REVIEW: #41 How NOT to Write a Novel
November 2, 2009 by Allison
Filed under Non-Fictional, Reviews, Writing
Reading time: 2 – 4 minutes
Book Cover
Synopsis: (Taken from Amazon)
“What do you think of my fiction book writing?” the aspiring novelist extorted.
“Darn,” the editor hectored, in turn. “I can not publish your novel! It is full of what we in the business call ‘really awful writing.’”
“But how shall I absolve this dilemma? I have already read every tome available on how to write well and get published!” The writer tossed his head about, wildly.
“It might help,” opined the blonde editor, helpfully, “to ponder how NOT to write a novel, so you might avoid the very thing!”
Many writing books offer sound advice on how to write well. This is not one of those books. On the contrary, this is a collection of terrible, awkward, and laughably unreadable excerpts that will teach you what to avoid—at all costs—if you ever want your novel published.
In How Not to Write a Novel, authors Howard Mittelmark and Sandra Newman distill their 30 years combined experience in teaching, editing, writing, and reviewing fiction to bring you real advice from the other side of the query letter. Rather than telling you how or what to write, they identify the 200 most common mistakes unconsciously made by writers and teach you to recognize, avoid, and amend them. With hilarious “mis-examples” to demonstrate each manuscript-mangling error, they’ll help you troubleshoot your beginnings and endings, bad guys, love interests, style, jokes, perspective, voice, and more. As funny as it is useful, this essential how-NOT-to guide will help you get your manuscript out of the slush pile and into the bookstore.
Review:
I found How NOT to Write a Novel to be quite humorous and to the point. An easy read, the book is separated into sections such as character, scenery, plot, and marketing. This allows an aspiring writer to use them as a quick reference point of “Do Nots”. Are you describing every single detail of the character’s wardrobe, of every single character, every single time? Does your point of view shift one too many times? Do your characters all sound like the narrator without a voice to call their own? The rules are simple and easy – and.. well.. funny!
How NOT to Write a Novel is a must have for any aspiring novelist- as well as for book bloggers who may need to something to aid their explanations as to why a book was not up to par for them. I definitely will be keeping this book in my writing reference section as it helps prepare me for #NaNoWriMo (http://www.nanowrimo.org) and beyond.
Popularity: unranked [?]
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