In this post I’m going to share the lessons learnt since I got serious, in organising your writing life in general, as opposed to organising a specific novel, which I’ll do in another post.
I’m going to cover the below 6 ideas for getting and staying organised.
- Don’t Throw Anything Away
- Create a Compendium
- Hard Copy – Note Books Vs Files
- Backup Copies
- Your Mobile is Your Friend
I wandered through my life dabbling at writing and ended up with hand written notes and scenes in various note books. I often lost one, only to discover it and the treasures it held, years later. I kept track of nothing. I think I’m a typical writer in that ideas strike and I have to write them down before I forget them. I wrote on torn up beer mats, back of tickets and scraps of paper. I would find them everywhere; my purse, my glasses case, even my gym bag. There was utterly no organisation, which was ironic because in the rest of my life I’m known for being uber organised. To do lists, holiday itineraries, hand bag full of essentials and would sprout out sayings like, ‘If it’s not a right angle, it’s a wrong angle’ and ‘A place for everything, and everything in its place.’ I drove some work colleges mad.
I think because writing is creative for me, I acted like some crazed artist. Now, I treat every creative thought with the respect it deserves.
1. Don’t Throw Anything Away
At least not without having written/ typed it up to be saved correctly.
Gather up all those scraps and post-it notes, sort them into categories of what they are (scene, title, character, story line, setting) and get them saved together in an organised manner for your reference. Either note books, files or electronic.
If you continue this scribbling habit (I certainly do), you just need to put in the time every so often to put the info in the correct organised place for saving.
As for larger handwritten works, I think these should be kept too, in their original form, as hard copy. Get a box and keep them.
I still have some of my hand written chapters from my first teenage horror novel I wrote 20 years ago. They are very sentimental to me. They help remind me where I’ve come from, how long I’ve wanted this and how far I’ve come.
2. Create Your Compendium (and keep adding to it)
Gathering all my note books, scraps and typed documents together, I then created a single list compendium of all my story line ideas. In one place, for easy and quick reference.
I got a new notebook just for creative writing. At the back I gave myself plenty of pages to grow into and started my list. Mine includes: Working Title, General Idea, Genre, If I’ve Written anything yet.
Then I typed it up onto Excel too, so I could easily sort by Genre.
Make sure you keep adding to it as your ideas come.
I no longer lose ideas, I use it to judge what I want to write next and bundle similar ideas together to get a meatier story.
3. Hard Copy Filing (Note books Vs Files)
Note books are great for quick access and carrying around, I like the ones with dividers, but eventually you run out of pages. You could be left looking through three note books to find that scene you wanted.
A wide file however, can hold multiple note books worth of pages. You can insert new pages in whichever section you need to. You can also insert different size paper, pictures you’ve found, maps and drawings etc. It has a spine label for a quick check on what’s in it.
I have a separate note book for the current novel I am working on each time. Eventually, these pages will be removed and inserted into its matching file for easier reference.
4. Back Up Copies
I’ve been stung here so I cannot stress this enough. I knew this advice but I was being lazy and I just didn’t think it would happen to me.
There are lots of ways of keeping electronic back up copies and I use several but try to find your favourite so it doesn’t add to your work load.
Personal Email Address – If I’ve typed up a scene at lunchtime and need to get back to work. Simplest way to save, email it to yourself for correctly saving later. Then it’s in Sent emails and in my received emails elsewhere.
Dropbox & Other Cloud Storage – Save your documents to cloud storage for access from any pc, laptop, or mobile. I use the free Dropbox but it will run out of space quickly, only 2GB. Although you can pay for a larger package.
There are many others, look online for the best one for you. Here’s a link to current info for 2020 – https://www.whizlabs.com/blog/best-free-cloud-storage/
USB Flash Drive – My favourite portable back up. Get one, get several.
I have one for my current trilogy specifically, then another for everything else writing and one for personal stuff. They are light weight and simple to use, you can even get them as keyrings.
5. Your Phone is Your Friend
By this I mean smart phone. They are miniature computers in your hand (maybe too often). But I wouldn’t be without mine in my writers life.
- It’s your dictionary and thesaurus
- It’s your picture gallery for inspiration
- It’s the entire internet for research
- It’s your connection to other writers and the world
- It’s your mini notebook
- It’s your voice recorder
All of the above can either be as Apps installed or just by using the internet connection.
6. Pinterest
This suggestion really is a personal one, I love this platform and I find it invaluable for my writing universe.
You create an account and then start pinning visual pins to your Boards. These visuals are links to the internet and its source. You can have your boards private or public for others to see and pin items to their own boards.
I have Boards covering various topics, and your Boards can even have Sections in them too. Ie Writing Tips Board, contains Sections of Editing, Research & Great Blogs.
I hope the ideas and suggestions above are helpful in getting your writing world in order.
Look out for my future post with tips on Organising Your Novel Writing – you can discover my other posts in the blog section.
candicedelton.uk 