The internet is filled with useful resources for writers, from free courses and downloads to insightful blogs.
The following Digital Goodie Bag is for the July 2023 CampNaNoWriMo season. Enjoy!
Our very own Judy L Mohr has developed a range of tools and calculators for writers to use during the NaNoWriMo season.
You have the Daily Target Calculator that calculates for you what your target should be for any given day based on what your larger goal is for a given period of time. And you can use the same calculator to work out what your monthly goal would be based on what you would like your daily goal to be.
There is a NaNoWriMo Hours/Word Count Converter designed to help those who are tracking time spent on writing, converting those numbers into something that you can input into the NaNoWriMo system. (REBELS UNITE!)
Just hop on over to the Black Wolf Editorial Services website and have fun with these calculators.
Becoming a writer is simple: Start writing. However, to turn your writing into a career, you need to develop sustainable writing habits that work for you. To do that, you need to understand your writing personality.
This free mini-workbook takes you through a series of guided questions to help you explore your own writing personality, so you can get your personality traits to work for you within your writing routines.
For more information on this mini-workbook, follow the link below.
Every single one of us involved with Canterbury Writers are fans of the resources from Angela Ackerman and Becca Puglisi. Their website is filled with so many amazing treasures, with new resources being created all the time.
From a Character Profile Questionnaire to an Occupation Speed Dating Tool, and a Goal, Motivation, Conflict + Stakes Tracker, there are so many ways to dive deeper into your stories. There is even a giant sampler of their books under The Show, Don't Tell Pro Pack.
Just go and take a look at the goodies to be found on the Writers Helping Writers website, and you'll start to understand why we're fans.
Writers are often on the hunt for names for their various characters, but with this fake name generator, you'll get a name, physical characteristics, a home address, an occupation, and the make and model of the car that your character drives.
It's also good for those who are planning to live a secret life.
Click the shuffle button to get a randomly generated prompt. Then start writing!
It's great for when you’re experiencing some creative slumps or blocks, or need some prompts for a scene or even an entire story. Hit shuffle and see what you get.
This timer silently counts down to 0:00, then alerts you that time is up with a gentle beep sound.
JJ Wallis loves these. Here's what she has to say about this resource.
With my ADHD brain, I struggle to stay on task and not be distracted. To get around this, I use writing sprints and visual timers. I started with a Pomodoro app but then moved to using YouTube video timers. With my desktop setup, I have multiple screens and keep this video full screen on one. If I get a distracting thought, I just look over and see how much time I have left to trick my brain to remain on task until it reaches zero.
Jami Gold (a paranormal romance writer) has compiled a wonderful collection of beat sheets for writers based on a variety of models, including Save the Cat!, Story Engineering, and the Six Stage Plot. There are checklists for writing engaging scenes and Scrivener templates. She also links to other useful resources for writers.
Every year, the Black Wolf editor releases a new handout for subscribers to help with some aspect of crafting their stories. The BW Story Structure Worksheet is designed to help you identify key beat points for your story without the need to fully plot out your novel. It's ideal for the pansters among us.
If you would like to get your hands on a copy of the BW Story Structure Worksheet, follow the link below.
The Writers of the Future contest is one of the most prestigious contests for science fiction and fantasy writers.
In this free writing course, David Farland, Orson Scott Card, and Tim Powers have pulled their resources together to give you some insight into what it takes to write a compelling story. If you go through the course and do all the exercises, you will come out of the course with a short story. And for those who are more advanced writers, you will gain some insights from some of the best science fiction and fantasy writers in recent history.
There could be any number of reasons why you might want a particular image: blog post, social media, cover designs, etc. But you want to ensure that any image you source from the internet is not copyrighted. The safest way to source images on the internet is to subscribe to a commercially-free image database.
There is no need to pay a fortune for images when there is a good FREE service at your fingertips.
Pixabay is one of the best servers around for commercially-free images. It's just a matter of searching for the image you want.
Onomatopoeia — using words to describe a sound
Sound is just one of the five senses, and using words to describe those sounds is an art form within itself. This downloadable resource contains a list of words that could be used for a variety of scenarios. From animal sounds to the sounds from electronics, this resource will help everyone to build show into their stories.
This book club (sponsored by Black Wolf Editorial Services) is intended for us to discuss books on writing craft and the publishing industry. A new book will be selected every two months, with discussion threads dedicated to each book and a live discussion at the end of the two-month cycle for those who want to take part.
The server is currently free to join—and members of the book club get a say as to what books will be discussed during each cycle. The group is international, but our very own Judy L Mohr (Black Wolf Editorial Services) manages and maintains it.
Pop on over to the Black Wolf Book Club Discord server, and explore some of the amazing books on writing craft.