USEFUL BOOKS--GENERAL WRITING
An Annotated Bibliography (double click the title link if you want to buy the book from Amazon.Com)
TABLE OF CONTENTS:
Card, Orson Scott. Characters & Viewpoint
Hood, Ann. Creating Character Emotions: Writing compelling, fresh approaches that express your characters' true feelings [each chapter focuses on one emotion; each section also has exercises for the writer. A very useful book if you have trouble portraying various emotions]
Kress, Nancy. Dynamic Characters: How to create personalities that keep readers captivated.
McCuthcheon. Building Believable Characters
Swain, Dwight V. Creating Characters: How to Build Story People [Highly recommended. One of the best books on characters]
Character Naming Dickson, Paul. What's in a Name?
Kenyon, Sherrilyn. The Writer's Digest Character Naming Sourcebook. [ Warning: One of my German friends has warned me that this book is not up-to-date on current German names. According to him, only about "one name out of a hundred is a name you will find in Germany, the rest are names they used maybe 300 years ago." ]
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Bickham, Jack. Writing Novels That Sell
Block, Lawrence. Writing the Novel: From Plot to Print [Highly Recommended]
Block, Lawrence. Spider, Spin Me a Web: A Handbook for Fiction Writers [Highly Recommended]
Block, Lawrence. Telling Lies for Fun & Profit: A Manual for Fiction Writers [Highly Recommended]
Budrys, Algis. Writing to the Point [Highly Recommended. A short, but extremely useful book]
Carroll, David L. A Manual of Writer's Tricks
Egri, Lajos. The Art of Dramatic Writing
Gardner, John. The Art of Fiction
Goldberg, Natalie. Writing Down the Bones
MacCauley, Robie; Lanning, George. Technique in Fiction. Second Edition: Revised and Updated for a New Generation [discusses different aspects of writing and uses excellent examples to illustrate good technique]
McConnell, Malcolm. The Essence of Fiction
Meredith, Robert C.; Fitzgerald, John D. Structuring Your Novel From Basic Idea to Finished Manuscript [Recommended]
Morrell, David. Lessons From a Lifetime of Writing: a novelist looks at his craft [an interesting and thought-provoking book dealing with the author's experiences wrestling with the craft. If you don't recognize his name, he's the author of First Blood and The Brotherhood of the Rose . Recommended] Provost, Gary. Make Your Words Work
Rico, Gabriele Lusser. Writing the Natural Way
Rubie, Peter. The Elements of Storytelling: How to Write Compelling Fiction [Highly Recommended]
Swain, Dwight V. Techniques of the Selling Writer.
Stein, Sol Stein on Writing [Lots of examples, both from his work and the work of authors he's published. Highly Recommended.]
Zuckerman, Albert. Writing the Blockbuster Novel.
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Brohaugh, William. Write Tight: How to Keep Your Prose Sharp, Focused, and Concise.
Browne, Renni and King, Dave. Self-editing for Fiction Writers: How to Edit Yourself into Print. [Highly Recommended]
Cheney, Theodore A. Rees. Getting the Words Right.
Cook, Claire. Line by Line: How to Improve Your Own Writing.
Hodges, John C. and Mary E. Witten. Harbrace College Handbook ,
Hopper, Vincent F. et al. Essentials of English
Madden, David. Revising Fiction: A Handbook for Writers.
Plotnik, Arthur. The Elements of Editing: A Modern Guide for Editors and Journalists.
Provost, Gary. Make Every Word Count: A Guide to Writing that Works for Fiction and Nonfiction.
Provost, Gary. Beyond Style: Mastering the Finer Points of Writing .
Provost, Gary. Make Your Words Work: Proven Techniques for Effective Writing--For Fiction and Nonfiction. [Highly recommended]
Shaw, Harry. Errors in English and Ways to Correct Them ,
Shertzer, Margaret. The Elements of Grammar.
Stern, Jerome. Making Shapely Fiction.
Strunk, William and White, E. B. The Elements of Style ,
Troyka, Lynn Quitman. Simon & Schuster Handbook for Writers. [Highly Recommended]
The Chicago Manual of Style,
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Bickham, Jack M. Scene & Structure: How to construct fiction with scene-by-scene flow, logic and readability. [Highly Recommended. This book helped me more than any other book on plotting]
Burroway, Janet. Writing Fiction
Dibell, Ansen. Plot
Knight, Damon. Creating Short Fiction
Kernan, Robert. Building Better Plots
Kress, Nancy. Beginnings, Middles, & Ends
Noble, June and William Noble. Steal this Plot: A Writer's Guide to Story Structure and Plagiarism
Noble, William. Conflict, Action, & Suspense
Rockwell, F. A. How to Write Plots that Sell
Tobias, Ronald B. Theme and Strategy
Tobias, Ronald B. 20 Master Plots (And How to Build Them)
Vogler, Christopher. The Writer's Journey. Mythic Structure for Storytellers & Screenwriters. [If you've ever tried to read Campbell's Man of a Thousand Faces and failed, this is the book for you. A very thorough and useful analysis of the Hero's mythic journey. Highly Recommended]
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Description
Bickham, Jack M. Setting
McClanahan, Rebecca. Word Painting
Wood, Monica. Description
Dialogue
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Bishop, Leonard. Dare to Be a Great Writer: 329 Keys to Powerful Fiction
Edelstein, Scott. The Writer's Book of Checklists
Glazier, Stephen. Random House Word Menu [just the book you want when you need a word to describe something or a synonym for a word you're working to death. Words are organized by logical topics, rather than in traditional thesaurus or dictionary form. An outstanding tool; it never leaves my desk.]
Polking, Kirk. Beginning Writer's Answer Book
Polking, Kirk. Writing A to Z
Roth, Martin. The Fiction Writer's Silent Partner
Research Aids Barzun, Jacques and Henry F. Graf. The Modern Researcher
Cottam, Keith and Robert W. Pelton. Writer's Research Handbook
Horowitz, Lois. Knowing Where to Look: The Ultimate Guide to Research
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Copyright 1998 Rich Hamper
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Last Updated:
Sunday, January 20, 2008
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