Fellow Writers, Look What I Found!

All right, so here's a list of a few of my new favorite writerly things....

1)  Well, baby #2 is due in August, and the hubster and I are packing up our belongings and our little boys and moving out of state end of September.  I've been participating in NaNoWriMo for years, and was sad to think that I wouldn't be able to this year with a new baby and moving and all.  I think I'll be a little busy and REALLY tired in November.  Cue Camp NaNoWriMo!

Think NaNoWriMo, but for the summer, rather than for November.  When you sign up for Camp NaNoWriMo you can choose if you want to participate in June or August.  Betcha can't guess which month I'm signed up for? ;)


2)  So, I'm a list person.  I also like writing notes and ideas for my stories in notebooks.  The problem with this is I sometimes lose my lists.  Or forget which notebook I wrote my story outline in.  Or put the wrong notebook in my bag for my solo trip to Starbucks.

But thanks to Evernote, I've been so much more organized!  Seriously, downloading this free thing to write notes, make checklists (complete with check boxes I can check off on my computer or with the Evernote app on my phone) has been awesome!  Love, love, love having all my notes in one place, they're easy to edit, and I feel so much more organized without notebooks and pieces of paper in random places around the house.

3)  I had heard that Kristen Lamb is the go-to gal on social media for writers.  And she definitely is.  I bought both of her books, "We Are Not Alone: The Writer's Guide to Social Media" and also "Are You There Blog? It's Me, Writer."  I learned a few things from the first book, and was inspired by a few others in the latter.  I would recommend you check out We Are Not Alone, if you want to learn more about using Twitter, Facebook Fan Pages, Blogs, etc to build your writing platform.  If you just want to be inspired to continue writing and to keep up with your blog, check out Are You There Blog?  Both books are available for $4.99 for the Kindle on Amazon, and I think that's a great price for the nuggets of gold you'll glean from these books.  And if you don't want to read the entire book/s, then check out her blog, full of helpful social media and writing advice.

4) If you're a writer and you haven't read Save the Cat! by Blake Snyder, then you are truly missing out!  That book is awesome for helping you plan out a story line if you're in the brainstorming/outlining process, or fabulous for helping you tackle your revisions to help you understand what your story may be missing.

Apparently, I've been missing out too.  I learned today that Snyder wrote a second book, Save the Cat! Strikes Back which I just ordered.  I can't tell you yet if it's as awesome as the first book, but I'm definitely excited about what I'll learn from it.

Or have you used/participated in/read any of these things I've mentioned?  Or plan to?  Any writerly finds you've made recently?