What Are the Best Writing Tools?
vocal.media – Monday August 25, 2025
Looking to write smarter, faster, and better? Whether you are a student, professional writer, content creator, or blogger, the right writing tools can make all the difference.
With so many online tools for writers available, it can be overwhelming to choose the best ones. This guide highlights the top free writing software, from brainstorming ideas to writing a perfect copy.
1. Brainstorming & Idea Generation Tools
Before a single word is written, ideas must be captured and shaped. These tools help with creativity and organization.
Evernote is like a digital notebook. You can create notes, add checklists, save web pages, attach images, or even record audio reminders. Writers often use it to collect story ideas, blog inspirations, or references they stumble upon during the day.
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Best Features: Syncs across devices, allows tagging for organization, integrates with apps like Google Drive.
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Why It’s Useful: Writers don’t always sit at a desk. If you think of a story idea while commuting, you can note it down and revisit later.
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Best For: Journalists, bloggers, and students.
Indie Presses Provide a Haven for Midlist Authors
publishersweekly.com – Sunday August 24, 2025
Independent literary publishing has a proud tradition of nurturing authors who’ve subsequently moved on to success at larger houses. Take Percival Everett, for instance, who published his fiction with Graywolf Press for decades before bringing his prize-winning breakout hit, James, to Doubleday.
But there’s a reverse trend that’s building steam: authors are moving away from corporate publishing to independent. While some are being turned away by the conglomerates that once published them, others say they are switching because they prefer the care and attention that indie presses provide.
Savvy authors and agents, Europa Editions publisher Michael Reynolds says, have long known that smaller publishers typically only put out books they feel strongly about, with the entire staff invested in their success, rather than books “being championed by one lone, intrepid, but increasingly powerless editor at an anonymous corporate imprint.” Europa, which published Elena Ferrante’s Neapolitan novels in the U.S., is one of many independent publishers who have welcomed the growing group of major house midlisters—and, in some case, marquee names—seeking asylum at smaller presses.
Author Rie Qudan: Why I used ChatGPT to write my prize-winning novel
theguardian.com – Monday August 18, 2025
“I don’t feel particularly unhappy about my work being used to train AI,” says Japanese novelist Rie Qudan. “Even if it is copied, I feel confident there’s a part of me that will remain, which nobody can copy.”
The 34-year old author is talking to me via Zoom from her home near Tokyo, ahead of the publication of the English-language translation of her fourth novel, Sympathy Tower Tokyo. The book attracted controversy in Japan when it won a prestigious prize, despite being partly written by ChatGPT.
The author speaks conversational English, but her translator, Jesse Kirkwood, is also on the line, interpreting questions and answers when needed. At the heart of Sympathy Tower Tokyo is a Japanese architect, Sara Machina, who has been commissioned to build a new tower to house convicted criminals. It will be a representation of what one character – not without irony – calls “the extraordinary broadmindedness of the Japanese people”, in that the tower will house offenders in compassionate comfort.
In the novel, Sara, herself a victim of violent crime, wonders if this sympathetic approach to criminals is appropriate. Does this sympathy reflect Japanese society in reality?
“It’s definitely prevalent,” says Qudan. One of the triggers for writing the novel, she adds, was the assassination of former prime minister Shinzo Abe in July 2022. “The person who shot him became the centre of a lot of attention in Japan – and his background elicited a lot of sympathy from people. He had grown up in a heavily religious household, and been deprived of freedom. That idea had been in my head for a long time, and when I came to write the novel, it came out again as part of the process.”
The question of public attitudes towards criminals runs through the story, in serious and satirical ways. Potential residents of the tower must take a “Sympathy Test” to determine if they are deserving of compassion (“Have your parents ever acted violently towards you? – Yes / No / Don’t know”) … and the ultimate decision will be made by AI.
Censorship from the other side of the aisle: New book considers publishing trends
as.cornell.edu – Wednesday August 13, 2025
As a new doctoral student at Cornell, Adam Szetela Ph.D. ’25 noticed an interesting trend in the book publishing world. Rather than criticism from people on the cultural right about the morals —or lack thereof — in current titles, authors and publishers were being slammed by folks on the cultural left, who were attacking books as racist or sexist, or questioning an author’s sensitivity.
“A lot of this is coming from a place of good faith,” Szetela said about the trend, which he writes about in “That Book Is Dangerous! How Moral Panic, Social Media, and the Culture Wars Are Remaking Publishing,” published Aug. 12 by the Massachusetts Institute of Technology Press and distributed by Penguin Random House. “But while the right is remaking the world in its image, the left is standing in a circular firing squad.”
Szetela said this new version of self-censorship is fueled by the vast reach of social media today.
Death of a publishing dream: how the Unbound revolution became untethered
observer.co.uk – Sunday August 10, 2025
The literary disrupters enjoyed great success with their crowdfunding model, signing authors that other publishers overlooked. And then the money ran out…
The revolution started in a small writer’s shed in 2011, amid the deck chairs, tents and bunting of the Hay festival, the highlight of the literary calendar. The talk was of shooting a rocket through the world of publishing.
Three friends – John Mitchinson, Justin Pollard and Dan Kieran – were launching a new company, one that they hoped would “democratise the book commissioning process”, with authors pitching their ideas directly to readers, who would choose whether or not to invest. Writers would crowdfund and profits would be split 50:50 between publisher and author – far more generous terms than the 10% royalties usually offered by others.
It would be author-led, author-first, the founders said. It would be a way for books that would otherwise be passed over by the old-school editors in traditional publishing houses to find their audience, and fly.
