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colinmeldrum's review against another edition
informative
fast-paced
4.0
Succinct, sometimes to a fault, especially when Le Guin provided examples (I would have liked more commentary).
emilyreadthis's review against another edition
4.0
Really really useful! Can't wait to read it again and do the exercises.
storytold's review against another edition
4.0
A lovely little craft book—more basic than it purports to be, but full of excellent general advice, almost all of which I happen to agree with. Good examples of the facets of writing Leguin is describing are particularly useful—I did not read all of them in full, but I think demonstration of the point is a wonderful pedagogical method, and I will certainly return to them when I am working on certain skills.
I took most away from the chapters on rhythm, voice, and narration. These are the things that most interest me about writing craft these days, are the things I am most working on. She also has some interesting things to say about exposition. A shortcoming of this book is that, despite plentiful exercises to practice the points in each chapter, there is little practically applicable direct advice. This is a deliberate and wise attempt to avoid prescriptivist advice, but the trouble is that practicing spreading out exposition throughout a story is obviously what genre writers are, generally speaking, trying to do but are simply not very good at. Much of the advice in the book is to learn to do things by doing them, which is exactly the right way to give writing advice and extremely unhelpful. I highlighted a great deal and will return to this in times of true writing turmoil, but it is unlikely to be a guide I return to day to day.
I took most away from the chapters on rhythm, voice, and narration. These are the things that most interest me about writing craft these days, are the things I am most working on. She also has some interesting things to say about exposition. A shortcoming of this book is that, despite plentiful exercises to practice the points in each chapter, there is little practically applicable direct advice. This is a deliberate and wise attempt to avoid prescriptivist advice, but the trouble is that practicing spreading out exposition throughout a story is obviously what genre writers are, generally speaking, trying to do but are simply not very good at. Much of the advice in the book is to learn to do things by doing them, which is exactly the right way to give writing advice and extremely unhelpful. I highlighted a great deal and will return to this in times of true writing turmoil, but it is unlikely to be a guide I return to day to day.
eowyns_helmet's review against another edition
3.0
I love LeGuin's sense of humor and also bossiness (marking the text with bossy little symbols, for hard words, for instance). This is definitely a book for beginners -- great advice from a master, but for anyone whose written for awhile, most of it is very, very basic and practically second nature. A decent refresher, but more for young people or those just starting to write.
aix83's review against another edition
2.0
This book was probably an excellent resource for writers some 300 years ago when it was first released, but it hasn't stood the test of time very well.
It's overly verbose and the chapters aren't titled in relevant ways. On top of that, the structure of the book doesn't help you to figure out what comes where, so it's contributing to the overall confusion and state of bloatedness.
But the biggest problem is that it's not an exhaustive book on writing. Instead it's picking bits and pieces of the craft, like managing point of view. In place of explaining things clearly and deconstructing the craft of writing, it's showing readers examples and giving them exercises. The problem with this is that it's showing whereas this a nonfiction book explaining how to do something should be telling. Not showing. Showing is for dramatizing fiction. By showing in a how-to book, you leave readers be as confused about it as when they started because you're neither explaining why they should do something, nor how those writerly tricks work, and you're certainly not telling them what their goal in doing the exercise would be.
"Have you completed the exercises?"
"Yep!"
"And isn't it so that your craft is much better for it?"
"Umm... how do I know?"
Well you don't cause you're not told what you're going for. Showing is best left for fiction.
It's overly verbose and the chapters aren't titled in relevant ways. On top of that, the structure of the book doesn't help you to figure out what comes where, so it's contributing to the overall confusion and state of bloatedness.
But the biggest problem is that it's not an exhaustive book on writing. Instead it's picking bits and pieces of the craft, like managing point of view. In place of explaining things clearly and deconstructing the craft of writing, it's showing readers examples and giving them exercises. The problem with this is that it's showing whereas this a nonfiction book explaining how to do something should be telling. Not showing. Showing is for dramatizing fiction. By showing in a how-to book, you leave readers be as confused about it as when they started because you're neither explaining why they should do something, nor how those writerly tricks work, and you're certainly not telling them what their goal in doing the exercise would be.
"Have you completed the exercises?"
"Yep!"
"And isn't it so that your craft is much better for it?"
"Umm... how do I know?"
Well you don't cause you're not told what you're going for. Showing is best left for fiction.
rebeccarennerfl's review against another edition
3.0
This is low-level nuts and bolts stuff. I think it might be useful for teaching high schoolers, but I teach more high brow stuff in my class, so who knows.