Utah's picture
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Utah from Fort Worth, TX is reading Lonesome Dove by Larry McMurtry December 4, 2011 - 3:46pm

What are the books about fiction writing you most recommend be in every fiction writer's library (or what you find indespensable)? 

 

My picks: 

Robert Olen Butler's From Where You Dream

Natalie Goldberg's Writing Down the Bones

Josip Novakovich's Fiction Writer's Workshop

Nighty Nite's picture
Nighty Nite from NJ is reading Grimscribe: His Lives and Works December 4, 2011 - 3:48pm

Stephen King's On Writing

bryanhowie's picture
bryanhowie from FW, ID is reading East of Eden. Steinbeck is FUCKING AMAZING. December 4, 2011 - 3:52pm

I'd say nothing is better Chuck's essays.  Otherwise, Stephen King's On Writing.

Tim O'Brien's short story / essay "How to Write a True War Story" is a great place to start.

Fylh's picture
Fylh from from from is reading is from is reading is reading is reading reading is reading December 4, 2011 - 3:55pm

I've only read one that really marked me: John Gardner's The Art of Fiction.

avery of the dead's picture
avery of the dead from Kentucky is reading Cipher Sisters December 4, 2011 - 3:57pm

Tim O'Brien's short story / essay "How to Write a True War Story" is a great place to start.

 

Yes, that. ^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^

Utah's picture
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Utah from Fort Worth, TX is reading Lonesome Dove by Larry McMurtry December 4, 2011 - 4:22pm

@Phil:  I've crossed paths with the Gardner book and never read it.  Anything in particular that sets it apart?

R.Moon's picture
R.Moon from The City of Champions is reading The Last Thing He Wanted by Joan Didion; Story Structure Architect by Victoria Lynn Schimdt PH.D; Creating Characters by the editors of Writer's Digest December 4, 2011 - 4:57pm

Chuck and Craig's essays.

The First Five Pages by: Noah Lukeman

On Writing by: Stephen King

Novels are probably the best books to learn from.

.'s picture
. December 4, 2011 - 8:19pm

Elements of Style- great for any writing piece.

R.Moon's picture
R.Moon from The City of Champions is reading The Last Thing He Wanted by Joan Didion; Story Structure Architect by Victoria Lynn Schimdt PH.D; Creating Characters by the editors of Writer's Digest December 4, 2011 - 8:24pm

@Jack: Yes, another great one. Good call buddy.

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misskokamon from San Francisco is reading The Moonlit Mind December 4, 2011 - 10:03pm

I have more books on writing than I can count, but I suggest anything by James Scott Bell. I like his approach. 

Do you guys have suggestions for books that focus on world building? It doesn't have to be a book primarily on writing, either, just any tool you might have used to help flesh out the world your characters will play in would be helpful.

 

R.Moon's picture
R.Moon from The City of Champions is reading The Last Thing He Wanted by Joan Didion; Story Structure Architect by Victoria Lynn Schimdt PH.D; Creating Characters by the editors of Writer's Digest December 4, 2011 - 10:18pm

He did the plot book for Writer's Digest, right? I have that one and Characters, emotion and viewpoint. Also have Description. They're decent, sometimes have to dig for some good information, though. Description has helped me a lot.

R.Moon's picture
R.Moon from The City of Champions is reading The Last Thing He Wanted by Joan Didion; Story Structure Architect by Victoria Lynn Schimdt PH.D; Creating Characters by the editors of Writer's Digest December 4, 2011 - 10:26pm
R.Moon's picture
R.Moon from The City of Champions is reading The Last Thing He Wanted by Joan Didion; Story Structure Architect by Victoria Lynn Schimdt PH.D; Creating Characters by the editors of Writer's Digest December 4, 2011 - 10:30pm

http://www.fictionfactor.com/

Here's a site, too. Just search for world building.

postpomo's picture
postpomo from Canada is reading words words words December 4, 2011 - 11:30pm

good suggestions. I'll throw some other titles I've come across here and elsewhere:

the hero with 1000 faces by Joseph Campbell (the basics of myth & storytelling)

Story by Robert McKee (about writing screenplays, but much can be applied to fiction)

Practical English Usage by Michael Swan (the ultimate grammar book)

Stein on Writing by Sol Stein (good general fiction/non-fiction guide)

A good dictionary (OED being the first choice, but who can afford it? not I not I).