I’m a best-selling children’s author – this is how to write a good book for kids
inews.co.uk – Saturday August 9, 2025
When I meet someone new, the conversation often goes like this: “What do you do?” “I’m a children’s book writer.” “Oh, I have a great idea for a book… a toaster who wants to be a pop star!”
But despite what people think, it’s surprisingly difficult to write a good picture book. With a standard length of just 32 pages and around 1,000 words to play with, you must weave a satisfying story that is concise, engaging and entertaining enough for an audience who are forever tempted by one more episode of Bluey. How do you write a story that will stand out on a crowded bookshelf? Where do you even start?
My journey into children’s book writing was slightly accidental. When I graduated, I just knew I wanted to do “something creative”. Luckily, a supportive friend weighed in with a suggestion, presumably inspired by watching me spend the past three years knitting, painting and learning the ukulele rather than going to English lectures. “You’re basically a child – have you considered children’s book publishing?”
The authors who make millions through self-publishing
telegraph.co.uk – Friday August 8, 2025
Tens of millions of books have been self-published online since Amazon first made it possible in November 2007. Many languish in obscurity with zero sales, so writing a bestseller is anything but straightforward. But the rewards for getting it right are enormous.
“It felt like winning the lottery,” says Simon McCleave, 55, a crime novelist whose debut novel, The Snowdonia Killings, has sold half-a-million copies since he published it in 2020.
“I’d written a book that thousands of people wanted to buy and they were asking for another one,” he adds. “I thought, ‘Can I give up my job?’” A thought that doesn’t often occur to debut authors who publish through traditional channels, controlled by agents and publishers.
The Spec Script
bbc.co.uk – Wednesday August 6, 2025
As the dates for our next annual Open Call will be announced very soon, we turned to Script Consultant Philip Shelley to outline some of the key things you should be thinking about if you are considering entering your script.
What is a Spec Script and Why is it Important? Will it get made?
‘Spec’ as in speculative. Also known as a ‘calling card’ script, 'specimen' script or ‘writing sample’.
For new screenwriters looking to break into the industry – indeed even for experienced writers looking to refresh / relaunch themselves – spec scripts are absolutely fundamental. They are your currency as a writer. Everything good will come from a promising spec script. And without it, potential employers won’t be able to engage with you as a serious proposition.
The Channel 4 screenwriting course is all about the spec script. Initially we choose 12 writers largely based on the script they have submitted. The main purpose of the course is for them to then write another script. So, by the end of the course, they should all have two outstanding spec scripts.
I have witnessed these scripts kickstarting and indeed sustaining careers over many years. That’s the very good news. The less good news is that while, over the years, many of these projects have been optioned by production companies and taken into active, paid development, they pretty much never seem to end up getting made. What they do instead is get you in the door, initiate conversations and relationships with the producers and development executives who have the power to commission you to write your next scripts.
Writing What You Want to Learn: The Joy of Real-World Research When Crafting a Novel
crimereads.com – Monday August 4, 2025
I have never believed in the adage Write What You Know. How boring is that? Frankly, my life’s just not that interesting. Instead, I prefer to write what I want to learn.
Case in point, I travelled to Yorkshire, England to do location research for Tea with Jam and Dread, the newest Tea by the Sea mystery. I’ve been to London several times but never to Yorkshire. In earlier books in the series it was mentioned that the grandmother character, Rose Campbell, had been a kitchen maid at a grand manor house near Halifax in her youth before marrying a visiting American, and moving to his country.
When I decided I wanted to take Rose back to Thornecroft Castle House, which is now a hotel, for the hundredth birthday celebrations of Elizabeth, the Dowager Countess of Frockmorton, I knew right away I’d have to make the trip myself before I could take my characters there.
These days you can do an enormous amount of research on the internet. Examine historical records, check up on the weather and the climate, study other people’s tourist photos, follow the layout of roads and streets on maps and zoom in at the level of an individual house or pan out to see the spread of the coastline.
The end of the road? What The Salt Path scandal means for the nature memoir
theguardian.com – Saturday August 2, 2025
When The Salt Path came out in 2018, it was a publishing phenomenon, going on to sell more than 2m copies globally. As even those who haven’t read it are likely to know by now, the book charted Raynor Winn and her husband Moth’s emotionally and physically transformative long-distance walk along the South West Coast Path in the wake of utter disaster: a financial collapse that cost them their home, and Moth’s diagnosis with an incurable neurological disorder. Winn followed it with two further books in a similar vein, The Wild Silence and Landlines, also bestsellers. Earlier this year came a film of The Salt Path, starring Gillian Anderson and Jason Isaacs. That original book by a first-time writer had become what writers, editors and booksellers all dream of: a bestselling, spin-off generating brand.
But it wasn’t the first nature memoir to top the charts, by any means. In 2012, Wild by Cheryl Strayed described the 26-year‑old’s hike across the west coast of America in the wake of her mother’s death and the end of her marriage, and after soaring up the book charts it was made into a film starring Reese Witherspoon two years later. That same year, H Is for Hawk by Helen Macdonald was a surprise bestseller, telling the story of a year spent training a Eurasian goshawk as a journey through grief after the death of their father. In 2016, Amy Liptrot’s The Outrun saw her return to the sheep farm on Orkney where she’d grown up in order to recover from addiction through contact with nature; it was also recently filmed, with Saoirse Ronan in the lead role. Meanwhile, in last year’s bestselling Raising Hare, foreign policy adviser Chloe Dalton describes moving to the countryside, rescuing a leveret and rediscovering her relationship with the land.
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