Online I see a lot of authors using gorgeous tools for their writing. Beautiful laptops, monitors and keyboards. Journals full of stickers and mood boards just like their stories. Pens and post-its that match color exactly. Every time I see those beautiful plot journals and character inspiration sheets, I am jealous. I wish I could be that person. I wish I could make everything pretty and surround myself in the vibes of my story. But every time I try, I either get so intimidated by all the choices of making inspiring plot cards and character sheets, or I get frozen with fear of making a choice I can’t unchanged later, since they are on paper and permanent.
Unfortunately, no matter how much we might try, not all tools work for all of us. Everyone’s brain works a little differently, and we need to accept that about each other and ourselves.
Personally, I’ve always done better with digital tools. I like the ability to change things. To constantly adapt my process if it isn’t working without guilt. There is nothing truly permeant in my tools, and there for I can always change it match my current needs. Besides the time to set it up, I’ve lost nothing.
And I’m sure I’m not the only one out there that feels this way.
As a result, over the years, I’ve learned to use digital tools to give me some of the same effects that those beautiful plot journals and vision boards, while having the flexibility that my brain needs to explore and be creative. There are just as many fantastic resources out there for those of us who work better digitally. Most are a lot easier to find and create than a notebook or happy planner.
Spreadsheets, whether in Google sheets or excel, are one of my strongest writing tools. And one that doesn’t get enough love from the writing community. Spreadsheets malleable nature means they can be used for so many functions. Here are a few ways I use spreadsheets, but I’m sure there are hundreds more that others could add to the discussion.
Series Binder/World Building Dictionary – using multiple sheets within excel file I keep track of every aspect of my world building. From what characters look like, to family trees, names and descriptions of locations, or anything else that I want to be able to find at a moment’s notice. I even sometimes add rules to have cells to color them for certain aspects of a story or world, so I can follow a family or storyline through all my sheets (though this might be a more advanced skill, and not necessary). Spreadsheets also have a find function, which makes it easy to search information quickly if you need to know a character’s eye color or last name in a pinch. And images can be added to still give that character reference and even story vibe that some of the prettier plot sheets that others create.
Vision boards– While I do create most of my vision boards and aesthetics in Canva, so that I can then add them to my computer, phone and tablet backgrounds, a spreadsheet is another great place to add all this information. They can be placed wherever needed on the spreadsheet to give the same appeal as a journal, without any commitment.
Outlining – since I’ve started writing longer and more complex books, I’ve needed a way to keep the story straight, since it doesn’t all fit in my head anymore. I use spreadsheets to track my progress and the story together. I can note what scenes I’ve completed, which ones need more work, how much of the whole story they represent. I even add columns to the spreadsheet to note where the characters are in their romantic relationship, and to track any subplots that might be happening. I add notes of things that I need to check or change when it comes time for revisions, all in one place. It’s great to be able to look at the whole plot in one quick glance.
Time tracking and goal setting – I use spreadsheets a lot to track time and goal setting. I love to create bar charts and line graphs and all that fun stuff to track my progress. I also like to track my time and determine how long I work on a story or scene. I find that tracking my time keeps me more productive and focused, while also offering me a lot of interesting information to analyze.
Tracking sales – This one is an obvious one. I’m sure most authors track their sales, progress and expenses in a spreadsheet, but it is valuable to be able to see your data so closely. I’ll track what series have the best follow through, what tropes are most successful for me, and even what projects I plan to work on and when.
There are plenty of other things that can be tracked in a spreadsheet as well, such as influencers and bloggers that have been contacted, who reviewed your book, where it’s published, and probably a million other things I haven’t thought of yet.
Another invaluable digital tool for authors is a word document.
In the past I have been a Scrivner girl. I wrote most of my books in Scrivner (though I have always revised in word). Since I am an inspiration writer—which means I don’t usually write in chronological order—I often find it distracting to have the words of other scenes and parts of the story I am not currently thinking about on the page before me. I loved Scrivner’s corkboard and the ability to not just work on one scene at a time, but also to move them around if needed. But for convenience and availability I’ve moved to using google docs. Especially since they have created the new tab function, where you can do the same thing as Scrivner with different scenes being on different tabs, unconnected and moveable. You do need to collect them into one document at the end, instead of the compile function of Scrivner, but a small price to pay for the convenience.
I’ve also used word documents the same way, with each scene being its own document to eventually be merged into one giant document. Just like with google docs, it’s more convenient if not a little more troublesome with the pasting.
Series Binder/Worldbuilding dictionary – Word documents are also a great place to create a worldbuilding document. With their bookmarking tool you can easily move to different locations in the document with just a click. And just like spreadsheets they are searchable, allowing you to find information quickly. Images can also be added easily, including a whole title page of a vision board or aesthetic, though images can’t be easily nested so you might need to do create the graphic in another product like Canva first, and just copy the image to your word document.
Character sheets/Plot sheets – whenever I want to write a character sheet, I find a writeable word document the best place to do it. Any questions desired can be asked and answered in the sheet, a grid can even be created for plotting if necessary. And images can be added. For anything, where I know the questions will be the same each time, setting them up in word is a great way to play with the characters without being afraid about the permanence of writing in on paper. They can be set up once and used over and over again.
These are just the digital tools I use to write my novels. Each one is easy to adapt and change depending on the story and current place I am in my head. What tools do you use to create your stories, worlds and characters?
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