I don’t know about you, but I come across a ton of great writing tools on a weekly if not daily basis. They come from blogs I follow, books I hear about, workshops, and just overheard conversations (OK, not on purpose, really). What do I do with all that great information?
I have a file on my computer titled “Writing Tools.” Original, right? I put all that information into a subfile if appropriate, or just save it as some kind of document (might be Word, a PDF, a JPG, etc.).
I have a file for Agents & Editors, with genres. A How to Make Audio Books. Business Plan. Contracts and Negotiation. Editing (big, big file!). Marketing. Social Media. Self-Publishing. Submitting. And one titled just “Writing Books.” I had to go into that file to figure out what I put in there – it was good stuff on things to help getting my thoughts and plans in order to write a book: plot points, character charts, genre and tropes, interesting vocabulary words, story beats, POV, Tips if You’re Stuck – stuff like that.
I’ve read every one of those saved files and kept those particular ones because I thought I could really use the info. And I keep looking for more/new stuff to add. I currently have 478 “articles to read for writing” in an e-mail file. Yep. 478. Not all of them will be saved. Some probably shouldn’t even be in there, but a lot of them will have something that I’ll want to remember or use at a later date.
Maybe I’ll never go back into that file, but the chances are really good I will, when I’m ready. When I need that specific tip or plan.
Are you a collector? How do you keep track of writerly info?
No matter if we have all those things in our head, on paper, or stored in some computer file, we need to remember why it’s there – because we need to WRITE ON! Right?
I have some hard copies in a writing info file folder, some in computer files, and some in saved emails in the cloud.
I have a “Writing Resources” folder chock full of stuff from articles, to worksheets, to lessons from training through Lawson’s Writing Academy and Writer U. I go back in from time to time to peruse.