 

Nick Wilczynski's picture
Nick Wilczynski from Greensboro, NC is reading A Dance with Dragons by George R.R. Martin December 4, 2011 - 11:54pm

George Orwell's Why I Write (including Politics and the English Language)

Of course, this is only my small addition to this very useful list, hardly a complete library in itself.

postpomo's picture
postpomo from Canada is reading words words words December 5, 2011 - 8:24am

I really like that Orwell essay.

misskokamon's picture
misskokamon from San Francisco is reading The Moonlit Mind December 5, 2011 - 12:51pm

Thanks for the World Building links, guys. I've added to my toolkit. I also found a great website on the stuff, but I'm at work and don't have access to it at the moment. When I get home I'll add it to this list!

Fylh's picture
Fylh from from from is reading is from is reading is reading is reading reading is reading December 5, 2011 - 12:58pm

@Utah1977

It's an exceptionally literary version of the writer's handbook. Gardner was a good stylist and a good storyteller — but he was also a deeply opinionated and provocative guy, so all of that combines to make The Art of Fiction very inspiring reading. You can love or hate it, but it goes beyond the how-to and makes you think about what writing should be DOING, in a grander and loftier sense.

Utah's picture
Moderator
Utah from Fort Worth, TX is reading Lonesome Dove by Larry McMurtry December 5, 2011 - 1:04pm

@Phil

Thanks for the response.  Looks like I have something new to put in my ToDo List.

@everybody: 

I notice nobody's throwing in that Julia Cameron stuff.

miked's picture
miked from Los Angeles is reading White Noise December 5, 2011 - 1:18pm

Jane Vandenburgh's "Architecture of a Novel: A Writer's Handbook" really opened my eyes into constructing the small, event-based components that make up all novels. It actually made me feel like writing a novel CAN be done.

It is a bit on the hippie side ("do what feels right, etc"), but interesting nonetheless.

http://www.amazon.com/Architecture-Novel-Handbook-Jane-Vandenburgh/dp/1582435979/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1323116122&sr=8-1

.'s picture
. December 5, 2011 - 3:11pm

^ Theres a good one.

R.Moon's picture
R.Moon from The City of Champions is reading The Last Thing He Wanted by Joan Didion; Story Structure Architect by Victoria Lynn Schimdt PH.D; Creating Characters by the editors of Writer's Digest December 5, 2011 - 6:44pm

Here's Elmore Leonard's Ten Rules of Writing. Enjoy.

http://melodygodfred.com/

bryanhowie's picture
bryanhowie from FW, ID is reading East of Eden. Steinbeck is FUCKING AMAZING. December 5, 2011 - 5:11pm

Looking at my bookshelf, it seems like The Fiction Writer's Workshop was a pretty good one, so I'll second that one.

Alex Kane's picture
Alex Kane from west-central Illinois is reading Dark Orbit December 5, 2011 - 6:38pm

On Writing Horror, ed. Mort Castle, published by the Horror Writers Association, is phenomenal.

Zen in the Art of Writing by Ray Bradbury contains what I consider to be the finest essays on tapping into your own creativity ever penned.

Also: How to Write Fantasy & Science Fiction by Orson Scott Card, Character & Viewpoint by Orson Scott Card, and Scene & Structure by Jack M. Bickham, Writer's Digest Books, are all tremendously useful and just as inspiring.

On Writing is a book most valuable as a call to action; a welcome boot in the ass, complete with no-nonsense wisdom and King's prescription to make time for 4-6 hours of reading and writing every single day.

