Clear ARC helps authors (especially those who hate planning) outline, plan, and write their books. To make that fun, it should be so simple, no manual is required. But hey, you gotta have a manual, so here we are (and besides, if you don’t take a look at the end of this manual, you won’t know what the keyboard shortcuts are).

50,000 Foot View

It might help to see the whole picture first. Start by creating a ‘book’. This contains the things you need to know to remind yourself what your book is about. You then add chapters to your book (again, to remind you what each chapter is about – or not – that’s up to you). You can then add scenes to your chapters, and ultimately events to your scenes. You don’t have to do this of course – you can just start a book, add your first chapter, and start writing the book. Which is the point of this overview. Clear ARC takes you from concept, to the actual writing of the book itself, all in one neat online application.

The Hierarchy of a Book

Because books tend to have a hierarchy, and hierarchies make things easier to follow (book > chapter > scene > event), Clear ARC, as you’d expect, uses that hierarchy to make the planning process a little easier. It also allows for series of books to be developed as well as one-offs.

So at the top level, a book may be stand-alone or part of a Series (you could even collect your one-off books into a series you call, say, ‘One-off Books’ – how novel is that).

Here’s how to create a series:

Click the Series button from the main navigation bar at the top (or press S)
Click the Add Series button from the central panel (or press A)
Fill in the details (as much as you want, you can edit this anytime)
Press the CREATE SERIES button (or Ctrl+S on Windows – Cmd+S on a Mac) on the lower right of the central panel to save it
Click View Books in the series card you just created (or press V)
Click Add Book (press A) from the central panel (this will automatically add it to your series)
Fill in as much detail as you can, then click CREATE BOOK to save it (Ctlr+S Cmd+S)
You now have a series, and a book that belongs to it – all ready for planning, plotting, and when that’s done, writing. Think of a series as being the ‘parent’ of the books it contains. You’ll see the ‘Parent’ label used in the Book view to show which series a book belongs to, and also when editing a chapter, scene, or event, so you know which ‘parent’ they belong to as well.

If you’re creating a stand-alone book (not part of a series):

Click the Book button from the main navigation bar at the top (or press B)
Click the Add Book button that appears in the central panel (or press A)
Add a title and other details (as much as you want, you can edit this anytime)
Press the CREATE BOOK button on the lower right of the central panel to save it (or Ctrl+S)
You now have a book all ready for planning and plotting
Press V to open chapters, press A to add a chapter

If you later decide your stand-alone book should be part of a series:

Add a new series (if you haven’t created one already) – see above
Click Books from the main navigation bar
Click the Edit Book button in the book you want to add to your series
Add the series to it by clicking on the Parent drop down menu selector
Select the series you want to add it to
Press the SAVE button to save it

Note: When editing most fields, pressing Return will save it and close the form unless the field is a multi-line text field or a dropdown menu selection field. This allows you to add all your chapters one after another with minimal effort (the same applies to scenes and events). Ctrl + S also saves (Cmd+S on a Mac).

Creating a book

If you’ve read the The Hierarchy of a Book section above, you’ll already be looking at the new book you created.

Note that the only mandatory field for a book is its title (anything will do to get you started, you can edit it anytime).

It’s a good idea to also enter a description at this point to remind yourself of the big idea for the book. It’s one thing us Clear ARCs tend to think up in a millisecond, then forget completely (I do anyway).

You might also want to enter the genre, but it’s entirely up to you how much detail you want to include. For example, Clear ARCs might wait until the book is done before deciding on a genre (I mean, why not? It started out as an epic thriller to beat all thrillers until you realised it was a love story). That’s what this app is all about. Add as much or as little detail as you feel like, whenever you feel like it..

Next time you login, you will be taken back to where you left off. But if you were filling in a form, make sure you save it by clicking the SAVE button (you’ll get a warning if you try to logout or move to another section of the app.)

Creating a chapter

Once you’re happy with your book’s details and have clicked the CREATE button to save them (or the SAVE button if you went back to edit it later), you will be returned to the Book view page.

Click the View Chapters button in the book’s card (or press V). Then click Add Chapter (A). Fill in the title and anything else you can think of. Click CREATE CHAPTER to save it (Ctrl+S). You can call it Chapter 1 if you’re not bothered about a descriptive name. This makes it easier to navigate your book when you come to edit it later.

Having said that, every element in a story has an order number. This appears on the top right of each card. You can drag and drop these cards (your story elements) around and even rearrange them to other sections if you made a mistake or decide a scene you wrote, in say, chapter 3, should have been put in chapter 2. Just click the edit button on the element and assign it a new parent (note you cannot move elements from one book to another, only within the same book).

