How do you organise your stories?

[ShelbyDawn57]

How do you organise your stories on your computer/cloud?

Under my main Stories folder, I have a subfolder for each primary character (I have two published, but more planned). Within these are additional folders for each series. This is where I keep the manuscripts themselves and any supporting files, such as the PowerPoint "mood boards" I sometimes create. I find this structure especially helpful when I need to check for continuity.

I also have a reference for each story, e.g. A2.4, which is the fourth story in the second series about Adam. This is useful for keeping track of things like which story a character first appears in and any crossovers between series.

Organize? What is this strange new word you use???

I have a single WIP folder with dozens of stories in various stages of not done. When I get the rough draft completed, (rough draft - completed, yeah, I caught the oxymoron) I move them to pending where they will get periodic reviews until I can't find anything else to change.

Once published, I have folders for short stories, novellas, and novels, by word count. Inside these, I have arbitrarily placed folders for the entries in series or common-world stories, e.g., My Transitions stories. They are all stand alone, but all occur in the same world and revolve around gender change using the Transitions tech used in the original story.

 

[Areala-chan]

Organized? In my head.

 

[TheLobster]

You're better off copy and pasting each chapter into word or Libre Office and sending a docx to each other.

Wait, seriously? It doesn't even have sensible exporting options? Can't you just tell it to produce a .docx, .pdf, LaTeX, Markdown, HTML etc. from a particular chapter?

If so, then that's completely disqualifying. I don't want to have to meticulously copy-paste however many distinct scrapbook fragments Scrivener will store my work as into LibreOffice, only to then worry how Lit processes during submission. I'd rather just write plain text with HTML tags like I do right now, because however imperfect the Preview is, it is still better than nothing.

 

[IWroteThis]

I keep telling myself that it would be an imprudent indulgence to spend a hundred bucks (Windows + OSX) on a hobby that will never earn me any money.

Your glowing review is really not helping there, you know?

Try yWriter. It's not Scrivener, but it's free. (Registration requested, but not required.)

It breaks everything down by chapter and scene, so it's easy to create empty placeholder scenes and it's drag and drop to rearrange them as the story develops. It has features for managing characters, Locations, and Items, as well as two different timeline formats.

I know it's not for everybody, but it's a huge step up from trying to write in a single, linear document. I've never regretted the time I spent moving my old text and word processing files into it.

 

[IWroteThis]

Wait, seriously? It doesn't even have sensible exporting options? Can't you just tell it to produce a .docx, .pdf, LaTeX, Markdown, HTML etc. from a particular chapter?

If so, then that's completely disqualifying. I don't want to have to meticulously copy-paste however many distinct scrapbook fragments Scrivener will store my work as into LibreOffice, only to then worry how Lit processes during submission. I'd rather just write plain text with HTML tags like I do right now, because however imperfect the Preview is, it is still better than nothing.

PS: yWriter exports to HTML, Text, RTF, docx, epub, and Nanowrimo Obfuscated Text. I have no clue what that last one is, but it's a menu option. I just export to docx, as I use MS Word's grammar checker and Read Aloud for final editing.

 

[GemmaGemmaGemma]

I have a folder for one shots, a folder for series and just debuted a folder for contests. I also have a word document called ideas that I haven't updated in months, because it's easier to store my ideas in my head. I also forget them a lot, which is a key element of my vibe.

 

[TheLobster]

Try yWriter. It's not Scrivener, but it's free. (Registration requested, but not required.)

It breaks everything down by chapter and scene, so it's easy to create empty placeholder scenes and it's drag and drop to rearrange them as the story develops. It has features for managing characters, Locations, and Items, as well as two different timeline formats.

I know it's not for everybody, but it's a huge step up from trying to write in a single, linear document. I've never regretted the time I spent moving my old text and word processing files into it.

I had a look at yWriter, and it does appear promising. One downside is that it is Windows-only; I'd have to check if it works well enough on Wine on Mac, since the native OSX version is apparently still in early beta.

 

[IWroteThis]

I had a look at yWriter, and it does appear promising. One downside is that it is Windows-only; I'd have to check if it works well enough on Wine on Mac, since the native OSX version is apparently still in early beta.

