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A word from your editor.
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When you need a break: games, quizzes, book recommendations and more...

Among the many websites we have visited, we think the following are worth mentioning. Many of them have links pages themselves with further useful information. If you come across a site which you feel should appear on these pages, please let us know.

  Search engines
  News
  Reference
  Writers' Web Sites
  Poetry Sites
  Miscellaneous

Search engines:
 Ask Jeeves Perhaps the easiest web search tool available. You just type a question in to the search field and Jeeves does his best to find a web site that can tell you the answer.
 Google Another easy to use but powerful search engine.

News:
 The Independent
 The Guardian
 The Times
 Alta Vista World News

Reference:
  The Electric Eclectic Lots of useful documented links about 'all kinds of everything'.
  Bartleby's reference An enormous selection of searchable reference works available from one site.
  Acronym Finder tells you what all those TLAs mean asap!
  Merriam -Webster on-line. Any writer should have a dictionary and thesaurus to hand. Here's one version that won't clutter your physical desktop. And it includes some neat word games, too!
  Blue book of Grammar and Punctuation Many of us left school with some gaps in our grammar and punctuation knowledge. You can brush up on them here.
  Grammar book Another useful reference work.
  Rhyming Dictionary Trying to write a poem, but you're stuck for a rhyme? You'll find the words and phrases you need here sorted by syllables or number of letters.
  Babel Fish Remember the Babel fish from the Hitch Hikers' Guide to the Galaxy? Well this is a web site that 'decodes the brainwave patterns'. OK, so that probably isn't how they do it, but it's amazing, anyway. Probably no computer translation will ever be perfect, but this will certainly give you a good idea of what a foreign text means.
  Internet translator Another translation site - with even more language options.

Writers' Web Sites:
  Jacqui Bennet Writers' Bureau Includes lists of (UK) small press publications, agents, and much more.
  Purdue University's On-line Writing Lab. Lots of resources for writers.
  Writers' Resource Center Articles, job opportunites, book reviews etc for writers.
  Inscriptions Information and resources for writers.
  Byline As well as providing information and resources for writers, By-line run many on-line competitions.
  Moira Allen's Writing World More information and resources from the erstwhile editor of Inkspot.
  Zuzus petals The blurb states: "Our mission (in keeping with Dana Gioia's National Book Award winning, Can Poetry Matter?), is to expand the influence of poetry beyond its traditionally academic audience and to make quality writing an everyday craving." Includes a vast number of links.
  Writers' Digest More information for writers.
  Robin's Nest Another resource site
  Absolute Write For information about freelance writing, screenwriting, playwriting, novels and non-fiction.

Poetry Sites:
  Luminarium A perfect joy of a site for all lovers of classical poetry. Includes medieval, renaissance and 17th century sections.
 Alt.Art.Poetry.Comments The home page of a news group based on the idea of commenting and critiquing each others' poems. You can learn as much from studying someone else's poem and making an intelligent critique as from reading comments on your own work. As well as information about the group, you will find useful links and resources. PLEASE read the faq before joining the discussions. (I also recommend 'lurking' - listening-in without participating - for a while to get the tone of the group.)
 Alsop Review Includes some excellent pages on various aspects of poetry writing.
 EveryPoet A showcase page of poetry which also incudes a useful links page, discussion forums for critique, and even a haiku generator.
 Bob's Byway Poetry definitions and examples.
 Poetry Society UK
 Academi Includes searchable lists of literary events, writers, publishers and activities.

Miscellaneous:
  Tantamount Our sister site. Web site design & management, publications and presentations.
  World Wide Words A fascinating site with facts and fun for language lovers.
  BBC Radio - both world service and UK national and local radio. Includes the possibility of listening to the programmes and also background information.
  New Scientist A serious scientific publication, but check out their Last Word section for some fascinating fun facts.
  The Spectator the on-line version of the London based literary and political magazine founded in 1828.
  USPS United States Postal Service: buy your stamps on-line instead of wasting money on IRCs.
  Tony  Squance As well as painting, Madrid-based artist Tony does story-boards for advertising. This is his award winning web-site.
  Pemberley Here you can find out almost anything you ever wanted to know about the life and works of Jane Austen. The site includes a complete hypertext version of Pride and Prejudice.
  Amazon The famous on-line book shop.
  X-Files There are many websites dedicated to the sci-fi TV series, but this is the official one. It includes a complete episode guide.
 Your stars for the week ahead from Susan Miller.
 Magnetic poetry As well as a place to buy any of the magnetic poetry products - including special paint to turn your walls into an enormous magnetised notice board - this site includes an anthology of poems created with the various versions, and an opportunity to try your hand at writing poetry on-line using drag and drop word tiles.
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