Don’t forget to save any changes by clicking the SAVE button or pressing Ctrl + S or Cmd + S on a Mac.

If you fancy creating all your chapters in one go, simply click the Add Chapter button (or press A) from the View Chapters view, enter the title, press Return, and repeat until you’re done. You can do the same with scenes and events too. This is a super fast way to help you plot out a book from a very high perspective – and it can be done without touching the mouse.

Creating a scene

Creating a scene is the same process as creating a chapter. Click View Chapters from the Book view. Then View Scenes from the chapter you want to add the scene to. Then click Add Scene (A). Once again, you only need to fill in the title of the scene to create a new one and press Return or click CREATE to save it. The more detail you add, the easier it will be when you start writing the book itself, as you’ll see.

A scene represents a major movement in your story from one state to another. They can be short or long, it depends on the pace of your story in relation to the scene and chapter the scene is in.

NOTE: The idea behind major movements and the label ‘scene’ relates to theatres. Creating a theatrical set for a scene requires a lot of thought, so changing the actual scenery is never done lightly.

Creating an event

An event (click View Events from any Scene view, click Add Event or press A) is the smallest unit you can use when planning your book. It usually represents an action of some sort. For example, an event might be a door opening revealing a long lost relative. Or it might involve the main character falling in love at first sight, or an explosion turning the night sky into day.

Events are what move a story along. Think of them as a storyboard or slides from a film. This is especially useful later when you’ve planned your whole book. You can view all the events sequentially (or scenes or chapters) in a single view just like a storyboard.

Like all story elements in Clear ARC the only mandatory field for an event is the Title. Make this as clear as you can. Later when you’re writing your book, it will be easier to understand what you need to be writing about.

Adding Characters, Places, and Items

You can add Characters, Places, and Items with a click on their main navigation buttons or use the keyboard shortcuts, C, P, and I (then click Add or press A). You can even start the whole process of writing a book by adding them first. Very useful if you had a brainwave for a character’s name and no idea what they’re going to do yet.

You can of course add any assets like these whenever you like or when inspiration strikes. Adding more detail will help you picture them when you’re starting to flesh out your scenes etc., and will ensure you stay consistent (a huge problem for most Clear ARCs).

Restricting assets to specific books

By default, you can add any character, place, or item to any book, but as your library grows this can become cumbersome. The way to deal with this is to edit your assets ‘Allowed Books’ field. That way you can restrict any assets to specific books, which means they won’t clutter drop down menus for books they’re not meant for. You can of course un-restrict them again at any time.

The field is slightly different to others in that all the books are displayed unhighlighted (by default), which means the asset you are editing is available everywhere. If select a book and save, that book will be highlighted and will be the only book the asset can be selected from now on (if you added it to some other book earlier, it will still be part of that book – you can remove it when you want). If you want to add (or remove) an asset to more than one book, then press the Ctrl (or on a Mac the Command) key whilst clicking. Don’t forget to save afterwards.

Images

You can add image links to any of these assets (as well as to your books if you have designed covers for them). None of these images are stored with your books, just the links to them. I am including thousands of public domain links to AI generated faces if you don’t have your own, you’ll find them on the Clear ARC blog (the link is in your Clear ARC profile menu in the main navigation on the right).

Right click on any image, choose ‘Copy image address’ or ‘Copy image link’ and paste it into the Image URL field. It’s always best to go to the source of the image when copying links (rather than right-clicking on images directly within Google or any other search engine – when you see an image you like, left click on it so it opens its source view, that will usually give you the correct link – be careful about copyright when doing this – although you’re not saving the image anywhere, only the link).

Attaching your assets to your story

Once you’ve added your assets to Clear ARC you can add them to your books. They can be added to any elements you like. You can also see all the assets for any given part of your book including the book itself by clicking the toggle button on any story element card. That means you only need to add assets to the actual place they’re used, and you will automatically see them in higher levels, e.g. when viewing the book itself.

When the edit window opens after you click Add, you can give a reason why you’re attaching the asset at this point in the book. That reason will appear on your book’s timeline. You’ll find these pieces of text invaluable later on. Keep them short and to the point.

The Timeline

As your book grows, you’ll want to stay in touch with what’s happening. It’s easy to get bogged down when looking and editing tiny parts of a book, so we created a timeline for you to see what’s going on everywhere, all the time, all at once (to paraphrase the excellent movie).

