Books on Writing
Books by Donald Maass
The Emotional Craft of Fiction
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While writers might disagree over showing versus telling or plotting versus pantsing, none would argue this: If you want to write strong fiction, you must make your readers feel. The reader’s experience must be an emotional journey of its own, one as involving as your characters’ struggles, discoveries, and triumphs are for you.
That’s where The Emotional Craft of Fiction comes in. Veteran literary agent and expert fiction instructor Donald Maass shows you how to use story to provoke a visceral and emotional experience for readers. Topics covered include:
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- Emotional modes of writing
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- Beyond Showing versus Telling
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- A story’s emotional world
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- Moral stakes
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- Connecting the outer and inner journeys
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- Plot as emotional opportunities
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- Invoking higher emotions, symbols, emotional language
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- Cascading change
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- Story as emotional mirror
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- Positive spirit and magnanimous writing
- The hidden current that makes stories move
Readers can simply read a novel … or they can experience it. The Emotional Craft of Fiction shows how to make that happen.
Writing 21st Century Fiction: High Impact Techniques for Exceptional Storytelling in Modern Fiction
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The first book to provide a concrete framework for writing powerful literary/commercial novels. Practical tools in each chapter allow novelists to apply these methods immediately to create fiction that transcends genre, creates realities unique to its authors, conjures characters who feel more “real” than real people, and shows readers the world around them in new ways. What is it that makes twenty-first century fiction different from twentieth-century fiction? It’s a real issue, attested by slush piles that are chock full of stories that are weak because they adhere to “rules,” feel old-fashioned or in some other way are written the (outdated) way that writers think they should write in order to get published.
By explaining the techniques of high-impact (and often best-selling) recent novels, expert author and literary agent Don Maass will push novelists beyond genre boundaries, beyond outdated styles, beyond their safety zone to ways of writing fiction that are personal, unique, contemporary, and excellent in ways that are both literary and commercial. Like Writing the Breakout Novel and The Fire in Fiction, this is intended to be a how-to with extensive “practical tools” and plenty of examples from recent novels.
The Breakout Novelist: Craft and Strategies for Career Fiction Writers
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If you’re serious about making your fiction vibrant, engaging, and marketable, you’ve found the right book. The Breakout Novelist gives you the craft and business know-how you need to make your book stand out.
Inside, veteran agent, Donald Maass brings together the most innovative and practical information from his workshops and previous books to lead you through every aspect of setting your novel apart from the rest. Maass shares examples from contemporary writers across all genres to equip you with the strategies great writers use to craft great fiction—from core fiction-writing elements like character, setting, description, and plot, to more advanced techniques including point of view, voice, and suspense. Plus, you’ll find over 70 practical exercises to help you move your writing from blah to breakout.
You’ll also learn from Maass’ experiences over more than three decades in the publishing industry. Get straight talk from an insider about agents, contracts, how the industry is changing, and how to be the kind of author who builds a successful career book after book.
The Fire in Fiction: Passion, Purpose and Techniques to Make Your Novel Great
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Which writing techniques do widely published authors use to continuously improve their writing and ensure compelling storytelling in every release? The Fire in Fiction delves deep into the world of character development, with fiction writing tips that can turn any writer into a pro at developing character and voice in writing in no time at all. Learn how to write dialogue effectively by using the same techniques of favorite and best selling authors around the world.
The book contains a wealth of information for fiction and nonfiction writers alike. Complete with a character development worksheet, and containing answers to the most commonly asked character development questions, the included examples and fiction writing exercises will improve your writing and take your storytelling skills to the next level.
Writing the Breakout Novel Workbook: Writing Exercises to Put the Instruction into Action
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Building on the success of its predecessor, Writing the Breakout Novel Workbook presents the patented techniques and writing exercises from Maass’s popular writing workshops to offer novelists first-class instruction and practical guidance. You’ll learn to develop and strengthen aspects of your prose. Maass also carefully dissects examples from real-life breakout novels so you’ll learn how to read and analyze fiction like a writer. With authoritative instruction and hands-on workbook exercises, Writing the Breakout Novel Workbook is one of the most accessible novel-writing guides available. Set your work-in-progress apart from the competition and write your own breakout novel today!
Writing the Breakout Novel
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Take your fiction to the next level! Maybe you’re a first-time novelist looking for practical guidance. Maybe you’ve already been published, but your latest effort is stuck in mid-list hell. Whatever the case may be, author and literary agent Donald Maass can show you how to take your prose to the next level and write a breakout novel—one that rises out of obscurity and hits the best-seller lists. Maass details the elements that all breakout novels share—regardless of genre—then shows you how to use them to write books that can stand out and succeed in a crowded marketplace.
“Don Maass describes the business of writing novels in a clear, concise, and brutally honest fashion. If you want to learn to write bigger and better novels, this book should be first on your reading list. It is the best book on writing bestsellers I have ever read.” —Dean Wesley Smith, bestselling author of 60 novels
“What a delight to read the advance manuscript of Donald Maass’ book, Writing The Breakout Novel, and to discover that it flows like a best-selling novel itself. In the course of two decades he has arrived at a number of definite and highly perceptive conclusions on just what the differences are between an ordinary, pedestrian but enjoyable novel and an ostensibly similar work that catapults the book and its author into an entirely new plane of literary success. I found myself interrupting my reading of his manuscript after three chapters to go back and revisit my own current work-in-progress, checking it to see how it jibed, or failed to jibe, with his suggestions.” —Jack Whyte, author of The Camulod Chronicles