Tag Archives: references

Books

The Story Grid by Shawn Coyne: The idea is good, but the book is confusing.

A few months back, I was part of a discussion on Facebook about books that are specific to developmental editing. Being a developmental editor, I watched the thread like a hawk. I wanted to know what books are out there and what was high on the recommended lists. Many of the books discussed I already had, but there was one that came highly recommended by several on the thread.

The book in question: The Story Grid by Shawn Coyne.

So, I ordered a copy of the book myself. It took approximately 6 weeks to arrive (shipping to New Zealand is always a long, drawn out wait), and when it got here, I sat down and started reading. And instantly regretted buying the paper version of the book.

Don't get me wrong: the technique presented in the book is gold. The book itself…

The editor NEEDED an editor. It takes forever to get to the crux of the methodology, and when you finally get to the end, there is no discussion on what to do with the full Story Grid, or how to even generate those pretty graphs that Coyne often talks about. At one point, the book became a political statement against Trump, which actually left a sour taste in my mouth. I'm sorry, folks, but a book about editing books is NOT the place to discuss your political views, whatever they are.

Political discussions aside, what really got to me was the word count taken to discuss certain concepts. Waffle! He spent forever circling the drain.

Let's just say that I WILL NOT be adding this book to my list of recommended books for writers. BUT… As a developmental editor myself, I could see the beauty in the method he presented. He tracks the upbeats and the downbeats, and marks the points of transitions within his detailed spreadsheets—spreadsheets that take days if not weeks to compile. Pretty graphs seem to magically come out of it (the magic of which was not explained, unless that was something that I missed entirely, which wouldn't surprise me). But the idea of understanding the rise and fall of tension is something that is incredibly important. It's for this reason alone that I think many writers keep pointing other writers to this book.

However, much of the details in the book could be compressed into a more concise format and rewritten so it's understandable by all writers.

So, that's what I'm going to do. It's a tall ask for a single post, and I'll likely fail, but if I don't try, then the knowledge that I've gleaned from this book will likely be lost in the filing cabinet that is my brain.

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The “Must Have” References for Every Writer, Regardless of Genre

There are many resources out there for writers, each looking at a different aspect of writing. Some will go into the nitty-gritty about how to structure a story or build a character. Others will go into narrative voice and points of view. And of course, you have the countless number of resources about punctuation and grammar.

Then you have all the genre specific materials that you might pick up along the way. For me, these include books about weaponry, criminal investigations, herbology, and, probably the most odd edition on my shelf, improvised munitions (complete with actual, functional recipes—thank you, U.S. Army).

If you're anything like me, most of the writing resources you have sitting on your shelf are books that you refer to occasionally. They're useful to have, but they aren't something that are an instant GO-TO for most things you write. Perhaps you've read them through cover to cover once, but they tend to sit on the shelf collecting dust.

But, there will be those books that you just can't do without. You love them so much that you seem to have accumulated multiple copies of them along the way. They are books that are so well loved that your paper copies (if you have paper copies of them) have little tabs added everywhere, marking important pages that you keep going back to. Or the electronic copies are annotated to the point of exhaustion.

And if someone asks to borrow that book... NO WAY! Get your own.

The following list of books is like that for me. These books are volumes that live within arms reach of my desk. For a few of them, I have both paper and digital formats, that way I can always have them with me when I'm writing. Regardless of the fiction genre you write, these books are beyond valuable.

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