NovelMaker and TextAloud

Neat article on new startup NovelMaker.com and how they are using TextAloud.

NovelMaker.com - Network for Literary Pursuits

NovelMaker is a social network for the literary set. Unrecognized authors, struggling poets, readers, editors, and critics even are invited to take part in this ‘first truly interactive [lettered] community’. The first thing that catches the eye is the rather desperately in the need of a make over site design. It’s not fresh enough, having the feel of a well worn, musty book. But you can’t judge a book by its cover, now can you? The social features, and the possibility for exposure, structured criticism and interesting reads, makes up for the lack of aesthetic panache. Members of the site may upload their manuscripts, adjusting the settings to private or public. Publicly available works may receive critiques, comments, ratings, and reviews. Manuscripts are kept on site for a year, unless you advise otherwise. If your book or tome happens to be picked up by a publisher you’re contractually bound to give NovelMaker 1% of the gross revenue from the sale of your literary creation. You can also self publish using the site’s tools. Some books have been recorded using TextAloud, so you can listen to them if that’s your thing. To read and upload works, registration is required.

“NovelMaker.com is the world's first truly interactive community for fiction writers, readers, critics, literary agents, editors, and publishers. Authors can upload to NovelMaker.com their completed works, or works-in-progress, and receive editorial suggestions, comments, reviews, and ratings. Those reviews and ratings may take new and unpublished writers into a realm never before accessible to them - a large, interactive community participating with them in the creation, and potential commercial success, of new works of fiction.”

Why it might be a killer

NovelMaker has potential. The social writing site isn’t yet an oversaturated market place; still there’s room for improvements. However, it does give writers a place to publish their work and get feedback from their peers, without charge. Ultimately, it's a good way get a start in the literary world. full Story...

More TextAloud and Proofreading

NovelMaker.com Recommends TextAloud for Writers Seeking Valuable Tools to Improve Their Work

From proofreading and catching typos, to listening to flow, dialogue, and more, TextAloud makes a powerful secret weapon for writers

Clemmons, NC (PRWEB) August 3, 2007 -- For many writers, their writings often don't truly come to life for them until they can listen to those words spoken aloud. This makes Text to Speech tools like NextUp's TextAloud especially valuable, as they enable the writer to listen to her words and not only catch typographical errors that traditional word processing spell-checkers might miss, but to also get a sense of flow and syntax, and to even get a realistic feel for spoken dialogue exchanges between different characters. Now NovelMaker.com (www.NovelMaker.com), an acclaimed new online community for writers, agents and editors, has honored TextAloud by recommending the program to its participants seeking the best proofreading tools for writers.

TextAloud is an award-winning program that converts text into spoken audio for listening on a PC, and can also save to audio files for the added option of easy playback on-the-go, from iPod (TM), to iPhone (R), to car and beyond. Thanks to an elegant and simple program interface, along with a wide array of superb premium voices in almost any imaginable age, gender, or accent, many writers have already discovered the value of TextAloud to proof or simply listen to their work. Now comes the endorsement of NovelMaker, sure to be a resource for thousands of writers worldwide.

Just launched in July 2007, NovelMaker.com is the world's first truly interactive community for fiction writers, readers, critics, literary agents, editors, and publishers. With NovelMaker, authors upload their manuscripts or works in progress to the site for free, and can upon completion see their completed books in the site's own literary library. Community members (authors, editors, agents and more) as well as readers will then offer suggestions, reviews, ratings and encouragement. The site recommends TextAloud as one of a short list of helpful tools in its Helpful Tools & Links section (http://www.novelmaker.com/links_tools.php?s=).

"TextAloud offers enormous assistance in the writing process by catching errors more conventional tools like spell-checkers may miss," comments Chris Olander, President and CEO of NovelMaker.com. "It also offers a great deal of creative potential, for use in testing dialogue or even characterization. TextAloud ultimately offers a multitude of fascinating uses sure to be helpful to writers who take part in the NovelMaker community."

"We're delighted to have been recommended by NovelMaker," comments NextUp President Rick Ellis. "TextAloud has often been considered a secret weapon by many writers who have contacted us, assisting them in truly listening to their works in a way that was not possible before. We hope that writers and editors in the NovelMaker community can use this recommendation to discover the power of Text to Speech for themselves."

TextAloud enables anyone to easily and affordably export documents, books, magazine articles, web content, even e-mails, into spoken audio. The program smoothly converts text into spoken audio for listening on a PC or laptop, and can also save text to audio files for playback on portables like the iPhone (R), iPod (TM), PocketPC (R), and a wide range of other players and devices. Highly popular with people of a variety of professions and walks of life, TextAloud is affordably priced, and is simple for anyone with a PC, laptop or portable.

About NovelMaker.com

NovelMaker.com is the world's first truly interactive community for fiction writers, readers, critics, literary agents, editors, and publishers. From authors to agents, every participant in NovelMaker has access to a large, interactive community to participate with them in the creation, and potential commercial success, of new works of fiction. For more information, please visit www.NovelMaker.com.

About TextAloud

TextAloud has been featured in The New York Times, PC Magazine, Writer's Digest, on CNN, and more. Hailed by critics and users alike, TextAloud is priced at just $29.95, and is compatible with systems using Windows (R) 98, NT, 2000, XP and Vista. The program is available for fast, safe and secure purchase via http://www.NextUp.com