Scouring the great wasteland we know as The Internet is a great way to procrastinate - a favourite pastime of any writer or creator. Hours upon hours spent on pretending to be looking for answers loosely related to our writing, like the history of socks, how ale is made, what did the medieval peasants eat on Sundays, and such weirdly fascinating facts, yet the biggest sinkhole of all time is trying to find the optimal way to write. No shame to the people who link up their Grammarly with their Google Docs and make spreadsheets out of their chapters, but that sounds like an absolute nightmare to me.
The harsh truth, that I've come to find after procrastinati-I mean, writing a lot, is that there's no one best way to write. Yep, you know what you just read, and we both know it's true. Time to close all the 108 tabs, brew a warm cup of coffee, and just write. Like in the good old times. A typewriter, an imaginative brain and fired up fingers.
If you still insist on using the absolute best tools, here's my helpful list of websites, in no particular order. Mind you, I am no expert in this topic. This is merely a list of resources I've found helpful.
If you are concerned about your carefully crafted wordsmithing in any way, do not use Google Docs or Microsoft Word. Many people swear by GDocs, but I simply cannot trust my creative offspring with a giant corporation. Documents get lost, "accidentally deleted", and replaced, crimes against writers that should be punishable by hefty lashing. LibreOffice Writer, on the other side, is an open-source, community driven project which functions as the aforementiond MS Word, yet it's better in every way. It respects your privacy, and the Libre font is just crispy delicious.
A pretty neat site to artificially check your writings for spelling, grammar, and most importantly, readability. It scans your text for elements that are generally frowned upon in the writing community, such as too many adverbs and use of passive voice, as well as simpler alternatives to more complicated words. Apparently, the word 'utilize' is too complicated. While somewhat creatively bankrupt, this site is a great tool for new writers to learn the rules, so they can safely break them later on.
The king of all pastebin sites. Simple and effective, with a clean design. They have everything you need to share and edit your work - markdown support and custom URL. It is all free of charge. Honestly, could not recommend this one enough.
An amazing tool to organise all your thoughts into folders, notes, and graphs. It is not based on cloud storage or any other ethereal and abstract concepts. Rather, it sits on your device as a simple folder. Obsidian uses Markdown, it is completely offline, and it looks clean. Appearance can be changed using any template created by the community, and if you don't like any of those, they got you covered - it also supports CSS customisation.
This one might seem weird at first glance, but let me explain. The Etruscan language existed alongside spoken Latin for a long time, but it eventually died as Latin started taking over. People smarter than me are still figuring out the vocabulary and the grammar of Etruscan, going by very few remnants of an era long gone. Yet, they did find some words, and put them all together in a glossary. What this means for us writers is literally free real estate on unique names. Open it up and let your imagination go wild. You can add sufixes and prefixes and twist the words around without linguist purists hounding you for misusing a language when they themselves don't know it even exists. This little outdated link is my secret treasure trove, and a gift to you for landing on my website.
Some writers prefer to write without any background music, and while it can be true that music diverts your attention, I've actually gone through a lot of soundtracks to see what fits best. Naturally, the following advice works for me, and it probably won't work for you. The key is to find music with no lyrics, or lyrics that are intertwined completely with the instrumentals that you cannot understand it. First that comes to mind is, of course, classical music, but I've found strange comfort in reverb+slow versions of songs. Here are some of my favourites! Sextape - Deftones Intro 1 Hour Slowed this playlist will make you feel like a 19th century villain Wisp - Negions Fail mr. kitty "after dark" + rain + traffic + reverb | 1 hour Tzafu - Blood Rave Virtual Festival 2021
Do not neglect video game original soundtracks! These tracks were literally designed to keep you doing what you're doing [playing the game], but they work just as intended outside of gaming, too. It'd even be beneficial if they're from a game you've played religiously before, as the familiar sounds will calm your mind, so you can focus on writing. Shin Megami Tensei V OST - Da'at - Tokyo Diet Building 20 minutes Goldshire Tavern music - ingame - World of Warcraft 1 HOUR // Braum - the Heart of the Freljord | Login Screen - League of Legends Elden Ring - Full Official Soundtrack Music | OST - Yuka Kitamura (All Tracks So Far) Disco Elysium Playlist for Studying, Work, Relaxing (and contemplating life) World of Warcraft - Invincible - endless 2 hours
As a final note (yep I did that on purpose), I will suggest a complete wildcard.
Frequency-Shaped Propeller Aircraft Cockpit Noise GeneratorThis website offers a white noise generator, but from the cockpit of an aircraft. It is oddly and insanely soothing if you choose the "Night Bombing" preset. The gentle rumbles it produces are felt in the pit of your stomach, and my theory is that it's the closest thing to the sounds from inside the womb.
What it all comes down to is to face your own demons. Read, write, read, write, write. Our brains dislike putting effort into things that are not deemed immediate threat, so we have to re-wire them and keep going at it. Word by word, we're all going to make it.