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A review by wafflefonfabre
Story Genius: How to Use Brain Science to Go Beyond Outlining and Write a Riveting Novel by Lisa Cron
4.0
3.5 Stars.
This book is hard to review because while I liked some of the writing help. I also found this author obnoxious. This should really be called: useful writing advice from a know it all "I'm not like those other author's" person. This author spends 3 chapters debunking other peoples writing styles or advice. Debunking Pantser's and plotters even existing while also saying a messy first draft is a myth. The problem is she doesn't have strong points its more like she's dragging or discrediting other methods to make hers seem better. Which is especially funny when you realize toward the end she's a plotter, she likes planning a lot of her story before writing and having every scene writing on cards. But that's enough focus on this author.
The exercises or questions themselves are the most part good starts. I don't like some of them but by using her staring question it did get me thinking and starting to really flesh out my Main character and her arc. I think she spends a little too much time making you think about the backstory and how it relates to protagonist current situation since not every story has a situation caused by the protagonist's lie or flaws. Sometimes its a hurricane and trying to get a flawed person to survive that.
But I find her very specific questions to be good. Depending on your writing method, scene cards may not useful but I think going through and deeply considering your main character is very helpful even if your a pantster or tweener. There useful things to think about even if they don't always work with your story.
I would recommenced this book to writers with caveat of you should skim through or just skip the first three chapters and really focus on the end of each chapter where the exercise is explained or given examples of. Everything else is the author dropping there strange opinions or spending way to long explaining simple concepts. Due to how long she spends waxing and wasting I can't give it more stars but the exercises are good so 3.5 it is.
This book is hard to review because while I liked some of the writing help. I also found this author obnoxious. This should really be called: useful writing advice from a know it all "I'm not like those other author's" person. This author spends 3 chapters debunking other peoples writing styles or advice. Debunking Pantser's and plotters even existing while also saying a messy first draft is a myth. The problem is she doesn't have strong points its more like she's dragging or discrediting other methods to make hers seem better. Which is especially funny when you realize toward the end she's a plotter, she likes planning a lot of her story before writing and having every scene writing on cards. But that's enough focus on this author.
The exercises or questions themselves are the most part good starts. I don't like some of them but by using her staring question it did get me thinking and starting to really flesh out my Main character and her arc. I think she spends a little too much time making you think about the backstory and how it relates to protagonist current situation since not every story has a situation caused by the protagonist's lie or flaws. Sometimes its a hurricane and trying to get a flawed person to survive that.
But I find her very specific questions to be good. Depending on your writing method, scene cards may not useful but I think going through and deeply considering your main character is very helpful even if your a pantster or tweener. There useful things to think about even if they don't always work with your story.
I would recommenced this book to writers with caveat of you should skim through or just skip the first three chapters and really focus on the end of each chapter where the exercise is explained or given examples of. Everything else is the author dropping there strange opinions or spending way to long explaining simple concepts. Due to how long she spends waxing and wasting I can't give it more stars but the exercises are good so 3.5 it is.