Book picks similar to
The Plot Dot: An eight-step visual guide to plotting unforgettable fiction and writing a book readers love. by Derek Murphy
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non-fiction
writing-resources
nonfiction
The Introvert Writer: Being Your Creative Best By Being Your Truest Self
Jamie Arpin-Ricci - 2016
Many of the most celebrated and successful authors are introverts, yet there remains a negative stigma around introversion. "The Introvert Writer" invites those who identify as introvert and have passion for the art and business of writing to discover their natural strengths while learning to overcome common obstacles. From our best writing comes from our truest selves and this book will help the introvert writer thrive. Jamie Arpin-Ricci, an established author in both the traditional and self-publishing worlds, has spent more than 20 years working with non-profits around personality and team dynamics. In this one of a kind resource, he applies his decades of expertise to the field of writing. This is the ultimate "How To" for every introvert writers collection
The Naked Truth About Self-Publishing
Jana DeleonDenise Grover Swank - 2013
A book so raw it was banned in one small city in Iowa. If you are thinking about self-publishing or you just want to know all the juicy insider scoop this is a must read.
Damn Fine Story: Mastering the Tools of a Powerful Narrative
Chuck Wendig - 2017
Great storytelling is making readers care about your characters, the choices they make, and what happens to them. It's making your audience feel the tension and emotion of a situation right alongside your protagonist. And to tell a damn fine story, you need to understand why and how that caring happens. Using a mix of personal stories, pop fiction examples, and traditional storytelling terms, New York Times best-selling author Chuck Wendig will help you internalize the feel of powerful storytelling. In Damn Fine Story, you'll explore:Fretytag's Pyramid for visualizing story structure--and when to break away from traditional storytelling formsCharacter relationships and interactions as the basis of every strong plot--no matter the form or genreRising and falling tension that pulls the audience through to the climax and conclusion of the storyDeveloping themes as a way to craft characters with depthWhether you're writing a novel, screenplay, video game, comic, or even if you just like to tell stories to your friends and family over dinner, this funny and informative guide is chock-full of examples about the art and craft of storytelling--and how to write a damn fine story of your own.
How to Market a Book: Overperform in a Crowded Market (Reedsy Marketing Guides #1)
Ricardo Fayet - 2021
Marketing it can be even harder.Marketing a book in 2021 can seem like a full-time job, what with the crazy number of things authors seem to be expected to do: social media, blog tours, advertising, price promotions, mailing lists, giveaways, you name it. But here’s a little secret: you don’t need to do all those things to successfully set your book on the path to success. What you need is a solid plan to find the one or two tactics that will work, and start to drive sales… in a minimum amount of time. And that’s exactly what you’ll find in this book.Instead of drowning you in information or inundating you with hundreds of different tactics and strategies that eventually prove fruitless, this book will guide you through a step-by-step framework to find the ones that actually work for you and your book, so that you can start marketing more efficiently.In particular, you’ll learn: • How to change your mindset and sell more books with less effort.; • How to write books that guarantee a lasting, profitable career; • How to get Amazon’s Kindle Store to market your book for you; • How to get thousands of readers into your mailing list before you even release the book; • How to propel your book to the top of the charts at launch; and • How to automate your marketing so that you can spend less time marketing and more time writing,After helping over 150,000 authors crack the marketing code through a popular weekly newsletter, Reedsy’s Co-founder Ricardo Fayet is sharing everything he’s learned over the past few years in this beginner-friendly, jargon-free guide to book marketing.
Craft in the Real World: Rethinking Fiction Writing and Workshopping
Matthew Salesses - 2021
The traditional writing workshop was established with white male writers in mind; what we call craft is informed by their cultural values. In this bold and original examination of elements of writing—including plot, character, conflict, structure, and believability—and aspects of workshop—including the silenced writer and the imagined reader—Matthew Salesses asks questions to invigorate these familiar concepts. He upends Western notions of how a story must progress. How can we rethink craft, and the teaching of it, to better reach writers with diverse backgrounds? How can we invite diverse storytelling traditions into literary spaces?Drawing from examples including One Thousand and One Nights, Curious George, Ursula K. Le Guin's A Wizard of Earthsea, and the Asian American classic No-No Boy, Salesses asks us to reimagine craft and the workshop. In the pages of exercises included here, teachers will find suggestions for building syllabi, grading, and introducing new methods to the classroom; students will find revision and editing guidance, as well as a new lens for reading their work. Salesses shows that we need to interrogate the lack of diversity at the core of published fiction: how we teach and write it. After all, as he reminds us, "When we write fiction, we write the world."
Paper Hearts, Volume 1: Some Writing Advice
Beth Revis - 2015
When it comes to writing, there's no wrong way to get words on paper. But it's not always easy to make the ink flow. Paper Hearts: Some Writing Advice won't make writing any simpler, but it may help spark your imagination and get your hands back on the keyboard.Practical Advice Meets Real ExperienceWith information that takes you from common mistakes in grammar to detailed charts on story structure, Paper Hearts describes:• How to Develop Character, Plot, and World• What Common Advice You Should Ignore• What Advice Actually Helps• How to Develop a Novel• The Basics of Grammar, Style, and Tone • Four Practical Methods of Charting Story Structure• How to Get Critiques and Revise Your Novel• How to Deal with Failure• And much more!BONUS! More than 25 "What to do if" scenarios to help writers navigate problems in writing from a New York Times Bestselling author who's written more than 2 million words of fiction.
