I have a lot of tools in my writer’s toolbox and I use each and every one despite the fact that many overlap in their abilities. Is that nuts? Weird? Inefficient?

Maybe, but it works for me.

Before I even begin to write a book, I create characters and plot the book on paper with worksheets I created (you can get them on Etsy).

Once I’m done this, I move to my computer and move to Obsidian. There I create a page with a list of my characters—primary and secondary—linking them to character pages I already have (which I will if I’ve used these characters before) or create new pages for each new character. I then create a page for each scene I’ve already plotted and another page with a table of these scenes in chronological order (later, if I need to, I can list them by POV character because that is one of the properties I list on the scene page—tune in next week for a detail on exactly how I use Obsidian to write).

With all this information neatly organized, I can now begin to actually write the book. I do this two different ways. I use Scrivener where it’s easy to see my scenes laid out on a virtual bulletin board and move them around as necessary. And I also write by hand on my Kindle Scribe because my brain works better when I’m writing by hand. With the Scribe, I can email myself what I’ve written and it appears as a text document. I copy and paste that into Scrivener where I clean it up.

If I’m feeling stuck at any point in the writing, I can always put my outline into Plottr, which shows me a nice graph of my scenes. It’s also great for creating family trees if needed.

When it’s time to edit my work, I compile it from Scrivener into a Word document. As I’m reading and editing the book, I sometimes feel the need to see it all laid out before me so I can see the bigger picture, the structure. I create a stack of index cards—yup, physical cards with the name of the scene and what day it happens. I can put these onto a physical bulletin board in the form of a W graph so I can see the major beats, how many scenes there are between beats and make sure everything happens at the right time (first turning point at 25%, point of no return at about 50%, black moment at 75%, resolution at 90%, leaving space for the wrap up at the end).

So many tools: paper worksheets, Obsidian, Scrivener, Plottr, Microsoft Word, and index cards. I use all the different ways of looking a story and I use them all to write the best book I can.