For £1.99 (about $US3.30) Lists for Writers from Thinkamingo is a very handy app to have.  It is extremely simple in structure as it only contains lists of words.  Under the Character segment you will find male first names, female first names, last names, clothing, occupations (from accountant to zookeeper), body types (‘chubby’, emaciated’, etc) and descriptive words for people (eg ‘acquaintance’, ‘admirer, ‘baby, etc).  The Personality category covers phobias (fears) and philias (likes) as well as obsessions, character traits, hobbies and emotions.  Other lists include generic locations (such as ‘airport’, or ‘harbour’), cities, animals and animal sounds, foods or words (nouns, dialog verbs, rhyming words, etc).

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An interesting insert is the Plot category where you can find the ‘Seven Basic Plots’, and ’36 Dramatic Situations’ as well as ‘Conflicts’ and ‘Issues’ which can be used for triggering ideas.  There is also a section where you can write your own notes for printing or emailing.

The app has currently gathered a rating of 4 ½ stars with some very positive reviews.   It’s an app that does, as they say, ‘what it says on the tin’ – lists of useful words for writers.  A convenient extra is the ‘define’ function which will call up New Oxford American Dictionary definitions for a tapped word.  Using the ‘Manage’ option for the dictionaries allows download of a British English (Oxford) dictionary, or alternatively those for Italian, German, Korean or even Simplified Chinese, amongst others.  ‘ Search the Web’ will load the word into your Safari browser ready for a wider search.

For the name lists alone, this app is worth its price for a fiction writer.  The other lists simply make the job that little bit easier.