Five winning stories will be selected by a panel of judges, and the winning entrants will each receive an Amazon Kindle 2 as well as Dragon NaturallySpeaking upgrades for three years.
Life is an adventure which finds you doing and saying things altogether unexpected. “Speaking Dragon” into my laptop as I creatively compose my first novel has presented itself an altogether unexpected and remarkably prolific adventure, by its own definition.
Traveling through New Zealand for an incredible 6 month journey, I conjured up all sorts of stories to share. During this action packed adventure I was often swept away with the activities at hand. Using the Dragon software with the laptop I toted along, I was able to accurately and expediently capture the renderings of these discoveries and adventures in short order, soon after they unfolded. The series of story sketches I created with the Dragon Software, while traveling, are as precious as they are priceless. I returned to the states with reams of transcribed notes filled with crucial information that now provides valuable reference and assistance to me as I complete the creative writing of this novel. Need I mention my excitement and delight with this miraculous software?!
By “talk writing” Dragon Software allows me to create what promises to be an incredibly entertaining novel, in the form of a series of linked short stories, all about travel adventures through New Zealand. I find its accuracy amazing, and am surprisingly awed at what it is teaching me about the nuances of my own language.
An incessant knitter, I rarely find myself without knitting in hand. The long dreamed of travel to New Zealand, land of 40 million sheep and the finest wool in the world (unless of course you happen across an unfortunate occasion to debate this fact with an otherwise opinionated Aussie) found me in wool heaven! I distinctly recall using this software at various sheep farms where a chorus of thousands of sheep were baahing in the background. I spin wool into yarn, and weave as well, but feel most at home with a pair of knitting needles in hand, and a new project to explore.
Long ago I discovered knitting as a sort of meditative means to clearer thought. I have knit my way through college, through countless movies, a few boyfriends, while traveling, waiting in line, etc. I even knit in church. In using Dragon Software not only are my hands free to center myself with my knitting and clear my thoughts, I am able to efficiently “talk write” as I “knit up” my first novel if you would. This incredible Dragon Software is an all around win, win, win adventure for me. It allows me to sit quietly, knit blissfully, and write prolifically letting my imagination soar. I suppose it helps that I am, by nature, a quite natural and well practiced talker, a true story teller!
Thanks for a creating a terrific, time saving, industrious way to flourish creatively.
As they say in New Zealand – “Good on you!”
Cynthia Poppe
Lummi Island, Washington, USA
483 word count