FREE Novel Writing Software?? (For Authors Who Want to Stay Organized)
Have you ever tried novel writing software? If you’re looking to stay organized while writing or want a better way to format your ebook, you should check out these free options.
0:00 Intro
0:37 Option 1: PapyrusAuthor
5:38 Option 2: yWriter7
10:13 Option 3: Bibisco
16:18 Option 4: Reedsy Book Editor
21:44 My recommendations
Check out my ROUGH WRITER blog at: joey-durso.com/blog/software
SOFTWARE LINKS
PapyrusAuthor: www.papyrusauthor.com
yWriter7: www.spacejock.com/yWriter.html
Bibisco: bibisco.com
Reedsy Book Editor: reedsy.com/write-a-book
Read my novel “DEVILS IN SUNDAY HATS,” a tale of redemption, coming of age and the death of the American dream: amazon.com/dp/B078RRC9RJ
Or if you’re a libertarian sci-fi fan, read “THE AETHERVERSE,” where outer space is NOT a safe space: amazon.com/dp/B019L2YBMA
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TOTALLY changing my last name to Van Texel!
Thank you so much for this! I have been using Scrivener but I HATE their customer service and etiquette. So I was looking for another program to support (even though I already own scrivener) that unlike scrivener has a mobile version on Android. I was using Campfire and they are amazing, but I am disabled and ran into a financial issue so I then went looking for something free and resolved to have a world building program and use scrivener for writing. I discovered Obsidian and have been watching research videos and am in love with the freedom it provides! I'm not sure if I am going to exclusively use scrivener for compiling for publication, or use it for writing and use obsidian for WB, but I love what I'm learning about it right now.
Thank you so much for this video. I am using Word, and am fairly fappy with it, but it is always nice to have other options. In Word, I've developed a couple of workarounds for Navigation. My book has both a Table of Contents and a Dramatis Persona, So I make liberal use of bookmarks and hyperlinks to move around the book.
I'll always have a softspot for yWriter, too. I've moved onto Scrivener from it, but there are still things I use yWriter for, like writing blog posts or flashfic and such. Also, I definitely drafted in yWriter. I know it seems basic, but it has all the functions I need while drafting.
Thank you! Always useful to know about free software.
You're welcome!
Being strictly a hobbyist, I found Manuskript is fulfilling all my needs.
Thank you so much for this video ! It was exactly what i wanted to know and I really like the first program you showed! Have a wonderful day
Thank you!! I’m glad you found it helpful 😀
You can write in Atticus and they are developing iit for that purpose. They like the Reedsy Editor are more aimed at formatting and publication but they are developing. I am writing in Atticus now.
Thanks, I’ll check that out!
The free version of Papyrus Author isn't as good as the + version, and you still have to "check in" now and then (they won't say exactly how often) or it stops working.
Thanks! Good video! But am I missing something? Have you been collaborating in reedsy? I just tried that with a friend the other day, couldnt get it to work and then asked the reedsy staff. They said they havent implemented the collaboration feature yet!
I mean a co-author. Not a hired editor or anything like that
Weird because when I was playing around with it, it seemed like you could do that! Maybe it’s not specifically designed for collaborating yet, but with the ability to add comments/track revisions, I feel like it could be done. You’d end up using the same login I guess?
So how about if I want to start with free software and then import it into another that would be better to use for publishing. What would you suggest?
I’m actually not sure! 😂 I would think you can export from the free program and save it as a text file, which you could probably import into a different program. It would probably affect the formatting but again I’m not totally sure. If you find out, let me know!
In Papyrus Author, how extensive is the Timeline? The app I am using currently has a hard limit on how many thousand years it can cover.
I played around with it just now and it let me make a timeline that spanned over 5,000 years, so it looks like there probably aren't any limits (and if there are, they're pretty high).
Is the first one useful to also formatting your novel to see how many real pages you have in an actual real book? And is it available for MacOs?
I dunno about the program, but for pages I normally divide my word count by 300 for a good estimate.
Yes, it looks like it's available for MacOS! Unfortunately, I don't think it can estimate the page count in print. If this helps, I divide the word count by 500 and it's usually pretty accurate.
Don't care about your face honestly
Wish I could say the same, I’d save a lot of money on skin products 😂