On Writing Well: The Classic Guide to Writing Nonfiction
William Zinsser - 1976
It is a book for everybody who wants to learn how to write or who needs to do some writing to get through the day, as almost everybody does in the age of e-mail and the Internet. Whether you want to write about people or places, science and technology, business, sports, the arts or about yourself in the increasingly popular memoir genre, On Writing Well offers you fundamental priciples as well as the insights of a distinguished writer and teacher. With more than a million copies sold, this volume has stood the test of time and remains a valuable resource for writers and would-be writers.
The Forest for the Trees
Betsy Lerner - 2000
From her long experience working with successful writers and discovering new voices, Lerner looks at different writer personality types and addresses the concerns of writers just getting started as well as those stalled mid-career.
The Ultimate Hero's Journey: 195 Essential Plot Stages Found in the Best Novels and Movies
Neal Soloponte - 2017
Every great novel and movie follows a common narrative pattern known as the Hero’s Journey. In this book, for the first time at such level of detail, independent writers can have a look into the Hollywood’s manual on how to create a classic. Make no mistake about it: This is not just another popular take on the subject. This is it. All the 195 plot milestones found in the greatest stories of all times are outlined here—clearly, exactly, concisely. If you are writing a novel or a script, don’t run with disadvantage: Step into this mythical landscape and follow your favorite heroes along The Ultimate Hero’s Journey, as you discover the master structure of timeless storytelling.
What If?: Writing Exercises for Fiction Writers
Anne Bernays - 1990
With more than twenty-five years of experience teaching creative writing between them, Anne Bernays and Pamela Painter offer more than seventy-five exercises for both beginners and more experienced writers. These exercises are designed to develop and refine two basic skills: writing like a writer and, just as important, thinking like a writer. They deal with such topics as discovering where to start and end a story; learning when to use dialogue and when to use indirect discourse; transforming real events into fiction; and finding language that both sings and communicates precisely. What If? will be an essential addition to every writer's library, a welcome and much-used companion, a book that gracefully borrows a whisper from the muse.
Reading Like a Writer: A Guide for People Who Love Books and for Those Who Want to Write Them
Francine Prose - 2006
Written with passion, humor, and wisdom, Reading Like a Writer will inspire readers to return to literature with a fresh eye and an eager heart - to take pleasure in the long and magnificent sentences of Philip Roth and the breathtaking paragraphs of Isaac Babel; she is deeply moved by the brilliant characterization in George Eliot's Middlemarch. She looks to John Le Carré for a lesson in how to advance plot through dialogue and to Flannery O'Connor for the cunning use of the telling detail. And, most important, Prose cautions readers to slow down and pay attention to words, the raw material out of which all literature is crafted.
Writing Tools: 50 Essential Strategies for Every Writer
Roy Peter Clark - 2006
"You need tools, not rules." His book distills decades of experience into 50 tools that will help any writer become more fluent and effective. WRITING TOOLS covers everything from the most basic ("Tool 5: Watch those adverbs") to the more complex ("Tool 34: Turn your notebook into a camera") and provides more than 200 examples from literature and journalism to illustrate the concepts. For students, aspiring novelists, and writers of memos, e-mails, PowerPoint presentations, and love letters, here are 50 indispensable, memorable, and usable tools. "Pull out a favorite novel or short story, and read it with the guidance of Clark's ideas. . . . Readers will find new worlds in familiar places. And writers will be inspired to pick up their pens." -Boston Globe"For all the aspiring writers out there-whether you're writing a novel or a technical report-a respected scholar pulls back the curtain on the art." -Atlanta Journal-Constitution"This is a useful tool for writers at all levels of experience, and it's entertainingly written, with plenty of helpful examples." -Booklist
Consider This: Moments in My Writing Life After Which Everything Was Different
Chuck Palahniuk - 2020
Consider it a classic in the making.
Writing the Other
Nisi Shawl - 2007
This opinion, commonplace among published as well as aspiring writers, struck Nisi as taking the easy way out and spurred her to write an essay addressing the problem of how to write about characters marked by racial and ethnic differences. In the course of writing the essay, however, she realized that similar problems arise when writers try to create characters whose gender, sexual preference, and age differ significantly from their own. Nisi and Cynthia collaborated to develop a workshop that addresses these problems with the aim of both increasing writers' skill and sensitivity in portraying difference in their fiction as well as allaying their anxieties about ''getting it wrong.'' Writing the Other: A Practical Approach is the manual that grew out of their workshop. It discusses basic aspects of characterization and offers elementary techniques, practical exercises, and examples for helping writers create richer and more accurate characters with ''differences.''
Bullies, Bastards and Bitches: How to Write the Bad Guys of Fiction
Jessica Page Morrell - 2008
Realistic, credible bad guys create essential story complications, personalize conflict, add immediacy to a story line, and force the protagonist to evolve. From mischief-makers to villains to arch nemeses, "Bullies, Bastards & Bitches" shows you how to create nuanced bad guys who are indispensable to the stories in which they appear. Through detailed instruction and examples from contemporary bestsellers and classic page-turners, author Jessica Page Morrell also shows you how to: Understand the subtle but key differences between unlikeable protagonists, anti-heroes, dark heroes, and bad boys Supply even your darkest sociopath with a sympathetic attribute that will engage readers Set the stage for an unforgettable standoff between your hero and your villain Choose the right type of female villainfemme fatale, mommy dearest, avenger, etc.for your story "Bullies, Bastards & Bitches" is your all-encompassing bad-guy compendium to tapping into any character's dark side.