videojay 's review for:

Save the Cat!: The Last Book on Screenwriting You'll Ever Need by Blake Snyder

4.0

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I have read SO MANY screenwriting books (and yet only written one feature length screenplay in my life). This was a pretty exceptional addition to my screenwriting library. It really seems to turn the process into a paint by numbers, but, ya know, you still get to be creative and not as prescriptive as all that...but kind of prescriptive, because screenwriting is all about structure. I may update my review after I try it. But you can take one thing away from the fact that I've read a million and one books on screenwriting and written very little: I am a procrastinator. Reading books about screenwriting makes me feel like I'm working on my script. Any screenwriter will tell you their various expert ways that they deceive themselves into feeling productive while actually procrastinating. Reading books about screenwriting is mine. And the reason I procrastinate is because, well, the whole thing just feels so huge. It's like looking at the Ol' 96'er in The Great Outdoors and thinking "I can't possibly eat that whole thing!" And maybe you can't, but you can take the first bite, and then the next one, and the next one. And in the end you might have the dubious honor of having eaten more steak than any person should. Snyder teaches you how to take the bites of the script. Each chapter is basically a task. Do this task, then move on to the next task. If you follow it, you'll likely have a script at the end. Whether or not it's a quality script still falls on you, though.