Episode Thirty-Four: My Top 10 Craft Book Recommendations for Writers - Part 1
Writing craft books have been an essential part of my education as a writer & editor. In this episode, I’m sharing 5 of my top 10 books for aspiring fiction writers (the final 5 will be shared next week).
Have a craft book recommendation to share? Hit me up in the DMs - I’m @oliviahelpswriters on Instagram!
Here are the resources mentioned in this show - please note, this list contains affiliate links:
My Bookshop.org shop (affiliate link):
The Scene Book by Sandra Scofield: https://bookshop.org/a/93888/9780143038269
Blueprint for a Book by Jennie Nash: https://bookshop.org/a/93888/9781733251129
The Complete Art of World Building by Randy Ellefson: https://bookshop.org/a/93888/9781946995407
Conflict and Suspense by James Scott Bell: https://bookshop.org/a/93888/9781599632735
The Anatomy of Prose by Sacha Black: https://bookshop.org/a/93888/9781913236007
The Rebel Author Podcast: https://sachablack.co.uk/the-rebel-author-podcast/
Want to hear more from me? Subscribe to my weekly newsletter, The Better Writer Weekly, here and get my Revision Kickstart Guide for free here: https://olivia-helps-writers.kit.com/revision-kickstart-guide
Thanks for listening, keep writing, and keep getting better one word at a time!
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Thanks for listening, keep writing, and keep getting better one word at a time!
Transcript
Olivia (00:00)
Once upon a time, many years ago, I was a senior in college with a dream. I was going to write a novel. And I did it. I woke up at six o'clock in the morning, every morning, except maybe on weekends, but literally, as a college student, I woke up at six o'clock in the morning to write because I was dedicated. And I finished the draft, and it was awful. Just awful. Not even readable. And I was devastated because I had been reading fiction for my entire life, it felt like. I had parents who read to me. I have been reading at a college level since elementary school because I was that kid. And I thought that all of my reading knowledge would translate when I decided to write books. I mean, I had a degree in English, could not write for shit.
Sorry, I hope you don't mind the swear words there. I don't usually swear on this podcast, but it's true. And I realized that everything I thought I knew about fiction was just plain wrong. I mean, obviously I knew how to read it, but I did not know how to write it. Everything I learned in school did not prepare me for writing fiction. And why am I telling you this story? I'm telling you the story because it is the beginning of my journey. I realized I had to learn to write. And over the next, you know, several years, I took classes, I got training, I got feedback in workshops, I became an editor. I got all the training to start this as a new career. But all of that learning started with craft books.
Back when I did not have the time or money for writing courses, back when I did not even have the confidence in myself to, you know, think about sharing my work with anyone else. I started by reading fiction craft books.
And I know for someone out there right now, you are maybe still in that stage where you don't know what you don't know, or you just finished your draft and you realize it's awful and it is so awful that you're not even ready to share it with anyone. Trust me, I get it. That, you know, first book that I wrote all those years ago stayed in a file folder, collecting dust on my hard drive until I pulled it out to use it as an example in Reader Ready Revisions, my 16-week group coaching program.
So now I basically use that to show people how to revise by letting them see my very messy, very sad draft that was so incoherent that I have not even ever tried to resurrect or revise it. But the point being that my writing journey started with craft books and they have such a special place in my heart and I have really had my life changed by books, by those craft books that taught me how to write so that I could then go on to become an editor and make this my job. So over the next couple weeks, I am going to be sharing my top 10 craft book picks for writers. This week I'm starting with the first five, and then next week you'll get the rest of the list.
These books are different. They have done different things for me at different points in my life, but I think that there is going to be something on this list for everyone. So stay tuned to hear the first five books that changed my writing life that I absolutely recommend to all fiction writers.
