Most writers have seen ads galore for gadgets and gizmos to increase productivity that do anything but. You have undoubtedly received endless pens, paper weights, journals, etc. Here are a few of my favorite tools that you can ask Santa for this year. If Santa neglects to bring them, treat yourself. 1. Nuance PDF  allows you turn documents into PDF documents within Word for Windows: just select Print, Save as PDF, and voila - done. 2. Word Web Pro  brings up a dictionary and thesaurus within word with a click of Control-W. It includes pronunciations and usage examples, and has helpful spelling and sounds-like links. 3. Smart Edit  goes beyond the many editing tools available in Word for Windows (as outlined in Story Building Blocks III) to make your prose the best it can be before you turn it over to an agent or editor. If you are an independent publisher and can't afford an editor, at least give your manuscript a run through with this tool before hitting u...

Character profiles. Character pictures. Snippets of dialogue. Outlines. Images of houses, cars, etc. of book characters. Sketches of scenes. At some point, a writer has to take all of the “things” s/he has collected for a story and start organizing them in order to tell the story. As an organizer, I’m always looking for strategies, programs that help me visualize story components while I’m writing. For years, I’ve used One Note ; its notebook style helps me to see the project as a whole and to see it in chunks by chapters or by scenes while also allowing me to embed notes, images, videos, and web links. One Notes has helped me organize several of my novels and also academic papers, to include my dissertation that I’m currently researching and drafting notes for. One Note There may be, however, another program that will fight for my attention: Scrivener. It’s been around for a while for Mac users, but recently, I downloaded the Windows beta version of Scrivener ; the official v...