I don't have a Mac, so I didn't realize it was just in beta. I just knew the web site said that Windows, Android, iOS, and MacOS versions existed. Sorry about that.

I personally run the latest Alpha version for Windows, as I know that the guy writing it is responsive to bugs and reasonable requests.

 

[Candy_Kane54]

I have two folders: Current and Published.

 

[iwatchus]

I have two folders: Current and Published.

I'm essentially the same, with subfolders for series.

 

[Writer61]

If MS Word is an old cargo ship that's had modern equipment bolted and welded all over it to keep it afloat, and Pages is a sleek new cabin cruiser to get you there in comfort, then Scrivener is an aircraft carrier (there are add-ins for special needs such as grammar checking) that's fully armed for battle and you're the Commodore of the fleet.

I have tried Scrivener on my Mac at various times. v1 was OK, but v2 just did not work for me. I have found it easier to use a dedicated template in Word, supported by Excel and PowerPoint, which are all tools I use every day.

 

[SimonDoom]

I don't keep stories in the cloud. I keep them on my computer hard drive and back them up to another hard drive. I have a "Literotica" folder and subfolders for each story. In each subfolder I have the text of the story and another Word document consisting of the notes and outline for the story that I prepare before I write.

 

[VallesMarineris]

Wait, seriously? It doesn't even have sensible exporting options? Can't you just tell it to produce a .docx, .pdf, LaTeX, Markdown, HTML etc. from a particular chapter?

If so, then that's completely disqualifying. I don't want to have to meticulously copy-paste however many distinct scrapbook fragments Scrivener will store my work as into LibreOffice, only to then worry how Lit processes during submission. I'd rather just write plain text with HTML tags like I do right now, because however imperfect the Preview is, it is still better than nothing.

I didn't include Scrivener's output features because that would have made the post even longer than it was. Here's some detail, since you ask.

You can export any file in a long list of formats:


Much more versatile and powerful is its "Compile" system, that let's you produce a whole complex, multi-part work, complete with title page, chapter titles, footnotes, header/footers, front matter, back matter, separators, pretty much anything you'd need to publish a book:


You can see on the right of the second screen capture where I'm compiling a chapter in my latest work. For Lit I'm publishing a chapter at a time, but I could very easily output the entire novel with all the bells and whistles I want, meant for an editor or, as you can see on the left, an ePub-friendly site.

It's a professional tool. Like that Altoids billboard once said, maybe you should practice on the other mints first.

It's true that it doesn't do collaboration. Even handoff from MacOS to iOS is awkward. But MS wants at least $100/year and Google will feed everything you produce to its AI (probably so will MS if you use the free version).

You pay once for Scrivener and updates are free.

 

[iwatchus]

another Word document consisting of the notes and outline for the story that I prepare before I write

I don't keep an outline beyond the story writing process. I do start with a document that describes my characters (background, interests, not physical generally). The document will evolve into my cheat sheet for characters over time. I am mostly a pantser so I often don't outline at all. Of sometimes I will write a very loose outline (maybe ten lines for a 25K story). This goes into the document that becomes the story. The story itself goes before the outline. As I write the parts that cover a point in the outline, I delete it from the outline. If I realize the story is going to take a different path to the ending (I almost always know the ending, always a HEA for me), I edit the remainder of the outline.

With my novels, I have found an outline of the next few chapters helps, so I do 4-8 point outlines for each of the next two or three chapters, still consuming the outline as I write. If I need to take a step back and think about the story. I might extend the outline a chapter or two (assuming I have written a chapter or two since last time I did this).

For stories that take notable elapsed time, I generally have a third document that serves a timeline. For individual stories, including novels, which I write as one piece, I just add a tag to the name. So my active WIP is snowfall and I write in pages (a mac word processor). So the story itself is in snowfall.pages. There is a second file snowfall-people.pages. (I sometimes use a simple text file for the timeline or the people file, but I used pages this time.) Snowfall take place only over about a week, so a timeline is not necessary, but if I had one, it would be snowfall-time.pages.

 

[Erozetta]

Wait, seriously? It doesn't even have sensible exporting options? Can't you just tell it to produce a .docx, .pdf, LaTeX, Markdown, HTML etc. from a particular chapter?

