends on which style guide you’re talking about. Grammar rules from Chicago Manual of Style are damn near diametrically opposed to the grammar rules in Associated Press. Contrast those two style books with Gregg, APA, or MLA… and what you have on your hands is a big, fat, “Well, they’re all right! There IS no wrong answer! Sweet!” This is a completely pointless discussion given the OP has no plans to share or publish.

[MsWhatsit]

I used WordPad on my PC and TextEdit on my Mac. I have Word, but I find all of the features to be too distracting. I really just want a simple blank page.

[Voyager]

@njtt

In my experience, grammar checkers are wrong far more often than they are right. Especially, they flag a lot of perfectly cromulent constructions as errors, and often, even when they find real errors, their suggestions for changes are not good.

The best use I’ve seen for them is seeing if you have used too many passive verbs - sorry, if too many passive verbs have been used.

Spelling checkers need to be used with care too. They are good at finding errors, but often the first spelling they suggest will not actually be the word you intended (which may or may not be further down the list). Using a real but inappropriate word usually makes you look far more stupid than a mere misspelling of the correct word would.

They are great for typos but not as a substitute for a poor vocabulary. And too much reliance on them might make you miss words misspelled into other words.

[Voyager]

@njtt

I say compose in single spacing, then if you want to print it out and get others to critique it, or revise it on paper yourself (which is often a good idea), you can easily convert to double spacing before you print.

It is an excellent idea. I revise three ways: on the screen, as I’m writing. Reading on paper, which for some reason reveals problems I don’t see on the screen. Reading the piece aloud. That shows you other problems, and your ears hear problems your eyes don’t see.
Luckily my wife is a writer who reads aloud also, so I can do it and not feel like a nut.

[RealityChuck]

I do my drafts single spaced and switch to double space when I submit them.

I use the grammar check as a reminder. I have discovered that I sometimes type one word when I mean another and having something flag that is very useful. But it should never be a substitute for your own knowledge and judgment (I also turn off detection of things that aren’t errors).

[FrankJBN]

An open question:

Has anyone who has actually written been initially stymied by the question of what materials to write with. iow how to physically get the words on a page?

[Dogzilla]

@FrankJBN

An open question:

Has anyone who has actually written been initially stymied by the question of what materials to write with. iow how to physically get the words on a page?

There is no way to answer that because, of course, none of us can possibly interview everyone who has ever actually written. however, I don’t think the OP was stymied about how to get the words on a page; rather, he was simply inquiring as to what the general consensus was with regard to which tool is the best tool to use.

[bup]

I use the free online version of Dr. Wicked’s Write or Die application, and then copy and paste it into a google doc.

[picker]

I use Scrivener and absolutely love it. I use it for fiction, lyrics and my professional writing for publication (educational material primarily)

The other platform out there is called Storymill.

[don_t_ask]

@FrankJBN

I’ll answer too then. For god’s sake, it doesn’t matter what you use to write with. Try an Eberhard-Faber No. 2.

And a notebook like Kerouac.

[bup]

The protagonist in* A Confederacy of Dunces* wrote in Big Chief tablets.

Don’t do that, though.

[tellyworth]

Put it on an anonymous blog. Your friends and family won’t see it. WordPress has basic word processing features, and you can easily point people to it for anonymous feedback.

[eschereal]

Word is really too heavy for the writing part, you need something fairly simple, that does not have a zillion toolbars and keeps helping you with everything. Use the simplest text editor you can tolerate, write as well as you can, then pour the text into Word if you want to format it an clean it up.

There is/was a nice little Mac tool called Circus Ponies notebook – although it is a bit on the pretty side, it has two advantages: I personally prefer to have a page that is not pure white, for eyestrain reasons; and, if you would be writing stuff longer or more complex than a few thousand words, it lets you organize the text into discreet sections or chapters in one file, look for something that offers that.

[ZenBeam]

@Shakes

No, I articulated it poorly. Thankfully, most of the people in this thread knew what I meant anyway.

I’m not familiar with softwares for this type of thing. I mean heck, I just pulled up MS word on my computer for the first time since I’ve owned it. I just wasn’t sure if one was preferred over the other.

Since you’re a total newb at Word, I’ll say this: if you want your text to be double-spaced, do not hit return twice to enter a blank line between paragraphs. You can format the paragraph style to add as much space between paragraphs as you want. Then later you (or someone else) can change it throughout the document by just changing the paragraph style. Same with margins, whether it’s right justified, or lots of other things.

Also, don’t hit return at the end of each line, let the computer do the word wrapping (Not that much of a newb? Well, better safe than sorry. :))

[Grrr]

Wow, such a wealth of information in this thread. Thanks so much guys.

[Trinopus]

@FrankJBN

An open question:

Has anyone who has actually written been initially stymied by the question of what materials to write with. iow how to physically get the words on a page?

Well, for me, the transition from ball-point-pen on lined paper to typewriter was a tough one. Very tough. I missed the ability to look back and make insertions.

The transition from typewriter to word processor was a dream! Like going to heaven! Best thing ever! I could go back and make insertions!

(These days, I use the “backspace” key more than any other key, save maybe the space bar. Delete delete delete!)

Also, take comfort: first drafts are permitted to be crappy! If you have a character named “Mr. Whatever” you can simply go with that, and choose a real name for him later. You can say “Colonel (xyz) had commanded the (look it up later) regiment for (lots of) years.” First drafts are the apex of freedom! You can go make and fix it later!

[Mister_Rik]

@For You

Word is really too heavy for the writing part, you need something fairly simple, that does not have a zillion toolbars and keeps helping you with everything. Use the simplest text editor you can tolerate, write as well as you can, then pour the text into Word if you want to format it an clean it up.

I’ve done that for years, and it’s worked well for me. I also like to keep that original plain-text file around as a backup, largely because I’ve experimented a lot in the past with different word processors and have run into some interesting glitches that have made me glad I still had the basic text available. I ran into one particularly annoying situation where I’d used MS Word to format my writing, switched to using OpenOffice (or one of its variants) by opening the Word files directly in OpenOffice and then re-saving them in OO’s native format, and then later decided I didn’t like OO and returned to Word, using OO to resave the files back to Word format.

Somewhere along the way, the various file-format changes borked my documents in a very peculiar way: When they finally returned to Word format, some hidden flag in the files was now telling Word that they were “UK English” files instead of “US English”. So all of my US English documents were now covered in wavy red lines pointing out all of my “incorrect” spellings, and nothing I could do would convince Word to use its US English dictionary instead of its UK English dictionary. I ended up having to create all-new documents and then copy/paste the text from my plain-text “backups”.