You don’t need what they’re trying to sell you.

Back in the good ol’ days, all a writer needed was a pen and paper. Is that the kind of writer you are? Or are you more familiar with the sight of a crowded desk and even more crowded tabs?

It sure is popular to be a writer nowadays; seems like everyone and their grandma is trying to sell you something that will “improve your writing”—“a tool you can’t live without!”

But how many of these are actually necessary?

Very few.

As both an indie author and freelance writer/editor, I write every day. I do everything from plotting to outlining to writing to all kinds of editing. I even write blog posts (hi!) and publish books, too.

Yet, there are only a few tools I’ve found absolutely necessary for my workflow.

Tool #1: reMarkable

In 2021, I moved into an apartment with my husband. It was the first big move of all my stuff, since my parents had also recently moved and given me all my leftovers from the house I spent middle and high school in.

Oh, the notebooks.

I didn’t know it was even possible to write that many words. Page after page of college-ruled paper was stuffed full of stories, dating from third grade all the way through college and beyond. It must have been hundreds of thousands of words written on paper.

I can’t help it—there’s just something about handwriting stories that draws out the raw emotions in me. Someone else gets me, right?

With that fateful move, I realized I had a problem: space. If I kept writing and writing and filling up notebooks, where would they all go?

And I was already running into the issue of remembering where I’d written things down. To this day, I have snippets of stories in my brain that I know I wrote down somewhere, but I can’t find them. They’re doomed to be lost in the unruly jungle of paper until I can take the time to look through everything.

Then 2022 comes along, and with it, the knowledge of a new innovation: paper tablets. With work rolling in, the blog gaining traction, and new stories being written all the time, it seemed like the answer to all my problems. I did hours of research on paper tablets, and in the end, I settled on the new reMarkable 2.

Pricey? Yes. Worth it? Every penny. If I could only pick one writing tool to keep, this would be it, even over my laptop. Not only does it scratch the itch of writing on paper, but it also isn’t backlit—saving my eyes strain—and is a secure place to store all my digital notebooks.

If you’d like to know the nitty-gritty details, you can check out this post I made a few years ago after owning the tablet for a year. Some of the info might be a little outdated, but it gives you a better idea of what the tablet is like.

So let me ask you: if you could only keep one of your writing tools, which one would it be?

Tool #2: ProWritingAid

Long, long ago, before the days of generative AI…

Grammarly was a staple in my writing flow. I only had the free version, but I appreciated the proofreading of my writing so I could be pretty confident my content was error-free. (As much as I’d love to pay my editor to edit every single story and blog post, that’s not quite in the budget yet.)

Seemingly out of nowhere, ProWritingAid (PWA) came on the scene. I first discovered their platform through online writing events and soon tried out their grammar checker. It was still new and a bit clunky, so I stuck with Grammarly. But I continued to get emails from PWA, so I’d go over and dabble on my dashboard there every once in a while. Every time, there were more features.

Then came the offer of a lifetime subscription for their Premium version. I rarely pay for “pro” versions of anything, and even more rarely pay for writing tools, but I decided to test the site for a week and just see if it was worth it.

Is there a writing tool you ever deemed worthy enough to pay for? Well, for me, it ended up being ProWritingAid. When I logged back into PWA, I was overwhelmed with the ingenuity of the platform.

The big draw for PWA is that it’s geared toward fiction, and has been from the very start. It’s not just a grammar checker, but also helps to identify weaknesses and repetition in your writing. You can get a whole breakdown of how you write, which words you use most often, how often you use passive voice, etc.

Grammarly checked my grammar. ProWritingAid helped me become a better writer.

I did get that lifetime pro subscription, and I use PWA to this day. I’ve since found their writing community delightful as well—there are groups for writers of any genre, and they host multiple Zoom writing sprints every day.

Tool #3: Kindlepreneur

If you are an indie author, you need to be on this site.

I’ve learned far more about self-publishing from Dave Chesson than anyone else.

Seriously, if you aren’t already using Kindlepreneur, what are you doing?! Not only are there hundreds of articles on self-publishing, marketing, writing, editing, and literally anything you could ever want to know about creating and publishing a book, but Dave also has several free and paid tools for you to use to your advantage.

Most sites like this are gimmicky. They want tons of money in exchange for info you can get anywhere for free. They sell you “get rich quick” writer schemes that are doomed to fail.

Kindlepreneur is totally different. Dave’s commitment to staying easy access is so strong that out of the twelve programs/tools his team has developed for writers, only two are paid, and even those are so worth the money that I have both.

All articles are free to read, multiple courses are free, and the paid ones are all under $200. The website is easily searchable depending on what info you’re looking for, and Dave stays on top of the Amazon keyword/publishing trends.

I’ll say it one more time so you believe me: It is the best hub for book publishing/marketing online. Do not miss out on this one!

Bonus: What I Don’t Use

Generative AI

When it was new, I dabbled in it—though I never let it write or create for me. But it didn’t take even a year before I realized how dangerous GenAI is, especially in the creative space. It turns art into a mockery, literature into a farce, and music into lifeless noises.

It scares me to think that some people are out there being “good at everything” because AI does 80% of it for them. The beauty of the creative world, especially, is that none of us is good at everything, which is why we need each other. If AI does everything for us, not only does our output all start to look the same—losing the creativity that makes it art in the first place—but it deprives us of the connections that we and the creative sphere need to thrive.

Writing Courses

At the start of my author career, I dove headlong into every free writing course that ever existed. Know what I still remember from those?

Nothing.

Writing courses aren’t bad, but there comes a point where it’s much more useful to do than watch. If you are interested in writing courses, make sure you find one that’s specifically tailored to what you need to work on—outlining, editing, character work, publishing, etc.

But for the most part, just put in the practice. Get feedback. Fail a little. That will do more for you than one hundred writing courses.

Scrivener

So many writers swear by it.

I can’t stand it.

Maybe it’s the “pen and paper” part of my brain coming back, but Scrivener is too much for me. I’d rather keep everything organized in a folder on my computer or reMarkable—no fancy bells and whistles.

Scrivener—and the other apps like it—are too overwhelming. I like to keep things simple.

---

Okay, be honest—how many of your collected writing tools are you actually using? Which one is your favorite?

Happy writing!
-E.J.

---

If you enjoyed this post, I hope you’ll consider buying one of my books, leaving a tip, and/or taking a look at my RedBubble shop so I can continue producing 100% free content!