An Update

Life improves, and - although I am so behind with everything that it's hard to tell - things are clearly much easier than they were six months ago. Husband's leg is very much better. He is walking (albeit still with a limp), and continuing to make gradual progress. The small boy has started at his sisters' school, which has had a very positive effect on all our lives. I have work coming out of my ears (which is a very good thing, and I am not complaining...).

I am heading to Scotland next month for a chunk of respite care in the arms of my beloved mountains - I wasn't planning to take the laptop, but am tempted to try writing something; I have not written a word since January, which saddens me, as my head is bursting with stories of many kinds. I am struggling a bit with my OU course (it always comes bottom of the list), but loving it when I can settle to a few hours of linear recurrence series and the like ;o) On the flip side, the smaller girl has broken her arm (less said about that the better!), and I injured my eye last week - but we are both healing well!

Looking forward to a better year :o)

Macworld Award for Scrivener

I've just caught up with the fact that Scrivener (the marvellous writing software for Mac OSX) is one of eighteen applications selected for Macworld's Annual Editors' Choice. It sits beside Adobe Premiere Pro, iWorks '08, Reunion 9, and (get this) MacOS 10.5!

This is a just reward for Keith Blount, a budding novelist, who created (and still develops) Scrivener
in his spare time. Now on version 1.1, Scrivener
rightly deserves this award. (My review is here.)

Scrivener for Mac OSX

Scrivener is a writer's software package developed by Keith Blount of Literature & Latte. In Scrivener, Keith has collected everything a writer wants in one tidy package. Here are a couple of screen shots:

      

I can't begin to list everything Scrivener can do, but here are some of the main features:

The Binder: easy access to multiple documents within one window.

The Inspector: for handy note/keyword/link storage for each document.

The Corkboard: a facility to view multiple synopses.

Outliner: which gives information about multiple documents.

Edit Scrivenings: where multiple text files can be strung together.

Full screen mode: where only the text shows - no distractions.

There are many, many other great, and useful, features.

The best way to find out about Scrivener is to visit the Literature & Latte website and download the latest version (free for a 30-day trial). It is only by using it, that you can appreciate the full extent of Keith's brilliance.

In my opinion Scrivener is, by far, the best value-for-money writers' software.

Aside from the software itself, Scrivener's greatest asset is its free-to-use Forum, where a host of friendly and knowledgeable people (including Keith) are on hand seemingly twenty-four-hours-a-day to answer users' questions. As well as technical support, there are also areas for general discussion, philosophising, and so on.

My first word processor was Word Wise Plus, which (for anyone under the age of thirty five) worked in much the same way as html code does today (but not that good). Even so, it was a vast improvement on the typewriter, and I thought it was great.

The jump from MS Word to Scrivener has been even better.