So I’ve been playing with Scrivener for a couple of days now, and it’s pretty cool, I have to say. I’ve uploaded the manuscript of Cabaret of Monsters (book 2 of the Creature Court) and have been footling with the features – dividing it into scenes (ridiculously easy) and labelling each scene with title, synopsis, keywords.

Okay, I’ve only done a couple of scenes. But I am enjoying the process and this seems to be a very good way to get back in contact with my novel after a six-seven week separation. It’s also well and truly doing the job of getting the novel back in my head – out driving yesterday evening I was thinking about it, turning the story and characters over and over. Thank goodness!

One of the things that I’ve realised is that the second half of the novel, which I wrote super-fast and finished in a haze of sleep deprivation as I tiptoed back to the novel after having Jem, is written entirely in the wrong order. I wrote chunks of scenes/plot with the same characters when they are actually going to need to be separated out. So… yes, Scrivener is my friend! I’m going to need it over the next couple of months.

Catherynne Valente (@catvalente) tweeted recently that she also opens a Scrivener ‘project’ each season (winter, spring, etc), and uses it for all of her short story and non fiction WIPs. This seemed like a brilliant idea, so I did this too, uploading my Sprawl-submission-in-progress and my Leviathan-review-in-progress. Which of course means that I didn’t progress either project today.

I did, however, make shortbread with my big girl, introduce my littlest girl to the wonders of Bonjela (yes, teething already) and we managed to take some vaguely Christmassy photos today.

Also, my review of Rampant by Diana Peterfreund is up at AsIf!

Tags: christmas, scrivener, writing