R.Moon's picture
R.Moon from The City of Champions is reading The Last Thing He Wanted by Joan Didion; Story Structure Architect by Victoria Lynn Schimdt PH.D; Creating Characters by the editors of Writer's Digest December 5, 2011 - 6:45pm

Elmore Leonard's Rules have been updated. When you get to the page just type his name in the search box.

http://melodygodfred.com/

Nick's picture
Nick from Toronto is reading Adjustment Day December 8, 2011 - 12:00pm

Anyone read The War of Art? Not about writing specifically (though it is by a novelist) but rather how to overcome "resistance" aka procrastination. Fast read and really insightful.

"Resistance is fear. But resistance is too cunning to show itself naked in this form. Why? Because if Resistance lets us see clearly that our own fear is preventing us from doing our work, we may feel shame at this. And shame may drive us to act in the face of fear."

Utah's picture
Moderator
Utah from Fort Worth, TX is reading Lonesome Dove by Larry McMurtry December 8, 2011 - 12:13pm

Nick, are you talking about the album by American Head Charge?  Great album, I listen to it in the gym a lot.  "A Violent Reaction" is an amazing song.

The Pressfield book is interesting.  He throws a lot of overt mysticism into it, as I recall.  Angels and muses and whatnot.  However, looking past that, the book has a lot of good advice.  Or, I think more appropriately, one really solid piece of advice ("Keep your ass in the chair and ignore the I Can'ts") broken into pieces and fed to the reader as completely as possible.  I need to read that one again, because it's the piece of advice I -- and probably most writers -- need to hear often. 

I need it on a daily basis.  Maybe it would look good taped to my bathroom mirror. 

Renfield's picture
Renfield from Hell is reading 20th Century Ghosts February 26, 2013 - 3:17pm

I'm about halfsies into the aforementioned ART OF FICTION by Gardner. It's really engaging and, in spite of his superficial elitism, easily accessible and very practical to someone like me, who is both a lover of junk fiction and uneducated. Whereas I'm working my way up to Kundera's ART OF THE NOVEL, which I'm not yet smart enough to read, I don't think, and which seems to skew much more towards the analysis rather than application. Similarly in that I hadn't done enough reading for Italo Calvino's SIX MEMOS to hold as much weight as it should with me, though otherwise an enjoyable read. So I've put off getting that Kundera book, however I did also pick up with the Gardner book this LETTERS TO A YOUNG NOVELIST by Mario Vargas Llosa, and I'm hoping to limp through that one with my unacademic reading background.

So I was going to say that these are literary craft books that may be pertinent to genre writers as well, but if you have to brush up on your Chaucer and Shakespeare and Tolstoy and Cervantes to read them instead of books of your own genre, then are they really?

Jack Campbell Jr.'s picture
Jack Campbell Jr. from Lawrence, KS is reading American Rust by Phillipp Meyer February 27, 2013 - 9:40am

I am a big fan of Gardner as a writer and thinker. Not a big fan of his elitism, but I got a lot out of The Art of Fiction, as well as On Becoming a Novelist, and to a lesser extent On Moral Fiction. All three are pretty good. I've also got On Writers and Writing on my kindle, but I haven't read it yet.

I have a ridiculous number of writing books, so I wouldn't know where else to start.

Zen and the Art of Writing, and Stephen King's On Writing are particularly important. Bradbury makes you want to run to the typewriter, and King makes you want to stay there, even when it isn't going well.

I bought Robert McKee's Story for a screenwriting class, but it could apply to any sort of writing. The books 45 Master Characters and 20 Master Plots are interesting for generating ideas and thinking about archetypes.

I liked the Horror Writer Association's On Writing Horror, and I am currently reading Michael Knost's Writing Workshop of Horror, but both are mostly a collection of essays on different aspects of writing. However, they are good if you are in to that sort of thing.

I've heard Dwight Swain's Techniques of the Selling Writer is good, but I haven't read it yet. Just another of a hundred books I own that I keep meaning to get around to reading.