Most of us like to think we’ve got the English language down pat. If your friends can understand you, then anyone can, right? True, but in business, the academe, and anywhere perceptions matter, you want to be more than understood—you want to impress. And that means flawless writing, among other things. A sentence checker allows you to check your text for typos, wrong tenses, and more advanced errors like subjunctives and dangling participles. While you can find most of these concepts on the web and may even know them by heart, sometimes when you’re caught up in your writing these rules just slip you by. These programs are like a second pair ...

Back in the day, all you needed to write was a pen and some paper—or a stick and tree bark, if you want to go that far. Technically that still holds true, but why deprive yourself when there are better tools in your arsenal? Writing software can help you better plan your structure, check your grammar, format your text, and minimize distractions, among others. Here are some cool programs that can help you write that novel, essay, or screenplay—or at least make the job easier. Open-source word processing Maybe you’re a hard-up writer or a student trying to get your first break. In any case, you can’t afford the $300-plus Microsoft Office suite, ...

Every family gathering that you attended, you were always able to earn the applause of everyone present who heard your fascinating stories. You felt you had so much success with your family that you decided to write your stories down and make them into a book. However, before you embark on that crusade, you must first decide on how to make your book known. This is why eBooks are becoming more and more popular everyday. Writers from all over the world will go to eBook publishers in order to distribute their work faster and easier as well as to make it more accessible. Writing a book serves no purpose at all if you are unable to have it printed and ...

Writing a children’s book seems easy: how hard can it be to write a few dozen pages, most of which are illustrated anyway? Harder than it looks, if you ask writer Susan Marie Swanson of St. Paul, Minnesota. Swanson’s latest book, The House in the Night, awarded the Caldecott Medal in 2009, took her about ten years to write, edit, and re-edit to perfection. Often, it’s because they’re so short and simple that children’s books are challenging. More than just tell stories, they should “inspire, intrigue, and uplift,” according to publisher Brett Waldman. It’s not the kind of thing you can do over a weekend. Even someone with advanced degrees can take ...

The Information Age may have changed the landscape of publishing, but writers still rely on one age-old tool to push their craft: word of mouth. UK columnist Robert McCrum calls it the “holy grail of publishing.” J.K. Rowling and Dan Brown both owe much of their success not to brilliant PR or cutting-edge marketing, but to casual conversation between book-loving friends. Word of mouth has taken on a new form since the advent of the Internet and social networking, of course. Whereas Victor Gollancz, in the early days of his eponymous publishing firm, had to pay others to read his books and get word around, the likes of Amanda Hocking merely have ...