Camp NaNoWriMo is almost upon us, and if you, like me, are taking up the challenge, then chances are that you’re in the middle of last minute preparations. Maybe you’re finishing up plotting, like I am, or you’re clearing away a TBR pile, or putting the finishing touches to the edits of another book. There are many things to be done to make Camp NaNoWriMo a little easier. Today I’d like to share a few useful links that hopefully might help your Camp go a little smoother.

Willa @Willa Nicole Scribblings has a post on five unusual ways to get over writers block. 

Sophie @The Techno Maid has a great video with tips and tricks to help you make it through Camp NaNoWriMo 

@Go Teen Writers has two great posts on motivating yourself to write. Stephanie Morrill has five tips to help you keep going to the end of your book. Guest poster Katherine Grubb has seven tips to help you carve out the time and space to work on your book.

Laura Mizvaria @Writer Owl has an awesome post listing eleven websites for writers. There are name generators, inspiring Pinterest profiles and many more helpful sites.

Imogen @Gossiping with Dragons (hey wait, that’s me!) has a post on three ways to motivate yourself. 

These are a few of the useful posts I’ve found. Now it’s your turn. Link me to some posts you’ve found helpful. Are you taking part in Camp NaNoWriMo? 

Occasionally I discover not one piece of writing music but a massive resource with enough music to last a life time. Or at least a few feverish writing sessions. This week, I present to you, Extreme Music. This website is dedicated to music, specifically from films and TV shows, although they have plenty of other music too. There are loads of albums to try. Or, if you need music to suit a certain mood, genre or situation, you can search the keywords. Then refine the search as needed, even down to the type of instruments used. You can even filter the songs by speed, depending on how much energy you need in your music.

You can find Extreme Music HERE.

I’m still exploring this site myself, but I’m loving it already. With Camp NaNoWriMo just around the corner, a musical resource like this is a gold mine. I know where I’ll be going to find the music for my writing sessions. I’m looking up more romantic-y types of music at the moment to help me prepare my novel. What type of music suits your book? Is there a song that just feels right for your plot?

Fantasy writers, like myself, often draw heavily from history, especially from the medieval period. With all its sword, bows, castles, and noble lords and ladies, it’s perfectly suited to the fantasy genre. But sometimes it can be hard to visualise what life would actually have been like in those times. To get the correct facts and the authentic feel often involves at least some research. Thankfully however, we have the internet, which makes researching much easier.

Recently, I discovered an amazing resource for information about life in medieval times. And that is a TV series, available on YouTube, called ‘Secrets of the Castle’. The series is focused around an archaeological experiment of building an authentic medieval castle. This series is full on interesting information about not only castes and how to build them, but about the trades involved with the building such as blacksmithing and masonry, and also showcases some of the war machines. I haven’t yet seen the entire series, but I’ve already learned a whole bunch of things about life in the medieval period that I know will help my writing in the future.

If you’re looking for information on life in the medieval period, want to learn more about trades like blacksmithing, or are interesting in seeing a real castle and how they were built and decorated, you might like to check out this series. They’re highly informative and very entertaining as well. Theirs is nothing like actually seeing a castle, weapons, and a medieval village to help you get a real feel for what life might have been like back then. You can find the first episode down below, and the rest are freely available on YouTube.

Do you do research for your books? What writing resource have you discovered? And are you interested in seeing more resource recommendations from me in the future?

I have a lot of links bookmarked on my web browser. There are just so many interesting things to see and I often want to go back and look at them later, or to share them with other people. Sometimes I share them on myFacebook page, but I have many, many others that I haven’t shared with anyone yet. So today I want to share five random writing related links that I have particularly enjoyed. Some are useful, some are informative, and some are just plain fun. Hopefully you’ll find something you like.

Ology List: Have you ever wanted to write about a branch of science, but had no idea what on earth it was called? Have you ever wanted to give a character an interesting scientific career but didn’t know what area he should study? This place lists a huge number of science branches by their proper names, which is really helpful for scientifically challenged writers like me.

