Dabble is a writing tool and word processor designed to help novelists and writers of any long or scholarly work stay organized and focused.
I’ve been using Dabble to write a nonfiction book for more than a month and have been impressed with its ease of use and the way it allows me to jump back and forth between various chapters and stay organized with research. I’ll be recommending it to my master's writing students going forward, and would also recommend it to educators undertaking long writing projects of any kind, from a thesis for a master's program to a sizable research project or report.
Here’s a closer look at Dabble.
What is Dabble?
Dabble is a cloud-based writing tool that works like a souped-up version of Microsoft Word or Google Docs that is fine-tuned for writing. This may not sound necessary, but while I like Google Docs for short projects, I was finding it increasingly slow with long documents, and was having trouble keeping track of various drafts and versions. I like to work on each chapter individually but also have the option of viewing the work as a whole, which can become time-consuming with a general word processor.
For instance, when I use Google, I create a folder for each chapter, but then combining all those chapters and keeping track of updates becomes time-consuming. Dabble helps with all this.
Though designed with fiction in mind, Dabble works well for nonfiction. It automatically organizes your work around chapters. You can edit, export, and save each chapter by itself, or select the entire work. When you select the work as a whole, the chapters all come together without a hitch.
Dabble also has a cool scene feature that lets you break down each chapter into smaller “scenes,” which makes keeping track of your work’s structure easier. If you’re writing nonfiction, it may be easier to think of these breaks as “sections” rather than scenes—either way, it’s a helpful organization tool.
What Are Dabble's Best Features?
I’d been looking for a tool such as Dabble for a while. I wanted something cloud-based and that didn’t have a big learning curve. Dabble checks both these boxes. Everything is cloud-based, but it’s quick and easy to convert a Dabble file into a Microsoft Word, Google Doc, PDF, etc.
The layout is an absolute pleasure, and helps me start writing instantly without a learning curve. I had tried some other word processors designed for writing long works, and though writers I know raved about those, most proved too difficult to learn for me. After trying one demo, I realized I would need to devote some serious time to learning that software, and that was time I felt that would be better spent writing.
Dabble’s features are not only helpful but easy to use, which is crucial. I didn’t anticipate using the scene feature as much as I have; it really helps me navigate a chapter more quickly in the editing process and identify the parts that need work.
Another wonderful feature is that Dabble saves to the cloud automatically. So if you want to edit on multiple devices, you can. I’ve even read nearly completed drafts on my phone instead of my laptop and have been able to successfully make little changes.
While its prices make it more realistic as an option for educators to use themselves rather than with students, all these features would certainly help writing students navigate longer projects. This is why I'll let my graduate writing students know about it as a potential tool to use outside of class.
What Are Some Areas That Dabble Could Improve?
Though I am a big fan, not everything Dabble does is perfect. For example, it is designed for fiction writers and I write nonfiction, so the research assistance tools could be more robust. In a perfect world, there would be a place to save my research for each chapter at a spot that would be linked to that chapter but not show up in the actual text. But since nonfiction is clearly not the tool’s focus, this is an understandable drawback.
More significantly for writers of any kind, it doesn’t have the best in-tool draft-saving capabilities. It’s easy to back up each chapter to Google Drive or elsewhere, which is great, but I haven’t figured out an easy way to do all this within Dabble. One workaround is to save these elsewhere in a Dabble-linked folder. This works, but I'd love the option of saving everything related to my book in Dabble and only using my own computer or something such as Google Drive as a backup.
How Much Does Dabble Cost?
After a 14-day free trial, Dabble pricing starts at $19 per month, with additional features available for more premium subscriptions at $29 and $49 tiers. I've been happy with the starter $19 subscription.
What Are The Best Dabble Tips and Tricks?
The Scene Feature
Breaking my chapters up into scenes helps me think about each chapter and complete it bit by bit. It also makes navigating the chapter during the editing phase easier.
Tracking Dally Progress
Dabble lets you set a daily writing goal and tracks your progress toward that with a daily word count feature. I wasn’t drawn to this feature at first because word counts are not always the best way to track writing progress, particularly nonfiction. You can crank out a lot of words but not really move your project forward; meanwhile, you can write one great paragraph and thus, have spent a fruitful day. That said, Dabble’s progress feature is a better gauge of progress than I anticipated, and it’s surprisingly nice to know exactly how much I added to the manuscript in a writing session. There are days, for instance, when I feel like I’m not getting anything done but realize I’ve logged close to a thousand words.
Exporting Material
This isn’t the flashiest feature, but it's important. The way this program works with Word and Google Docs makes getting my work ready to send to my agent or publisher really easy. I’m spending less time thinking about formatting and more time focused on what’s actually important: the writing.
