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In terms of writing software, I use Scrivener from Literature & Latte.  It’s $45 dollars, which is pretty cheap when you compare it to, well, almost any other word processing program.  And you can download a trial version for free, so you can see if you’ll love it as much as I do before committing to buying.

What I love about Scrivener is that it allows me to break up scenes or chapters, but to have them be part of the same master file and be able to move between them easily (there’s even a split screen function).  I can also keep my research in a different part of the same master file, including imported websites, photos, and quotes.  Before Scrivener, I never let myself write out of order, but now I can because I can still see the scope of the project and move around it easily, I do write a little bit out of order and  I don’t worry that the bits I do will be lost.

Here’s my current project, THE COLDEST GIRL IN COLDTOWN, in Scrivener.  You can see all the chapters to the left and the text window open to write in:

And here’s the notecard view, where you can see your scenes or chapters in brief and rearrange them:

I never thought that software could make an actual difference to my writing, but this program really did.  I only use about a fraction of what it can do, but I’m okay with that.  For those more ambitious, there are tutorials on the site.