The CharacterGenerator: There are plenty of generators out there that will generate random names for characters, but this generator goes way beyond that. At a click of a button, you can have a ready-made character with strengths, weaknesses and even prospective careers. Great for when you need a character in a hurry.

Writing Quotes:Everyone needs a bit of inspiration every so often. For me, I love to read what other writers have said about writing. This list has some great quotes that I really love. If you’re looking for some great sayings about writing, check out this list.

40 Writing PostIdeas: If you’re anything like me, sometimes you just can’t come up with any ideas for blog posts. Fear not. This list has 40 ideas for blog posts specially geared towards writers. Even if you don’t feel like using any of the ideas, they might spark something for you.

And lastly, just for fun…Teddy’s Story Joint: A fun YouTube video about writers and their books. Definitely worth watching for a laugh.

Do you collect random links like me? Got any interesting links to share? Did you find any of these links interesting?

Being inspired is one of the best things ever. Ideas pour through my mind. Simple, everyday events suggest new plot events, characters, and awesome snippets of dialogue. It’s a truly amazing feeling. But sometimes the inspiration just…stops. I might be trying to brainstorm for a new book, or deep in the midst of writing one already, and there are no new ideas to help me push through. I could sit around and wait for inspiration, but frankly, who knows when inspiration might deign to come back? So instead, as Jack London said, I have to go look for it with a club.

There are lots of places online to look for inspiration. Pinterest is an excellent (though dangerously addictive) place to find inspiration, as are some websites. My amazing writing friends Cait, Elizabeth and Kristana, helped me compile a list of 15 places on the web where you might be able to track down some of that elusive inspiration and capture it for your books. There are a lot of great Pinterest boards and quite a few other resources as well. Hopefully at least one place on this list will help you find some awesome ideas.

1. Writing Exercises: This is a great website with random generators to generate instant plots, dialogue, opening sentences, titles, and many other things. 

2. Prompts: This is a Pinterest board with a whole bunch of writing prompts. There are suggestions for stories you could write, sentences to spark ideas, and random what if’s to get your mind thinking. 

3. Saturday Story Prompts: The writer who runs this posts five new story prompts every Saturday, and her back catalogue is enormous. She posts dialogue and thought provoking sentences that could inspire some new ideas.

4. Storyboard-Words: This is a Pinterest board filled with pins covered in words. Sentences, dialogue, words on interesting pictures, quotes from famous people, this board has plenty of inspiring pins.

5. Stories of Someday: This Pinterest board has some of everything, words, sentences, pictures of people and settings. Perfect for generating new story ideas.

6. Waiting for My Pen: This is another Pinterest board that has both pictures and words. I’m especially inspired by the pictures on this one. They all seem to have a story waiting behind them.

7. Writing Starters: This webpage has lots and lots and lots of ideas to help writers start stories. It’s got first lines, dialogue, and words to incorporate into stories. There’s plenty of inspiration for starting a story here.

8. Writing: This is a really helpful Pinterest board with lots of sentences, words and even links to helpful writing posts on subjects such as how to write fight scenes with injured characters.

9. Inspiration of Things: Yet another Pinterest board, with words and pictures. Seriously, this board has some of the most inspirational pictures I’ve seen. I might be coming up with a few new story ideas myself.

10. It’s Time to Tell a Tale: This Pinterest board has lots and lots of amazing pictures to scroll through for ideas. There are a few with words, but mostly they’re just pictures.

13. Writing Prompts: If you’re wanting just writing prompts, then this Pinterest board is for you. It is entirely dedicated to pinning prompts to get writers started with interesting facts, story ideas, and challenges.

14. Stories of Their Own: The pictures on this Pinterest board all scream ‘story ideas’ at me when I look at it. There are a few interesting word pins too, but the pictures are definitely most inspiring.

15. Characters in Their Own Right: This Pinterest board is perfect for character inspiration. There are so many good pictures of all kinds of people who look like they’re just waiting to populate a story.

Where do you go to find inspiration online? Any of these places help you?