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ejpass's review against another edition
3.0
3/5 stars
Recommended for people who like: fiction workshopping, writing advice
I had to read this for my CRW 207 class, which is a class on workshopping fiction, mainly short stories.
Some of the bare-bones advice was good. I liked the bits that talked about dialogue and that suggested stepping away from a story before editing/revising it, as the break would give you time to have 'fresh eyes' when you go back to it. Admittedly, a lot of the advice was also the standard advice you'd get from a writing advice book: add detail, flesh out character, find your narrative POV, etc. The book definitely got repetitive and boring.
One of the writers, I'm not sure which one, is a rather pretentious sort of person too. They'll be going along with their advice and then out of the blue make a comment that's just so pompous it's off-putting. Also, there was an example in one of the character chapters where the author (and I like to think it's the same author) gave one of their own pieces as an example--"big boned, lanky, melon-breasted, her best feature [...] oblivious to her eccentricity" (134-35)--that I also found to be off-putting. It comes back to this idea that male authors have a fascination with the breasts of their female characters, and of course with the idea that said female characters are unable to identify their beauty or, in this case, eccentricities (also, is he aware how heavy that would be? Especially on someone with a 'lanky' figure).
Some of the stories provided were pretty good. I really liked 'The Red Fox Fur Coat,' 'Fiesta, 1980,' 'Sea Faries,' 'Mrs. Dutta Writes a Letter,' and 'Keith.' Overall, I actually think I liked the short stories more than I liked the advice portion of the book. Some of the other short stories felt as if they were written for the specific purpose of proving a point made in the book. Others felt as though they were written by amateurs.
In general, despite the standard 'Recommended for...' portion of the review, I really wouldn't recommend this book.
Recommended for people who like: fiction workshopping, writing advice
I had to read this for my CRW 207 class, which is a class on workshopping fiction, mainly short stories.
Some of the bare-bones advice was good. I liked the bits that talked about dialogue and that suggested stepping away from a story before editing/revising it, as the break would give you time to have 'fresh eyes' when you go back to it. Admittedly, a lot of the advice was also the standard advice you'd get from a writing advice book: add detail, flesh out character, find your narrative POV, etc. The book definitely got repetitive and boring.
One of the writers, I'm not sure which one, is a rather pretentious sort of person too. They'll be going along with their advice and then out of the blue make a comment that's just so pompous it's off-putting. Also, there was an example in one of the character chapters where the author (and I like to think it's the same author) gave one of their own pieces as an example--"big boned, lanky, melon-breasted, her best feature [...] oblivious to her eccentricity" (134-35)--that I also found to be off-putting. It comes back to this idea that male authors have a fascination with the breasts of their female characters, and of course with the idea that said female characters are unable to identify their beauty or, in this case, eccentricities (also, is he aware how heavy that would be? Especially on someone with a 'lanky' figure).
Some of the stories provided were pretty good. I really liked 'The Red Fox Fur Coat,' 'Fiesta, 1980,' 'Sea Faries,' 'Mrs. Dutta Writes a Letter,' and 'Keith.' Overall, I actually think I liked the short stories more than I liked the advice portion of the book. Some of the other short stories felt as if they were written for the specific purpose of proving a point made in the book. Others felt as though they were written by amateurs.
In general, despite the standard 'Recommended for...' portion of the review, I really wouldn't recommend this book.
forbes_dru's review against another edition
5.0
A blessing in disguise. -yes, a cliche, I know. I can't express how happy I am that I've read this book. It's an excellent book to help you hone your craft without needing to take a class.
maustin18's review against another edition
4.0
Really helpful for getting into fiction writing, whether it be short stories or a novel.
mrjonathan's review against another edition
5.0
Fantastic. This book translates the intuition of writing into the thoughtfulness of craft. Great advice broken down into logical sections, and the stories included are dynamite.
sunnivamidt's review against another edition
2.0
This book was very basic, if you know anything about writing form before this book is not for you. I can see it being useful for very inexperienced writers, because it points out a lot of things worth considering when starting to write. I do think, however, that these flaws might just as well be self-explanatory for anyone who has read a considerable amount of books. I used this for a 200-level writing class at college, and I stopped reading half-way through because it did not really offer any new information.
arnzen's review against another edition
5.0
A great overview of the fiction writing process, chock full of awesomely teachable example stories. I've been teaching out of this book for years.
emlickliter's review against another edition
informative
slow-paced
5.0
Writing Fiction: A Guide to Narrative Craft by Janet Burroway – If you have the urge to read books on craft, I actually liked this homework. Happy Reading!
migrex's review against another edition
5.0
I have two editions of this book. The advantage and disadvantage of the 10th edition is that none of the stories are included. This makes the book less expensive. As Burroway says, it can also function as a way for students to get the stories at the library. This is laudable but not realistic and, at least in my case, impossible, as the chances of finding all of the referenced stories in a library near me are slim to none. My suggestion is to buy the 10th edition and also one of the older ones as used books, that way at least you have some representative stories to go to. I do like the 10th edition for the fact that it has been updated so has excerpts from current short stories and novels.