Friday Five: Resources for Writers

by | Nov 29, 2013 | Uncategorized

by Stephanie Morrill

Stephanie writes young adult contemporary novels and is the creator of GoTeenWriters.com. Her novels include The Reinvention of Skylar Hoyt series (Revell) and the Ellie Sweet books (Playlist). You can connect with her on Facebook, Twitter, Pinterest, and check out samples of her work on her author website.

I’m currently holed up in a cabin in Estes Park, Colorado with a bunch of my family. We’re up here to celebrate Thanksgiving, which is one of my favorite holidays. Even though I’m a big fan of presents and Christmas lights and all that good stuff, I love the (relative) serenity of Thanksgiving. That’s it’s about being together and eating great food and that, other than the grocery store, I didn’t have to do a bunch of shopping for it.

With Thanksgiving in mind, here’s a Friday Five list of 5 Resources That Writers Can Give Thanks For:


1. Agency Blogs
Seriously, how great is it to live in a time where many literary agents blog? Publishing isn’t such a mysterious, faceless business anymore. Here are a few greats, listed in alphabetical order:

Miss Snark (a classic – the blog closed in 2007)
2. Etymonline.com (And Dictionary.com and Thesaurus.com)

Etymonline is a great resource for understanding the origins of words. Every historical writer should have this bookmarked. 
3. Google Street View

For the Ellie Sweet series, I basically lived on Google Street View trying to get a feel for the Redwood High School campus. (Note to self: Use a fake school next time!)
If you can’t afford a research trip, Google’s got your back with Street View and Google Maps Views. Want to go to Antartica? Or see the Bridge of Sighs in Venice? Stonehenge?
4. Conference MP3s

Conferences are pricey. By the time I buy plane tickets, book my hotel, and pay my registration fee, I’m looking at $1,000. 
But some writers conferences also offer the MP3s of the classes for purchase. You can buy an entire conference or just a few sessions. American Christian Fiction Writers offers that option on their site. For RWA, it looks like you have to be a member to order the conference recordings.
Also, Jill speaks very highly of the podcasts on Writing Excuses, which is for fantasy and sci-fi authors, but has stuff that would apply to writing in general too.

5. The Chicago Manual of Style

This thing is ridiculous. Look at it:
She’s the orange one with the 15 on the side. I’m not sure why she’s a girl in my head, but that’s the pronoun that came out.
It would be pretty impossible for me to write a book of that length on any subject … but if it had to be on grammar? No, thank you. I’m super appreciative, however, of the folks who’ve actually given thought to the fact that brussels sprouts shouldn’t be capitalized despite Brussels being a proper noun in another context. 
What resources are you thankful for? Pinterest? A certain writers conference you go to every year? A favorite craft book? Please share!