LivingWriter: Is It the Novel-Writing Program You’ve Been Waiting For?

I’m starting to feel like the author gods have cursed me in search of the perfect novel program. But when a fellow NORIMO participant told me about Living Writer, I was still optimistic enough to be surprised: “Is this the program I’ve been waiting for?”

Like every program I’ve used and reviewed until (I think I’m up to 11!), There are some features that I like. I don’t hate any part of it, but there are quite a few things I want to have here. I’m constantly looking for a stop-shop to write my novel and it’s not for me. Despite this, my honest review of what I think is one of the best programs I’ve tried.

An Overview of LivingWriter
If I were to add the techbizhunt, I’d say it’s a mix between Google Docs, Scrivener and the now-blocked Storieshop. In fact, it was the Google-esque word processor interface that appealed to me the most.

Like the most novel writing programs, you can drag and drop scenes and chapters. It occurs in two places: on the left-hand sidebar and on the board. The board looks exactly like corkboard on a screwdriver.

You can also create one-of-a-kind research and story elements of the ongoing world-Bible and access them from the right sidebar while you are in writing mode. There are several plotted templates to create your story or you can freestyle your outline and structure.

Living Writer allows you to import your manuscripts and it will read title sizes as chapter and scene breaks. As someone who had to copy and paste multiple stories into other programs, I found it extremely appealing. There is a mobile app for both Android and iPhone it is cloud-based and you can set the dark mode. The goal setting feature is also a selling point.

What I love
The erase interface is familiar and painless to use. There are lots of formatting options like a normal word processor. Images are even easier to insert.

I really enjoy the story material. You can add elements for characters, objects, settings and “others” so you are not limited. In each component, you can add as many categories as you need; For example, you can add physical details, relationships, motivations, etc. These are free-form, so you can create it yourself.

You can add pictures! The story elements link inside your manuscript so you can quickly access them as you write. You can even add character nicknames. For example, my main character’s name is Angelica, but she will appear as Hale and Miss Spencer. By adding this nickname, the manuscript will link to its element each time those names appear.

There are a total of eight plot structures that you can use to plan and write your story. Five fiction and four non-fiction. They are:

• Dan Harmon’s Story Circle
• Hero’s Journey
• 27 Beat Chapter Plotting (a.k.a. Save the Cat)
• Dan Wells’ Seven-Point Story
• Three-Act Structure
• Memoir
• Biography
• Self-Help
• Book Proposal

Additionally, the mobile app is really great! When an idea strikes you and you only have your phone in your hand, it’s great to choose where you left it on the computer.

What I Don’t Love
I only had two problems with Living Writer and customer service was more interested in helping me identify what went wrong. Both of these are involved in uploading my manuscript.

Living Writer has acknowledged my chapter breaks, but half of my chapters have been uploaded. It took some time to get them back in order. Second, the format of all my paragraphs is now left-contiguous with no indents and no gaps.

While you can change the formatting settings for new text, it does not allow me to select larger text and apply new formatting. If I stick with the Living Writer, I will ask customer service to help determine it so I don’t have to manually indent each paragraph.

There is nothing more to dislike in my harsh words, but there are some features that I wished it was. I want to be able to create my own character template and I like a timeline feature. I want to be able to use my own plotting template without having to create it from scratch every time.

Final Thoughts
Living Writer is one of the best programs I write. I think it’s a great price at 9. 9.99 a month and there’s a discount if you pay for it annually. There is a two-week free trial to see if you enjoyed it.

Did I sell it outright? Not yet. I will give a chance to one or two more programs before deciding what is committed to the rest of this project.

Have you used Living Writer? What is your favorite novel-writing program? Let me know in the comments section