Looking for a gift for a writer friend, or perhaps, one for yourself? Here are five books I have found helpful in my writing this year.

Fiction Blurbs: The Best Way Forward Way by Phoebe J. Ravencraft

If you hate writing blurbs – those short pithy summaries of your story found on the back cover or online book page for your fiction or non-fiction book, you will love this book. The book starts by having you practice the skill on existing books and then helps you transfer what you learn to your own blurb. Chapter by chapter, Ravencraft breaks down the structure of a blurb into what each sentence needs to convey and then suggests the type of language you need to use to capture a reader’s interest. For example, she suggests that no sentence in a blurb have more than one comma to maintain clarity and snap.

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Save the Cat! Writes a Novel: The Last Book on Novel Writing You’ll Ever Need by Jessica Brody

I am not sure this is the only book you need to write a novel, but it is a very helpful one. Using the plot structure from the original Save the Cat by Blake Snyder, Jessica Brody breaks down and analyzes the structure of ten novels each representing one of the major genres. For people who love outlining and a structural approach to plotting, the tools she provides are extremely useful. She goes over determining word count, locating the major plot points or fifteen story beats, and how to distill your story into a summary and blurb/pitch.

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Techniques of the Selling Writer by Dwain V. Swain

This is an oldie but a goodie. Written in 1965, Swain, who was a successful writer of genre fiction, breaks down the structure of a novel into its smallest parts, starting with the words you choose and builds to the overall structure of the novel. Most writing advice commonly offered today comes from his book. So, if you want to read writing wisdom in its original form, get this book. I particularly like his discussion of the action-reaction sequence, the role of character motivation, and the importance of having change at the beginning of a story.

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Writing Deep Scene: Plotting Your Story Through Action, Emotion & Theme Martha Alderson and Jordan Rosenfeld

I think the most important part of this book is the typology of scene types they present and their discussion of how to use them. Now I have to admit that I have written and published five novels without ever thinking about scene types. But I think my books would have been stronger if I had been more thoughtful in my selection and arrangement of some of my scenes. They also dig deep into action and emotion with excellent examples from selected novels.

Novel analysis is one of the best ways to learn what makes a novel work. However, I often find that examples are used that I am unfamiliar with. That is particularly the case in this book. What can be done and probably is of more benefit, is to apply their structural critique to a novel that resembles the one you want to write or to your own at the revision stage.

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Writing for Emotional Impact: Advanced Dramatic Techniques to Attract, Engage, and Fascinate the Reader from Beginning to End by Karl Inglesias

This book covers much of the same craft techniques as the three books above. The style, however, is a little friendlier. Each technique is summarized in a few paragraphs. Instead of novel examples, movies are analyzed. My suggestion would be to read the other books in the preplanning stages for study so as to obtain deep knowledge of the techniques, and then use Inglesias for quick review during revision.

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What helpful writing books have you read this year? Post below and share them with our fellow writers.

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Looking for short, quick reads full of useful writing tips?

Check out my Write for Success series.

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Prefer to Take a Workshop?

Write a novel in a month? Learn tricks and techniques for getting the words of your WIP down on the page in the quickest, most efficient way possible, so that the story makes sense and requires the least amount of revision. Perfect for people planning on participating in NaNoWri in November or April, or for anyone who needs a toolbox of ways to speed up their writing process.

Offered by SAVVY Authors Jan 30 to Feb 28, 2023

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