Orca

When it comes to writing, creative processes always make for an interesting topic. Only you know what's best for you, and that applies to doing anything that involves your creativity: perhaps, for some, writing a novel to the best of their ability requires pen and paper, and a nice view by the lake. Of course, that's quite the requirement, but the idea is that there's a good reason why, for instance, designated novel writing software exists, even though a normal text editor would do just fine.

Calamus is a to-the-point novel writing program, and for the writers looking for a no-distractions environment, this might just be it.

Though text editors are hardly complex, design-wise, this one is decidedly simple: there's nothing but your text, and the app makes it very clear that this is a distractions-free environment. There aren't any toolbars to manipulate your text like in Microsoft Word, and you can even hide the Table of Contents panel on the left, so that only your text is shown.

As for the writing experience, it's as you would expect. Everything went well for us, and the general typing experience was ultimately a positive one. The font is clear, making the text very legible, and the presence of Markdown capabilities means that you can handily format your passages to optimize your writing. In order to take advantage of those functions, you'll have to memorize them — if you aren't familiar, it's best to have a Markdown commands page open in your browser for convenience.

When it comes to exporting, PDF is the main — and only — extension to export as. Owing to the extension's overall compatibility, you should have no problem with formatting or anything of the sort.

Before exporting, though, you can utilize the Preview function to see how your text would look in a PDF document: you can toggle the function, and it'll update as you write, which is very helpful when you want to be precise with your formatting.

Calamus makes for a nice software solution for those looking to write novels: if you want to be unbothered by numerous menus and panels while writing, this one's for you.