Press B to open the book view, then T to open the timeline and see your book come to life. This view shows every chapter, scene, and event along with all the assets you’ve been adding to the sections, along with all the reasons you’ve been adding, all strung out along the full length of the book.

And that’s not all. By carefully thinking about each reason, you can also record changes in mood or characteristics to your characters. So you can record your super hero starting out with low self-esteem, then watch as that esteem grows to epic proportions and confidence by the end.

Or you could watch a town grow and then decline as the action takes place, and know exactly when and how these changes occur. The timeline brings your work to life. Using that and the exportable guide is all you need to write and complete your now well-planned masterpiece.

Another great feature about the timeline is that you can view it on sections of your book too. So if you want a bird’s eye view of all the action in a scene, go to that scene and click View Timeline (or press T).

Writing your book

Once you’re happy with your outline (or even if you just want to get started writing right away), open your book and view its chapters.

Press W (or click the ‘Write your story’ button on any chapter). On the left you’ll see your chapter info. Click the Scene or Event drop down buttons on the right to open your scene and event views for the chapter. Now click your cursor in to the middle section and start typing.

Clear ARC remembers your left and right panel settings, so whenever you return to this chapter you can continue from where you left off.

If you don’t need the chapter, scene, or event information, toggle the left panel off (the toggle switch is just above it – 3 horizontal line icon) and click the X button on each card in the right hand panel.

At any time you can click the Export HTML button and Clear ARC will export every chapter you have written in this section into a single HTML file you can open in any browser.

It will save it to your browser’s default folder, or open a save window if you haven’t set a default folder.

You can then copy and paste your entire book’s chapters and content from the browser to wherever you want.

Every chapter title is automatically formatted HTML H1 tags. Every paragraph is automatically formatted in HTML P tags.

If you want to add more specific formatting, use markup language to do this. You can see your options at the foot of the editor panel. Markup language is very simple and ensures that exported files (such as the Export EPUB option) work as expected when importing into eBook Readers.

Use markup carefully if you must use it. Remember that most readers care more about words than styles. Fancy formatting can lead to distractions, and take your reader’s attention away from the book.

Easy Navigation

One of the most annoying things about any software is the ability to return to a page you were looking at earlier. The more complex the software, the harder it is to remember everything.

Clear ARC has many keyboard shortcuts, but perhaps the two most important are ? which opens Keyboard Shortcut Help – to remind of they shortcuts and what they do, and Ctrl+L (or Cmd+L on a Mac). This remembers the last pages you visited so you can return to any of them with a single click (or use the arrow keys to move up and down the list and press Enter to activate).

Undo and redo

You can undo and redo most things (except reordering elements). For most people, this will be rarely used, but it’s there in case the worst happens.

Note that deleting any story element only archives that element, so if the element contains child elements (eg. you archive a book with 10 chapters) the child elements will become ‘orphans’. If you unarchive the element (by pressing the undo button) the orphans will be joined back to their book (or whatever element they were orphaned from).

Use undo/redo with care. It’s meant for accidents rather than some kind of strategy.

NOTE: Undo/redo will not work if you click the Delete Permanently button on an element. This allows you to remove elements completely. You shouldn’t need it, but it’s there if you want to start from a clean slate.

Export HTML

You can export your entire book with all its assets in HTML. Open the Books view and click the ‘Export HTML’ button. It will save to wherever your computer saves to by default (or your browser will open a ‘save as’ window if you don’t have a default download path).

Double clicking the saved file will open it in your browser.

Export JSON

In the Book view, click the Export JSON button to create a complete copy of your book in a format that Clear ARC understands.

Use this to make backups of your books. You can import an exported book at any time, but cannot overwrite an existing one.

If Clear ARC detects this, it will warn and stop you from importing it. If you wanted to return to an earlier version of your book, click the Delete Permanently button, then you’ll be able to import the earlier version (it’s a good idea to export the original before you delete it just in case).

Quick start

Click the Books button from the main navigation bar
Click the Add Book button at the top of the central panel
Enter a name for the book and click CREATE BOOK
Click View Chapters, then Add Chapter
Name the chapter and click CREATE CHAPTER
Click View Scenes, then Add Scene.
Name the scene and click CREATE SCENE
Click View Events, then Add Event
Name the event and click CREATE EVENT
Navigate to any part of the book you want to edit
Create Characters, Places, and Items
Add them to any elements of your book
Repeat the above until you have planned your book
Open any chapter and click ‘Write your story’
Repeat until your story is written
Click Export in the Writer view to export your book
Click Books, click View Timeline for another perspective
Click Books, click Export HTML
Click Books, click Export JSON to create a machine readable backup

Adding metadata

Some fields have select buttons to the right of them. Character role is one example. Click on the drop down menu and select the role you want for the character. Note that the actual role field is entirely editable. You are not restricted to the suggestions in the drop down. Make up your own roles if it helps.