Welcome to episode 34 of the Better Writer Podcast. This week I'm sharing five books that have absolutely changed my life as a writer and I'm so excited because these books are awesome and I think they will be helpful for you too. Before we get started, I just want to remind you that I have a weekly newsletter. If you like the way that I teach and you like learning from me, then please subscribe to the Better Writer Weekly. I will be in your inbox every Tuesday, to share writing tips, insights, and also talk a lot about what I'm reading at that time, both fiction and nonfiction. So if that interests you, you will find the link to subscribe to this newsletter wherever you are listening to or watching this podcast.
All right, now on to book number one, which is The Scene Book by Sandra Schofield. If you are not watching on YouTube, I'm actually holding the book up to the screen. it's actually adorable. The cover looks like a composition book. again, the title is The Scene Book, A Primer for Fiction Writers by Sandra Schofield. And this book has a very special place in my heart because learning how to write in scenes is the thing that turned me into a fiction writer. And I say that because I was a person who essentially wrote in narrative summary. I did not know how to bring a story to life until I learned how to write in scenes. That was the secret to me mastering show-don't tell, essentially, was learning to think of my story in concrete moments and not just a series of things that happen.
So if you're a person who has struggled with show-don't tell and you are not writing your story in scenes right now, or if you are someone who doesn't even know what a scene is, I highly recommend this book. I will say her definition of a scene is a little bit abstract. I do like to think of it a little bit more concretely as a unit of narrative time that is following one situation in real time until it ends. That is my definition of a scene. Hers is little bit different, but the way that she talks about scene writing, the way that she introduces it, the exercises in the book, all super, super helpful. Could not recommend more. So that is the scene book, a primer for fiction writers by Sandra Schofield.
All right, next up we have Blueprint for a Book by Jennie Nash. The full book title is Blueprint for a Book: Build Your Novel from the Inside Out. Jennie Nash is the founder of Author Accelerator. I am an Author Accelerator Certified Book Coach. I am not being paid to promote this book on the show right now, but I would have chosen this even if I were not an author accelerator certified book coach. I am only an author accelerator certified book coach because I came across this book and Jennie's work in general.
And I think that her approach to planning stories, outlining them, is something that I can get behind, even as a panster. And personally, I use exercises from the blueprint process in revision. And that is something that Jennie says in the book that you can do. And so I always appreciate that flexibility when even if someone is a plotter, even if they are advocating for you to use their tools in the planning process. I always love it when they also have that door open for pantsers to use it in revision, which is how I use it, how I teach it. Exercises from Blueprint for a book are in my Reader Ready Revisions course. because again, I am one of their certified coaches. And so overall, I think it is a flexible process that you can use at any point to make your story stronger.
And what I love about Blueprint for a book is that it's not about locking your story into a rigid plot framework, plot structure is essential. But too often I see writers trying to lock themselves into a very specific structure. And it may not be the structure that is actually right for their book. So you might have someone who is actually writing a heroine's journey story who has been told that the hero's journey is the only one, and they are trying to lock themselves into that rigid framework, and it's not doing anything for them.
And that is why I think it's so important to have tools that are flexible. And that is something that you will get in the blueprint book. because it's not again, not about rigidly outlining your story. It is about figuring out a few fundamental things about your story that are going to help you either in revision or in the drafting process, depending on where you are using this framework. So highly recommend blueprint for a book. And just a way that Jennie talks about writing and thinking about your story. Again, you can use it for planning or you can use it in the revision process. It's up to you because you get to make any tool adapt to your process, not the other way around.
Next up, we have The Complete Art of World Building by Randy Ellefson. And technically this is a series, but I'm treating it as one because this is my podcast and I make the rules. so I have all three of the books here. There are some others that I don't have in print that are part of this full series, but these are the three that I think are really core to the series. So three books. Creating life, creating places, cultures, and beyond. This is all about world building. And I absolutely love this series. It was instrumental when I was world building, creating a new world for my story. And what I love about this book is that it is not just a list of questions to answer. And I know that for myself, that is where I got stuck world building before. Is I'm just answering questions that are completely devoid of context. I am just trying to fill in information that I don't even know if I'm going to use.
