Good Advice for Fiction Writers

More on How to Write a Million by William Noble
My rating: 5 of 5 stars

When I got a job as an editor of academic texts I began looking at books in the university library with advice to writers and editors. I could recognise bad writing when I saw it (even as a student, having to read obfuscatory prescribed texts), but as an editor my job as to improve it, and turn a bad text into a good one.

As a result, I read quite a lot of books on writing, both fiction and nonfiction, and when I saw this one going cheap on a book sale, I bought it. I would not have bought it at the full price, because the title put me off. I thought someone really needed to edit that (a million what?). But on sale it was cheap enough that there was nothing to lose, and I'm glad I did, because it really is one of the better books on the subject.

It is actually 3 books in one, by three authors I had never heard of. The three books in one binding have separate page numbers, indexes and tables of contents. They are on Description, Revision and Setting. As an editor, I read the Revision one first, and also used it when revising my first novel, Of Wheels and Witches, and have just reread it for working on a second edition.

They give sensible advice. For example, nearly all books on writing give the advice (or sometimes a command) to "Show, Don't Tell", and this one covers it from three points of view -- in description, revision and setting. But here it is not overly prescriptive about it. It is more helpful than that, and gives advice on when to show and when to tell, and also how to do both showing and telling, when each is most appropriate.

I recommend it for both beginning and experienced fiction authors, but nonfiction authors and editors could also benefit.


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