Hello, writers. One of the many things that is less trouble than writing is reading books about writing. Of which there are thousands. I think I've read 207. Most have a problem that is typified in the title of a book by the late Joan Aiken:
The Way To Write For Children
There is no "way" to write for children, of course, or for anybody else. As my guru is fond of saying, "There are nine and ninety ways of constructing tribal lays, and each and every one of them is right." (Some other guy said it first, apparently, but he says it all the time.)
But all of 'em have something useful in 'em, so let's take a quick tour through the ones I can find at the moment. (The rest are hors du combat due to a multi-year project called rebuilding my library. I started with the built-in bookshelves and am now replacing the floor, so there are organizational issues.)
One of the greatest sinners in the "one way" category is Rita Mae Brown's Starting from Scratch, which informs you among other things that you must have a non-intellectually demanding day job, a home gym and a cat in order to write. Hopefully that is intended in a sort of tongue in cheek way because I've got none of those things. But most successful writers are sure their way is the only way, so of course you have to read their books with your eyes open, as it were.
Books for the Writer's Blocked
Two books that are very popular that I couldn't make it through are Writing Down The Bones and Bird by Bird. I think that both books are aimed at helping writers get into the flow of writing. They might be useful if that's where you're at. Dunno.
Someone on here suggested a few weeks back that books of writing exercises were a better way to get going, and I recommend Anne Bernays and Pamela Painter's What If? for this.
Technique-Oriented Books
The quality of these is variable. I try to stick to those by writers I've actually heard of, although people who have never written much of anything other than writing books seem to sell pretty respectably, go figure. The ones below are good ones.
Nancy Kress's Beginnings, Middles and Ends is a good book to read with your finished manuscript on the floor beside you. Kress is terrific at identifying just where a lot of writers fall down, and at helping them up. Her Dynamic Characters is another one that's full of sticky-notes.
Patricia Highsmith's Plotting and Writing Suspense Fiction is useful even if you don't write suspense fiction, because you always need some suspense. In fact if, like me, you don't really care for fight-and-flight scenes but need to write some anyway, it's a godsend.
Stephen King's On Writing-- well, what can I say, you gotta read this whether you're a fan or not (I'm not). Amidst the biographical stuff, there's a ton of quote-worthy, pithy writing advice in here, so you'll need your own copy for highlighting. You can easily find it used, or buy new in the secure knowledge that Mr. King donates heavily to the Democratic Party.
(By the same token, you might wanna check Orson Sc. Card's writing books out of the library.)
Useful for the plot-perplexed is Plot by Ansen Dibell. This book helped me enormously in trying to turn my first novel, A Pickpocket's Tale, from a bunch of random stream-of-consciousness into a story. Plus he explains how to create a Gandalf.
David Morrell's Lessons from a Lifetime of Writing is the only book I've run across that deals with writing as a form of mental illness. I found this approach very useful, as well as such techniques as imagining the characters in a scene turning to you like method actors and saying "What's my motivation here?" The book ends:
I'll die telling stories to myself in the dark. But there's never enough time. There was never enough time.
(And if you don't know what he means, honey, you just ain't there yet.)
I have a lot of other books about writing technique but they're not as good as these.
Background Books
Writer's Digest Books prints a lot of these. The Writer's Guide to Everyday Life in Colonial America type of thing. Needless to say that title's nowhere near as useful as Richard Hofstadter's brilliant America at 1750: A Social Portrait-- these writers' guides are misleading. They're meant as shortcuts to the research, and there are no shortcuts. You have to actually do the research, and if you don't want to do the research, it's possible you don't actually want to write the book. (On the other hand, I am happy to use their guides for something that interests me not at all, eg firearms or poisons, so maybe I'm wrong. They have a whole Howdunit series for the mystery writer.)
Business-of-Writing Books
Some of these I've found useful are: Richard Curtis's How To Be Your Own Literary Agent (although he makes it clear he thinks you have a fool for a client); Michael Seidman's Living the Dream: An Outline for a Life In Fiction (warning to TxDemFem, there's a lot about writing for the market in here); and Harold D. Underdown's Complete Idiot's Guide to Publishing Children's Books, which has useful info about how the publishing industry works and what your editor is thinking.
I also have a copy of Self-Editing for Fiction Writers, which I know many people swear by. To me it hasn't been that useful, probably because my editor had already taught me this stuff, but if you are doubtful about self-editing or are wondering whether to hire an "editing service", probably cheaper to try this book first. Esp. if you get it from the liberry.
In other writing news, Darkyn author Lynn Viehl shares The Reality of a Times Besteller in terms of actual sales numbers and dollars.
The Al Blanchard Award Contest is open (no fee, natch, or I wouldn't publicize it). Prize is $100 + conference admission + publication for an unpublished mystery story up to 5000 words with a New England setting or by a New England author.
I've said it before and I'll say it again: If you're tryna break in, enter (free) writing contests!
Write On! will be a regular Thursday feature (8 pm ET) until it isn't. Be sure to check out other great lit'ry diaries like:
sarahnity's books by kossacks on Tuesday nights
cfk's Bookflurries on Wednesday nights
plf515's What are you reading? on Friday mornings