And one of the things that I love about Ellefson's series is that every section of the book starts with: do you need to create this thing? Is this relevant to your story? And I think that it's just a great mindset to take into your world building because the world should always serve your story, not the other way around. Of course. The world might be the first thing that you came up with. It might have been the inspiration for writing the story in the first place, but that doesn't mean it should be allowed to take over.
And that's why I love that Ellefson is having writers think about is this a part of your world that actually needs to be developed? Or is it something that your characters are never going to touch? For example, do you need to have a fully fleshed-out school system if all of your characters are middle-aged and have no children? Probably not.
You might need to know a few details of how education works because that is part of their backstory. But do you need to actually understand that you know every person in your world has to take an entrance exam that has exactly 51 questions? No, you don't. You don't need to know the specifics unless, of course, your main character had a traumatic experience with that test. But again, it really is about figuring out what matters to your story. Then as you go from there, this book just has phenomenal information to help you think through every aspect of your world. if you're watching on YouTube, you can see that this is a pretty meaty series, especially book three, Cultures and Beyond, which is personally my favorite. This is like over 400 pages that really dives into different aspects of culture, how to develop them, what to think about. And also kind of helps you think about how to use real-world inspirations ethically. His rule is that you have to change three big things if you are taking from any culture and not trying to faithfully represent it, which I think is a good rule of thumb, is a great starting point.
Obviously, there are so much more in these books that I highly recommend if you are writing a speculative genre. World building is so important. We know that world building is so important. And sometimes we have blind spots, we have things that we don't think about. And this book is going to help you develop those things, depending on where you are in the proces you could use any one of these volumes.
The first one, creating life, is all about creating people groups, races in terms of like fantasy races, orcs, goblins, etc., whatever that is for you. Creating places is all about both the physical world and then also starting to think through kingdoms, how those kingdoms are structured, the politics, et cetera. And then cultures and beyond is going to go even deeper in how your societies are structured, thinking about laws, institutions, all of those things that are super important. It also talks about rituals and daily life and, you know, what are we eating and drinking and how are we celebrating and things like that.
So great resources. You do not need to read these books cover to cover. I would recommend against it, because again, we don't want to get too deep into the world building hole if it is not serving our stories and our process, but use it as a reference. Pull it off the shelf whenever you need to figure out part of your world. Obviously, if you are just starting the world building process, maybe you will work through all of the sections that are relevant to your story, but keep it as a reference, keep it on hand for all of those world building questions that come up.
If you are a science fiction fantasy writer, even if you're thinking about historical fiction, I think it could be helpful to think about the things that you need to research because sometimes historical fiction writers don't focus on the right things. And, you know, I love working with historical fiction, partially because I lump it into the same category as sci-fi and fantasy, in that it is a world-building genre where you have to construct a world, you're just basing it off of things that really happened and existed. And the things that you are reading in a textbook are just the beginning. There is a lot of cultural information, information about daily life that you need to research.
And I think that this book, even though it is designed for people who are making up worlds, I think if you're a historical fiction writer, looking at world building from the perspective of what would I need to know if I were creating this world from scratch is going to help direct your research in a more helpful way than just reading the textbook version of events, because far too often I give the critique to historical fiction writers that this dialogue sounds like characters are quoting a textbook at each other, or this internal narration has no personality. It's just telling us the textbook version of history versus telling us how someone living through these historical events would actually feel. So if you can approach your worldbuilding from the perspective of how can I bring this world to life, which is what we do in fantasy and science fiction, that is going to help your historical fiction. So even if you do not think of yourself as someone who is world building because you are working with a real life setting, this book might help you think through how to fully immerse readers in your world and what kind of information you need to have about your setting.
So world building isn't just for fantasy and science fiction. If you are trying to bring any kind of unfamiliar setting to life, unfamiliar to your readers, of course, that is going to require some world building, and this book can help.
And then next up is one of my favorite books to recommend to writers at the end of a developmental edit, and it's Conflict and Suspense by James Scott Bell. And I have said before that almost every writer that I work with needs more conflict in their stories. And this book is an excellent resource for figuring out how to add conflict that is meaningful for your genre, conflict that is high stakes for your genre. Because it is not just about having more bombs go off, as we know is about figuring out what matters to your characters and then creating conflict that threatens those things.