The same applies to all other fields that use this mechanism. The items in the drop down menus are just suggestions. These may expand as Clear ARC develops.

Reordering story elements

You can reorder elements using drag and drop, just remember that this is reordering the elements within the element being dragged, so if you were to drag chapter 3 to chapter 1, then all the elements withing chapter 3 would now become elements within what chapter 3 has become, namely ‘chapter 1’. The actual chapter 1, which would now be in chapter 2’s place includes its original elements too (and chapter 2 would have been moved into chapter 3’s original place). That means if you dragged chapter 3 back to chapter 3’s original position, everything would be back to normal again.

In short, just take care dragging things around. If things get messed up, it is easy enough to look through the various views and drag things back into the order you want again (the undo/redo feature does not apply to drag and drop).

You can auto renumber any group by dragging any element a tiny amount within its own space and letting go (you don’t have to physically move it to another spot to reset the order number – and note that order numbers run sequentially from the beginning of a book to the end – so the first event in chapter 2 will be numbered event 2 if there is already a single event in chapter 1.

Reassigning story element’s parent

You can assign new ‘parents’ to books, chapters, scenes and events, so if you decide a scene in chapter 2 should be moved to chapter 1, that’s fine. It will bring all its events with it too. And if you decide event 3 in, say, scene 3 in chapter 2, should be in scene 4 in chapter 2, that’s fine as well (just view the scenes in chapter 2, then the events, edit event 3’s parent to scene 4 and you’re done.)

Search/find

Press / to activate the search bar, then enter any text you feel will find what you’re looking for. This even searches links, so if you want to see all the characters who have images you’ve used from Clear ARC.co.uk, search for ‘cleararc’. In other words, the search searches pretty much everything you’ve entered. It’s great for finding references to characters and showing them all in a single view for example (or items, places, or anything else).

Deleting (soft-deletes)

If you delete (soft-delete) elements, the order numbers aren’t updated, which is fine because they still run in the same order (just with a gap where the element was archived). If you restore the archived element immediately, the gap in the order numbers will be removed.

The best way to view the progress of your book is by viewing the Timeline, but it can also help to click options such as View Events (assuming you are using events to plan it out) directly from a book’s view to get the overall picture – event by event. The same applies to chapters and scenes.

Permanent Delete (and backing up)

You can also delete your stories forever. These are NOT recoverable. You’ll see the button next to the Delete button at the foot of your story element cards. Unlike a soft-delete a hard delete also removes all its children including any connected assets (characters, places, and items). Use with care (and remember you can export your book in two ways – either as a stand-alone HTML file so you can read it in a browser, or by using the ‘Export JSON’ button so you can import it again later (exporting your book is a great way to make a backup of your book in a form readable by Clear ARC).

Keyboard Shortcuts

S – View all Series
B – View all Books
C – View all Characters
P – View all Places
I – View all Items
A – Add current element
V – View children
E – Edit
T – View Timeline
W – Open Writer (if chapters exist)
G – Open last pages selector
Ctrl + G – Open last pages selector from input fields
Ctrl + B – Back to parent
Ctrl + S – Save / Create
/ – Focus search
? – Toggle this help on/off
TAB – Move to next field/button
Return/Enter – Save and return to previous page if pressed on a single line input field
Esc – Close help / Cancel

TODO Lists

There is no dedicated TODO list in Clear ARC, but that’s because you can add a TODO anywhere you want (the best way is to add it to any Notes field – literally enter the text ‘todo’ – the case doesn’t matter). Then if you want to see ALL your TODOs, enter TODO in the Search box and press Enter. Or you can use any words you like (TODO is just a suggestion).

Remembering your last position

Clear ARC remembers where you last were, so when you next login you will return there. Remember to save your work before you log out if you’re adding a new element or editing an existing one. helps authors (especially those who hate planning) outline, plan, and write their books. To make that fun, it should be so simple, no manual is required. But hey, you gotta have a manual, so here we are (and besides, if you don’t take a look at the end of this manual, you won’t know what the keyboard shortcuts are).

Clear ARC User Manual