Provides: Creative writing tools and reference dictionary
Format: Download and CD
Developer: MasterWriter
Minimum System Requirements: 1.42GHz PowerPC or 2.0GHz Intel Core 2 Duo processor, Mac OS X v10.4, 512MB RAM, built-in or external microphone, QuickTime 7.5.5 or better (installer included)
Processor Compatibility: Universal
Price: $9.95/mo, $99/yr, or $199 purchase
Availability: Now
Version Reviewed: 2.0
A good friend of mine from high school—a gentleman and a poet—once told me that when writing lyrics he always tosses out the first rhyme that comes to mind. Too obvious. I’m not sure if he developed that rule on his own or if he borrowed it from someone else, but it seems like good advice to me. I can think of a lot of songwriters who really need to take that approach (I’m looking at you, Paul Stanley).
Trouble is, of course, that the second option isn’t always there. You’ve got “love” on the page, so now what? “Shove” again? “Glove?”
This is where a program such as MasterWriter can prove helpful. It’s just a database, really, but it’s a database full of rhymes, phrases, parts of speech, word families, pop culture references and plenty of more, all of which place that perfect word or phrase right at your fingertips.
There’s a version of MasterWriter 2 aimed specifically at poets and songwriters. I’m not reviewing that version, but if that’s your outlet, you can learn more about it here. I will be looking at MasterWriter 2.0 for creative writers.
First, the toolset. MasterWriter 2.0 is broken into:
- Word Families - reference dictionary
- Parts of Speech - descriptive words with numerous filters
- Phrases - 33,000 phrases, sayings, idioms and word combinations
- Rhymes - over 100,000 rhymes and close rhymes
- Pop-Culture - 11,000 icons of American and world culture
- Dictionary - Merriam-Webster—165,000 entries with 225,000 definitions
- Thesaurus - Merriam-Webster—over 340,000 synonyms, antonyms, idioms and more
Each of these tools works basically the same way. In Word Families, for instance, you can search for “angry.” Characters are often angry in stories, after all, but how angry? Well, search for angry, then select your part of speech. I chose adjective, and was presented with 44 options. “Bristly,” for example, but that looks kind of wimpy on the page. “Hot-under-the-collar?” Perhaps a few generations ago. “Incensed?” Better. “Wrathful?” Now, we’re getting somewhere. “Ireful?” “Livid?”
These are good words. Much better than “angry,” but you can only go with one. You won’t need to search for “angry” again to remember these options, though. You can double click the ones you like to add them to your favorites. Then, you can call them back up with the click of a button.
You can also play with filters to see more/fewer options, or target specific uses and degrees of intensity.
Now, click on Phrases, and you get a list of popular phrases that use the word “angry.” That angry character can express it in ways people do in real life (like it or not, most of use tend to speak in clichés from time to time). I found this helpful in other ways, as well. For instance, is the phrase “six ways to Sunday,” “six ways til Sunday” or “six ways from Sunday?” Searching for “sunday” and clicking Phrases, MasterWriter tells me it’s to. I’ll trust them.
What would be really helpful here, however, is a history of the phrase. The dictionary gives you the basic origins, but knowing how a word was used when would be very helpful with historical fiction. That would pretty much require a whole new database to be worthwhile, however.
The Rhymes feature is pretty powerful here despite the program’s songwriter/poet counterpart. “Sunday” gave me ten pages of rhymes. I could narrow these down by primary (May), secondary (jetway) and pop culture (James Earl Ray), and even search for rhyming phrases (you can’t drink your cares away). There are 29 pages in this result, 39 if I search for wider sound-alikes, decidedly less if I narrow it down by syllables. Have to worry about meter, after all.
Pop-Culture proves to be one of the more surprisingly powerful tools available, mainly because of its integration with Wikipedia. You can search for popular references in numerous categories, then pick a name. Say, comedians, then Steve Martin. Click on his name, and it appears in the Wikipedia search bar. Click Go, and you’re at his Wikipedia entry without leaving MasterWriter.
And that presents me with my only real complaint about MasterWriter 2 (well, aside from the dated and somewhat clumsy PC-like user interface); pretty much every tool presented here is available through something called the Internet. The difference is that you get access to everything in one tight package with MasterWriter 2.0, including the ability to keep your results well-organized and easily retrievable. You can even write your stories within MasterWriter 2.0, but it’s not nearly as friendly or powerful for that as Storyist or Storymill.
What I don’t know, then, is whether it’s worth the heavy pricing schemes, especially if it’s only a reference tool for you. I’m always put-off by software subscriptions as you can get with MasterWriter’s monthly and yearly plans. There’s an outright purchase option, but it includes no upgrades; you’d have to go two years without upgrading in order for that to pay off versus the yearly license fee.
So, it’s expensive. But it’s also convenient and powerful (there are many features I didn’t have time to cover here), and you could likely make that money back in time saved, depending upon how serious you are about finding the perfect word, phrase or reference. The aforementioned Paul Stanley doesn’t need MasterWriter 2.0. He’s more than happy to rhyme “rough” with “tough.” Steve Martin likely doesn’t need it, either. He’s happy to rhyme “pointy” with “annointy.” I need it, though. I’m likely to use it six ways to Sunday.
You, in the meantime, can check out the trial version.
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