And this book gives a really holistic view of how to add conflict, it starts from the planning phase all the way through drafting, and it's going to talk about conflict in various domains because conflict is so interwoven with other aspects of your story that we can't just create conflict in a vacuum. It comes from character, it comes from the world, it comes from the type of story that we're creating. So this book is an excellent resource for figuring out how to add conflict to your story that is going to be meaningful and is going to feel relevant to your readers.
This book also talks about suspense and how to create it, which I think is something that is much easier said than done, especially if you don't understand how suspense actually comes about. I've talked about this before that oftentimes writers overrely on certain techniques that are memorable, but those aren't actually the techniques that are engaging us in that medium. For example, we often think that twists are so important, that twists are essential that we need to surprise our readers. And surprise is memorable for us as a viewer, but that doesn't actually mean that it is the best way to hook an audience or keep them engaged. And what we don't realize is that we would not have made it to the surprise if there weren't other things hooking us and keeping us engaged throughout. And that is what suspense is doing for us. And there is no suspense in a surprise. I think that is something I originally learned reading in this book. And that is, you know, just one of the many things that Bell talks about. that when we know that a bad thing is happening, that is what keeps us at the edge of our seat. Surprise has an impact later, but we need to make sure that we're also keeping people engaged before that.
So again, this is a great resource if you are someone who has been told that you need more conflict, who isn't sure how to add conflict to your particular genre.
It is really also for genre fiction writers, which I love because There are a lot of craft books out there that are written for people writing literary fiction. And this one really takes genre into account. So definitely recommend Conflict and Suspense by James Scott Bell.
All right. And then the final book for part one is The Anatomy of Prose by Sacha Black. If you don't know Sacha Black and her podcast, the Rebel Author Podcast, please check it out. It is a great show. She is no longer making new episodes regularly. She does have some episodes that she does with another author called The Black Herron. Those are still being published, as at least as far as I know at the time of this recording. her regular podcast is no longer creating new episodes, except for a couple, once or twice a year. But it is still a great podcast. All the back episodes are still there, so you can absolutely still listen to all of her interviews with writers. She just does a fantastic job talking about both the craft and the business of writing. And I think that's something that you don't always see married well. You have people who talk about the craft, you have people who talk about business, and she does both excellently. And her craft books for writers are also excellent.
I have not read all of them. again, this one is The Anatomy of Prose subtitle 12 Steps To Sensational Sentences.
And I think this is one of the best, most approachable guides to line level writing that I have found. This is a resource for the line editing phase of your process. It is all about fine-tuning descriptions, making your story work at the sentence level. it is beautifully written, it is so clear, and it's funny.
Most books about grammar and editing are not funny, but this one is hilarious. I will say she swears a lot in her writing, but I loved it. I think it is such an engaging book that is also super clear and super helpful. So highly, highly recommend The Anatomy of Prose by Sacha Black. If you want a book that is going to teach you and make you laugh at the same time, then I could not recommend a better resource. And I really think it is an excellent guide to line editing and all those tasks that we know we need to do, but we don't always have strategies for how to actually edit. And that book is going to give you what you need.
All right, those were the first five of my top 10 craft books for writers.
You will find links to all of these books in the show notes wherever you are watching or listening to this show. I am an affiliate of bookshop.org. So if you happen to purchase I will get a small commission. It will not cost you anything extra. So check out those books. I will also link to my full bookshop.org shop. Which is bookshop.org / shop / Olivia Helps Writers, where I have even more craft books linked and some of my favorite fantasy reads linked as well. All right, thank you so, so much for listening to this episode. If there's a craft book that you think I missed, something that everyone needs to read, please send it my way. I'm at Olivia Helps Writers. You can slide into my DMs with BookRecs anytime.
All right. Thank you so so much for listening to another episode of the Better Writer Podcast. Have a wonderful week. Keep writing. Keep getting better. One word at a time. See ya.
