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| How Not to Write a Novel by Sandra Newman and Howard Mittelmark |
First of all, if you've ever toyed with the idea of writing your own novel: read this book!
As some of you may know, I completed NaNWriMo last month. I still can't believe that I managed to hit the 50,000 word count in just one month. Despite most of it being complete drivel that needs completely rewriting, I'm really proud of myself.
However, before I entered into the deep dark world of the second draft, I wanted to make sure that I was clued up on some of the writing sins that should not be in my book. How Not to Write a Novel is an absolute joy to read and has really helped me figure out what I need to do next.
It starts by explaining that there are countless ways to tell a story and the only thing most authors would agree on are the things not to do. It is broken down into sections such as: Plot, Character, Style and it presents short paragraphs of bad writing and then details how these mistakes can be corrected.
It's both funny and informative and I've definitely learnt a lot from reading this. I've now got quite a few of my own writing sins to be edited out such as my main character having a cat for no reason other than the fact that I wanted there to be a cat... (I really like cats.)
A must-read for anyone looking to write their own book.
I've seen this book floating around a lot lately - it sounds awesome!
ReplyDeleteI saw this book mentioned a couple of times during NaNoWriMo and I was intrigued by it, but I think this is the first review I've seen of it. I think I'll pick this up before NaNoWriMo starts this year, or if by some miracle I decide to edit my 2014 NaNoWriMo story.
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