If so, then that's completely disqualifying. I don't want to have to meticulously copy-paste however many distinct scrapbook fragments Scrivener will store my work as into LibreOffice, only to then worry how Lit processes during submission. I'd rather just write plain text with HTML tags like I do right now, because however imperfect the Preview is, it is still better than nothing.

I haven't updated it in a while, but I don't recall a docx option. Html and PDF are options as are epub and some others I can't recall if hand. But those can be a pain for editing purposes.

And I don't want to send somebody my entire 300k words in an anthology if I only want to send them one 10k story, so I copy and paste that story into Libre Office.

There are admittedly more bells and whistles in the program than I know what to do with, lol.

 

[TheLobster]

There are admittedly more bells and whistles in the program than I know what to do with, lol.

Well, there could always be more

The HTML export, for example, I'd assume is into a predefined set of tags that cover the entire gamut of text formatting that Scrivener offers. As we know, based on what @FrancesScott recently compiled into an article, Literotica has some very exacting requirements and quirks when it comes to the types of markup it accepts.

Ideally, it should be possible to get the app to export something that Lit's submission form accepts directly. But features like that are often solely within the purview of custom plugins (c.f. Blender), and plugin systems aren't something which is commonly found in software that only costs double-digit $.

 

[Bramblethorn]

Another Scrivener user here. I find the tagging feature useful for things like marking scenes where the protags discuss their relationship or one of them discusses her family. That makes it easier if I want to go back later and check what I've already established about those relationships.

Much more versatile and powerful is its "Compile" system, that let's you produce a whole complex, multi-part work, complete with title page, chapter titles, footnotes, header/footers, front matter, back matter, separators, pretty much anything you'd need to publish a book:

I find this particularly useful when publishing across multiple platforms (for me that's potentially Lit, Ao3 and Smashwords/D2D). When I'm posting a chapter to Lit, I'll often have something before or after the main content e.g. a header or footer, and sometimes a Lit-specific pirate trap in the middle of the chapter. ("If you're reading this somewhere other than Literotica, it's been pirated" kind of thing.)

Back when I was composing in Word I'd include those with each chapter, then when I republished elsewhere I'd have to go through, find all that content and edit it out, and from then I'd be maintaining two or three forked versions of the document - if I found something like a typo that needed fixing, I'd need to correct it in each version separately.

In Scrivener, that platform-specific stuff goes in its own "scene", labelled as "Literotica header" or whatever. When I compile the document, I can select/de-select those scenes, without having to fork the content.

 

[Writer61]

I haven't updated it in a while, but I don't recall a docx option. Html and PDF are options as are epub and some others I can't recall if hand.

From the Mac version, select Files

and then choose the format:

 

[ShamBaLa]

IIm sort of in league with ShelbyDawn above. I've been writing erotica for 10 years for my own therapy/ entertainment before screwing up enough courage to publish.

I have Four WIP folders. #1 has three or four stories I'm actively working. I run with one until I hit a wall then look at another to work.

Stories that get really stalled go to folder #2. Secondary stories. Some have titles and an outline. Some have a 50 word situational abstract. A few are over 8,000 words and need rewrites or a better story arc.

Folder #3 has pure ego writing. And not suitable for Lit standards writing. Or 5,000 words on an 1890s suitor desperately trying to seduce a ministers daughter that sounded erotic and but just got awkward. Yea, I know. Hit delete.

Folder #4 is probably 24 pages of ideas, scraps of dialog and questions. Like, would a hotwife & husband on a cruise ship make a decent story? Three GF in their 50s teach newly divorced/ widowed how to be a cougar. With college age guys....

I run stories through an online HTML converter. Paste the result onto DRAFTS in Lit and also a separate document in the folder with suffix HTML Version for comparison to when it actually drops. Save that in PENDING file also.

Ill do final HTML editing, clean up etc in DRAFT and PUBLISH. The documents get moved to a PUBLISHED Folder. Sub folders for multi part series. Ocassionaly I'll screen shot the ratings and reader hits for a couple months and put them with the story.

Then I have folders for research: ancient greek/roman sex. Proper names for styles of women's underwear. Descriptors for fabrics, blouse/shirt/ skirt/ dress styles.

Another folder with copies of comments and DM messages that either inspire new work or offer an insight to what works or doesn't.

Hope that helps. Cheers